Having music play in the background of a game is a fairly divisive issue – some love it, some hate it. However, I have found that if you pick the right music it can add a real ambiance to the game that players will enjoy. Over the years I have discovered a few bands that are not particularly well known, but are great for background music whilst gaming. This week I am going to write a series of articles highlighting musicians and bands that I have found to work well in a role-playing game environment.

Zoë Keating

I discovered Zoë Keating through a random tweet by @wilw (Wil Wheaton) describing how impressed he was with her music. I thought I would check it out, and I was quite stunned by it. Zoë Keating is a cello player who uses multiple tracks and loops to build up each song. The mood can be quite dark and haunting but always beautiful.

Over the course of the last year or so, Zoë has used the internet as a tool to promote her music with great success. When I first discovered her, she had a few hundred followers on Twitter. Now it is over a million. She has toured with Amanda Palmer (Dresden Dolls) and has even had Wired and Techcrunch do pieces on her. She is one of the ‘new breed’ of artists who can get to the top of the iTunes charts (in Classical mind…) without have a contract with a major label.

Her music is probably best suited to late Medieval fantasy games. Currently, the two albums of hers that have been released are ‘One Cello x 16 (EP)’ and ‘One Cello x 16: Natoma’.

You can buy Zoë Keating’s music in our Dice of Doom Amazon store…

Zoë Keating’s Details:

• Website: http://www.zoekeating.com/
• Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/zoecello
• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/zoekeating