The year was 2005. iPods were the hot thing, YouTube had just been launched, Twitter didn't exist yet, and the words "podcast" and "social media" had only just been added to the dictionary. It was, in short, a great time to be a kid, as well as the nexus point of many of our modern everyday experiences, like being able to listen to music wherever you are, or watching videos of some guy at the zoo whenever you fancy.
It was also the year that I played a lot of Tony Hawk's Underground 2. The game originally came out for GameCube and Game Boy Advance (and other non-Nintendo platforms) in 2004, but the PSP version — the one my brother was gifted, and which I promptly claimed for my own — came out the following year on Universal Media Disc, a format which turned out to not be so "universal" after all.
Was it a good skateboarding game? I have no idea, really. Metacritic says yes, and at the time of writing Nintendo Life readers rank it in eighth place on our Best Tony Hawk Games Of All Time list, but I pretty much played that game as a moving-around simulator with a fantastic soundtrack. Sure, I'd pull an ollie or a kickflip every now and again, and I really enjoyed grinding on just about any 90-degree angle available to me, but I was in it for the jams — and I still am.
To this day, it's tough to quantify exactly how much influence THUG2 had on my musical taste, but it was lot. I was of the age where I was basically a big ball of putty, ready to be moulded; all it took to get me into something was for it to be in front of my face for a few seconds. It was the era of Jackass, Bam Margera, pop punk and Avril Lavigne, and yes, I was the teen who had spike bracelets and massive, baggy jeans. We all make mistakes.
Baby teens don't tend to know much about music beyond what their parents listen to (or they didn't back then), which for me was classic bands like The Beatles and Fleetwood Mac for my mum, and dad-rock like Dire Straits and The Eagles for my dad. Nowadays, I'll mix in a healthy dose of the Mac, Sheryl Crow, Steely Dan, T-Rex, ABBA and Neil Young alongside much, much cooler stuff (don't worry, I still think Steely Dan are cool), but as a teen, there was nothing more embarrassing than acknowledging the things your parents enjoyed. Teens are awful. Sorry.
Tony Hawk soundtracks were pretty much cheat sheets for kids who didn't grow up in the '80s and '90s, but needed a crash course in everything they missed
Instead, it was the extremely cool-for-its-time Tony Hawk's Underground 2 that coached me. Bands like Faith No More, Jimmy Eat World, and The Distillers became my musical blueprints, and because the worlds of rock and punk are incredibly incestuous, that took me to bands such as Queens of the Stone Age, The Strokes, The Offspring, and Eagles of Death Metal. Sprinkle in a bit of pop-punk-du-jour like Sum 41, All-American Rejects, Avril Lavigne, and Blink-182, and you have a pretty fully-formed taste in music there, kiddo.
(Also, shout out to my uncle, who pre-loaded my first-ever iPod with music from his teens and twenties, introducing me to other bands including Green Day, Weezer, Muse, and Rage Against the Machine. Probably inappropriate music for a young teen to be listening to, but that's why he's the cool uncle.)
I would later buy the soundtrack to Tony Hawk's American Wasteland without even playing the game, which probably makes me a poser, but listen: Tony Hawk soundtracks, most likely without intending it, were pretty much cheat sheets and starter packs for kids who didn't grow up in the '80s and '90s, but needed a crash course in everything they missed.
I ended up going to see many of the bands I just listed live, in a sticky-floored venue that had a thick haze of cigarette smoke (this was before the indoor smoking ban). I would come away from each gig with my clothes stinking of tobacco and ash, and my ears ringing with the warning peal of tinnitus. I wore these dubious honours like a badge of coolness, because once again, teens don't have fully-developed brains, and make bad decisions sometimes at the expense of their future, wiser selves.
But god, was it fun. And who could have predicted that a PSP game about skateboarding would directly lead to me stumbling into moshpits, being invited to dance on stage at Dropkick Murphys concerts, and forming a lifelong love for Queens of the Stone Age? So thank you, Tony Hawk and friends, for being surrogate older brothers for me. Sorry I never actually got into skateboarding, but at least we can share the music.
Be sure check out the other Nintendo Life VGM Fest articles in our season of music-focused interviews and features.
- Further reading: Best Tony Hawk Games Of All Time
Comments 25
THUG2 is decent but the Jackass stuff put me off. The first is even better. The best soundtracks are probably Pro Skater 2 and 4. 4 has the best ska punk stuff and 2 has the best classic tunes.
All the Tony Hawks games have class soundtracks. Good article. Damn I miss gigs.
1 and 2 are easily the best. Goldfinger, Primus, Rancid, Dead Kennedys, Bad Religion, Millencolin, plus so many more! Great time for music
I gotta say, I adore your musical taste, Kate! Mine got shaped by Tony Hawk Pro Skater (1 and 2) and GTA (Vice City and San Andreas especially). I am very nostalgic for the early 2000s, stupid but fun times
I love THUG2. Especially the rage mechanic and playing as Shrek.
Agree on Steely Dan, music for cool people 😎🤙
I got into The Beatles at 13 through some school friends. I don't think I ever heard my parents playing them.
I was a kid who brought a ghetto blaster out with me at the weekend and insisted on listening to The Beatles and Velvet Underground instead of the early 90's rave music my friends were into.
30 years later and I still listen to them more than any other band. They are the greatest there was, is and ever will be.
Great article. I never played THUG but for me it was THPS 1 and 2, like the commenters above. I downloaded almost all those tracks onto my Napster machine.
I feel older and older with each passing NL article. With that said the soundtrack was incredible, even for someone who had left their teens.
This still happens today, the songs on FIFA sees a boost to the artist.
I love that skating has come back over the last few years, that there are visibly more women involved, that it's at the flipping Olympics, that's all brilliant and fills my 90's reared heart with joy.
All of that said, I cannot get my head around how all the skaters outside my work are all listening to grime.
It's like Leia flying through space in SW:TLJ; you can run through all sorts of justifications and on paper it might make total sense, but in practice I just cannot, it doesn't work.
funny about Steely Dan, you could used to burn CDs onto the original xbox and listen to them them while playing quite a few games (maybe all?). But one of them I had was steely dan's first album from my dad's collection, no shame there I played so much THPS 1/2 to that (and other burned CDs), along with a million listen-thrus of their own soundtracks, man take me back
Def Jam fight for New York, and Def Jam Vendetta, decent games, outstanding soundtracks.
I stopped playing Tony Hawk games after Underground 2 and I‘d have to agree that its soundtrack was amazing. And I‘d really add any Tony Hawk game before it as well.
The good old days where trouble was far away.
It’s amazing the effect gaming can have on your musical tastes.
My interests were a mix of pop and indie until O heard the soundtrack to Wip3out in 1999 and it blew my mind. I heavily got into progressive trance and house because of that game and discovered tons of artists and DJs I still follow within that scene.
I think it was the release of SSX3 that got me back into rock and indie. Love me some Yellowcard and Placebo.
The most recent (?) is Forza Horizon. The OST to the original 2012 release is on constant repeat in my car. They created the perfect driving playlist within that game.
I enjoy this music more as the soundtrack to the THPS series than I do when I hear it on the radio. Same with the Offspring in Crazy Taxi and the Vice City songs. On their own the songs are ok, but they really give you a nice slice of that era and the feeling of smashing down a halfpipe.
Hey.
Don’t write yourself off yet.
If you don't like Steely Dan, get off this website
Can't say I've ever listened to much Jimmy Eat World, but I do love Authority Song.
For me Underground 1
Nas illmatic
madlib quasimoto
mf doom
omg list goes on
The pixies were responsible for my impeccable taste x
Loved the music in that game! Though not in the game, but instead listed in the article, I have Rage tickets on hold from pre-COVID times. Can't wait to see my favorite band live for the first time!!!!
We never give thug2 enough credit. People are always "pro skater 2/3 was the peak" but y'all seriously slept on the underground games. Thug2 has the best controls, gameplay, level design, writing is kinda horrible but it's a Tony hawk's game but jssjjzjzhzhzhzbbz everything else just so good
@KittenWarrior The series got better as it evolved. I love every single game although never played THPS5. Did anyone? Hope there are plans for more remakes.
@B4L0R_CLUB honestly I can't get into the remakes. Compared to THUG Pro it's a massive downgrade in terms of content and control. Honestly I was very disappointed.
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