In 2025 all our media is trending toward favoring streaming and digital downloads for everything from video games, to movies, to music. Recently I’ve been making a concerted effort to buy more physical media and that has included purchasing CDs again. Due to how cheap they are, it is really easy to go to the record store, pick up something that looks cool and take a chance on it. This organic discovery leads to something that feels unique compared to the algorithmic discovery we’ve become accustomed to on Spotify and YouTube. I had this experience recently while shopping at a local used CD store. Browsing the shelves, I noticed they had a small section dedicated to movie soundtracks. I picked up the movie soundtrack for Resident Evil Apocalypse and flipped the case over to read the tracklist. Immediately I was struck by the presence of many of my favorite rock/metal bands: The Used, Killswitch Engage, Lacuna Coil, etc. It didn’t hurt that the price tag was $5, so I picked it up and decided to give it a shot. What I ended up getting is a very solid collection of metal/rock songs that authentically captures the dark themes and vibes that provided the drum beat to action movies of the early aughts.
"Many of these songs have not been recommended to me by any of my algorithmic feeds, again highlighting the importance of organic discovery of music through physical media.""
I got home and immediately put the album into my Xbox, slipped the headphones on and was transported back to that crunchy 2000s era metal greatness. The excellent collection of artists here all bring something different to the table. Anthemic choruses, powerful vocals, and pumping drums that all fit in the general theme of Resident Evil. Most of the tracks have dark themes that fit right at home in a movie based on a zombie survival horror game. One stand-out track for me is “Digging Up The Corpses” by DevilDriver, its a heavy, atmospheric melodic death metal track that chugs along with haunting vocals that set the horror/action movie vibes. I’m a huge Killswitch Engage fan, so of course I love the inclusion of “The End of Heartache”, Howard Jones powerful vocals and lyrics about loss add that sense of desperation. Personally I loved listening to this album in it's entirety, enjoying the classic songs I remember and discovering songs I hadn't heard. Many of these songs have not been recommended to me by any of my algorithmic feeds, again highlighting the importance of organic discovery of music through physical media.
The soundtrack seemed to be pretty well-received at the time of release but this is one of those special collections that holds a lot more weight as time passes. In 2004, this was mostly received as a loose collection of metal music "inspired" by the film, with many songs also appearing on recently released or soon-to-be released albums. However, in 2025 it stands as an interesting time capsule, a window into the music that drove the era and for that I think it's worth a listen for any metal fan. This was a really special CD find for me, looking on streaming services the album isn’t available on platforms like Spotify/Apple Music…most likely because most of the songs come from pre-existing songs from each individual artists’ albums. Luckily I’m not the only fan of this album, a kind user on Spotify has compiled all the songs into a playlist, I’ve linked it below: