Jun Senoue

Biography

Senoue started playing the piano at the age of three, whilst living in Japan. After moving to Panama at the age of 12, he became dedicated to rock music after being exposed to MTV. He began to teach himself to play the electric guitar at the age of 15, and made his first original band recording at the age of 17.

After graduating from college with a degree in economics from Aoyama Gakuin University in 1993, Senoue sent demo tapes to Namco and Sega, with him joining Sega later that same year. His first project with the company was on Dark Wizard, where he arranged a medley of the game's music for the staff roll. After that, he wrote a few pieces of music and jingles for Sonic the Hedgehog 3, his first involvement in the Sonic series. After doing multiple projects in the Worldwide Soccer series in the mid 1990s, among other titles such as the Sega Genesis version of Sonic 3D Blast, Senoue was selected to be the lead composer and sound director of Sonic Adventure in 1998. The game's success lead to his name becoming known worldwide, as well as him being promoted to the sound director of the series.

After the completion of Sonic Adventure, Senoue moved to San Francisco in 1999 and began to work on Sonic Team USA games such as NASCAR Arcade, Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes, and Shadow the Hedgehog. In 2007, Senoue provided three new arrangements for the Japanese console release of OutRun 2 SP, including covers of existing series tracks "Splash Wave" and "Rush a Difficulty", and an original track titled "Lift You Up!". Also in 2007, Senoue choose to arrange and perform "Angel Island Zone" from Sonic the Hedgehog 3 for Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

In 2009, Senoue announced a compilation album titled The Works. Containing only three Sonic related songs, it mostly features more obscure works he provided for other games. The album was released on October 21, 2009. More recently, Senoue worked as the sound director, composer, and arranger for Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode I, Episode II, and Sonic Generations. At the Sonic Appreciation festival at Joypolis in December 2015, Senoue announced a sequel to The Works, titled The Works II. The album was released on February 24, 2016.

Crush 40

Crush 40, originally a musical project founded by Senoue in 2000 to write music for NASCAR Arcade, consists of Senoue on guitars and Johnny Gioeli on vocals, with frequent collaborators Toru Kawamura and Takeshi Taneda on drums and bass, respectively. The band created several songs from the Sonic the Hedgehog series by Sega. Additionally, the two have produced a cover of "Seven Rings in Hand" from Sonic and the Secret Rings, which was featured exclusively on the Japanese-only release True Blue: The Best of Sonic the Hedgehog. Gioeli co-wrote the lyrics for the Sonic the Hedgehog theme song "His World", and Crush 40 performed their own version of the song, featured as a bonus track on the game's vocal track soundtrack. They also recorded a cover of "Sonic Boom", the main theme of the North American version of Sonic CD, with the American band Cash Cash in 2011.

In October 2008, Crush 40 took the stage at the Tokyo Game Show to perform some of their most popular Sonic based songs in front of a live audience for the first time. Gioeli and Senoue have since created a YouTube account and uploaded video footage of the event. In 2009, a new Crush 40 album was released titled The Best of Crush 40: Super Sonic Songs. The compilation contained most of the band's Sonic releases, as well as a mixture of old tracks from NASCAR Arcade and brand new songs. In August 2010, Crush 40 performed at the "Summer of Sonic" convention in London, marking their first full-length performance and first performance outside Japan. In 2012, the band performed at two conventions, at the Summer of Sonic in Brighton and at the Sonic Boom event in San Diego during the Comic-Con. The band released their first live album in October 2012, titled Live!, which featured songs from their concerts in Tokyo. In August 2013, the band performed in St. Louis for the Sonic Boom 2013 event, and also performed at the 2015 Youmacon in Detroit. For the 25th anniversary of the Sonic series, Crush 40 performed at the San Diego House of Blues during Comic-Con in July 2016, and at Summer of Sonic in London the following month. At the 2017 Comic-Con in July, Senoue performed various Sonic material with Shota Nakama of the Video Game Orchestra.

JxJ

In 2005, Senoue released an EP with Japanese voice actress Junko Noda, titled "Ready!". The project went under the name JxJ, and was only available to purchase in Japan.

Bubblicious Blvd

In 2010, Senoue performed several gigs in Tokyo with former Magna-Fi guitarist, C.J. Szuter, in a band called Bubblicious Blvd.