Wipeout Xl

Various Artists - Dance & DJ - Techno/Rave | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 15, 1996)
• Original Release Date: October 1996
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Astralwerks
• ASIN: B000003RYJ
• Also Available in: Audio CD
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #144,198 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. We Have Explosive

2. Atom Bomb

3. Loops of Fury

4. Tin There

5. The Third Sequence

6. Leave Home [Underworld Mix One]

7. We Have Explosive [Herd Killing][Mix]

8. Firestarter [Instrumental]

9. V Six

10. Musique

11. 2097

12. Titan

13. P.E.T.R.O.L.

14. Afro Ride

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as the REAL soundtrack, November 29, 2001

By 

Brett Foster (Xenia, OH USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wipeout Xl (Audio CD)

This soundtrack is a good disc, but it might surprise you to find out that it is very different from the actual PlayStation CD. If you like this disc at all, or if you think the songs are a little grating, I would suggest getting your hands on the real PSX WOXL, which you can play like any other CD if you skip past the first data track.

Let me point out the differences. The above soundtrack has 14 tracks, the following of which are not on the actual PlayStation game:

02 Fluke - Atom Bomb
06 Chemical Brothers - Leave Home (Underworld MX1)
07 FSOL - We Have Explosive (Herd Killing)
10 Daft Punk - Musique
11 Source Direct - 2097
12 Photek - Titan
13 Orbital - Petrol
14 Leftfield - Afro Ride

Besides that, FSOL's We Have Explosive lasts 6:14, while the PlayStation version stops a little abruptly at 5:53, and Underworld's Tin There stops at 5:00, while the PlayStation version is 6:08.

The PlayStation disc has 11 audio tracks, the following of which are missing from the above soundtrack CD:

03 FSOL - Landmass
04 Fluke - Atom Bomb (instrumental, shorter/faster than CD)
06 Chemical Brothers - Dust Up Beats
11 Cold Storage - Canada
12 Cold Storage - Body In Motion

The PlayStation selection is much less harsh than the soundtrack CD. The soundtrack-only "herd killing" version of We Have Explosive is a pretty good track, but other than that, the PlayStation CD is much better. The PlayStation-only tracks are all good, especially Dust Up Beats and Canada. Dust Up Beats is something Chemical Brothers have played live, but I haven't seen it on any CD besides the PlayStation WOXL.

Another odd thing about the WOXL soundtrack is that the version of Petrol it has is the same as the version on Orbital's In-Sides CD, except the WOXL version fades out at 5:49, while the real one is 6:20.

1999's Wipeout 3 also has 13 songs, but it's only available for PlayStation. It has six great original Sasha tracks, a 4:03 version of Paul Van Dyk's Avenue (showed up later on his Out There And Back CD), a 3:06 version of Underworld's Kittens (from Beaucoup Fish), the album version of Chem Bros' Under the Influence (from Surrender), two MKL tracks, and Orbital - Know Where to Run & Propellerheads - Lethal Cut, which I don't think are on any other CD's.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required listening for EDM fans, May 12, 2005

By 

SRFireside "ZOOM!" (Houston, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Wipeout Xl (Audio CD)

If you are into electronic dance music this CD not just a good album, but required listening. Actually it's great if you are just starting into the genre and want to hear the music that catapulted it. Based on a video game soundtrack Wipeout XL takes what the Playstation game (Wipeout 2) did with the music genre and moved it another level. The Wipeout 2 games was heralded as not only an excellent arcade racing game, but a game that had one of the coolest soundtracks ever. This is because the game designers decided to get a broad range of artists together on their game project. The result was a video game with a soundtrack that defined electronic music in the 90's.

What Wipeout XL did was take that style of music and put it on a CD so people can just pop it in and jam without having to either rip the tracks off the game or play the game cd on a stereo system. There are track differences between the two. For one the games staff writer, Cold Fusion, doesn't have any tracks on it so that takes out two songs. From there a couple other songs were replaced for whatever reasons (personally I think Future Sound of London's Herd Killing is just too dissonant for anything but a title scroll for the game). But don't fret, because what they replaced them with is definitely worth your while.

Some of the new tracks on this CD are exclusive to this CD only. That's right. Exclusive mixes. I don't mean crappy freak mixes that don't deserve proliferation I mean some killer mixes that you MUST have in your collection. Here's my opinion on some tracks:

ATOM BOMB and V-SIX by Fluke is not the regular version. It's one of those exclusive versions I was talking about. And this is the coolest mix of Atom Bomb I have ever heard (and I heard lots). Totally new beat and feel, but definitely the same song. V-Six is an exlusive song you won't find anywhere but here. Not even remixes. It's aggressive and driven like a lot of his dancier tracks. The CD is worth getting for these two tracks alone.

LOOPS OF FURY and LEAVE HOME (Underworld Mix) By Chemical Brothers, while not exclusive mixes, they are songs you won't find on any of their albums. They were released on singles only. Either way Loops of Fury to me is the ultimate big beat song. Powerful drums on top of a driving bassline with a mess of fun noises dancing around the groove. Leave Home is just powerful, but more minimalist. Still great on the dance floor. This CD is worth it for these two tracks alone (Did I just repeat myself? See where I'm getting at?).

2097 by Source Direct can only be found on the Wipeout CD's (game and XL CD). At least it's not on any of their albums. It's some crazy drum and bass that you might not be able to dance to, but it sure is interesting listening to what do they the instruments.

Other good tracks (not exclusive) are Orbital's P.E.T.R.O.L., Future Sound of London's WE HAVE EXPLOSIVE (very popular), and the lyricless FIRESTARTER by The Prodigy. TIN THERE and MUSIQUE are a little repetitive but manageable. Photek is very much like Source Direct, only not as interesting in their drum-&-bassiness.

If you are just getting into modern electronic music then this would be a perfect primer for you. If you have been into it for a while there are some tracks here worth getting that are either not that easy to find or you just won't find elsewhere. Either way this is an excellent CD that's worthy to be in your collection.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wipeout XL has the "who's who" of electronica, September 30, 1999

By 

"ruban909" (Toronto, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wipeout Xl (Audio CD)

Some of the greatest electronica beats from some of the UK's best artists can be found on Wipeout XL. Great tracks such as; Fluke's "Atom Bomb", Prodigy's popular "Firestarter", France's own Daft Punk with "Musique", and my favourite, "We Have Explosive" by The Future Sound Of London. There are many reasons that make this disc worthy of notice, one for example, it packs an insane amount of "adrenaline" perfect for any driver with a heavy foot. Listening to this disc at 50km/h just isn't going to cut it. It's hard to call this a soundtrack. Wipeout XL is more of a "compilation of a compilation" due to the fact that EVERY song is exceptional. I highly recommend that you pick this up. It's a rush........in the form of a compact disc. For underground beats at one notch lower try Infinite Beat Vol. 1 (ib1), Mono (Life in Mono), and Purple Penguin (De-tuned)......enjoy!