Half-Life 2 Soundtrack

Kelly Bailey composed numerous short pieces of original incidental music that are interspersed throughout Half-Life 2. Also, several tracks from the Half-Life soundtrack were re-titled and carried over, some of them remixed. Energetic techno tracks tend to back significant battles. Atmospheric synthesizer pieces enhance key plot and exploration moments and reinforce feelings of adventure, isolation, or melancholy in the player.

The limited-edition Half-Life 2 "Gold" package included, among other exclusive extras, a CD soundtrack. Although the CD contains several exclusive tracks, it does not include all of the music released with the game. Using an appropriate program, it is possible to extract all audio tracks heard in-game from the "source sounds.gcf" archive file. Tracks 44–56 in the list below were not released on the CD and can be obtained by this method. The soundtrack (save the CD version of tracks 1 and 34) was also included in the game directory of both the full and demo Audiosurf releases on Steam.

Description
The most iconic track, this is now the signature theme of Valve Corporation.

Location played
At the titles, a section of the track can be heard when putting on the HEV suit for the first time in the game.

Description
Fast paced action music.

Location played

 * Route Kanal: During Route Kanal, early in the level in a train tunnel that has Gordon moving through passages on the side. Later in the level a remix of the track is played.

Description
"Beam Me Up" For more info on the name.

Location played

 * Route Kanal: when first fighting MP7 wielding Metrocops.
 * Anticitizen One: when Dog shows off his strength during a fight with Civil Protection.
 * On console versions of The Orange Box, this is played when highlighting Half-Life 2 on the menu.
 * This was the music used throughout the duration of the Half-Life 2 trailer.

Description
Relatively slow paced action music. Continues same beat throughout, with some electronic sounds - however, mainly drums.

Location played
Anticitizen One: leading up to the fight in the plaza containing the Combine generator.

Location played

 * Highway 17: Played when leaving Shorepoint Base.
 * During the first part of the credits.

Description
An eerie track that introduces the player to the dark city of Raveholm.

Location played

 * "We Don't Go To Ravenholm...": As soon as the level begins, the track begins.

Location played

 * As the player enters the Strider battle just outside the Overwatch Nexus.
 * Dark Energy: When the player is descending in the elevator to face Breen.

Description
The "Requiem For Ravenholm" track, only shortened and centering around a loud guitar wail.

Location played

 * "We Don't Go To Ravenholm...": After passing through the gate at the end of the courtyard and Father Grigori bids farewell, the song plays. This is commonly not heard because the loading area is right at the other side of the door.

Description
A harrowing track, follows through a strange siren like refrain before ending with a subtle outro.

Location played
During the Headcrab shelling towards the Route Kanal level.

Description
Not so much dark as very strange, follows through a distorted field of sound effects. Seems to be very anticipatory. Quite eerie.

Location played
Upon entering the Vortigaunt Camp in Sandtraps, as well as the Zombie-infested building near the start of "Follow Freeman!".

Location played
New Little Odessa, after the Gunship has been defeated.

Description

 * Fast paced action music.
 * The name is most likely a reference to Gordon's apprehension by Civil Protection and his subsequent escape through which this song is played.

Location played

 * "A Red Letter Day": While escaping from Civil Protection through the train tracks.
 * Sandtraps: During the night time raid on Nova Prospekt (the bunker raiding section).

Description
Extremely short and dramatic trumpet piece. The track is commonly confused with "Sharp Fear Short", which is a 8 second dramatic track that plays whenever a miniboss is defeated in HL1 - and when the Hunter is defeated in Water Hazard.

Location played
In Follow Freeman!, played directly after the last Strider is killed.

Location played

 * "A Red Letter Day": The teleporter room in Kleiner's laboratory

Description
An 8 second track, very hard to explain. You have to listen for yourself. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MpJ0Yr1jsA

Location played
In the Half-Life 2 beta, there is a G-Man sighting, where if you see him, he books it away from the window, the lights around you flash, and the track plays.

Description

 * A very earnest track. It is designed to be contrasted with the atmosphere of Ravenholm, once more placing the player in the middle of an uprising, while simultaneously almost mourning the situation - played in tandem with Winston's moans of pain.


 * The name is a reference to the the very situation the player finds himself at the point it is played - Triage of Winston at dawn break.


 * "Triage at Dawn" is incorrectly said to be based on the track "Path of Borealis", supposedly from the Half-Life 2 Beta. This is completely untrue, as no such thing can be found in the playable Half-Life 2 Beta files or any other leaked files. "Path of Borealis" is actually a remix of "Triage at Dawn" made by DJ Dain, named "That Long Train Ride", the song title being apparently based on a note featured in a map of an early Half-Life 2 journey found in Raising the Bar. It was one day presented by a gamer nicknamed "Black Mantis" on the Half-Life 2 Beta oriented Father Grigori Forums. There he pretended he received the track directly from Valve, which was a lie. After that, the lie was spread to the Facepunch forums. Today many players think "Path of Borealis" is a track from Valve, here crediting it to Kelly Bailey, there to Viktor Antonov, who is not even a composer. Many videos of it can be found on YouTube, crediting it as being from the Half-Life 2 Beta, and fixing that lie now appears to be impossible. The track is also used as the game menu music for the mod Obsidian Conflict, where it is also incorrectly named "Path of Borealis" and incorrectly credited to Antonov in the mp3 tag.

Location played
At Shorepoint, when the battle in the garage is over.

Description
The title is a reference to the "combine harvester", a farming machine that harvests grain crops.

Location played
Under the bridge in Highway 17. Also plays when returning to Kleiner's Lab during the uprising at the very end of Entanglement.

Description

 * The name, aside from detailing the location it is played, hints at its content (based on what one already knows of the place). Beginning, with the throb of a bass drum, the track whirls through a range of different ambient themes. A subtle refrain from "CP Violation" can be heared at 1:00 at last for around twenty seconds, before dropping to a more dramatic outro. The track is very creepy and unsettling. Gives a hint at what is to be expected later in the level.
 * Duration: 1:56.

Location played
At the start of Nova Prospekt, just as the player enters the jail.

Description
A strangely-placed reflective track, a repetition of two bass chords with a synth pad. A little similar to the "Self Esteem Fund" track from the Portal soundtrack.

Location played

 * Route Kanal: Upon leaving the sewers.

Description
Appears at the climatic ending of Freeman's witnessing of The Uprising whilst fighting a multitude of Striders. Lengthy, fast paced action music. Has a few sections throughout.

Location played

 * "Follow Freeman!": At the time of arguably the climax of the game whilst fighting a multitude of Striders.

Description
Medium paced action music.

Location played

 * Follow Freeman!: When fighting the Combine Gunship over the Overwatch Nexus.

Description
Fast paced, electronic action music.

Location played
Water Hazard: after receiving the mounted gun for the Airboat.

Location played
Anticitizen One: While meeting your first rebel squad member of the chapter in the playground.

Location played
Anticitizen One: during various fights with Civil Protection, while assaulting a barricade and the underground shoot-out while waiting a hole to be blown open by a rebel.

Description
An anticipatory track, seems to awaken one from the darkness of Ravenholm.

Location played
Kicks in upon leaving the Ravenholm Mines and into the sniper's nest outside, right before the Fast Zombie appears.

Description

 * Strange & mysterious music.
 * The whirring of Manhack blades and Kleiner's teleporter can be heard in the background.

Location played
Point Insertion: Very beginning of Half-Life 2, during the G-Man's speech.

Location played
Our Benefactors: Upon exiting the sewer tunnel at the base of the Citadel.

Description
Reused from the song Cavern Ambience from the Half-Life soundtrack.

Location played
Route Kanal: When first entering the sewers after the Hunter-Chopper first attacks.

Description
Known also as "Space Ocean" this track seems to have a very intense 'walking the tightrope' feel, and appears extensively at such moments.

Location played

 * Anticitizen One: Upon entering the underground hazardous liquid cavern with the cars.
 * Our Benefactors: While Freeman is in the prisoner pod, moving through the Citadel.

Description

 * An Ambient track. Reasonably dark, but implies a relatively passive and innocent atmosphere. Fits well during the player's first encounter with Dog.
 * Name derived from the first level of Half-Life, in which Gordon is making his way to the Anomalous Materials Lab.
 * Duration: 2m 11s.

Location played
Black Mesa East: The scrapyard where you first receive the Gravity Gun and meet DOG.

Location played
Dark Energy: Upon reaching the top of the Citadel just before meeting Breen.

Description
A techno song. This is a remix of the song Credits - Closing Theme from Half-Life.

Location played
The second credits song.

Location played
This is played upon the viewing of the Nova Prospekt teleporter in Entanglement.

Description

 * Also named Dimensionless Deepness. It opens with the sound of water splashing (a possible reference to the track's name). Like most of the ambient soundtrack, it is hard to hear - keeping volume to a minimum - but is somewhat eerie.
 * Its name is most likely a play on Dirac Sea, a "theoretical model of the vacuum as an infinite sea of particles possessing negative energy".

Location played
Entanglement: when entering the flooded basement.

Description

 * Starts with the blast of a distorted electic guitar chord. Comes from the Half-Life song "Electric Guitar Ambiance". Enhances feeling of desolation.

Location played
At the beginning of Black Mesa East, right after the loading screen.

Description
Reused from the Half-Life soundtrack, previously known as Steam In The Pipes.

Location played

 * Our Benefactors: At the beginning of Dr. Breen's speech saying, "You have destroyed so much. What is it exactly that you have created?"
 * In addition to Half-Life 2, this song appears (though not on the soundtrack) of Episode One during the elevator sequence in the Citadel.

Description
Reused from the Half-Life song "Drums and Riffs".

Location played
Highway 17, when first reaching the crane.

Description
A techno-sounding track. Gives off a feel of urgency. Reused from the Half-Life soundtrack, previously known as Nuclear Mission Jam.

Location played
Lighthouse Point during the Dropship attacks in Sandtraps.

Description
A fast-paced track with a car-chase feel. Its Half-Life name was "Diabolical Adrenaline Guitar", a good indicator of how it sounds.

Location played
Water Hazard, when fleeing from the second Hunter-Chopper, involving drives through large cement pipes.

Description
A much shorter version of Hazardous Environments.

Location played
Immediately upon equipping the HEV Suit.

Location played
In the credits.

Description

 * The title track of the short level, extremely minimalist, sounds like a distorted choir singing. The track is barely audible, but if you pause about 5 seconds after entering Kleiner's lab, you'll hear it.
 * It is actually a slightly edited version of the start of the track "London Deserted" from the soundtrack of the film 28 Days Later.

Location played
During A Red Letter Day, upon entering Kleiner's lab for the first time.

Description
The entire soundtrack is quite disturbing, with what seems to be short, sharp echoes.

Location played
At the beginning of Sandtraps, when driving through the tunnel full of zombies.

Description
Medium-fast paced action music.

Description

 * Despite being one of the shortest and most simplistic, it is most probably the darkest track on the soundtrack. It is mostly a strange, discordant sound, as if a multitude of songs were mixed together. Very eerie and disquieting. Ends abruptly, as if a real song were being played.
 * If played backwards, you can slightly hear a woman saying "Gman, can you hear me? Gman, can you hear me?"
 * Name perhaps derived from the similarity of the sound to an old or out-of-tune radio.
 * It can also be heard in the film 28 Days Later (at 00:26), making it another sample from the 28 Days Later score.

Location played
Anticitizen One: Just as the TV with the G-Man on it is seen.