PC Gamer has an article talking about how they feel the
music seems disconnected from the game world. The music in their view does not take any risks or leaps, it is all very contemporary sounding for the year 2077. Too 2020 sounding for a game 50 years in the future. While I disagree with the article there are no memorible tracks... (Fade away, I really want to stay at your house.. hello?) I agree with the larger point. The music does sound far more 2020ish then 2070ish. Here is a snip;
While the soundtrack is impressive, it also appears to be random. Despite the deep soundtrack to call upon, it never employs any of these songs to create cinematic moments while you ride to the crime scene with River, cruise the desert with Panam, or sit on the roof and kick off the moss with Johnny. There are very few times at all where the music is anything more than the background blare in a nightclub or the distracting hum on the radio. There's no "May I Stand Unshaken"—it's 150 tracks of elevator muzak.
It doesn't feel particularly 2077. Even in 2023, when Johnny Silverhand died, it's clear the universe of Night City is more technologically advanced than ours, and with that you'd think would come new developments in music. Even if we assume Night City's 2020 is musically similar to our own though, shouldn't its music of 2077 feel more alien, futuristic, and fresh? It doesn't need to be cliched electro-sci-fi, but think of the difference between the music of today from the music of the 1960s. I wish CDPR had tried for this, instead of just hiring contemporary artists and dancing them around like Bez, waving a glitchcore beat around instead of a tambourine.