‘Hope For The Future’ was a song recorded by Paul McCartney for the video game Destiny, and released as a digital download in December 2014.
The game soundtrack was a collaboration between McCartney and composers Marty O’Donnell and Mike Salvatori. ‘Hope For The Future’ appears over the credits at the close of the game.
‘Hope For The Future’ was produced by George Martin’s son Giles. First tracks were laid down at McCartney’s Hog Hill Mill studio in Sussex, England, before further recording took place at Avatar Studio in September 2012. The orchestral and choral overdubs were added at Abbey Road Studios in late November 2012.
McCartney collaborated with the other composers over a two-year period, trading ideas, sample melodies and themes. The former Beatle’s involvement with Destiny was announced in a Tweet sent in July that year.
“I’m really excited to be working on writing music with @bungie, the studio that made Halo.” – Paul pic.twitter.com/lRxl8Jr8
— Paul McCartney (@PaulMcCartney) July 7, 2012
According to O’Donnell, McCartney was drawn to the project due to his interest in the technology behind interactive music. “He didn’t only want to do Paul McCartney music,” he said. “He wants to get involved in themes, how melodies and motives can be a touch point for people.”
When you’re writing something like ‘Hope For The Future’, which is custom made, it is like doing a portrait for someone. You have to use your imagination and work out what they need, what they’re going to want and then what you want to give them. Then you’ve got to combine those three things into something that you still think maintains integrity. So in the game you’re a Guardian of the last city on Earth so that suggested to me the ‘hope for the future’ idea and I went from there. Then I thought it is not just a game song, this will get played outside the game so it has got to be stand alone too, you can’t have references to aliens or people will think, ‘What’s he talking about?’ So it had to have its own stand alone meaning and integrity.
The release
Destiny was released on 9 September 2014 on the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One video game consoles, with sales worth more than $325 million worldwide in its first five days.
‘Hope For The Future’ was globally released on iTunes on 8 December 2014 as a digital download EP, alongside four alternative mixes. The tracklisting for the release was as follows:
- ‘Hope For The Future’ (Main)
- ‘Hope For The Future’ (Thrash)
- ‘Hope For The Future’ (Beatsession Mix)
- ‘Hope For The Future’ (Jaded Mix)
- ‘Hope For The Future’ (Mirwais Mix)
A radio edit, lasting 3:07, was also made for broadcast, but was not released commercially.
A 12″ single containing all the mixes was announced for release on 13 January 2015.
The Destiny soundtrack was released on iTunes on 26 September 2014. Although it did not include ‘Hope For The Future’, it did contain 10 instrumental pieces co-written by McCartney. These were: ‘The Traveller’, ‘The Fallen’, ‘The Hope’, ‘The Tower’, ‘Tranquility’, ‘The Rose’, ‘The Tribulation’, ‘Guardians Lost’, and ‘Lost Horizons’.
