Soundtrack Cover Character Jam

Definitely not the Cats musical you were expecting.

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A common trend for Anime and Video Games that sell their soundtrack commercially. Have the characters of the work itself participating in a jam session, playing instruments, singing or listening to music on the cover.

Usually, the characters will be dressed and playing appropriate instruments to reflect the musical genre featured in the release. Can be considered a form of Go-Karting with Bowser if both heroes and villains alike are featured.

This can also include promotional artwork, like the ones used to advertise a live concert or represent an online music channel, as long as it follows the pattern of characters being musical (plus, said artwork tends to be reused for CD releases anyway). Works that actually focus on music (like Rhythm Games), however, do not count.

A lot of the artwork here can be found somewhere else on TV Tropes, usually in the Awesome Music subpages for those series. Those are frequently a case of No Export for You since the physical media market for music has been on a constant decline in the West for a long time already.

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Examples

Anime & Manga

• The cover of the Bubblegum Crisis Complete Vocal Collection features the four Knight Sabers performing on musical instruments: Priss on vocals, Linna on guitar, Nene on keyboards, and Sylia on bass. In universe, however, Priss is the only character that is an actual musician.
• My Hero Academia 2nd Original Soundtrack has several of the male characters playing music on the cover. The characters' apparel and instrument design seems to be a homage to 60s teen idol bands, most specifically The Beatles.
• The cover for Digimon Adventure Song and Music Collection haves the chosen children performing on various instruments: Taichi on guitar, Yamato on his usual harmonica, Sora on keyboard, Koushiro on violin, Mimi on tambourine, Jou on drums and Takeru on triangle.
• Haikyuu!! features the main characters listening to music with headphones for the first season soundtracks, the second season soundtracks have Kageyama listening to music for the first volume and Yamaguchi offering one of his earphones to Tsukishima to listen to his music, and finally the third season soundtrack features them play-acting as a band with random cleaning supplies in their classroom.

Film

• The poster for the 1978 Star Wars concert featured C-3P0 and R2-D2 equipped with One-Man Band instruments.

Video Games

• Super Mario Bros.
  • Both Super Mario Galaxy and its sequel have a starry◊ silhouette◊ of Mario with a conductor baton (reflecting the game's heavy use of orchestral pieces), with Yoshi being included in the latter as well.
  • The Japanese release of Super Mario 3D World's soundtrack shows the game's 5 playable characters (and a Sprixie Princess) playing various jazz instruments. The booklet within includes the full artwork◊ with most of the game's cast present and playing their own instruments as well.
  • The Mario & Luigi Sound Selection reward for Japanese Club Nintendo members features both Mario brothers wearing a pair of headphones each◊.
  • The Super Mario Odyssey's iTunes release◊ features both Mario and Pauline, with the latter singing.
• Physical copies of the Kirby 25th anniversary orchestra concert comes with artwork of most of the prominent cast performing an orchestra, complete with formal attire
• The The Legend of Zelda: 2018 Concert used an promotional artwork featuring the Links from Ocarina of Time and Breath of the Wild, plus Zelda from Skyward Sword, all playing their iconic instruments (except BotW Link, who plays secondary character Kass' accordion).
• Sonic the Hedgehog has the Sonic Adventure-centric Passion & Pride: Anthems with Attitude album, featuring everybody's favorite blue hedgehog playing an electric guitar and technically wearing headphones wrong.
• Mega Man has had countless of those, which is very appropriate since the series is known as Rock Man in Japan. Most of them focus on rock (of course) and sometimes techno imagery:
  • The two We are ROCK-MEN arrangement soundtracks◊, featuring both Mega Man and Proto Man on keyboard and guitar, respectively.
  • The Rockman 10 Image Soundtrack, with Bass headlining on vocals while the good guys play rock in the background.
  • The ZX Tunes album, with Megaman ZX's female protagonist Aile wearing elaborate headphones.
  • The Mega Man X Legacy Collection Soundtrack, featuring X, Zero, Axl and Alia with rock instruments.
• The Street Fighter Compilation ''RE:''Mix Chiptune◊, containing the original 8 playable characters of SFII enjoying tunes.
• Ace Attorney has had albums for orchestra and jazz arrangements of its series' songs, both featuring the cast humorously playing in concerts. There's also this one for the fourth game in the series, starring Apollo and Klavier listening to music together.
• NieR: Automata used a piece of artwork◊ of the three main characters playing orchestral instruments to promote its "The Memories of Puppets" concerts. It was later used for the CD release of said concert. There's also the Piano Collections CD◊ with 2B playing the piano.
• Octopath Traveler uses this artwork◊ of a typical tavern show for its soundtrack. There is also this one found within the special Arrangements Break & Boost -Extend- release, which features the cast playing in diverse, anachronistic genres.
• The Rayman Legends soundtrack◊ is a rare western example. It has all the playable characters rocking out.
• The Season One◊ and Two◊ soundtrack releases of Sam & Max: Freelance Police feature the titular characters doing Jazz/Blues.
• The Knack II soundtrack cover featuring Knack with headphones◊.
• Sony's Japanese Development Studio once advertised a concert through a poster◊ of Kat as a violinist and their Mascot Toro as a conductor.
• Downplayed with Celeste. The official soundtrack shows the protagonist, Madeline, holding what appears to be a mixtape◊. The soundtrack for the B-Sides meanwhile has a similar one of Badeline holding a tape of her own◊.
• Fire Emblem Awakening has Lucina wearing a pair of flowery headphones◊.
• Chantelise: A Tale of Two Sisters has the titular sisters listening to a phonograph.
• The Epic Battle Fantasy series, over multiple games:
  • Epic Battle Fantasy 4: The protagonists form a band.
  • Epic Battle Fantasy 5 has the protagonists listening to Phyrnna.
• Unsurprisingly for a heavy metal-inspired series, the original Guilty Gear soundtrack features Sol Badguy playing a guitar◊.
• Averted with the original Banjo-Kazooie soundtracks despite both characters being named after two musical instruments, but played straight with the vinyl re-release of the first game's soundtrack by Fangamer, featuring caricatures of the main characters playing their instruments from the opening.
• Bastion's soundtrack features the Kid wearing headphones.◊
• The cover of Plants vs. Zombies Original Soundtrack features a Chomper, Squash, Digger Zombie and Sun-shroom singing (illustrated by music notes), with a Snow Pea playing itself as a trumpet and a Sunflower acting as the conductor, next to a sheet saying "Sunflower Music Lessons".
• Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap (2017) shows mouse-man and the pig shopkeeper next to a music player, with the pig wearing headphones (the bonus album's cover is a more normal scene in the shop, but said shop features a radio prominently).
• Skullgirls has Marie playing a grand piano (with bones as the keys, natch) while the other fighters are hiding in the piano.
• The Kingdom Hearts concert albums feature Sora as the conductor of the orchestra.
• The Fate/Grand Order orchestra albums' art showcases Mozart, befitting the most musically talented Servant in its cast. For the recorded album, he's playing the piano with Marie Antoinette, while the live album has him conduct alongside his rival Antonio Salieri.
• Tales Series has a series of orchestra albums from 2016-18, all of them featuring various characters across the franchise as part of an orchestra, but most prominently from either Tales of Zestiria (that being the latest flagship title for the first two albums) or Tales of Berseria (its immediate successor and a prequel to Zestiria, released in 2016).
• Granblue Fantasy has released several soundtracks with this style of cover art.
  • The Chiptune Remix album has Lyria and Vyrn jamming out to synthesizers.
  • Sora no Kanade, the orchestra album, has members of the game's own in-universe orchestra ensemble performing on the cover.
  • The Granblue Fantasy Versus Special Soundtrack has Katalina playing a guitar while Ferry and Metera take a break from playing.
  • The actual Original Soundtrack for Versus features the first wave of DLC characters (yes, this even includes Beelzebub) unexpectedly collaborating together as a band in a recording studio.
• The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero Super Arrange album shows the main characters listening to music on headphones.
• Girls Frontline had several of its characters in formal wear for its orchestra DVD artwork, and went the extra mile by making those outfits available in-game and cementing them as canon for the game itself.
• The Monster Hunter 15th anniversary orchestra album features some Felyne characters in formalwear playing a violin and a flute.
• The Trauma Team soundtrack cover art features the Mysterious Girl lying in a flowerbed and listening to music on her headphones.
• Undertale: Fangamer's collector's edition of Undertale, which includes the soundtrack, has Papyrus, Shyren and Toriel singing, Alphys playing the saxophone, Sans playing the trombone, Napstablook sound mixing and Undyne playing the piano while Mettaton lays on it, feeding himself grapes as Burgerpants stands behind a prop bush; Toriel is wearing headphones while Papyrus is in his "Cool Dude" outfit. The standalone soundtrack, however, is cropped to just Sans, Undyne, Mettaton, Shyren, and Toriel.
• The first half's cover of Yume Nikki's official soundtrack depicts Madotsuki playing on her flute^note an effect that can be obtained in-game. The cover for the second half is a more downplayed case, as it simply depicts Seccom Masada standing in front of his spaceship's organ.
• The Jackbox Party Pack:
  • Party Pack 5's OST cover◊ has Mayonnaise (the Split The Room host) listening to music while studying in a parody of the "Lo-Fi Hip Hop Study Girl".
  • Party Pack 6's OST cover has a Push The Button alien on guitar, the assistant from Role Models on trumpet, the word "rock" from Dictionarium on flute... and Captain Chuck Hull from Joke Boat trying to go to the bathroom in peace.
• Unhack: Its soundtrack release has A², Weedy, and Debug side by side. The first two are listening to music, or at least trying to. A² has a Confused Question Mark and examining her headphones, so it seems they don't work, while Weedy's works, and Debug is sleeping on Weedy's shoulder.

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Web Comics

• Homestuck: The track art for "October" from One Year Older depicts the four main kids jamming out on a stoop. John, Rose, and Jade are playing their respective instruments, while Dave is beatboxing.

Western Animation

• The cover of Steven Universe's second soundtrack has Greg playing his guitar while he and Steven are talking.

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