As a young lad who spent as much time as he could in arcades - hell, I'd even take a greasy pizza place if it had two or three decent cabinets in it - I was always drawn to the music of Sega games. Shinobi, After Burner, Space Harrier; these games not only had iconic visuals and gameplay, their soundtracks were evocative and memorable as well.
Out Run was never one of my favorite Sega titles because I was (and still am) terrible at it, but I did rather enjoy its soundtrack. I was fascinated by the fact that you could choose the background music by "changing the radio station" at the beginning of the game, and I distinctly remember standing back and silently judging the folks who didn't pick my preferred track, "Passing Breeze".
The smoothed out Latin jazz vibe just fits so well with the visual motif of the game, and the quality of the arrangement was remarkable for the era.
In researching this song, I came to find out that its composer, Hiroshi Kawaguchi, also played keyboards in Sega's official in-house band, S.S.T. Band, which was active during the late 80's/early 90's. S.S.T Band specialized in creating full-band versions of songs from classic Sega games and THEY WERE AWESOME! Seriously, I can't believe that I'm just finding out about these guys. You MUST hear their ultra-funky version of "Passing Breeze".
I also came upon this short documentary about Kawaguchi and fellow Sega musical heavyweight Yuzo Koshiro (Streets of Rage, Shenmue) produced by the folks at Red Bull Music. There's an interview with Kawaguchi around the 5-minute mark where he gives some insight into his inspiration for the Out Run soundtrack. Apparently, the sound design team for that game travelled from Japan to Florida so that they could drive around and feel the vibe of the area. In an amusing twist, Kawaguchi didn't accompany the group himself, instead using photos and relying on the impressions of his team to help him set the tone. Have a look..
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