The iconic soundtrack to Doom has been added to the US Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry.
The National Recording Registry celebrates music that is “culturally, historically or aesthetically important, and/or informs or reflects life in the United States”.
Anyone can nominate a recording for inclusion in the National Recording Registry with 25 added every year. Over 700 recordings make up the US Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry including The Beatles’ 1967 album ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’, a radio broadcast describing the Hindenburg disaster, the commentary of the 1941 World Series baseball game between the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers and Kermit The Frog’s ‘The Rainbow Connection’.
There are no rules on genre or format but “no recording is eligible for inclusion into the National Recording Registry until ten years after the recording’s creation.”
The 25 recordings being added to the library thie year were announced over the weekend, with Bobby Prince’s industrial metal soundtrack to 1993’s first-person dungeon shooter Doom now part of the collection of “important” recordings.
Weezer’s debut ‘The Blue Album’, the original Broadway cast recording of Chicago, Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ and Beyoncé’s ‘Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)’ were also added to the US Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry. You can check out the full list here.
“Music and recorded sound are essential, wonderful parts of our daily lives and our national heritage. The National Recording Registry works to preserve our national playlist for generations to come,” said Acting Librarian Of Congress Robert R. Newlen. “The Library Of Congress is proud to select these audio treasures and will work to preserve them with our partners in the recording industry.”
Despite the eclectic and wide-ranging collection of recordings, only two other gaming soundtracks are part of the US Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry. C418’s Minecraft soundtrack was added in 2025 following ‘The Ground Theme’ from Super Mario Bros’ inclusion in 2023.
The original Doom has been followed by number of sequels, including 2025’s Doom: The Dark Ages. The soundtrack for that game was inspired by metal titans Metallica, Slayer, Black Sabbath, Spiritbox and the foundations laid by the original game’s ferocious soundtrack. “It’s a Doom game, of course the music has got to be metal,” composer Brian Lee White told NME last year.
In other news, underground rap icon EsDeeKid has arrived in Fortnite with an official skin and three of his tracks added to the Festival spin-off game.
