Scifi book from late 80's

[Sneakmaster]

Help me hivemind, you are my only hope...

I have been trying to find a scifi book i read most of about 25 years ago...

What i remember of the book: Good races and bad races are at war in the galaxy, evil races use psionics to control conquered races. Most of the races in the galaxy are soft cuddly creatures who come from planets with Pangaea like continents, no tidal moon forces. Basically nice places to live. They assume no life would be on earth when they discover it since it is such a hostile planet. But they find humans who turn out to be excellent warriors. They contact a guy on the planet who is a music composer, he rounds up so humans to go fight for them (they pay with straws of gold made from processing saltwater).

It is about all i remember of the book, and it has been driving me nuts for 10 years trying to find it again.

 

[Vince W]

The rounding up humans bit sounds like Starstrike by W. Michael Gear.

 

[ashewyntr]

Alan Dean Foster The Damned trilogy

 

[ralphkern]

I second the damned trilogy