[Closed] Now Playing XLIII

NP: SkyWorld - Thomas Bergesen & Nick Phoenix


The first track is my favorite so far, and it's another Thomas Bergesen composition.

I think it was Scribe who used the analogy (as have I in the past) that those types of albums are like a smorgasbord of fast food; it's quite nice in moderation, and it can be instantly gratifying... but you soon feel sick if you have too much.

I agree with both Alan and Steven, a few tracks are great but then it's too much.

I only made it to the third cue. After that i got dizzy.

Wussies!

I made it through and found about 4 really good ones. Completely worth it!

So here's the 4 I like, plus a few more notable ones.

I find that SkyWorld is in the same league as the previous albums, as in I don't love the full album, just some of the tracks.

All Is Hell that Ends Well was just surprising and bold enough to make me like it alot. It has all the ingredients that I find interesting, the juxtaposition of the banks of drums and brass melody with inspiring Baroque/Classical string passages then kicks it into gear for the finale with a very trendy modern dubstep. Dubstep has gotten a bad rep, what with the like of Skrillex ruining it for everyone.

SkyWorld seems like a track that is so promising, like it's gonna go above the route it took, but alas. It's still missing something to really cinch the deal and because I keep waiting for it, it feels much longer than it has to be.

El Dorado has an interesting start with the Gypsy-esque violin (cause it certainly doesn't sound like something from Spain). The brass melody is reminiscent John Powell's theme for the DreamWorks movie, if only because of the MV/RC-inspired nature. But the shifting bass line melody is quite interesting.
All The King's Horses is certainly in my wheel house. It starts with a Mozart-ian string line backed by percussion before adding that the choral scat section. Very memorable, if not shorter than it should have been.

Winterspell incorporate some of that Hans Zimmer choral writing for the Robert Langdon stories, but adding a nice twist of the Irish jig and a huge choir with the requisite pounding percussion to match. It's quite entertaining and big, if not slightly predictable.

Dark Ages reminds me of something from Alan Silvestri? or maybe it's from an early album? I like it, though I don't like how short it is. It feels like it ended before that brass melody got developed a bit more.

Blizzard is another good track. Love the string melody and how the brass develops it. It tells a good story, but, once more, ends way too early for my liking.

NOTE: I decided to not like Blackheart because of how it tries rearrange the Jack Sparrow stuff in a Yanni style of easy listening. I actually like some of Yanni's stuff, but this feels really wrong to listen to. It's attractive enough, but too subversive for me.

NP : LAST OF THE DOGMEN - David Arnold



A fine score, very Barryesque in parts.

Well observed Steven. Yeah, I caught the end of it and it made me want to play it.

Will, is a short film (which can be viewed in its entirety on Youtube - link below) about a young girl whose dad gets caught up in 9/11. She dreams how time could be reversed and her dad could be back with her. The score is very sparse in terms of orchestration: just electric guitar and weird electronic tones. I was listening to these tones and they sounded as though they were reversed notes. They start playing at a specific point in the film and this ties in with the story itself. I thought that it was an interesting idea for the score to echo the storyline.

I was watching it again recently and, again, I was listening closely to the score. And it struck me that the reversed notes, more specifically, the rhythm itself sounded a reversal of the main repeating melody. So I took my mp3 of the score and reversed it in Audacity and the score actually plays as it's heard the right way round (more or less).

I thought that this was quite a neat thing for the composer to do and illustrates Kleiss playing about with the musical form. Maybe, people may not be as struck by this as I am about this manipulation of the music in the score. Any comments?

Youtube video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYX1as8qElo

Link to track download: http://juliankleiss.bandcamp.com/album/ … soundtrack

I do like that one. It's not DANCER UPSTAIRS or TINKER TAILOR, but it's a serious thoughtful approach to the subject with a powerful finale. (The cue is a mixture of cues from the film's ending, with two tracks overlapped for effect at the end.)

NP: Argo (Desplat)

Getting into it more, but I still feel this is a much more cliche American score about the Middle East than I would have expected to hear from this composer. The writing is streets ahead of most people who've written this score, but for some reason the general feel bothers me more than the specifics.

NP: Cosmopolis (Howard Shore)

Works for me.

Indeed.

And if that was the only temp lift, then I'm a banana. I couldn't resist a chuckle when reading the remark from Korzeniowski (in the liner notes?) that writing music for Madonna's film allowed him to write the way he wanted. The irony's a bit much.

A couple of titles worth recommending:

La Discesa di Aclà a Floristella - Dario Lucantoni

"Brutal film about the exploitation of a young Italian boy, who is virtually sold to the operators of a sulphur mine where he is beaten and sexually molested."
I'd never heard of this film and was surprised with how imdb.com described it (the quote). The score itself doesn't really reflect the depressing-sounding storyline (though there are tracks that are darker that the rest) but the main memory is for attractive melodic parts such as "Per Aspera" and "Itinera". The score features predominantly strings, winds, acoustic guitar and occasional vocals.
https://itunes.apple.com/album/la-disce … mpt=uo%3D1

Il Grande Fausto - Franco Piersanti

"This TV movie tells the real story of the Italian cycling champion Fausto Coppi, who was one of the first men to win both Giro d'Italia and Tour de France in the same year."
I can't help thinking that we're in Morricone country here with the delicate woodwinds of the title theme and the accompanying strings. "La Dama Bianca" is a beautiful piece and one of the highlights. Strings, winds and piano dominate this score.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/tango … mpt=uo%3D4

NP : A HISTORY OF SCOTLAND - Paul Leonard Morgan


A great way to follow up on my previous play, I love this work, an enjoyable album from start to finish.

Here's what Alan ( Falkirkbairn ) had to say about it...

[Paul Leonard-Morgan's score for the BBC documentary A History of Scotland comes a pretty close second to my top choice. The composer manages to limit the "Scottishness" of the score, focusing more on general themes of drama, romance and the trials of a nation. I think that the score does suffer a bit when heard in the programme itself by being a bit too prominent and there does seem to be a lot of tracking of specific segments of the score for when the aforementioned drama, romance and trials-and-tribulations are needed.]