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    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    Martijn wrote
    It's not Lean, It's not Jarre, it's not Delerue, it's not lovely.
    There is some desert, though.


    100% agree on no Jarre. ( I can't comment on Lean, not seen the film )

    Everything else is tenuous, I can even hear an itsy-bitsy bit of Beethoven there but maybe I'm straining my ears a tad. The Bernard Herrmann makes sense, there's certainly a touch of Psycho.
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016 edited
    There is definite Lean in those scenes. Hence I wouldn't be surprised if a certain Jarre-ian attitude isn't present as well -- a big epic, string-laden, melancholic theme for when Lawrence/Mad Max contemplates his position in a solitary desert landscape. Agreed, it doesn't really sound like Jarre, but it has that whole Lean/Jarre approach to it, in my opinion.

    You can all ridicule that observation, if you will, but it's one I stand firmly behind. In fact, it was one of the most striking things when I first saw the film (in addition to that whole Rammstein/car chase aesthetic for most of the rest of the film).
    I am extremely serious.
  1. Thor wrote
    it doesn't really sound like Jarre, but it has that whole Lean/Jarre approach to it, in my opinion.

    I can't wrap my head around this. It sounds like you're projecting that connection onto the music rather than vice versa. confused
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    What's so hard to understand? I found that to be a reasonable connection while watching certain scenes in the movie. If you don't get that connection, that's fine.
    I am extremely serious.
  2. I can see the connection with the film, but certainly not with the music!

    Also, I think Rammstein itself could have provided a far more interesting score to Mad Max than Junkie XL did.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016 edited
    Edmund Meinerts wrote
    I can see the connection with the film, but certainly not with the music!


    That's fine. I do. Certainly in approach (in those scenes), as explained above.

    Also, I think Rammstein itself could have provided a far more interesting score to Mad Max than Junkie XL did.


    That connection has more to do with how Rammstein conceptualizes their concerts than the actual music, but yeah -- as much as I think JXL's music is perfect the way it is, I'm also tantalized by the idea of Till Lindeman or some of the other guys doing a score. Any kind of score, really.
    I am extremely serious.
  3. So your idea is: Take any given pop musician, pair him with any given orchestrator, assign those to any given film project and the result will be an interesting score.

    wink Volker
    Bach's music is vibrant and inspired.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016 edited
    Captain Future wrote
    So your idea is: Take any given pop musician, pair him with any given orchestrator, assign those to any given film project and the result will be an interesting score.

    wink Volker


    Yes!!

    Well, no, not quite. But I think one of the most interesting things happening right now, is talented artists from the pop and rock world (with a cinematic flair) coming in and doing interesting film scores -- sometimes even superior or more rewarding than the 'specialists'. In fact, my Top 10 of the year has a fair amount of these.
    I am extremely serious.
  4. As far as I'm concerned it has worked, really worked, exactly once: Tron Legacy - and that's with a fair amount of help from "specialists". A pretty poor hit-to-miss ratio from where I'm standing. I don't have an ideological problem with pop, rock, electronica or what-have-you artists coming in and doing film scores, but the proof is rather in the pudding if you ask me.

    The biggest issue (for me, likely not for you, Thor, which is where we part ways for good on this matter) is how little attention most of these outfits pay to narrative. I feel like the music is rarely even spotted to film most of the time. Junkie XL isn't quite as bad as Trent Reznor in that respect (at least he employs some basic film music techniques), but even so, his many many action cues in Mad Max are desperately lacking structure. They start loud, continue loud and end loud with a bare minimum of sync points or changes in tone. Compare "Desert Chase" from Raiders of the Lost Ark, written for a not dissimilar scene, but which ratchets up the tension throughout and which reflects the ebb and flow of the chase - now the Nazis have the upper hand, now Indy's gotten back up on his feet, and so on (but in a way that's not just simple Mickey-mousing either). It's so much more involving and gratifying to listen to - not to mention light-years more sophisticated musically.

    I'm not saying that Williams' neoromantic orchestral style is what was needed, but rather his gift for storytelling. I think it would have been perfectly possible for a talented composer to take Junkie XL's basic ingredients - drums, synths, electric guitar - and create music that does more than just generate noise and basic propulsion.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016 edited
    Well, I'm really more interested in SOUND most of the time, than structure -- providing the film with its unique soundscape (and is also brilliant on album).

    My favourite score of 2015 succeeds masterfully in that regard -- Cat's Eyes' score for THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY. I have some issues with the film itself, but the score is such a gorgeous masterpiece, my jaw dropped when I first heard it. Soooo much more interesting than more traditional, "film music"-ey stuff from the specialists. Mozart channeled through Delerue channeled through electronica in this fantastic symphonic pop/fusion thing that set it apart from everything else last year.

    JXL -- despite some Zimmerisms here and there -- feels like a breath of fresh air amongst all the conventional stuff, because he's bringing all his brilliant production and electronica skills to the table. If you don't like it, that's fine. But it would be terribly ignorant to deny that particular aspect of it.
    I am extremely serious.
  5. There have been over the years numerous scores by pop musicians that I liked in and outside the respsctive films.

    - Toto's score for Dune is among my all time favourites.
    - Everything Vangelis did. (Though I don't consider him a pure pop musician, a cross over artist rather.)
    - Quite a number of scores by Hans Zimmer
    - The Alan Parsons inspired "Ladyhawk"
    - Scores by Mike Batt
    - "Tron Legacy" has been mentioned already.
    - Wendy Carlos, another cross over phenomenon

    And surely others that don't come to mind right now.
    Bach's music is vibrant and inspired.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016 edited
    Hans Zimmer and Vangelis are pretty much 'specialists' and not really just 'import artists' anymore.

    I used to be critical of this concept back in the 90s, but now I find it to be one of the most exciting things out there. Weird how we change.
    I am extremely serious.
  6. Yeah, I don't think you can call Zimmer or Vangelis (or Elfman) a crossover artist anymore.

    I'll allow Dune though, Volker, that's a score I quite enjoy (if not love) - but again, it has narrative and themes and "film-musicy-elements" that just happen to originate from a band.

    It's funny you mention JXL's "brilliant production" - you'd think, right? But no: Mad Max sounds like ass. Loudness wars to the max, everything squished together and overamplified in the interest of NOISE, NOISE, NOISE, NOISE. Nothing breathes in that score. It sounds terrible. Usually not something that hugely bothers me, but when done to this level it sucks what little dynamism the composition had in the first place right out.
  7. The 1980 TV movie "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", starring Jeff Goldblum and Meg Foster doing her Kirstie Alley face impression.

    I've not read the book, only seen a few TV interpretations, including that famous aniamted one with the flaming pumpkin end, so I can only make comments comparrative to those, but in this long-ish TV movie, the take is different; characters are expanded, more people are added to the cast with little side plots that tie everything together, and we are left questioning whether in this film there is even a headless horseman.

    Goldblum does a good job tough there is still a little bit of -- what is in every role I've seen him in -- Hey, I'm Jeff Goldblum playing this character tint to it.

    The orchestral score is by Bob Summers. Nothing amazing or remarkable, but some cues might be nice to hear apart from the film.


    Over all a decent TV movie and if you got nothing to do one weekend, it might be the thing for you.


    A quick search indicated it's only on VHS, but OOP, so your best bet is a youtube load.
    The views and opinions of Ford A. Thaxton are his own and do not necessarily reflect the ones of ANYONE else.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    Edmund Meinerts wrote
    It's funny you mention JXL's "brilliant production" - you'd think, right? But no: Mad Max sounds like ass. Loudness wars to the max, everything squished together and overamplified in the interest of NOISE, NOISE, NOISE, NOISE. Nothing breathes in that score. It sounds terrible. Usually not something that hugely bothers me, but when done to this level it sucks what little dynamism the composition had in the first place right out.


    You hear noise, I hear brilliance. That's how the world goes.
    I am extremely serious.
  8. It's not about what I hear. It's a FACT that JXL's score is compressed beyond belief and, yes, noisy.
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      CommentAuthorErik Woods
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    ^ It's sooooooooo noisy... but it has to be that way to battle with the relentless over-mixed sound effects. It's also doesn't help the Junkie's score is mix in a way that all dynamics are lost do to the highly compressed dynamic range. Loudness wars as it's all time worst.

    -Erik-
    host and executive producer of THE CINEMATIC SOUND RADIO PODCAST | www.cinematicsound.net | www.facebook.com/cinematicsound | I HAVE TINNITUS!
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    It's SUPPOSED to be an assault on the senses. That's the whole purpose of the film.
    I am extremely serious.
  9. You can have a piece of music be an assault on the senses and also be mixed and mastered competently.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2016
    I think it is, so I disagree with you and Erik on that point.
    I am extremely serious.
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      CommentAuthorErik Woods
    • CommentTimeJan 4th 2016
    Edmund Meinerts wrote
    You can have a piece of music be an assault on the senses and also be mixed and mastered competently.


    Yup! THIS!

    -Erik-
    host and executive producer of THE CINEMATIC SOUND RADIO PODCAST | www.cinematicsound.net | www.facebook.com/cinematicsound | I HAVE TINNITUS!
  10. Thor wrote
    I think it is, so I disagree with you and Erik on that point.

    That's like defending spelling and grammar errors in a novel as a stylistic choice. It doesn't really work that way.
  11. Spelling errors (emulating some kind of regional idiom or social vernacular) and grammar errors are indeed often used for stylistic reasons in written fiction.
    Bach's music is vibrant and inspired.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeJan 4th 2016 edited
    Edmund Meinerts wrote
    Thor wrote
    I think it is, so I disagree with you and Erik on that point.

    That's like defending spelling and grammar errors in a novel as a stylistic choice. It doesn't really work that way.


    Nope. It's subjective. Sure, you could put a chart with audio waves in front of me, and say this is more compressed than something else (if that were indeed the case), but that's really just half the story. Far more important is the EXPERIENCE of sound as it is in the film. Sometimes, the music is swallowed by the sound effects, othertimes it's given more presence -- but it's always part of the total aural (and visual) experience that the film tries to create. It's supposed to wash over you that way. Mixing it differently would betray the film's project.
    I am extremely serious.
    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeJan 4th 2016 edited
    I don't suppose anyone here, of those who could access it, watched the documentary LENINGRAD & THE ORCHESTRA THAT DEFIED HITLER on BBC2 on Saturday night?

    What a story. How a group of starving musicians assembled in the city of Leningrad to perform Shostakovitch 7th symphony in 1942, a year into the 29 month siege by the Nazis.

    Well worth your time and available on BBC catch-up.
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
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      CommentAuthorSouthall
    • CommentTimeJan 5th 2016
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      CommentAuthorSouthall
    • CommentTimeJan 5th 2016
  12. Southall wrote
    War and Peace

    I enjoyed it. I thought that Martin Phipps' score was quite adventurous at times: some of the vocal work sounded quite interesting. I'd hope that there's some release of the score at some point in the future.
    The views expressed in this post are entirely my own and do not reflect the opinions of maintitles.net, or for that matter, anyone else. http://www.racksandtags.com/falkirkbairn
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      CommentAuthorSouthall
    • CommentTimeJan 5th 2016
    FalkirkBairn wrote
    Southall wrote
    War and Peace

    I enjoyed it. I thought that Martin Phipps' score was quite adventurous at times: some of the vocal work sounded quite interesting. I'd hope that there's some release of the score at some point in the future.


    Yes, I quite enjoyed it too. I thought the music was a slightly odd blend of old-school Russian choral and very modern Desplat. Will be curious to hear it on CD.
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      CommentAuthorSouthall
    • CommentTimeJan 5th 2016
    Dickensian

    Tried one episode. Didn't like it. Nice idea but too many characters, no real idea what was going on a lot of the time.