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Incanus

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Everything posted by Incanus

  1. 25 years! Happy belated birthday to JWFAN and my warmest thanks to @Ricard for creating this place and all the great people here for making it this wonderful, vibrant community.
  2. That was another great conversation from more of a fan perspective and having nice insights to the music and discussions on the music's relation to the film. I loved those personal stories relating to the first experiences with this music and how affecting it was back in 1991. Also just having JW fans geeking out on the magnificent music was great to hear. Very much a shared sentiment guys!
  3. Well this 1st Hook episode was a thoroughly fascinating and engaging one. And it opened a window into the complexities of producing of these expanded/complete soundtrack releases in a very engaging way. I also loved the little asides touching on different releases, actually a lot of Williams and other scores, along the way from 2016 until the release of Hook Ultimate Edition. This release obviously felt like a culmination of something big to Mike as well. A long and circuitous journey finally complete. As a film score fan I felt deeply grateful after listening to this as hearing about the enormous amount of work and finessing involved in some of these releases made appreciate Mike Matessino's integrity and his work philosophy all the more. No point in doing things if you are not going to do them right. Yeah that just sounds like cynical repackaging of previous versions with minimum effort to get it out quickly for some extra bucks. Quite a few of the Deutsch soundtrack re-releases unfortunately followed this same philosophy.
  4. Well I have now finished my second full listen of the whole set and it is staggeringly glorious! While Jurassic Park was my introduction to John Williams' music and basically turned me into a fan back in 1993, Hook isn't far behind (Presenting the Hook sequence might be one of my earliest musical memories from movies in general) and the complete score has been my holy grail ever since I figured out that the OST was missing so much of the beautiful music. I won't reiterate too many of the thoughts so many others have already expressed in this thread about this beautfiul release. But I can't lie. I did shed a tear or two listening to this new presentation all the while grinning from ear-to-ear with delight. It is such a long time wish and now it has been delivered beyond my wildest expectations. The score most certainly holds a nostalgic place in my heart and aptly this score is so strongly about childhood and nostalgia. But at the same time seems to have it all: The winning thematic melodicism, the athletic (or should I say in this case acrobatic) colourful orchestral writing, the absolutely pitch perfect way Williams captures both the subtext and the straightforward narrative needs of the film while writing superbly engaging and intricate music that in itself paints such vivid pictures and stands on its own as well as functions likea musical mirror to the movie. In fact the music feels so very much in tune with the movie that it seems to capture the very mood and even lighting of the scenes in its notes. To me it is one of those perfect scores that seems like a world unto itself. The complete score on discs 1 and 2 is such a powerhouse of a fantasy score, now all the more satisfying in its truly complete form, inserts and all. Too many highlights to mention. The 3rd disc was a small revelation as it presents all the songs written for the production that were ultimately dropped. But their history detailed in the excellent liner notes goes a long way explaining the reason for the long lined melodies many of the themes in this score have. In a way the songs on disc 3 do enchance the listening experience of the full score as you really can chart the thematic development through them even better than before. Not all of the songs are winners but pieces like The Low Below - Pirate Sequence, Stick With Me and Childhood are just as catchy and delightful in their song guise as in the final underscore. The diegetic bonus material is equally wonderful in its piraty feel and makes you once again appreciate how much of Williams' musical effort for this movie went behind-the-scenes, unknown until now. Part and parcel of the film composer's craft but it is wonderful to finally hear all this existing recorded material. This is just about as Ultimate as a film music release can get (we even have stuff like Take Me Out to the Ball Game!) and a perfect Christmas present! My humble thanks to Mike Matessino, @Jay and @John Takis and everybody at La-La Land Records for producing this. P.S. I couldn't help but chuckle when I thought of the other John Williams "Ultimate edition" having a blue cover, a polar opposite of this one.
  5. Another great talk @TownerFan and @mahler3! As I have said before I could listen to you guys talk shop about John WIlliams all day. And since Heidi and Jane Eyre are personal favourites, it was especially interesting to hear the discussion on development of Williams' style and how and why these two scores were an important step in his career. Many of these points are also mentioned in the excellent liner notes for this release by John Takis but it was nice to hear snippets about the behind-the-scenes details on the production of this set like the hunting for the materials and how the new additional tracks for Jane Eyre were found. Looking forward to the extensive chat on Hook in the near future!
  6. Since I am soon travelling to my hometown for holidays I had to reroute the delivery of my package there. So I'll have to wait over the weekend to get my Hook. Oh well. A couple more days won't hurt. Much.
  7. This particular choral passage has always been one of my favourite moments in Hook. Simply magical.
  8. Shame that the original scores were destroyed but a reconstructed re-recording would be fantastic. I think e.g. the re-recording of Nino Rota's Romeo and Juliet and Goldsmith's QBVII and The Salamander are great examples of this.
  9. Yeah and it usually takes about 2 weeks or more for MBR to get their stock. So I expect they'll start sending their orders out soon-ish. I remember that last year I received my copy of Amistad ordered from MBR just before Christmas.
  10. For anyone with more than passing knowledge of these scores it still sounds extremely disjointed and bitty, a bit of cue from here and a bit from there. In the film the sound effects, dialogue etc. might hide some of it but on its own the cues cobbled together (whoever did it) sounds like a pretty awful mishmash. I would have taken original music interpolating some of the older Indy themes over this any day.
  11. The opening third is the worst offender. It feels like a complete cut and paste job of schizophrenic borrowing, not just from the Indy scores but from the likes of Minority Report and War of the Worlds as well. I can't believe cobbling together the prologue from such little snippets of Indiana Jones music was very satisfying. The rest 2/3 of the score when it steers into new writing has some quite excellent moments in it. Not on the level of the previous Indy scores but still very nice.
  12. Yeah it is their customary e-mail with these pre-orders. LLL releases usually arrive to the Music Box Records in about two weeks after they become available at the LLL store, sometimes it even takes longer. I might receive my copy of Hook (along with the new Mask of Zorro and Sneakers releases) just before Christmas if I am lucky.
  13. I think I am going to listen to the whole set from start to finish. Hearing the complete score in full for the first time will be glorious! I am certain disc 3 will be a fascinating collection of materials, songs, alternates and source music, but the actual film score in chronological order is certainly a priority for me.
  14. Yay my copy finally arrived today. And in a surprisingly good condition. Only a slight crack in the jewel case.
  15. My copy finally arrived to Finland today. Of course I had to pay extra 10 € for VAT and postal service fee. One of the most expensive regular OST albums I ever bought for certain. Hopefully I'll see my CD delivered next week.
  16. I assumed this was some kind of pre-recorded medley of music of Smee playing his concertina, which wasn't ultimately used in the film as he doesn't play one in the movie. Or some such. So much new material on this set to explore.
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