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What Is The Last Score You Listened To? (older scores)


Ollie

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The Bride of Frankenstein - Franz Waxman

 

Listened to this amazing score (or at least what’s available of it) on the new LLL album after watching the movie.

 

If you are completely unfamiliar with this score, you really must listen to this from the re-recording to at least see what all the fuss is about.

 

Listen from about 4:58 in

 

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With so many tracks it's a bit sketchy but Terence Blanchard's musical integrity is always in place. It's like one of those 90's Tom Newman americana scores 'a la 'Shawshank' or 'Green Mile', though sadly more muted thematically. Great orchestrations.

 

 

 

90 minutes of which only the old Dies Irae quote stand out, the rest amounts to static mood mongering that hardly moves, a few abstract geräusch collages excepted. But hey, at least you can't claim they're skimpy.

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A clockwork orange, OST. This is such a perfect album experience. 46 minutes of highlights. This is the first time I really understand what Thor means. Now listening to the score-only album and already feel bored.

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The King by Nicholas Britell

 

Don't let the lofty-minded track titles fool you. Some occasionally interesting textures aside, it's a largely monotonous sonic palette that borrows from the Zimmer school of brooding minor-key melodrama. Britell's clearly got an interesting ear for sound, but his core musical ideas sometimes lack real weight or variety, so far that it becomes more colour than substance. His mixes also tend to drown out the details of his textures, sometimes resulting in amorphous blobs of sound, especially with the primarily string-driven work of this score. With that said, it's not a bad listen at all. Cut it in half and you've got some decent, if a little half-baked, elegiac period-piece soap.

 

Succession by Nicholas Britell

 

A more successful effort at Britell's genre-bending brand. Melodrama served in some delicious Baroque stylings meets Britell's dabbling in hip-hop. Like its cousin, Vice, I'd imagine it works very well in context. Though once again, the high-minded track titles will draw a chuckle or two (at least the cited musical "forms" have a more passing resemblance to the actual music this time), and the whole thing is too long and pretty mono-thematic, but it's good fun. 

 

Midsommar by Bobby Krlic

 

All the usual genre stingers aside, this is strong stuff with a distinct sonic stamp that manages to assert itself as more than sound design, but moving music. Not an easy listen by any means, if especially because it brings back some uneasy memories of the film itself. But I'd say both the opening "Gassed" cue and the finale are some of the year's most powerful moments in film music.

 

The Lighthouse by Mark Korven

 

Again, some really interesting sounds that worked very effectively in picture. But frankly, I just don't have the patience for it on album. Well, at least not 30 minutes of it. Maybe on another day.

 

 

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Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald (JNH)

 

I love the title track, and I’ve listened to it an absurd amount of times now. Just wish we could get an entire HP score as joyful as the track from JNH, he would knock it out of the park. The fantastic beasts movies are far too clunky and overly moody

 

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Bravo Monsieur D! An entertaining light, comedic score for Costa-Gavras' (presumably satiric) political thriller about Greece in 2015: the economy is in tatters and the country is on the verge of bankruptcy. A new government rebels against the EU's iron-fisted rule. It's in the vein of 'Grand Budapest Hotel', with a bouzouki as lead instrument and a waltz-y orchestral backing. The cues are long and sustained instead of short and sketchy and it's frankly the best i heard from Desplat in a long time. Recommended!

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2 hours ago, publicist said:

 

Bravo Monsieur D! An entertaining light, comedic score for Costa-Gavras' (presumably satiric) political thriller about Greece in 2015: the economy is in tatters and the country is on the verge of bankruptcy. A new government rebels against the EU's iron-fisted rule. It's in the vein of 'Grand Budapest Hotel', with a bouzouki as lead instrument and a waltz-y orchestral backing. The cues are long and sustained instead of short and sketchy and it's frankly the best i heard from Desplat in a long time. Recommended!

Is it good if you are allergic to the sound of bouzouki in large doses, like I am?

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Learn something new every day.

14 hours ago, Incanus said:

Is it good if you are allergic to the sound of bouzouki in large doses, like I am?

 

The main theme, at the very least.

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Travelling to London while listening to some James Horner/LSO goodness:

 

An American Tail

The Land Before Time

The Pagemaster

Balto

 

All of these taste absolutely delicious at this time of the year. :)

 

Karol

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A Hidden Life - JNH

I've come to appreciate more this score after listening to it a few times. The delightfully folksy main theme is a direct relative to The Village, "The Healing" from Lady in the Water and "The Strawberry Fields" from Snow Falling on Cedars, but it's not all that present. Much of the score uses the solo violin and the strings to illustrate harsh living conditions, like he did on Defiance, parts from The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, and the Credence music from the first Fantastic Beasts - it's impressively done, but it's not exactly easy listening. On the other hand, he manages to find hope in amidst the darkness, on beautiful tracks such as "Return", "Hope" and "Knotted".

 

I'm curious to watch the movie, and also for the official OST, which I imagine it will be a more cohese listening experience. The FYC lacks an end title suite or something to sums up the musical ideas presented here.
 

Snow Falling on Cedars - also James Howard Newton

First time I've listened to the album in a long time. It's a weird combination of electronics, Japanese instruments, solo cello, solo violin, choir and a string section, that somehow manages to create an atmosphere - a dark, depressing atmosphere. "The Evacuation" is a highlight, a sinister and dark track that I remember working perfectly on the movie, and "Tarawa" contains JNH's best choral writing of his career - if he doesn't get to the epic heights of this track when he scores the legendary magic duel between Dumbledore and Grindelwald, I'll be seriously disappointed! The beautiful, hopeful and emotional ending of the score compensates the darkness that precedes it, with "Snow Angels" and "Can I Hold You Now?" being some of the most touching music he's ever written.

 

In any case, he should be scoring these romance/drama movies more, along with all the fantasy blockbusters.

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Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Recording Sessions) — Patrick Doyle

Quality is not that great, unfortunately. This definitely deserves a proper release.
Didn't like this score that much when I first listened to it. 
But it grew on me and, as far as the HP saga goes, this is one of the few non-Williams soundtracks that stuck in my head the most.
 

 

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On 11/4/2019 at 1:29 AM, The Illustrious Jerry said:

It's that time of year again- time for another John Powell Palooza!

 

Rio by John Powell 

Very pleasant, albeit one of his lesser works. It can be subdued at times, at least in comparison to other scores, but it's a solid album and fun to listen to.

 

How To Train Your Dragon 2 by John Powell

One of Powell's many home runs, building upon it's predecessor to great effect. His theme-crafting abilities are at their heights in this trilogy. It's amazing how consistently awesome he remains over the course of three films (and the movies are some of the best animated films of this decade).

 

Ferdinand by John Powell

Another out-of-the-park hit. There's not a single disagreeable note in Madrid Finale, for starters. The entire score is just mindbogglingly good. Powell is one of those composers who gives it his all for these casual animated projects, and that is immensely admirable.

 

Hubris: Choral Works by John Powell 

Somebody stop me. Now 10 times in the last four days I've listened to this album. I had tried to start it when it first came out but couldn't get into it. I now realize that I should've tried again much sooner- it's one of my biggest muses since Solo: A Star Wars Story (also Powell- coincidence? I think not). There's so much I could say, but I'd like to take time to culminate my thoughts. I'll probably post something in the review forum.

 

Across the Stars by Anne-Sophie Mutter and John Williams

Gorgeous. It's a lot of violin on one album, but @Bespin has a great playlist for spacing things out with the Dudamel album as well. Loving Rey's Theme, Sayuri's Theme, Theme from Sabrina, and the title piece, naturally. Wonderful interpretations.

Extremely excited for John Powell's Call of the Wild score, which is surely going to kick all kinds of ass. 

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The Nines – Alex Wurman (2007)
 



This is one of my favorite scores ever.
There's something about it I can't exactly put my finger on, but it sends shiver down my spine every single time.
Love Opening and Knowing Theme. Love the movie, too.

Don't know why the tracklist is different (and shorter) here 
http://www.alexwurman.com/the-nines/ 

but it has the Out Come Free cue, which I love as well.
Wish this soundtrack had a proper release.

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On 11/3/2019 at 3:29 PM, The Illustrious Jerry said:

Across the Stars by Anne-Sophie Mutter and John Williams

 

Gorgeous. It's a lot of violin on one album, but @Bespin has a great playlist for spacing things out with the Dudamel album as well. Loving Rey's Theme, Sayuri's Theme, Theme from Sabrina, and the title piece, naturally. Wonderful interpretations.

The title piece is the only one I was underwhelmed of...

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I'm listening to it again.

 

It's a definitive film score. The reason I got into soundtracks. The full thing is fabulous, but the original album is the strongest presentation of any soundtrack I've ever heard. I'll take you back to a time when we only had this Batman and the old Adam West TV show in reruns. I knew immediately upon the opening logos that this would be the coolest movie I'd ever see and the soundtrack was obviously the best ever composed. From the ominous opening notes to the grand finale with that epic heroic fanfare and reprisal of the badass testosterone-fueled Batman Theme that became instantly memorable and iconic as we flew around the bat logo at the start of the thing, it's simply better than everything. I don't want to just watch the movie and play with the dolls. I want the music. Suddenly, everything changes.

 

They don't make 'em like they used to.

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War Horse

 

Saw the film a year ago for the first time, heard Spielberg/Williams III a less then healthy number of times, but otherwise first ever listen - I purposefully waited until I can experience the proper complete thing (expecting it to take a couple decades based on the post-2005 thing and that JW scores don't really generally leak that much), thankfully that didn't take too long!

 

And it's great!

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Only 8 years! I still find it pretty crazy that a proper 'The Lion King' had leaked almost 20 years after the initial release date of the film.

 

What's the oldest score to have leaked before?

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The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo — Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross.

This is one of my favorite of theirs, if not my favorite.
It's like listening to the sound of snow (and blizzard) covering the face of the Earth.
Brilliant score, and a gorgeous, albeit not chronological, album presentation.
Love the movie as well (Fincher delivers as always), but I wish there weren't so many unused cues.

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On 11/8/2019 at 2:44 PM, Naïve Old Fart said:

@redishere, what do you think of the cover of CELEBRATION DAY?

 

Richard, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo features a cover of Immigrant Song, not Celebration Day.

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11 hours ago, Jay said:

 

Richard, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo features a cover of Immigrant Song, no Celebration Day.

 

11 hours ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Richard's obviously referring to the SE (Scottish Edition).

Och, aye! What a fool, I was! 

Yes, I meant IMMIGRANT SONG.

@redishere, what do you think of the cover of IMMIGRANT SONG? Personally, I like it. It fits the mood of the film, as much as THE HEART'S FILTHY LESSON fits SE7EN.

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On 11/8/2019 at 3:09 AM, Bellosh said:

Robin Hood Prince of Thieves - Michael Kamen

 

The opening credits still give me goosebumps.

 

 


Stirs the blood, as does the movie ... still my favourite version of the Robin legend. I can even forgive Costner's utter lack of an attempt at an English accent. 

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8 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

Och, aye! What a fool, I was! 

Yes, I meant IMMIGRANT SONG.

@redishere, what do you think of the cover of IMMIGRANT SONG? Personally, I like it. It fits the mood of the film, as much as THE HEART'S FILTHY LESSON fits SE7EN.


I liked it quite a lot! Such a gritty and glitchy introduction to the movie's aesthetic and feel.
I also like how they covered Is Your Love Strong Enough?
Great choice for the ending.

The Heart's Filthy Lesson is perfect for Se7en, even if every time the end credits pop up I'm usually standing with my mouth agape and a blank stare.
 

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Second Desplat in a row, and for Polanski's thriller about Dreyfus affair (a thriller by genre, a reflexion about anti-semitism further down the road) he creates a driving, stark string score with an eye towards chamber music that offers little respite from its oppressive tone. It's certainly a perfect antidote to the zesty 'Adults in the Room' from last week, though both are by renowned (or infamous, depending on how laissez-faire you are) veteran directors, and it shows in the quality of Desplat's compositions, offering much more zeal than usual. Recommended, best in a pack.

 

 

Brian Tyler offers his most entertaining dish in a while, since 'Now You See Me' to be precise. With a bit of help from the cheesy 70's theme and surprisingly linear orchestration that even offers a jazz/bass flute here and there without clobbering you with dense power anthem shit. Far from a musical revelation but at least an entertaining romp if a bit on the long side.

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