The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret Of the Unicorn by John Williams

[Incanus 5,891]

"Most"? I think not.

It is getting more common but you really can't say most scores get any expanded/ with extras treatment. I think out of all newer generation composers Brian Tyler usually fills his score albums to the brim and Giacchino has an occasional bonus cue thrown into the mix. Mark Isham's own label released e.g. his score The Conspirator in two formats, complete score with alternates etc. and a regular soundtrack album and even a special 2 CD 200 copy limited version with both CDs. Now that's taking fans into consideration. Then there are bigger sellers like HP which naturally has potential for a more buyers, and the deluxe sets are marketed among other things with extra music.

[King Mark 3,975]

yeah but with Giacchino albums , such as Let Me In and Super 8, the album is impeccably assembled to include as much of the score as fits on the c.d. in mostly chronological order

If War Horse and Tintin are like that I'll be the first one to stop complaining

But we'll get the microedits, reprised cues , a bunch of highlights left off as usual. You all know that .

[Romão 2,473]

And we'll get wonderfully assembled albums, as usual

[King Mark 3,975]

Williams OSTs are usually the worst assembled film score albums

It' s been like that since 1983, starting with Return of the Jedi

[Jay 46,245]

Williams has been arranging his albums in non-chronological order and editing out sections of cues, and combining cues from different parts of the movie together, from the very beginning. Long before ROTJ.

ROTJ just stunk because it was a 40 minute release that was mostly concert arrangements and alternates

[King Mark 3,975]

Decent presentation Williams albums of " franchise" type score:

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Attack of the Clones

that's about it

[Romão 2,473]

Jurassic Park

TPM and Hook (as could as they could be on one cd)

among others

[Incanus 5,891]

In my opinion Williams succeeds about 50% of the time when assembling his albums. The longer, more operatic scores with more material tend to suffer from the limitation of a single album. His soundtrack albums for his drama and comedy scores have been very good listening experiences, not leaving you wanting much more.

Angela's Ashes, Sleepers, SPR, Seven Years in Tibet, Presumed Innocent, Catch Me If You Can, Rosewood, Sabrina, War of the Worlds, Munich, The Terminal, Always, Stepmom all are well rounded albums that satisfy my need for their respective score presentation.

[King Mark 3,975]

Jurassic Park

TPM

You've got to be kidding me. These are among the worse offenders, especially TPM

(Return of the Jedi and Temple of Doom hold the trophy of worst OST's)

[Incanus 5,891]

I have to agree on TPM with KM. It is perhaps the most disjointed SW album ever produced, the tracks edited to high heaven to produce a jumble of pieces containing music from all over the place.

JP album could benefit from culling the repetition.

[Jay 46,245]

The TPM not only includes music from all over the place in every track, it leaves off just about all the important highlights. It is indeed one of the worst JW OSTs in that regard.

[Romão 2,473]

What can I tell you, I love the original album from TPM. I listen to it more often than any other version of this score

[King Mark 3,975]

And the thing is about JP is if they had done it right (instead of putting the same recording of Island Fanfare in 3 tracks) , there would be no need for an expanded release now

[Jay 46,245]

There is no music repeated 3 times on the OST. There are just two separate pieces of music that are each presented twice

[King Mark 3,975]

What can I tell you, I love the original album from TPM. I listen to it more often than any other version of this score

I hated it since the first day I listened to it, and even more after I saw the movie

The suckiness of that OST is the reason Ricard created JWfan

[Jay 46,245]

That is a good point!

I don't know how people can like that OST after seeing the movie. Almost all the best music is not included on it. All those gorgeous versions of the Force Theme - melting the blast doors, Anakin leaving home, Anakin destroying the Battleship - not included!

[Romão 2,473]

Some of the edits are great, like Panaka's and the Queen's Protectors or Anakin Defeats Sebulba. I'm just judging what's on the cd, how the music flows. It is a great listening experience, it's an album I'll always keep even if they release a complete score like Trent's wonderful edit

[Incanus 5,891]

What can I tell you, I love the original album from TPM. I listen to it more often than any other version of this score

I hated it since the first day I listened to it, and even more after I saw the movie

The suckiness of that OSt is the reason JWfan was created

And thus out of hatred JWFan was born. From the ashes of bitter disappointment a gleaming hope to the future generations of John Williams fans rose like a phoenix wreathed in blue flame!

I find it a bit distressing that JWFan was created out of pure discontent towards the TPM OST. I know the love for the music was the reason, although the obsessive love to hear great music turned into discontent toward Sony quite soon as the dreaded Ultimate Edition was released. I can still remember the days when I used to read news about video game files where the music could be found, Duel of the Fates lyrics, etc. on the ancient site.

[Neimoidian 15]

What can I tell you, I love the original album from TPM. I listen to it more often than any other version of this score

What can I tell you, I love the original album from TPM. I listen to it more often than any other version of this score

Me 2. The score is just too grand and too large to fit one CD. As good as some of the missing higlights are, if they got rid of any cue from the OST, people would nonetheless complain it wasn't on CD.

[Jay 46,245]

That's simply not true. If the OST had contained the 3 cues I mentioned containing the Force Theme, plus the Maul/Qui-Gon dessert fight, and some of the original ending battle music that was replaced by DOTF, and removed the duplicate versions of Anakin's Theme, DOTF, and Arrival at Naboo, and removed tracks like He Is the Chosen One and Wattoo's Deal and Kids At Play, then it would have been a MUCH stronger OST and we would have a lot less to complain about

[Incanus 5,891]

[Me 2. The score is just too grand and too large to fit one CD. As good as some of the missing higlights are, if they got rid of any cue from the OST, people would nonetheless complain it wasn't on CD.

I believe that's also true. There are some definite highlight on the album. But still the coherence of the listening experience is weak. There are several central cues that should have been on the album if you consider it a collection of highlights.

[fommes 165]

In my opinion Williams succeeds about 50% of the time when assembling his albums. The longer, more operatic scores with more material tend to suffer from the limitation of a single album. His soundtrack albums for his drama and comedy scores have been very good listening experiences, not leaving you wanting much more.

Angela's Ashes, Sleepers, SPR, Seven Years in Tibet, Presumed Innocent, Catch Me If You Can, Rosewood, Sabrina, War of the Worlds, Munich, The Terminal, Always, Stepmom all are well rounded albums that satisfy my need for their respective score presentation.

Agreed completely - though I can't help noticing a few scores on that list that shouldn't be there. I think Catch Me if You Can doesn't run very well as a listening experience with all the songs (and also leaves off some great music if I remember correctly); War of the Worlds is terribly, terribly sequenced (put it in chronological order and it improves a lot) - it also manages to find and cut out the best 15 seconds of the whole Escape from the City track, and Munich has all its highlights in the first few tracks so to speak (what were they drinking when they put that in "listening experience" order).

I know many of you don't like KM's overly pessimism, but he's expressing the inner fanboy in a lot of us, I believe. I'm always happy with an album listening experience, and I think there should always be one, and I played the Phantom Menace OST to death as well, regardless of the bad selection of cues, but at a certain point you want the other good bits too, and personally I'm growing a bit tired of having to wait 25 years before there's even a slight chance of expansion. It's depressing to think that we have to wait that long each time; think about it: Tintin, the complete score, by KM Records, in 2036. If we're lucky! And that's not in opposition of 'being content' with what we already have: it's both at the same time.

So I guess I'm kind of defending KM here; while it's very premature, I also think he has a good reason for being suspicious of Williams albums, given Williams's microedited track record.

And it's good to see that occasionally we get some bonus tracks here and there on other soundtracks, from the beginning, but then they always screw that up as well, don't they? I'm not familiar with Tron, but weren't there bonus tracks all over the place, and you had to basically buy it five times? With Deathly Hallows, the box set was ridiculously expensive, the DVD was hopelessly scratched (and didn't even offer an improvement over the CD quality, containing only as much MB as one CD), and the LP was worthless (without any unreleased stuff). As a consequence: nothing for Part 2. Same story with The Phantom Menace. One would think that they wouldn't make the same mistakes each time.

Anyway - rant over! Back to enjoying the music we do have, again

[BloodBoal 8,711]

[fommes 165]

Oh, boy! If that label existed, we would have perfectly complete Williams releases each time... and nothing from other composers, obviously.

Except maybe an unreleased Goldsmith-scored logo

[King Mark 3,975]

War of the Worlds is terribly, terribly sequenced (put it in chronological order and it improves a lot) - it also manages to find and cut out the best 15 seconds of the whole Escape from the City track,

You know your in trouble when the best musical bit of the score has narration over it . Twice!

That's exactly the type of thing I'm talking about

Angela's Ashes. Had to buy the album twice to get the version without narration

HPSS. No Gryffyndor Wins...album loses 10 points right there. It's part of the Finale ,for crying out loud.

PoA. Somehow Saving Buckbeak is not on the album but the rest of that sequence is. Opening of the End Credit is not there. Mischief Managed which is an edit of tracks we already heard

RotS. Palpatine's Teachings and Padme's Ruminations. Re-recording of the Throne Room instead of new music, The best part of Anakin's Dark Deeds edited out and the little amazing choir bit in Anakin's Betrayal....also microedited out

[crocodile 9,724]

My glass is still half full.

Karol

[Incanus 5,891]

My glass is still half full.

Karol

I can't say I am overly pessimistic.

We are just offering some criticism on JWs album producing habits.

P.S. In my listing of great JW albums I did not pay too much heed to the sequencing of the music but to the content, how much music from the film the album offers VS how much I would like to hear from the film. It of course does not mean that I would not be happy if any of them got expanded.

- WotW album needs resequencing and the narration is bit of a bother but goes with JW's listening experience.

- European pressing of Angela's Ashes was without narration from the start (hooray for common sense Decca!).

- Catch Me If You Can album is a good listen after you excise the songs. On the other hand some people like those in the mix. And the score is missing a couple of minutes of music that would be pretty neat but does not detract from the album experience.

[King Mark 3,975]

We got very LUCKY Decca released Angela's Ashes. And I bet the no narration was somekind of producing mistake when it was too late for JW to say anything

I have NO issues with the following albums

Schindler's List

Rosewood

Sleepers

Sabrina

Amistad

Saving Private Ryan

Seven Years in Tibet

Minority Report

Catch Me If You Can (I don't care they put songs because most of the score is on the c.d.)

The Terminal

Munich

Memoirs of a Geisha

Unfortunatly all these scores gather a lot more dust than the ones that are screwed up

[Incanus 5,891]

We got very LUCKY Decca released Angela's Ashes. And I bet the no narration was somekind of producing mistake when it was too late for JW to say anything

I bet it was actually JW who wanted the narration there.

Incidentally that list of yours contains many of my favourite JW scores.

[Josh500 1,620]

We got very LUCKY Decca released Angela's Ashes. And I bet the no narration was somekind of producing mistake when it was too late for JW to say anything

I bet it was actually JW who wanted the narration there.

Incidentally that list of yours contains many of my favourite JW scores.

The book Angela's Ashes was HUGE bestseller.

So from a commercial standpoint, it makes sense that the narration was included on the album. I bet that fact alone convinced many many non-soundtrack fans (but fans of the book) to buy the album.

That said, we got lucky of course, that a non-narration version was released, too.

[Incanus 5,891]

We got very LUCKY Decca released Angela's Ashes. And I bet the no narration was somekind of producing mistake when it was too late for JW to say anything

I bet it was actually JW who wanted the narration there.

Incidentally that list of yours contains many of my favourite JW scores.

The book Angela's Ashes was HUGE bestseller.

So from a commercial standpoint, it makes sense that the narration was included on the album. I bet that fact alone convinced many many non-soundtrack fans (but fans of the book) to buy the album.

That said, we got lucky of course, that a non-narration version was released, too.

Well the narration might be a marketing point for English speaking countries but not so much elsewhere.

And I remembered correctly. JW did produce the soundtrack(s) himself.

The Boston Globe, page D15, January 28th, 2000

Williams produced the CD himself; the disc exists in two versions. In English-speaking countries, actor Andrew Bennett speaks a connecting narration, as he does in the film; in the rest of the world, the record appears without the narration. "There's a broad foreign market for soundtrack recordings, and people felt the narration would be a problem there."

I am glad these people had some sense to say that to JW.

[Josh500 1,620]

We got very LUCKY Decca released Angela's Ashes. And I bet the no narration was somekind of producing mistake when it was too late for JW to say anything

I bet it was actually JW who wanted the narration there.

Incidentally that list of yours contains many of my favourite JW scores.

The book Angela's Ashes was HUGE bestseller.

So from a commercial standpoint, it makes sense that the narration was included on the album. I bet that fact alone convinced many many non-soundtrack fans (but fans of the book) to buy the album.

That said, we got lucky of course, that a non-narration version was released, too.

I remembered correctly. JW did produce the soundtrack himself.

The Boston Globe, page D15, January 28th, 2000

Williams produced the CD himself; the disc exists in two versions. In English-speaking countries, actor Andrew Bennett speaks a connecting narration, as he does in the film; in the rest of the world, the record appears without the narration. "There's a broad foreign market for soundtrack recordings, and people felt the narration would be a problem there."

I am glad these people had some sense to say that to JW.

Who told JW?

I am glad JW wrote the music, and I am glad JW released the music both with and without the narration.

[Incanus 5,891]

I remembered correctly. JW did produce the soundtrack himself.

The Boston Globe, page D15, January 28th, 2000

Williams produced the CD himself; the disc exists in two versions. In English-speaking countries, actor Andrew Bennett speaks a connecting narration, as he does in the film; in the rest of the world, the record appears without the narration. "There's a broad foreign market for soundtrack recordings, and people felt the narration would be a problem there."

I am glad these people had some sense to say that to JW.

Who told JW?

I am glad JW wrote the music, and I am glad JW released the music both with and without the narration.

Most likely the record label people told JW that the narration would not be marketable enough outside US. People in charge of selling this CD and marketing it.

I for one am just happy it was released without narration so I can enjoy the pure music.

[Josh500 1,620]

Most likely the record label people told JW that the narration would not be marketable enough outside US. People in charge of selling this CD and marketing it.

Most likely...?

Aren't you assuming too much? If anything, I would assume that the Sony marketing people wanted to put the narration there.

But that's also pure speculation.

I for one am just happy it was released without narration so I can enjoy the pure music.

Yes.

[Incanus 5,891]

Most likely...?

Aren't you assuming too much? If anything, I would assume that the Sony marketing people wanted to put the narration there.

But that's also pure speculation.

The Boston Globe article seems to indicate that Williams actually had his say on inserting the narration on the album and was perhaps the person to suggest it. The same goes for the WotW album. The narration would not be there if JW did not want it there in the first place.

[Josh500 1,620]

What does the Boston Globe know, I'd like to know.

But more important, the music wouldn't be there at all if not for JW, so I won't bitch about a bit of harmless narration on the WotW album. And AA is a non-issue anyway.

[King Mark 3,975]

Holy crap I forgot to bitch and moan about the A.I. OST. Where to start. Nah there's just too much

We can thank our lucky stars for that mistake promo

[Josh500 1,620]

All in all, JW fans are pretty lucky, I think. We have no reason to bitch, really.

Many many major JW scores have been treated to a special edition over the years. Sure, there are sill some missing, but hey... what would be the fun in getting them all at once?

And, as if that wasn't enough, this year we are getting 2 brandnew JW scores to boot!

[Maurizio 6,913]

I don't know, it's probably a matter of personal taste and preference. I usually enjoy how Williams presents his own music on the OST album. Yes, there are several exceptions and the reasons are various. Sometimes the selection is inspired and well-balanced, other times instead it lacks something or it's just a too scant presentation. But it always depends on the type and the style of the score itself. As Jason said, sometimes the scope and the length of the score is just too grand to be condensed into a single 70-minute album (i.e. TPM, HPSS, ROTS). Other times the score itself is a very eclectic mix of style and moods, hence it's much more complicated to create a "flowing" listening experience (Empire of the Sun, A.I. come to mind), no matter how it's edited and sequenced.

It seems to me that some people here always prefer to concentrate on the negative and seem incapable of sit back, relax, put on the CD and enjoy the music.

[Josh500 1,620]

And the thing is about JP is if they had done it right (instead of putting the same recording of Island Fanfare in 3 tracks) , there would be no need for an expanded release now

Don't you know? The "Island Fanfare" in "Journey to the Island" is a completely different version from the one in "End Credits"!

[Sandor 918]

I don't know, it's probably a matter of personal taste and preference. I usually enjoy how Williams presents his own music on the OST album. Yes, there are several exceptions and the reasons are various. Sometimes the selection is inspired and well-balanced, other times instead it lacks something or it's just a too scant presentation. But it always depends on the type and the style of the score itself. As Jason said, sometimes the scope and the length of the score is just too grand to be condensed into a single 70-minute album (i.e. TPM, HPSS, ROTS). Other times the score itself is a very eclectic mix of style and moods, hence it's much more complicated to create a "flowing" listening experience (Empire of the Sun, A.I. come to mind), no matter how it's edited and sequenced.

It seems to me that some people here always prefer to concentrate on the negative and seem incapable of sit back, relax, put on the CD and enjoy the music.

Yeah.

I think Williams is also a bit underrated as a producer IMO. It is easy to reject his original album of CE3K for example, just because there are many edits and it's missing a lot of music from the film. But you know what? As an album I find it much more satisfying than the (almost) complete score representation that came out decades later. It's the Williams-album I return to most, even if the sound-quality isn't that great.

[Josh500 1,620]

Yes. But it's not just that with some JW is underrated as a producer. Some people outright crap on him.

But you know what? It's his music, his album, his "vision." He can present the music to us any way he likes. You don't have to like it, but there's no need to crap on him, either.

And besides, the many Special Editions wouldn't have happened without JW's approval to satisfy the tiny fringe group that are into stuff like that (us, in other words).

[fommes 165]

In the case of Angela's Ashes: I love the idea of the usually lousy marketers (who most of the time screw things up) saving an entire JW album for us. Shouldn't it be the musician who needs to fight for the integrity of his music? Or: Williams is so bad at making album decisions, even the marketers do it better!

[BloodBoal 8,711]

[Josh500 1,620]

But you know what? It's his music, his album, his "vision." He can present the music to us any way he likes. You don't have to like it, but there's no need to crap on him, either.

Why not? I don't know about you, but I live in a democracy, and the great thing about living in a democracy is that if you don't like something, you can tell it. So I say let's crap on Williams for democracy's sake.

I don't know where you live, but where I live "saying things" and "crapping on somebody" are not the same thing.

In the case of Angela's Ashes: I love the idea of the usually lousy marketers (who most of the time screw things up) saving an entire JW album for us. Shouldn't it be the musician who needs to fight for the integrity of his music? Or: Williams is so bad at making album decisions, even the marketers do it better!

Bwaahaha. Case in point.

[BloodBoal 8,711]

[Josh500 1,620]

Where do you live?

[King Mark 3,975]

Josh500. From crazed poll maker to sensible Williams OST apologist

[Josh500 1,620]

I just don't like the endless bitchin' is all.

[BloodBoal 8,711]