Yavar Moradi

I still really dig the original 10+ min concert piece which is on YouTube (the same performance Jordan Peele ran across, apparently!) So awesome. My favorite new music in Nope is honestly his Morricone western homage...one of the very best I have ever heard. Yavar

Exactly, @Raiders of the SoundtrArk. I think @Nick1Ø66 if you were to see the film, and then watch some of the TV episodes Clarkson directed, you would be dumbfounded at the difference. No way in hell did she approve this sloppy, technically incompetent, work. I'm not saying she's some amazing director and there was a great film to be found in this, but she's been directing TV for a couple decades now and the half hour I saw of this film is far more amateurish than any TV show I've watched. Yavar

Easily the best creepy choral piece since The Omen's "Ave Satani", IMO! Yavar

I had to walk out of Madame Web after only half an hour it was so bad. Clarkson did a lot of very good directing work on TV before this (multiple very cinematic shows like TURN, Jessica Jones, and Succession) so yeah I totally believe she was largely fucked over by meddling incompetent Sony executives on this. Yavar

Honestly the 2006/2013 edition is very good too. I found the 2020 only a slight improvement over that master, though it was nice to have the full score chronological without Goldsmith’s trims and edits. Yavar

It’s not bad at all, but very good! It’s definitely the best-sounding and most complete release of the score up until that point. I’ve been enjoying it for years. If you want to sample it, it’s on YouTube (albeit not in lossless of course): The funny thing is that even though JTW keeps saying Intrada falsely marketed the 2020 release as “definitive”… they didn’t mention that word in their 2020 announcement: https://www.filmscoremonthly.com/board/posts.cfm?threadID=142438&forumID=1&archive=0 Yavar

To be clear, in your case @Trope I'm not laughing at you for being ridiculous, but because your sense of humor amused me. How do you know that about the liner notes already without reading them? But what really confuses me is... are you angry because this is the "same"/"identical" product, or because it's been "impoved"/made "better"? Because they both can't be true at once. The 2006 and 2013 editions are virtually identical. Not just the same number of discs but same number of tracks, same sound quality, same notes, and almost the same packaging. I do recall some people were upset in 2013 that Intrada was "lowering the value" of their edition which had been strictly limited to 1500 copies which sold out in like two days at the time. Again, you seem to be contradicting yourself. Either it's the same product (as the 2013 one was, essentially, compared to the 2006) or it's a new product "with a better configuration" which you're upset about being better than the one you have (which itself was at the time a new and improved product with a better configuration, compared to the earlier editions). Which is it? In your later post where you provide back cover images it's clear that Disc 3 of the 2024 edition has five additional tracks when compared against the Disc 3 from 2020. So it seems clear to me that it's not "identical", even apart from the matter of sound. Yavar

Yes they have, and I appreciate your nuance. I don't really agree it's a false equivalence because it's still a case of a Hollywood studio (or home video label) later putting out an improved edition of a film which renders the earlier edition obsolete and inferior. That's the case JTW is angry about here and I regard format change as rather incidental to that. But fine, if you don't want to jump formats there are plenty of examples of a DVD or Blu-ray being released as the BEST version of it available on home video at that time, and then a couple years later a full expensive restoration of the film elements is undertaken and lo and behold, a new BEST version comes out in the same format. I don't think purchasers of the previous edition, now rendered inferior, are entitled to free copies of the new edition. I have over a decade and a half of experience in the music industry. Not really in the world of film music but rather classical music, as a buyer for the retail operations of performing arts organizations (3.5 years with the L.A. Philharmonic, most of that at the Walt Disney Concert Hall's LA Phil Store, and now going on 11 seasons with the Santa Fe Opera Shop). I also managed Joel's Classical Shop in Houston (now moved and renamed as Classical Music of Spring, because the original founder/owner passed away) for over two years, seeing it through the tricky period of its transition to new ownership. Believe me when I tell you I've seen it all, in terms of ALL the major classical music labels (and a fair number of smaller independent ones too) reissuing, remastering, repackaging, recombining, revisiting, etc. And yes, some of those were new SACD editions of things that had only been on CD before, or Blu-ray Audio editions of things only on CD or SACD before. (Almost always the SACD editions were hybrids that also had a regular CD layer, and oftentimes the Blu-ray Audio editions would include separate CD copies which were also based on the rebuilt master that was the same source for the Blu-ray Audio disc.) But the vast, vast majority were just new editions on CD, frequently claiming improved sound and sometimes featuring never-before-released bonus tracks and such. And if some folks in film music land think that Inchon or Die Hard or Predator or The Blue Max have been reissued too many times in new-and-improved editions, and get resentful of their old editions being rendered inferior, WOW do I hope these disgruntled persons never get into the wide world of classical music because their brains will completely short-circuit. Basically, the music collector market dictates this! It's a rare and special even for a film score to get newly recorded; very few film scores have been recorded twice much less three times like say Vertigo. But there are literally HUNDREDS of recordings of the Beethoven symphonies. New ones get produced and released on album every. single. year. And yet even though say the Osmo Vanska Beethoven cycle on BIS is a spectacular modern multichannel recording in state of the art sound released on hybrid SACD for a very reasonable price, and his interpretation of the symphonies is so fresh and exciting it made them come alive again to the ears of this poor jaded classical music fan who's heard enough of the Beethoven symphonies (except maybe the super underrated fourth) to last a lifetime already... Deutsche Grammophon is still going to keep releasing new and improved editions of their classic Karajan cycle (actually Karajan recorded a full Beethoven cycle at least three times!) over and over, for the rest of time until our species destroys itself. When a recording is popular and keeps selling, it will keep getting reissued (as long as licensing is still possible -- I realize that sometimes it isn't, in our world, because a licensor stops cooperating as with Warner Bros. a few years ago). And if improvements are possible, a label is likely to do them because it will ensure better sales. Simple as that. But with JTW, it's like he's never encountered this phenomenon before -- even though he participated in it with the 2020 edition of Inchon -- Intrada's fourth release of the score in their long history with it! So I got a question for you, @JTW -- you were happy enough at the time with Intrada putting out their 2020 3CD edition of the score. You bought it, secure in the knowledge that it was "definitive", and you believe only 2020 edition purchasers are entitled to a free copy of the new 2024 edition from Intrada. ...why don't purchasers of the previous 2006/2013 edition matter to you? When the 2006 2CD edition came out, Intrada acted like that was the definitive-as-possible last word on the score, to the point that when they reissued it seven years later in 2013, it actually was a wholly identical master, with only the slightest changes in packaging! But in 2020 you didn't want to torch Intrada, even though they were rendering all copies customers had purchased of the 2006 and 2013 editions (and I might add, their original 1988 expansion) "obsolete". 2020 was the first time they redid the edits and everything in high resolution, but they were using the same source as the 2006/2013 edition. So did they have an obligation to send copies of the new edition to all previous customers back then? No, you don't care about that because you weren't among those customers (as I was!) -- you were just among the new customers purely benefitting from the new edition. And you're only so very upset now because now it's happened to you. Interesting. Yavar

That's my favorite element of the entire score too. I especially like the duduk accompaniment. Yavar

Ouch, you got me! I'm such a disgusting shill because I live in reality and don't think Intrada is obligated to go out of business so that you and everyone else who bought Inchon in the past can have a free new copy. If you can't because you don't have the disposable income in 2024 that you used to have in 2020, I'm sorry to hear that (and I've been there, man, not being able to buy new film music releases for years in a row because I didn't have the stable financial situation to afford it). And this is the part of the story where most people start looking at you funny. This is just, simply speaking, nuts. If you were in Intrada's shoes you wouldn't do that in a million years. There is absolutely ZERO basis for your claim of "false advertisement". Intrada didn't lie in 2020; as far as they knew that was the best the score was ever going to sound, because they were working from first generation elements. I'm pretty sure they DON'T expect everyone who bought the 2006/2013/2020 editions to re-buy now. But for anyone who loves the score enough and has the disposable income to afford a new edition, Intrada is bringing the title back into print sounding as good as it can sound. Since they now know that the backup safeties had better sound, if they just put out a straight reissue without any improvement at this juncture, THAT would be the dishonest move. It's unacceptable for you, and maybe a few other entitled people. And frankly, you can go ahead and keep crying about it I guess. Most film music fans understand at this point that occasionally new editions will come out that are improvements over the old editions they have, and that they can CHOOSE to buy the new editions if they have the disposable income and feel so inclined. Intrada NEVER said their old set "is no good anymore". That is YOUR assessment. Plenty of us have been enjoying that set for years now... or the 2013 set...or the 2006 set. I guess when new 4K editions of films come out from Hollywood studios, you send their home video departments angry letters telling them they owe you a new copy of the film, because when you bought a DVD copy they told you it was "the definitive edition" and now with the new release (from the same elements they've always had) it turns out they LIED to you and your old set is "no good anymore". Good grief. With the messed up world we have, THIS is the crusade you choose to go on, I guess. I have far more comprehension of the situation than you do, and a whole lot more perspective on it. Plenty of other people here have chimed in with reasonable takes on this situation. You're the one whose sense of entitlement has seemingly overwhelmed your ability to comprehend reality. But if you "don't have anything else to say" to me, then I guess I'll take that as a win. The JWFan board software literally just informed me at the bottom that you wrote another reply to me though, lol... EDIT — there it is! All I see here is you making yourself look bad. So I'll keep laughing at you whenever you make another ridiculous and entitled post that says Intrada is "guilty of false advertisement" and is obligated to go out of business because they didn't test the mixed down Len Engel safeties sooner. Yavar

I'm sure at least 1000 people bought the 2020 3CD set over the 60 days it was available. Probably even more. Do you have the slightest idea how much money Intrada would lose if they did that? There is ZERO incentive. If everyone had the same sense of entitlement you do, Intrada would be far better off just keeping to themselves that they discovered a better sounding version was possible. It's not Intrada "giving the finger to their customers" in the slightest. It's Intrada wanting to make a better sounding version available to those who are interested, and replacing all the previous buyers' copies is not REMOTELY practical. As for "deliberate cash-grab"... you're a bit confused about how businesses work, I guess? In any case, it's funny that you think only customers of the 2020 edition are entitled to this new edition for free, since that's the edition you happened to buy. So I guess it's just tough luck for folks who skipped the 2020 edition because they already had the 2006 or 2013 edition, which were from the same sources? How come in 2020 you weren't demanding that Intrada send replacement copies to 2006 and 2013 purchasers? *I* purchased the 2020 set because Intrada told us that that was the best and most complete edition. And, at the time, it WAS! And furthermore as far as Intrada knew, that was going to be their final physical edition of the score because they were transitioning it to digital download only! I simply understand that Intrada is a business and the people who run it are human beings who are passionate about film music like you or I, but they sometimes make mistakes and overlook things. There is not a single label out there that's perfect and never goofs on anything. Not LLL or Quartet or FSM and certainly not Varese Sarabande! Again, this is far from the first time this has happened from Intrada or ANY other label. So yeah, you can be annoyed, or frustrated. But to act publicly like Intrada set out to rip off their customers and simultaneously demand that they send out replacement copies to all purchasers of the 2020 edition is, frankly, unreasonable and out of touch with reality. According to you, the only professional way to handle this situation is for everyone at Intrada to slit their wrists by way of apology, figuratively speaking. Is there anything they could have done differently to satisfy you, besides sending you and every 2020 edition purchaser a free new 2024 3CD set? Exactly. All of the labels have been dealing with insane approval delays and such, moreso this past year than ever before. I think Inchon is either a rare title they have perpetuity rights on (see also: Tombstone) or, at the very least, a title which they have a *very* long-term license on. So if they've got a hole in their schedule brought about by other titles being long delayed, it makes sense that this one would pop up more frequently as it's more straightforward. Indeed, there have been far shorter spans of time in between editions of a score, just like the example you cite. Yavar

And of course he was also a fairly memorable part of The Kingsman franchise. Dude’s been in a lot! Yavar

The rest of his post didn’t really seem sarcastic, so I read his tone as differently than your post which was all about being silly and not because you actually thought those things. Yavar

It's unfortunate, and I certainly wish I didn't have to spend $30 + shipping on Inchon again, as I already spent full price on the 2006 and 2020 editions, myself. But I understand why it happened (I too would assume it to be a waste of time and money to transfer tapes later mixed down as backups, rather than the earlier generation source), and I for one appreciate Intrada's honesty about it since they could have just said that a better-sounding source for the score newly turned up, rather than admitting that it was sitting there under their noses the whole time. And again, this isn't the first time this has happened to a label. See Star Trek II. And even if a better source hasn't been uncovered one way or the other, labels have revisited popular selling titles over and over, as with The Blue Max or the Williams JPs I mentioned. The latter had additional alternates/film versions added, similar to how Intrada has now added a few more alternates on Inchon. Of course the labels try to entice some repeat buyers. They have to make a profit on these things in order to keep going. But what really pisses me off is the suggestion that Intrada deliberately withheld a better sounding source all these years, just so that they could dupe customers into buying yet another version. Yavar

So let's see if I have this conspiracy theory of yours right... you think Intrada knew that the Len Engel mixed-down "safeties" sounded better four years ago, and deliberately didn't use them on that release, so that four years later they could make the same "fools" (which is how they think of their customer base) buy it all over again. Is that about it? Would you have preferred they waited another couple of years? Would that have made it better? Or would you prefer they just keep the better-sounding source they embarrassingly discovered later hush-hush, horde it for their private use but never release it for Goldsmith fans to have the opportunity to buy it? (A source which original recording engineer Len Engel himself dismissed when he worked on Intrada's original expanded edition of the score in 1988, just eight years after he recorded the score for Jerry.) THIS. HAPPENS. ALL. THE. TIME. (It's unusual for it to happen where the earlier generation source sounds worse, that's all.) But I didn't publicly whine about it when La-La Land found a better-sounding source for Danny Elfman's Batman, and then made me re-buy the same master of his Batman Returns as well, in a $60 4CD set when I already had spent that much money on two previous $30 2CD sets. And when the reverse recently happened for the two John Williams Jurassic Park scores, adding some new alternates and such (including previously unreleased film versions!) to the program making me tempted to double dip even though the 4CD set from just a few years earlier sounds almost as good and COULD have fit those alternates? I'm not throwing a public tantrum about that, even though I'm frustrated/annoyed I no longer have the most "definitive" release of those two scores that I thought I had. And heck, I'm such a Goldsmith nut that to have the full set of spines line up on my shelf, I'm probably eventually going to cave and buy Vol. 1 of LLL's Goldsmith at 20th series, even though that volume out of all the volumes neither features new previously unreleased music (even alternates) OR a substantial sound improvement. But those dastardly folk at LLL knew what they were doing when they made THAT volume "Volume 1"... they knew it would nag at me to have Volumes 2-5 sitting next to each other on my shelf, and have that one missing. They're forcing me to spend more money on music I already have! They must be laughing at fools like me who bought their previous release of The Blue Max. Right? Yes, so outrageous that they wouldn't go out of business in order to replace every 2020 edition purchased by people. Actually they should not only have to replace copies for all "duped" purchasers of the 2020, 2013, 2006, AND 1988 editions, all of which used the inferior earlier generation source when the better-sounding "safeties" were *right there* in Len Engel's possession, but I think Doug Fake and Roger Feigelson should be put in prison for fraud at this point, and Intrada auctioned off and the proceeds distributed to all of the victims they have robbed of their good money, over the years. Thank you for taking a brave stand on this grave injustice. You truly inspire us, the victimized customers of Intrada, with your rallying cry. Yavar

You should! Yavar

The 2015 started out promising and I liked a lot of the cast. But yeah, there was clearly a much better movie somewhere in there than the one we got, which ended up something of a mess. Yavar

I was going to bring up the 1994 one but then said nah, that one’s actually not crappy at all! Yavar

Yeah the only hope at this point is Disney somehow also buying Sony itself, lol... Yavar

I don't know what that comment means, exactly. Both great scores in my view, and I actually hear quite a few similarities between them. They were, after all, composed and recorded only a year apart from each other. Parts of Inchon sound like the Klingons showed up and it's awesome. Botnick had no involvement with that as far as I know, so no. I think I read many people commenting that that release had very similar sound to the leaked sessions, but I haven't done any such comparison myself. That would indicate that a controversial new remix was not undertaken on that title though. Yavar

Except there was nothing actually *wrong* with the 2020 set, any more than the 2013 or 2006 editions. Those all sounded way better than Intrada's original 1988 expansion! So by your logic, Intrada is obligated to send this new 2024 "fix" to all purchasers of those previous four editions of theirs, which all neglected to check/use the Len Engel "safeties" as a source? Yeah, sounds like that would be a great business decision for them. At a certain point you've gotta let go of the entitlement and realize you aren't obligated to purchase this new version, but them offering an improvement when they become aware of an opportunity for improvement is better than NOT making that improvement available. If you remove the business incentive to put out a new release by kneecapping them with the expectation of them freely replacing all copies of 2020 purchasers, then golly they're just not going to bother offering this new and better sounding version. Surely you can realize that? Hell, even if this new 2024 edition didn't cost them anything to produce and manufacture, the shipping costs alone of sending out your proposed free copies would be astronomical if concentrated on Intrada. People who feel screwed are going to just have to get over it, but I suspect there are fewer people in that boat than you think and most previous purchasers are either happy enough with the version they have, or are mega Inchon fans like me and are just happy to have the score in better sound. New cover art to distinguish this version from the last version would have been nice, yes. You may not know who's going to get this but I'm guessing Intrada has some idea, since their previous four expanded editions of this score sold really well for them. (Actually I think their 1988 edition sold the worst, but every edition since then has sold better than it did!) When it's Jerry Goldsmith, it seems that it hardly matters if the film is hardly known. I suspect besides "JG purists" there are also some people out there who simply missed out on the 2020 edition and will want to grab this one since the score is rather unexpectedly available on disc again. But even if you're right and interest is limited to "JG purists"... I think that's a lot of people. Yavar

For what it’s worth, my Goldsmith Odyssey cohosts are planning to record a short Inchon Redux Soundtrack Spotlight episode this evening. I know David is planning to feature some before/after comparisons on it, so anyone on the fence can probably hold off and check that out after it’s edited, to decide whether a re-purchase is warranted for them. I confess I didn’t understand the need for a 3CD set in 2020 or now. One disc with the complete score in chrono film order, and one disc with the original album program + any unique edits from the 2006/1988 expanded program(s) would have worked just great for me. But at least it’s at a $30 price point. Yavar

… and they fixed it, and sent out replacement discs to anyone who wanted one. So… good example of Intrada responding to fair criticism with excellent customer service? Yavar

I guess I'll have to revisit that because I respect your taste. I do remember really liking Hiddleston in it, and really being disappointed by Eccleston's villain character. Agreed on early Pixar though. Until they got to Cars, they just COULD NOT MISS. For me the messy heavy-CGI third act kinda lost me, similarly to Shang-Chi. But I do still have warm feelings towards the first Captain America, even if The Winter Soldier outclassed it in almost every way IMO. Even though I didn't mention it in my list, I actually quite enjoyed Hawkeye. It just struck me as a little less fresh/unique compared with the rest. But it was arguably the most consistent of all the Phase 4 shows, even if it didn't hit the highs of Loki or WandaVision. Glad you liked Moon Knight as much as I did! Did you ever try Ms. Marvel? Yavar

That's the price of extreme fame and popularity, I guess. It's equally creepy to me in the opposite direction, when people feel the need to dump on her or denigrate her as an artist just because she's so popular. I wasn't whining in the slightest; it just struck me as a weird and unnecessarily negative comment made against someone who is anything but a Britney Spears manufactured pop star type. This is my favorite Taylor Swift song I think... very poetic: Yavar