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John Powell kicks ass


Morlock

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Since Powell is more retired than John Williams at the moment, check out Dominic Lewis' score for Free Birds. It's his first solo gig, but he's been a helping hand on most of Henry Jackman's stuff, as well as How To Train Your Dragon. He got the job based on Powell's recommendation to the filmmakers. It very much resides in that grand sound he popularized so well, while retaining its own voice. No electronics, minimal percussion and quirky instrumentation, this is just the kind of stuff I feel like many of you guys want in contemporary scores.

Unfortunately it's not up on YouTube to taste test, but give the samples at Amazon a try. "Fowl Play" is excellent.

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  • 3 months later...
  • 3 weeks later...

Wow, sounds a lot better than expected! It seems to employ Powell's usual bag of tricks, but it has a certain freshness to it. Not his most fresh work by any stretch, but at least he seems to be having more fun here than the original score, and it shows.

On a side note, Powell's orchestrations seem to keep getting better with every new score. It's quite amazing.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Listened to a few Rio 2 tracks.... meh. Just more of the same as I can see, although I also didn't really see the need for a sequel.

HTTYD 2 should be more interesting. It requires a more serious scoring approach.

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That cue reminded me of how much Inception's score takes after Powell's Bourne scores (ex. similar chord progressions to some of the Bourne material).

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Bourne score were very influential, but none of the other composers really bothered to make their own stamp. Powell actually developed quite a few themes in those.

Karol

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Not only that, but with the Bourne scores, Powell does the RC sound with style (something lacking in the clones to follow).

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You can say that about a lot of Powell cues/scores ;)

Yeah, but the first two Bournes do much for me than most of his other stuff. With the exception of Names Without Faces I'm not a fan of ULTIMATUM.

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I like that fact that the scores become increasingly acoustic with each entry, as the character becomes more human. Or at least acoustic-like.

Karol

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I like that fact that the scores become increasingly acoustic with each entry, as the character becomes more human. Or at least acoustic-like.

Karol

I always thought Bourne was at his most human in the first film (which is still the best).

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You can say that about a lot of Powell cues/scores ;)

Yeah, but the first two Bournes do much for me than most of his other stuff. With the exception of Names Without Faces I'm not a fan of ULTIMATUM.

No love for Tangiers? One of the best action cues of the 00s right there.

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You can say that about a lot of Powell cues/scores ;)

Yeah, but the first two Bournes do much for me than most of his other stuff. With the exception of Names Without Faces I'm not a fan of ULTIMATUM.

No love for Tangiers? One of the best action cues of the 00s right there.

I find it pretty monotonous, TBH. Would've been better if there was more harmonic variety, like that in that cue I posted.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Very interesting interview with Powell about his carreer in general, going through by some specific scores...

(about Bourne Identity) "People have used it as a temp. One of the hardest pieces on Face/Off was temped to David Arnold’s music for Independence Day. It was hell. Everything was being compared to this and you can’t get past it. He later said to me, 'That fucking Bourne Identity score keeps coming up in fucking temp scores.' I said, 'Well, I got you back.' That’s why film music is getting terribly uninteresting. It’s a snake sucking its own cock. Everything sounds like The Dark Knight if it is big and epic. Everything sounds like Bourne Identity if it is small and spy-y."

http://www.empireonline.com/features/john-powell-career/p1

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No surprises there!

Too bad Marvel never offered him a film. I'd love to see Powell return to live action

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Wow, those three upcoming concert pieces sound much more interesting than any Powell film he's been associated in quite a long time. Heck, maybe in his whole carreer. The musical possibilities are fantastic! Let's see what surprises our boy has in store with this.

I've been wanting him to do concert work for quite a while now, so this is great news for me. I just hope he doesn't end up in the Don Davis situation of being unable to return to film scoring, although with his recent comments about the current state of film music, it seems Powell's last thing in mind is to return to film. Good luck, John! Can't wait to hear those three upcoming works.

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That 45 min oratorio sure sounds interesting!

But it's a shame he's basically retired from film music.

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