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

[crocodile 8,056]

The Tree of Life by Alexandre Desplat

Samples didn't impress me. But I must say the whole album is quite impressive, in a very delicate ambient way. I think I'll buy it.

Now I'm listening to his The Twilight Saga: New Moon. It is one of his stronger works and yeah, better than his latest one. You can hear composer's voice shining through. Is anybody able to tell me how does it work in the film? It sounds way too elegant for it.

Karol - who was so embarassed while buying this CD in a store

[Taikomochi 1,145]

It works pretty well in the film, I think. Although, it does somewhat contrast harshly with the shitastic pop music interspersed throughout, but that's not his fault(and it's probably a good thing.) If anything, I'd recommend not seeing the film, though. The awfulness and unnecessary melodramatics of the film make me feel like the emotions of the score are somehow false and turn me off to it. It's like Desplat was scoring a much better film.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

He pulled a Goldsmith.

[crocodile 8,056]

I wish Howard Shore did the same...

Karol

[Ollie 1,069]

Karol - who was so embarassed while buying this CD in a store

That's why you but it online, like I'm going to do with Monte Carlo.

[Taikomochi 1,145]

Howard Shore more tried to blend in with the feel of the movies, and it results in something... unremarkable. Too bad. Desplat, I feel, fought to stand out in the film.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

Let's see how Harry does with the fourth film. I bet he'll be replaced by John Williams on Part 2!

[Taikomochi 1,145]

Let's see how Harry does with the fourth film. I bet he'll be replaced by John Williams on Part 2!

Where did you hear that? On imdb, it says Burwell is doing it(which doesn't make that much sense that they would just bring him back as probably the weakest of the past composers, meh), but I figured that may not be true. In googling, I found only rumors saying both he and HGW were doing it. I just want to know definitively either way.

If it is HGW, then I am completely indifferent. The past scores had interested me, but that seems like a poor choice.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

Right, I completely forgot about that. I believe Harry was originally attached, but now IMDb says Burwell is back. I don't know which is true.

[Incanus 5,728]

Mulan by Jerry Goldsmith: An engaging adventure/action score by the master. Not perhaps in my top tier despite some extremely entertaining action and dramatic sequences. To the score's credit it has to be said that the listening experience transcends the animated world completely.

[crocodile 8,056]

Only two lines of text? I'm disappointed.

E.T. by John Williams

Somewhat a by result of yesterday's controversy I gave my first listen to the original album presentation. It is enjoyable and everything I need from this score, to be honest. Not really because it's short, but because I really like these arrangement of themes. ET and Elliot themes benefits a great deal from this.

Karol

[Incanus 5,728]

Only two lines of text? I'm disappointed.

E.T. by John Williams

Somewhat a by result of yesterday's controversy I gave my first listen to the original album presentation. It is enjoyable and everything I need from this score, to be honest. Not really because it's short, but because I really like these arrangement of themes. ET and Elliot themes benefits a great deal from this.

Karol

Not every day is a 30 page analysis day.

Obviously I should start making 2 line posts. Otherwise I create undue expectations and people will be disappointed.

[crocodile 8,056]

Obviously I should start making 2 line posts. Otherwise I create undue expectations and people will be disappointed.

Too late for that. Way too late.

Remember that PDF file in which this guy described in great detail HP1 manuscripts? That's what we want!

Oh I almost forgot.

Batman Forever by Elliot Goldenthal

Too wet my appetite for the new release. Can't wait!

Karol

[Ollie 1,069]

Bad Girls from LaLaLand, the sound is improved from the original release and the added music doesn't hurt the listening experience. In fact some of the shorter cues add to it.

I also pulled out my homemade 1941 score and the original album, I can't wait for the proper release of this score. I can't listen to the isolated score anymore.

Anaconda, I keep forgetting I have this, not too bad for Edelman.

[Matt C 456]

I believe Harry was originally attached, but now IMDb says Burwell is back. I don't know which is true.

Burwell confirmed his return on his official website: http://thebodyinc.com/main/home.shtml

I do hope Burwell will aim for a more romantic and orchestral approach, and not that awful electronic rock trash he did for the first film.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

I don't think that electronic rock trash was his idea.

[Matt C 456]

You're right, it was definitely Catherine Hardwicke's idea (Red Riding Hood had the same kind of approach, but it worked far better than Twilight did). But Bill Condon did his homework, both musically and movie-wise, so it's possible Burwell may revisit it a bit for the Twihards.

[Taikomochi 1,145]

I didn't dislike the way Burwell scored the first film. It worked in the context of the film, I think, and led to some interesting passages. Nothing great, but it didn't bother me.

[indy4 155]

I listened to Philip Glass' Itaipu. Really great work. I hear some influences of Howard Shore's The Lord of the Rings, especially the choir in "Mato Grosso."

[crocodile 8,056]

I kind of liked Canyon piece at the end of that CD.

Karol

[indy4 155]

Yeah, The Canyon is great too.

[Ollie 1,069]

Super 8.

Excellent.

[crocodile 8,056]

I hate you.

Karol

[Ollie 1,069]

Sorry.

[crocodile 8,056]

Karol

[Marian Schedenig 8,244]

I kind of liked Canyon piece at the end of that CD.

That used to remind me of Goldsmith somehow.

[indy4 155]

Mad about Vivaldi:

My friend didn't want this CD anymore, so he gave it to me. The performances are great, but I must say that baroque music just doesn't appeal to me. I like most of "The Four Seasons," especially Summer, but the rest sounds incredibly monotonous and flat to me. It is just too predictable and repetitive. Maybe at the time it was written it was new, but having heard what I've heard throughout my life, I cannot get into this stuff.

Shostakovich: Symphony 10 and Ballet Suite 4:

Now this stuff is awesome. Pretty much the opposite of the bland predictability of baroque. It's exciting, angry, sometimes frenetic, and unpredictable. I definitely prefer this, and other works written in the 1800s-1900s, over the stuff that came before it.

[Demondm810 399]

Two Towers complete recordings.

Such beautifully amazing work.

[OneBuckFilms 325]

Two Towers complete recordings.

Such beautifully amazing work.

+1 !!!

[Romão 2,276]

Mad about Vivaldi:

My friend didn't want this CD anymore, so he gave it to me. The performances are great, but I must say that baroque music just doesn't appeal to me. I like most of "The Four Seasons," especially Summer, but the rest sounds incredibly monotonous and flat to me. It is just too predictable and repetitive. Maybe at the time it was written it was new, but having heard what I've heard throughout my life, I cannot get into this stuff.

Shostakovich: Symphony 10 and Ballet Suite 4:

Now this stuff is awesome. Pretty much the opposite of the bland predictability of baroque. It's exciting, angry, sometimes frenetic, and unpredictable. I definitely prefer this, and other works written in the 1800s-1900s, over the stuff that came before it.

The first movement of the ballet suite 4 is just stunning. I reckon you heard the Jarvi recording

[indy4 155]

Mad about Vivaldi:

My friend didn't want this CD anymore, so he gave it to me. The performances are great, but I must say that baroque music just doesn't appeal to me. I like most of "The Four Seasons," especially Summer, but the rest sounds incredibly monotonous and flat to me. It is just too predictable and repetitive. Maybe at the time it was written it was new, but having heard what I've heard throughout my life, I cannot get into this stuff.

Shostakovich: Symphony 10 and Ballet Suite 4:

Now this stuff is awesome. Pretty much the opposite of the bland predictability of baroque. It's exciting, angry, sometimes frenetic, and unpredictable. I definitely prefer this, and other works written in the 1800s-1900s, over the stuff that came before it.

The first movement of the ballet suite 4 is just stunning. I reckon you heard the Jarvi recording

Yup, that's the one. I agree, the first movement is great. I love the build up.

[indy4 155]

Finding Nemo:

Uh...really bad. This is one of the most jerky and disjointed listening experiences I've ever heard. Most of Newman's ideas in cues last a few seconds, at most a few minutes. The cues can't gather any momentum, let alone the score. I don't understand how this score could be nominated for an Oscar, I just felt completely detatched throughout the entire listen. There is some cool instrumentation, but nothing I haven't heard in the vastly superior Series of Unfortunate Events. The best track is "Beyond the Sea."

[Demondm810 399]

Listened to the DCC vinyl of Raiders this morning. Holy hell, is that fantastic sounding. It's like having the LSO in your house. The more I listen to Raiders, the more it tries to bully it's way to the top of my Williams list.

[Datameister 2,094]

Finding Nemo:

Uh...really bad. This is one of the most jerky and disjointed listening experiences I've ever heard. Most of Newman's ideas in cues last a few seconds, at most a few minutes. The cues can't gather any momentum, let alone the score. I don't understand how this score could be nominated for an Oscar, I just felt completely detatched throughout the entire listen. There is some cool instrumentation, but nothing I haven't heard in the vastly superior Series of Unfortunate Events. The best track is "Beyond the Sea."

I can't really comment on the OST, as I haven't really listened to it, but it works wonderfully in the film. A Series of Unfortunate Events just annoyed me.

Listened to the DCC vinyl of Raiders this morning. Holy hell, is that fantastic sounding. It's like having the LSO in your house. The more I listen to Raiders, the more it tries to bully it's way to the top of my Williams list.

Can't comment on the vinyl, but yeah, Raiders has a tendency to do that.

[indy4 155]

Finding Nemo:

Uh...really bad. This is one of the most jerky and disjointed listening experiences I've ever heard. Most of Newman's ideas in cues last a few seconds, at most a few minutes. The cues can't gather any momentum, let alone the score. I don't understand how this score could be nominated for an Oscar, I just felt completely detatched throughout the entire listen. There is some cool instrumentation, but nothing I haven't heard in the vastly superior Series of Unfortunate Events. The best track is "Beyond the Sea."

I can't really comment on the OST, as I haven't really listened to it, but it works wonderfully in the film. A Series of Unfortunate Events just annoyed me.

Yeah, it works very nicely in the film. I think Newman just takes mickey-mousing to the extreme, but instead of catching the action with a pluck of the strings or a percussion hit, he has the music change mood and atmosphere entirely. I don't know if that's explaining it right, but it was just so disjointed, while at the same time not sounding like classic "Tom and Jerry" mickey-mousing scoring. And I'm a fan of mickey-mousing, if done correctly (ie "Airplane Fight," "Arrival of Baby Harry," "Whirl Through Academe," etc.), but this was horrible.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

A Series Of Unfortunate Events is amazing.

[Taikomochi 1,145]

A Series Of Unfortunate Events is amazing.

I'm glad to see this score getting some love around here. I think it's Newman's best, and "The Letter That Never Came" is just one of the best examples of dramatic scoring I can think of. I adore this score.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

I was scrolling through the HBO channels a few years back and came across the film. I thought, why not? Never saw it in theaters and was slightly interested. When I went to the channel, the end credits immediately started. I didn't see a splice of the actual film, just that end credits segment. I instantly went to Amazon and ordered the soundtrack.

Caught the film at a later time and really liked it too. It's a shame they never got around to adapting the other novels.

[Wojo 2,453]

The only film music I've listened to all week is snippets of Star Wars on CD in my car. I've been at the beach, and haven't touched my iPod since last weekend (except today to charge it to go home), and it feels great.

[Taikomochi 1,145]

I was scrolling through the HBO channels a few years back and came across the film. I thought, why not? Never saw it in theaters and was slightly interested. When I went to the channel, the end credits immediately started. I didn't see a splice of the actual film, just that end credits segment. I instantly went to Amazon and ordered the soundtrack.

Caught the film at a later time and really liked it too. It's a shame they never got around to adapting the other novels.

Really? I find the credits to be the weakest part of the soundtrack. I find it to be somewhat overly repetitive, but I guess I'm minority on that. I've seen it used in a few tv spots and trailers, so I guess it's pretty popular.

And yes, it is a shame that they didn't adapt the rest. I find the film itself to be more enjoyable and emotionally authentic than all the Harry Potter films(except maybe PoA), and would have enjoyed sequels. I don't get the impression, however, that Newman wrote this score with sequels in mind as there are no really definitive, catchy themes to associate with the series.

My favorite part of the score is those two descending notes that I assume(it's been a while since I saw the film) are kind of symbolic of Count Olaf's ensuing grasp on the children, like an inescapable fate. The best usage, I feel, is "The Regrettable Episode Involving The Leaches." It comes in right after that exhausting action sequence that builds up tension, and then follows it with this depressing theme. When I saw the film last, this piece in context gave me chills. Olaf's boat emerging from the fog after what he had just done. Jeez, that's good scoring.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

It was just such a unique piece of music, something I had never heard before. Thomas Newman has a very good knack for instrumentation, probably one of the best working today. I, too, think the film is better than the Potters. For one, the acting is like 10x better.

[indy4 155]

I agree that the score is great. "Hurricane Herman" is probably my favorite track, but there's a lot to love. I haven't seen the film since it was out in theatres, but I remember enjoying it. If I remember correctly, the books become incredibly complex plotwise later on, and there isn't really a satisfying way to conclude all the loose ends in the final book, so I can understand why they didn't make the entire series. Still, they could've made a few more sequels I think.

[Koray Savas 2,251]

There are 12 books, right? And the film combined 3 of them?

[indy4 155]

13 books total, and I think the movie did 3.

[Jay 37,497]

13 books total, and I think the movie did 3.

Yep

[Datameister 2,094]

On the way to work today, I listened straight through the Decca release of Jaws. Now THAT, my friends, is a film score. Wow. I'm not an old geezer who saw the film during its original theatrical run, nor am I a young guy who grew up with this score...I only got into it in the last year or two, but this one obviously didn't require one bit of sentimentality for me to realize how great it was.

I can't get over how masterfully Williams builds the tension in the first half of the film, while they're still on land. There are some fantastically evocative tonalities in there, particularly in "Ben Gardner's Boat." Then it's out to sea, and Williams allows some brighter moments of seafaring jauntiness shine through, and they shine all the brighter because of the darkness surrounding them. There's so much more going on here than a simple dum-dum-dum-dum theme. It's a relentless build to the climax, and then the end credits are just impeccably calm and peaceful.

One thing about this score that I find interesting is how there are many motifs that get used repeatedly but never really...developed to the extent you might expect. It's not that they sound the same every time, but Williams never comes out and delivers straightforward, well-developed, prominent renditions of them. It's not a bad thing, but it's kind of funny how these melodies start slipping in after the three guys head out to sea, without any strong leitmotivic "meanings" or anything.

I seriously need to pick up the OST one of these days...I'm sure I'll love it as much as this album, albeit for somewhat different reasons.

[Incanus 5,728]

I had no nostalgic connection to Jaws either when I first heard the score, the OST album and it still was an eye opening experience since I had no idea the score was so varied because I had heard the Jaws theme on countless compilations before that and had naively figured that this must the extent of this score. Then about a year after I had gotten the OST Decca released the original tracks as part of the 25th anniversary of the film and I naturally, a Williams completist I am, bought the actual original recording of the score. It was a slightly different but equally powerful experience that added my admiration for this music.

It is one score where everything seems to fall into place. The suspence, the horror and the adventure. Williams delivers much more than the outstanding Shark theme of which he presents countless permutations depicting the movement and almost the state of mind of the unstoppable beast, the music indeed becoming the unseen leviathan. The superb fugue for the building of the shark cage (see Spielberg/Williams Collaboration album for a fantastic concert version) which makes you miss that particular composition form in modern scores, the Out to the Sea shanty and the material connected to the shark chase and the magical and eerie exploration music (the haunting Ben Gardner's Boat/Night Search being the highlight that awed me to no end when I heard the OST for the first time) and the violent The Shark Approaches with the tense and furious string writing and most awesome harp playing (glissandi have never sounded so good) depicting the chaos and panic and finally the Blown to Bits that gathers major elements of the score pitting the Shark motif against the heroic Out to the Sea shanty and the Shark Cage Fugue and finally ending with those glittering piano notes that announce the demise of the beast and at the same time capturing the sun lit sea.

The Decca release contains the original score and provides also great previously unheard music, only to mention two examples the subdued, melancholy, ethereal and eerie Father and Son and the positively crushing variation of the Jaws theme in Shark Attack where Williams showcases the power of the simple rhythm and how by simply adding insistence of the motif he creates a sense of panic in the listener. I tense up every time I listen to it.

A marvellous score indeed.

[Shane 0]

Masada. I don't use the term holy grail too often but this was top of my wish list. It's great to finally have the complete score with both the Goldsmith and Stevens material. I really enjoy the Roman march, especially in "Move On".

[crocodile 8,056]

Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire by Patrick Doyle

This one fine score and a very good album (never listened to the songs). But it should have been attached to DH movies. It feels much more climactic than anything in these two movies. I understand why many people hate it. It is so loud and bombastic, but it definitely feels like a proper fantasy score in a modern context. And there is somereally stron thematic material as well. I liked it back then and I like it now.

Independence Day by David Arnold

Karol

[BloodBoal 7,538]