Composers you used to like, but now dislike?

[JTN 2,035]

This is harder than the other thread actually, but I'm sure everyone has one or two composers whose work they used to enjoy, but now don't. 

 

I used to love Thomas Newman's scores, but I hardly listen to them anymore. I don't dislike his work, but I've gotten bored of them. 

 

Another one is... 

 

 

James Hornerpleasedonthurtme!

(That's not a composer's name btw.)

 

 

[Edmilson 7,466]

3 minutes ago, JTW said:

I used to love Thomas Newman's scores, but I hardly listen to them anymore. I don't dislike his work, but I've gotten bored of them. 

 

Another one is... 

 

 

James Hornerpleasedonthurtme!

(That's not a composer's name.)

 

I still love those 2. They were hugely important in my early years of film music fandom, and these days the two of them, alongside JNH, are about 70% of my personal playlist on Spotify.

 

One that comes to my mind is Michael Giacchino. He was also important in my formative years, especially as I was a HUGE Lost nerd when I was a teen. After Lost ended, I went exploring his other scores and really liked John Carter, Star Trek and ST Into Darkness, his Pixar scores, Super 8, Inside Out and Tomorrowland. I even enjoyed stuff like Dawn of the Apes and Jurassic World. In recent years, I loved his scores for the first two Spider-Holland movies, especially since they were personal favorites (they came out right when my best friend was celebrating his birthday, and we celebrated watching these two movies in theaters with a huge group of friends).

 

But then, in recent years (about 2020 from today) it's difficult to get me excited for a Giacchino score again. His scores nowadays sound so, I dunno, simplistic? Not refined enough? It's not like every score needs to be a Wagner symphony, but there's a somewhat unrefined blandness to his music that these days that is kinda grating for me. Even scores from him that I used to like I haven't heard them in years.

 

I'd like to give him another chance and binge his best scores to see if he will continue not "doing it" for me.

[Andy 4,140]

Waaaay harder than the other thread for me.  I grew up in Williams’ most popular era. Having developed my taste for film music that way meant any other composer had a high bar and had to really earn my liking.  Nostalgia also is hard to be objective about.   For example, I’ll probably never say I don’t like Leonard Rosenman anymore, because he has a sound that i just sort of associate with my childhood. 
 

I guess I could go so far as to say I prefer early works of many composers like Alan Silvestri and Danny Elfman to what they do now. But that doesn’t mean I like their early works less. 

[GerateWohl 4,371]

Unfortunately I have that issue with James Newton Howard. The first time I recongnized his name was, when he created the orchestral arrangements for Elton John's live concert in Melbourne. First score I recongnized was Unbreakable, to date my favourite probably. Then came the other Shyamalan scores. And King Kong, probably my peak of JNH fandom. 

But I couldn't find much more, that I liked. Wyatt Earp Was a great discovery. But already The Last Airbender didn't really click with me. Blood Diamond? No. After Earth? Fantastic Beasts? Hunger Games? No. 

My issue with him was, that he increasingly developed a style wth simple unoriginal triad loops in piano or strings plus more and more electronics using the orchestra just as another layer in a synthetic soundscape.

People hold his A Hidden Life score in high esteem, but for me the main theme also suffers from the boring triad pattern and apart from that the best tracks on the album are the ones by other composers. 

Night After Night is great. But that is a look back to my favourite works of his.

I wouldn't say, I am done with him, but since "The Happening" there was no score of his that really grabbed me.

[ddddeeee 257]

I absolutely love Giacchino's work on Lost. I own all the CDs and listen to them frequently. So many tracks are my 'to-go-to' if I want to cry.

 

But I cannot get into his film work much at all. I really enjoy moments of John Carter, Jupiter Ascending and Doctor Strange, and I love the Mysterio theme in Far From Home, but I otherwise find it all really limp. In fact, I'm so unresponsive to 95% of what he does that I wonder how much of my enjoyment of Lost is a projection of my love for the show onto the music. 

[Stark 316]

There are some composers whose recent work I like much less than earlier work (such as Giacchino or Brian Tyler), but I don’t know if I’d say I dislike them now, just their new stuff.

[Tom Guernsey 2,286]

On 02/02/2024 at 8:10 PM, Edmilson said:

I still love those 2. They were hugely important in my early years of film music fandom, and these days the two of them, alongside JNH, are about 70% of my personal playlist on Spotify.

 

One that comes to my mind is Michael Giacchino. He was also important in my formative years, especially as I was a HUGE Lost nerd when I was a teen. After Lost ended, I went exploring his other scores and really liked John Carter, Star Trek and ST Into Darkness, his Pixar scores, Super 8, Inside Out and Tomorrowland. I even enjoyed stuff like Dawn of the Apes and Jurassic World. In recent years, I loved his scores for the first two Spider-Holland movies, especially since they were personal favorites (they came out right when my best friend was celebrating his birthday, and we celebrated watching these two movies in theaters with a huge group of friends).

 

But then, in recent years (about 2020 from today) it's difficult to get me excited for a Giacchino score again. His scores nowadays sound so, I dunno, simplistic? Not refined enough? It's not like every score needs to be a Wagner symphony, but there's a somewhat unrefined blandness to his music that these days that is kinda grating for me. Even scores from him that I used to like I haven't heard them in years.

 

I'd like to give him another chance and binge his best scores to see if he will continue not "doing it" for me.

I think I had that same feeling although somewhat earlier when his score for the 2009 Star Trek movie came out. I hoped he'd channel his inner Jerry or James Horner, but instead of all that gorgeous late romantic style, it was all big, simplistic (agree on that one) clanking orchestration, an underwhelming theme (the FSM guys got it right when they said it was like the countermelody to a main theme that didn't exist).

 

I had the same issues with his first Jurassic World score, especially frustrating as his old computer game scores showed his aptitude for channelling John Williams in a Joel McNeely kind of way, but instead it's all loud, clanking orchestration (again). And again with Rogue One (especially after he was royally shown up by John Powell on Solo). Then again, his Pixar scores have largely still be delightful but I do wish he'd reign it in a bit, write fewer scores, and try to remember that nuance isn't a dirty word.

 

Otherwise, there's composers I play less of than I used to, but I tend to grow into composers rather than go off them.

[Loert 2,515]

OK, if we're talking about the composer as a person, then I can't say there's anyone in the film music world I used to "like" but now "dislike". But I have certainly fallen out with some people's output. I think the big one for me is Hans Zimmer. He was my entry-point into film music ("Up is Down" from POTC 3 was one of my first loves). But I'm not such a huge fan of his latest work. I was listening to Dune the other day, and aside from the opening track which I found quite exhilirating, the rest left me cold. But because of his 90s/00s output I'm (still) convinced he is a musical genius.

[Richard Penna 3,694]

A surprising candidate came to mind: Thomas Newman.

 

He was king of the early 00s after American Beauty and his style was being copied for all the dramas around then. When he's doing a regular drama there's usually something to like - I love 1917 and unpopularly I also like his Bond scores, but where I used to like animated and indie drama type scores, those leave me cold now. Elemental didn't have anything remotely interesting to me, for example. He's not a composer I really follow now unless he pops up in a Mendes film, really.

 

On 03/02/2024 at 9:50 AM, GerateWohl said:

Unfortunately I have that issue with James Newton Howard. The first time I recongnized his name was, when he created the orchestral arrangements for Elton John's live concert in Melbourne. First score I recongnized was Unbreakable, to date my favourite probably. Then came the other Shyamalan scores. And King Kong, probably my peak of JNH fandom. 

But I couldn't find much more, that I liked. Wyatt Earp Was a great discovery. But already The Last Airbender didn't really click with me. Blood Diamond? No. After Earth? Fantastic Beasts? Hunger Games? No. 

My issue with him was, that he increasingly developed a style wth simple unoriginal triad loops in piano or strings plus more and more electronics using the orchestra just as another layer in a synthetic soundscape.

 

The problem with JNH is that he's in such demand because he gives current directors what they want, which unfortunately for us is forgettable rubbish quite a lot of the time.

 

Some of his modern work is interesting but I struggle to see him being truly inspired by what he's asked to provide for a modern thriller like Salt or Bourne Legacy. I usually hesitate to accuse composers of this but I wouldn't be remotely surprised if he did those for the same reason Zimmer did stuff like Pirates 4 (existing relationships and a gargantuan paycheck).

 

That said, Willow and Songbirds were much more traditional but were just a bit dull, and while the third Beasts score was nice, it didn't have the sound of a composer who's firing on all cylinders of peak creativity any more, in a way that we're clearly seeing Powell's peak right now.

[JTN 2,035]

1 hour ago, Richard Penna said:

A surprising candidate came to mind: Thomas Newman.

I wrote him in my op.

[CatastrophicJones 18]

7 hours ago, Loert said:

OK, if we're talking about the composer as a person, then I can't say there's anyone in the film music world I used to "like" but now "dislike". But I have certainly fallen out with some people's output. I think the big one for me is Hans Zimmer. He was my entry-point into film music ("Up is Down" from POTC 3 was one of my first loves). But I'm not such a huge fan of his latest work. I was listening to Dune the other day, and aside from the opening track which I found quite exhilirating, the rest left me cold. But because of his 90s/00s output I'm (still) convinced he is a musical genius.

 

I feel like Zimmer has gotten lazier lately. He's capable of producing music that fits his projects, but they don't really stand out like they use to. I loved Interstellar, he did well recently with Wonder Woman 1984, Dune is not bad at all, it makes sense it sounds the way it does because Villeneuve seems to like spacious ambience in his films, but man oh man I am dying for a Zimmer score that really sings again. Something fresh. 

[Trope 527]

Henry Jackman was a composer whose work from 2011-2017 I really enjoyed. Winnie the Pooh, Wreck-It Ralph, Kick-Ass 2, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Kingsman: The Secret Service, Big Hero 6, Uncharted 4, Captain America: Civil War, Kong: Skull Island, and Kingsman: The Golden Circle are scores I particularly liked.

 

However, in more recent years, I've found it a little harder to get into his music. Whether it's because of the new music team he's collaborating with or because I'm not so interested in the films he's writing for, I'm not sure. I feel like whenever a Jackman score had additional music by Dominic Lewis or Matthew Margeson, it seemed to jump up a level in inventiveness and quality. 

[Tom Guernsey 2,286]

20 hours ago, Loert said:

OK, if we're talking about the composer as a person, then I can't say there's anyone in the film music world I used to "like" but now "dislike". But I have certainly fallen out with some people's output. I think the big one for me is Hans Zimmer. He was my entry-point into film music ("Up is Down" from POTC 3 was one of my first loves). But I'm not such a huge fan of his latest work. I was listening to Dune the other day, and aside from the opening track which I found quite exhilirating, the rest left me cold. But because of his 90s/00s output I'm (still) convinced he is a musical genius.

I think the batting average with Hans was and seems to have remained about 1 in 3 (don't ask me to show my workings...). There are things now I think are pretty much hideous noise (Dunkirk) but there are others which are terrific (Interstellar). Perhaps this average was slightly better earlier in his career, but not much. It's an average I can live with!