Author Archive

CD Review: THE SIGNAL soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/10/2014
THE SIGNAL soundtrack | ©2014 Varese Sarabande Records

While I’m dying to hear (let alone see) what composer Nima Fakhrara did for Japan’s live action version of GATCHAMAN (aka BATTLE OF THE PLANETS), I can only imagine that it must have caught the attention of THE SIGNAL – with the result being an eerily pulsing sci-fi score with a strong electric undercurrent. In this paranoid tale, three college students get far worse than they bargained for while chasing down a hacker. As they’re propelled into a sterile, claustrophobic nightmare of mad science where things gone from bad to mind and body-bendingly worse, Fakhara’s score tunes strongly into the […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: MALEFICENT soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 07/20/2014
MALEFICENT soundtrack | ©2014 Walt Disney Records

Genre films have always held a rewarding spell for James Newton Howard, an astonishingly adept, and prolific composer who from his first supernatural score to 1990s “Flatliners” has taken to the thematic majesty of a chorally-powered, symphonic orchestra to both horrifically dark and soaringly heroic effect – both emotional ends of which meet like never before in his magnificent MALIFICENT. For one of the best villain apologist fantasies in many a moon, Howard becomes a sorcerer’s apprentice as he unleashes Disney’s most infamous she-devil in all of her unexpectedly moving might. While he’s accompanied lost civilizations (ATLANTIS), talking thunder lizards […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

Interview: SNOWPIERCER composer MARCO BELTRAMI is on the right sound-track

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 07/14/2014
SNOWPIERCER | ©2014 The Weinstein Company

Among the genre-centric composers who’ve carried on the torch from Jerry Goldsmith, few stand out for blazingly inventive sci-fi and horror scores like the maestro’s USC protégé Marco Beltrami. Just as his mentor used his memorable thematic talents for orchestrally, and electronically conveying psychopaths, aliens and futuristic adventure, Beltrami has jumped on a similarly imaginative and prolific bandwagon. Since the psychopathic score for the smash 1996 hit SCREAM stabbed Beltrami into the Hollywood map, the composer has used every trick from chilling melodies to thunderous percussion and angelic choruses to embody the fantastical and fearful, music capable of rapturously symphonic […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

Interview: EARTH TO ECHO composer Joseph Trapanese phones home

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 07/13/2014
EARTH TO ECHO soundtrack | ©2014 Relativity Music Group

Listen to such pulsing wavelengths as Fall on Your Sword’s ANOTHER EARTH, Nathan Johnson’s LOOPER Nima Fakhara’s THE SIGNAL or Steven Price’s Oscar-winning GRAVITY, and you’ll pick up loud and clear on the burgeoning film scoring genre I prefer to call “alt. sci-fi.” It’s a plane of electro-orchestral existence where traditional symphonic melody (or at least the spirit of it) gets fused with an acoustical rock and roll vibe that can veer from psychedelia to grunge. Organic samples of everything from scraped metal to car engines are warped into new, unearthly entities, joining with electronic percussion and atmospheres that can […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

Interview: FARGO composer Jeff Russo makes his own musical hit for FX’s reinvention

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER
FARGO soundtrack | ©2014 Sony Music

With the winning likes of such improbable fim-to-tv adaptations as HANNIBAL, the boob tube and its scoring seem to have gotten significantly smarter and edgier than it’s been in the last several decades – or at the very least since the 16 years that FARGO first hit movie theaters. This North Dakota-set film noir represented the Coen Brothers at the height of their gleefully twisted irony, as a horrifically violent kidnapping-gone-wrong played out amidst cheerful salt of the Midwestern earth types. And only a humble (and very pregnant) female sheriff has the horse sense to figure out that this escalating […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: WHO IS KILLING THE GREAT CHEFS OF EUROPE? soundtrack (limited edition)

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 06/17/2014
WHO IS KILLING THE GREAT CHEFS OF EUROPE? soundtrack | ©2014 Varese Sarabande Records

All the dining metaphors in the world can’t do justice to Henry Mancini’s delicious mystery-comedy score for Ted Kotcheff’s equally delectable 1978 film that took cinematic food porn to new, mouth-watering heights. A composer who knew how to blend suspense, romance and humor with an escapist touch, Mancini starts the ovens rolling with a rollicking, Baroque theme that captures the pomp of haute culture. Eschewing “Pink Panther”-esque jazz in favor of a classical, continental approach, Mancini ooh’s-and-aah’s over the highly edible creations with perky brass and lush strings, while providing an unexpected melancholy bite in his love theme for Jacqueline […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: THE RESCUE soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 06/16/2014
THE RESCUE soundtrack | ©2014 Intrada Records

Intrada follows up their release of Bruce Broughton’s classic score to YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES with music for a just slightly more jingoistic youth adventure that’s sure to go down as one of Kim Il Jong’s least favorite entertainments. But for Broughton fans, 1988s Touchstone movie THE RESCUE  is a flag-waving, anti North Korean blast of nutty musical fun from the composer, if only to hear Broughton unfurl symphonic action combos of all-American funk and evil Asian percussion. But then, blasting commies was the rage in a decade that saw Basil Poledouris take down the Russians on U.S. soil for RED […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: THE MACHINE soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 06/15/2014
THE MACHINE soundtrack | ©2014 Movie Score Media

Among the wave of big-budget sci-fi scores using the latest in music high-tech to capture a lo-fi mid-80s electric sound, THE MACHINE resurrects the ghost in the synth to notable effect. Making his feature debut after numerous shorts (one tellingly titled THE BRITISH UFO FILES), Tom Raybould nails a hybrid approach between the coldly determined rhythms of John Carpenter, the more ominous sonic masses of Vangelis and the organic tonalities of a gentle, and just as effective piano and guitar. Put these together, and you’ve got an impressive recipe for creating musical artificial intelligence with a heart. Such is the […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: THE GERMAN DOCTOR (WALKOLDA) soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 06/14/2014
THE GERMAN DOCTOR soundtrack | ©2014 Quartet Records

While history itself never allowed us the satisfaction of Auschwitz’s “Angel of Death” being brought to justice, that hasn’t stopped the movies from imagining what happened to Joef Mengele during his decades-long sojourn in South America. Now Nazi-friendly Argentina offers their take on this legendarily evil figure with THE GERMAN DOCTOR, which finds the physician brought into the fold of an unsuspecting family, whose daughter he takes a potentially dangerous shine to. But if you’re expecting the rousing Bavarian strains of Jerry Goldsmith’s THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL or the menacing, slithering darkness of Michael Small’s MARATHON MAN, then composers Andres […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)

CD Review: THE FINAL MEMBER soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 06/13/2014
THE FINAL MEMBER soundtrack | ©2014 Movie Score Media

Whether it was a mildly horny teen in THE WAY WAY BACK, a guy getting it on with his dream girl through a good number of the (500) DAYS OF SUMMER or a high school senior MacDaddy facing THE SPECTACULAR NOW, Rob Simonsen has scored more than a few films where using one’s penis is of vital importance. The difference with THE FINAL MEMBER  is that it becomes a detachment contest among three particularly giving guys who want to donate their Johnson to the Icelandic Phallological Museum, the preeminent (and only) penis museum on the planet that needs to complete […]Read On »


COMMENTS (0)
  1. Pages:
  3. 1
  4. ...
  5. 14
  6. 15
  7. 16
  8. 17
  9. 18
  10. 19
  11. 20
  12. ...
  13. 44
Increase your website traffic with Attracta.com

Dr.5z5 Open Feed Directory

bottom round