23 Skidoo

By: Randall Larson
Date: Thursday, February 22, 2007

THIS WEEK’S RECOMMENDATIONS

Harry Gregson-Williams has taken a sidestep from the magnificent orchestral sweep of Shrek, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, and Flushed Away to provide a somber and spooky score for The Number 23, Joel Schumacher’s horror thriller starring Jim Carrey in a splendid dramatic role as a man afflicted and affected by the titular pair of digits. The soundtrack CD is available from New Line Records in the USA and from Silva Screen if you’re in the UK. The opening titles resonate out of an echoing sheen of synth and strings, emerging into a rhythmic pattern for violins, synth warbles, and sampled voicings that waft above a huge, pulsing, underlying industrial riff. Part House, part World Beat, part Ambient, it’s an extremely eloquent and compelling opening. “Fingerling’s Childhood” is a brisk reflective melody for winds over strings and synth, an effervescent association of memory and melody, nicely captivating. From there, things get pretty dark, as Carey’s character becomes more driven in his pursuit of the numerical duo. “Suicide Blonde” morphs from an ambient textured atmospheric piece to a bold phrasing for synths over a severely dominant techno drum beat, and then back to spooky atmospherics. Soft, breathy whispers wisp through the rhythms of “Ned,” whose strident string figures work above a carpet of electric bass and low-grounded synth issuing forth a recurrent and mysterious tonality. The same ruff recurs in “Finishing the Book” amid moaning voices and a rock-and-roll rhythm combo, and in “Laura Tollins,” becoming an insistent reflection of Carey’s obsession, its nagging electric tonalities scratching like bloody fingernails on the character’s psyche. Gregson-William’s orchestration is highly inventive, maneuvering sounds effectively and interestingly throughout the spectrum that makes up the score, so that it is well colored (if shaded fairly darkly) and accomplishes a fascinating array of atmospheric reverberations. It’s not a melodic score by any means, although its rhythms and tonalities are melody-based, but rarely exceed anything that might be described as more than a brief figure. But it’s a very compelling listen and an intriguingly designed tone poem for obsession, compulsion, revelation, and atonement.

www.newlinerecords.com

Ghost Rider Soundtrack
© Varese

Ghost Rider opened last week and features an epic quality orchestral score from Christopher Young, whose moodily atmospheric undulations for The Grudge 2 were heard in the DVD released the same week. Both scores are available on CD from Varese Sarabande. Ghost Rider is a massively energetic score, its first half a mostly unstoppable attack of aggressive orchestration, pulsating mightily as it supports the creation and infernal demise of Johnny Blaze, the stunt man who becomes host to the supernatural entity, seeking to regain his lost soul. In its first half, Young’s score softens only for “A Thing for Karen Carpenter,” a soft spoken acoustic guitar melody, associated with Blaze’s admiration of the singer, whose music soothes his tortured spirit; but otherwise the score remains as relentless as any diabolical soul-stealer intent on entombing his prize. “Cemetery Dance” builds to a climactic, fiery eruption, spewing its musical lava omnidirectionally after a painfully slow and powerful build up, its climax aurally provocative and stimulating. Choir enhances the texture of “More Sinister Than Popcorn,” which follows, as heart-slamming throbs of bass resonate below guttural drones of brass and a shrieking storm of violins, elevated with intensity through the rampant voicings of the choir. As the story begins examining the developing heroism and integrity of Johnny Blaze as he seeks redemption, Young opens up the score beyond the pure aggression of its first half. With “San Venganza,” Young introduces a Latin deguello and suddenly we’re almost in Italian Western territory – the motif lends a surprising and intriguing measure to the mix as the cue becomes more dissonant and violent. A softer and tragically resolute melody from strings and a haunting chorus is intoned in “Blood Signature,” while “Serenade To A Daredevil’s Devil” reprises the “Karen Carpenter” guitar melody heard earlier. At nearly six minutes, “Nebuchadnezzer Phase” is Young’s climactic tour do force, wherein choir and orchestra and Young’s own carefully unleashed onslaught of musical terror, given a human face through orchestral recollections of the deguello, Karen Carpenter, and sweeping passages for chorus over riffing violins. “The West Was Built On Legends” closes out the score with sweeping, fashion, as slowly undulating choir and orchestra lay out a reverential paean for the triumphant Blaze, and then the chorus comes in heavy and hollering in Wagner/Orff fashion for the film’s closing titles. A loud and aggressive but very passionate score.

www.varesesarabande.com

The Librarian

La-La Land Records has released two new scores by Joseph LoDuca, known for his inventive musics for the Evil Dead films and TV’s Xena and Hercules. Combined on a single 2-CD set, the scores for The Librarian: Return to King Solomon’s Mines and The Librarian: Quest for the Spear are both more traditional scores than the eclectic stew that went into those the aforementioned works, both fairly straightforward but very swashbuckling orchestral compositions, and quite likable. Both films are made-for-TV features from TNT (2006 and 2004, respectively), exec produced by Dean Devlin and starring Noah Wylie as a librarian whose mission to retrieve a magical artifact stolen from his library leads to multiple adventures. The music reflects Williams and Goldsmith and Korngold and is built from a sturdy tradition of adventure and fantasy-adventure films, and it’s extremely well-played and likable, built around a sturdy and, well, academic-sounding main theme that is versatile enough to provide sustenance for all manner of settings and situations. Both scores are fairly busy – there’s not a lot of respite from the action and energy of LoDuca’s musical activity, but there are melodies a-plenty as well as an intriguing exploration of African musical traditions to explore the musical environment of the King Solomon’s Mines episode, including a cool African jazz piece (“Honeymooners”). There are also a couple of surprises – such as the rock-and-roll riff that comes out of nowhere for “Chick Fight” and the lounge music interlude, “Poppin’ The Cork”, in Quest for the Spear. (“Chick Fight” is also nicely reprised in the second half of the End Titles). Joseph LoDuca is one of the most imaginative and prolific composers working in television (he also scored the miniseries The Triangle for Devlin and the same company), and I’m always pleased for the opportunity to hear more of his work. The release is a limited edition of 1500 copies. [I have also got to thank La-La Land for choosing the kind of double-CD jewel case that opens like a book, rather than opening from the inside outward, which always makes one of the CDs fall onto the floor in the process (pet peeve? This is only one of ’em!).]

www.lalalandrecords.com

FILM MUSIC NEWS

William Ross, one-time orchestrator and conductor for some of the biggest names in the industry, and now a composer in his own right, has been selected to conduct the orchestra for the 79th Annual Academy Awards, which take place this coming weekend, Sunday Feb. 25^th. Ross’ profile has been raised over the years with scores such as Tin Cup, The Evening Star, My Dog Skip and most recently Ladder 49, September Dawn and Driftwood, while perhaps most famously he adapted and conducted John Williams' music for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Ross joins a select few who have previously served as musical director, including, at the top of the heap, Bill Conti, who has conducted at the event 18 times, John Williams, Marvin Hamlisch, Henry Mancini, Marc Shaiman, and Lionel Newman, amongst others. The job of conducting the orchestra at the Academy Awards isn’t an easy one. Aside from striking up the band every few minutes, the ‘lucky’ candidate has to musically herd the winners off of the stage during what will likely be, for some, the single most important moment in their lives.

No details have emerged as to what the musical aspects of the 79th Academy Awards will be, but with an honorary Oscar going to Ennio Morricone, chances are there will be a good selection of his music performed this year, besides the usual nominated score performances. – via musicfromthemovies.com

Lakeshore Records has released the song soundtrack to Zodiac, David Fincher’s new film about the serial killer who haunted late 1960s San Francisco. It’s a pleasing collection of 1960s era music, featuring original classics from such bands as 1960s Santana, The Animals, Three Dog Night, Donovan, Isaac Hayes, The Four Tops, Marvin Gaye, along with jazz of the same period from Miles Davis and John Coltrane. While most of the selections are well known and familiar to those who have been around for a while, it’s a notable assortment of very compatible tunes from the period. The film’s actual score, David Shire’s darkly mysterious and assertive orchestral music, will be released separately on March 13th from Varese Sarabande.

On March 20th, Orange Mountain Music will release Philip Glass’ Dracula (for solo piano), an interpretation by pianist Michael Riesman of Glass’ alternate score for the DVD release of 1931’s Dracula (performed by the Kronos Quartet for the DVD and on Glass’ original album on Nonesuch.

www.orangemountainmusic.com

On March 27th, Varese Sarabande will release soundtracks to the new Robert Rodriguez/Quentin Tarantino collaboration, Grind House, which combines two feature horror movies put together as a double feature, mimicking the grind house exploitation horror films that both directors grew up watching and loving. The collaboration even includes fake Exploitation movie trailers and grind house type ads in between both movies. The score for Grind House was composed by Rodriguez himself. John Frizzell replaced Philip Glass on Stephen Hopkins’ The Reaping, starring Hilary Swank as a woman investigating a Southern town beset by Biblical plagues, and will also see a March 27th CD release from Varese.

www.varesesarabande.com

This Friday, Perseverance will release their long awaited release of Charles Bernstein's score from the Wes Craven picture, Deadly Friend (1986). The album includes both Bernstein’s orchestral music as well as a handful of remastered electronic cues from the original 1986 Varese Sarabande LP, as well as a 35 minute audio interview of Charles Bernstein and Wes Craven at the end of the album. The disc is limited to 1,000 pressings. www.perseverancerecords.com

In July, Interscope Records will release the soundtrack to The Simpsons Movie, composed by Hans Zimmer and featuring, of course, Danny Elfman’s main theme. While it’s a shame veteran series composer Alf Clausen isn’t more closely involved, it will be interesting nonetheless to hear Zimmer’s take on the zany world of Springfield.

In Japan, Think! Records has released a world premiere quartet of jazz-based soundtracks from notable 1960s-era Japanese nouvelle crime films, including 1964’s Kuroi Taiyou/Kyounetsu No Kisetsu (Black Sun/The Warped Ones – both directed by Koreyoshi Kurahara) on a single disc, with music by Toshiro Mayuzumi (famed in the US for his score to The Bible); Naozumi Yamamoto’s hard-boiled jazz score to Seijun Suzuki’s celebrated crime/beatnik film Koroshi no rakuin (Branded To Kill, 1967); and the funky jazz score by Keitaro Miho and Norio Maeda Miho for Suzuki’s Subete Ga Kurutteru (Everything Goes Wrong)1960. Also from Japan are premiere releases of the long-out-of-print soundtrack LPs of Ennio Morricone’s scores to Matchless and Buone Notizie, originally released only on LP from the elusive Italian label, Cometa.