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2023 Music Reviews S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television Year

Star Trek: Picard Season 3 – music by Stephen Barton and Frederik Wiedmann

6 min read

Order this CDThe third and final season of Star Trek: Picard has now unspooled in full on Paramount Plus, and its soundtrack is also now readily available. The third season was heavily promoted, promising a full reunion of the crew of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and late in the season, even miraculously brought back the Next Generation’s beloved Enterprise from what we’d all assumed was its final resting place on the planet onto whose surface it crashed in 1994’s Star Trek: Generations. Of course, to bring all of the characters back to their original places on that iconic bridge, there had to be a tremendous threat that they’d risk everything to fight, and perhaps predictably, that turned out to be the Borg, a well-worn Star Trek foe getting its third wildly different treatment in as many consecutive seasons of Picard. Whether it all holds together as a story without relying on dropping nostalgia bombs on the audience to distract them from the predictability of the plot – look, space squirrel! – is something I suspect fans and critics will be debating for years to come. In the meantime, the actors got to work together one more time, save the universe one more time, and pay their mortgages.

Into this fray walked two composers new to the franchise. Where Jeff Russo – also the resident composer of Star Trek: Discovery – had performed similar duties for Picard’s first and second seasons, giving those proceedings a somewhat more contemplative feel with the obligatory ramping-up-to-maximum-orchestral-anxiety required by end-of-act and end-of-episode breaks, Picard’s showrunners opted to bring in some fresh talent for the show’s last season. It’s also possible that they were looking to bring in talent that wouldn’t balk at the producers’ requests to reference Jerry Goldsmith and other previous Star Trek composers often. (There’s less money to be made from a new arrangement of someone else’s composition than there is from composing something completely original, but make no mistake, with all of the other easter eggs in the show, the producers of Picard make it clear they wanted to hear Goldsmith themes and hear them often.) What a spot to be in: your name is appearing in a high-profile streaming show with the weight of the expectations of the entire franchise on your shoulders, but what you’ve been asked to do is play Jerry Goldsmith’s greatest hits, with some stylistic nods to James Horner’s nautical stylings from Star Trek II. What a musical Kobayashi Maru scenario. (And one that’s likely to keep repeating itself as various long-running IPs play the nostalgia card more blatantly.)

The good news is that the two composers get quite a few original licks in during their sprints between the Goldsmith-ian goalposts. Barton, who did the music for the game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and previously worked with Picard showrunner Terry Matalas on Syfy’s series adaptation of 12 Monkeys (of which Matalas was also the showrunner), and Wiedmann, whose credits include numerous DC Comics direct-to-video animation projects, are no strangers to the epic side of the genre, and they bring that sound in bucketfuls. Rapid-fire brass runs, sinister bass notes, and the requisite strings are all there in abundance, along with a very few fleeting hints of the legendary Blaster Beam, but when it’s time for Picard and company to save the day, the Goldsmith theme from Star Trek: The Motion Picture (adapted to serve as the theme for The Next Generation’s TV run) returns, along with hints of Goldsmith’s Star Trek: First Contact Theme. Ironically, it’s everything that the weekly episode scores for Next Generation were strictly forbidden to be by that show’s showrunner: loud, thematic, percussive, and developing Goldsmith’s theme(s) as a motif. Courage’s Star Trek theme is quoted occasionally as well, and especially in the suite of material from the first episode, there are audible references to the style, if not necessarily the melodies, of James Horner’s Star Trek II score. In tracks like “Blood In The Water” there are even hints of Don Davis’ action music stylings from The Matrix trilogy.

Some of the best-utilized quotes are the most understated: the track “Legacies”, accompanying the lovingly languid survey of the ships in Geordi’s Fleet Museum, quotes Dennis McCarthy’s Deep Space Nine theme, Courage’s original series theme, Goldsmith’s Star Trek: Voyager theme, and Leonard Rosenman’s theme from Star Trek IV (as that movie’s recovered Klingon ship is glimpsed), all in the space of three minutes with a lovely subtlety (which is good, because the scene it accompanied was not a thing of subtely, bringing the story to a standstill to wallow in its nostalgia grace notes). The Rosenman theme – and indeed, that movie’s entire underrated score – is often omitted from the Star Trek musical canon, and it’s nice to hear it reclaim its place. Maximum Goldsmithification resumes with the track “Make It So”, unveiling the restored Enterprise-D.

3 out of 4It’s all nicely put together, but it reminds me of when, in the 1990s, with my ridiculously massive 18-disc Pioneer magazine CD changer loaded down with every available Star Trek TV and film soundtrack, I would hit “shuffle” and just bask in it. What I liked about Russo’s approach was that it was very much in line with Star Trek: Picard’s original remit to move the character, and his universe, forward into a new context, filled with new and sometimes less-than-sympathetic characters we hadn’t met before. It was something new. Both this season of the show, and its soundtrack, try very hard to hit shuffle play on Star Trek’s greatest hits, and so a lot of it sounds like something you’ve heard before, which does a disservice to the decent original material that Barton and Wiedmann did manage to squeeze in between the musical references. The point of Picard, the series, in its original formulation, was to use one character as a jumping-off point into new territory for the franchise. This season seemed like a decisive step away from that goal. I wonder what we might have gotten if the two talented composers hired for this gig were told to avoid all the Jerry Goldsmith references and chart their own course.

  1. Beverly Crusher (3:02)
  2. Old Communicator (1:58)
  3. Hello, Beautiful (1:57)
  4. Leaving Spacedock (3:44)
  5. I Like That Seven! (3:29)
  6. Breaking the Beam (3:59)
  7. The Shrike (3:34)
  8. Picard’s Answer (4:08)
  9. Riker and Jack (2:08)
  10. Call Me Number One (2:02)
  11. No Win Scenario (3:57)
  12. Blood in the Water (2:58)
  13. Let’s Go Home (3:24)
  14. Flying Blind (5:51)
  15. A New Family (4:16)
  16. Klingons Never Disappoint (5:32)
  17. I Do See You (5:26)
  18. Legacies (3:15)
  19. Evolution (2:44)
  20. La Forges (2:08)
  21. Invisible Rescue (3:34)
  22. Catch Me First (2:32)
  23. Proteus (3:46)
  24. Dominion (7:04)
  25. Lower The Partition (3:38)
  26. Get Off My Bridge (4:26)
  27. Family Reunion (3:18)
  28. Impossible (1:37)
  29. Frontier Day (2:43)
  30. Hail The Fleet (4:03)
  31. You Have The Conn (3:44)
  32. Make It So (6:02)
  33. This Ends Tonight (3:07)
  34. Battle on the Bridge (2:58)
  35. All That’s Left (2:02)
  36. Annihilate (3:05)
  37. Trust Me (2:06)
  38. The Last Generation (2:51)
  39. Where It All Began (2:19)
  40. The Missing Part Of Me (4:30)
  41. Must Come To An End (1:32)
  42. A New Day (3:22)
  43. Legacy and Future (1:44)
  44. Names Mean Everything (1:43)
  45. The Stars – End Credits (2:59)

Released by: Lakeshore Records
Release date: April 20, 2023
Total running time: 2:30:15

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2022 B Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Wars Year

The Book Of Boba Fett, Volume 1 (Chapters 1-4) – music by Joseph Shirley

5 min read

Order this CDSince it’s embraced full-time fanservice, I’m not as sure as I used to be that The Mandalorian was the revolution in Star Wars storytelling that was so urgently needed after the bulk of the sequel trilogy, but I will still give it credit for shaking up the status quo where the music of the Star Wars universe is concerned. That willingness to experiment beyond the John Williams playbook continues with the music from The Book Of Boba Fett, scored by Mandalorian composer Ludwig Goransson‘s longtime collaborator, Joseph Shirley. He’s been Goransson’s programmer since 2015‘s Creed and began racking up “additional music by…” credits alongside his mentor on TBS’ Angie Tribeca series and season two of The Mandalorian. The Book Of Boba Fett really should be his breakout work, because there’s a lot in this score to enjoy. I don’t expect to see him doing much programming work for other people after this.

Goransson still has his fingers on the scale, however: he composed the theme for the series, which is referred to frequently in the score, and he also has intimate knowledge of Goransson’s working style, so there are plenty of ways in which The Book Of Boba Fett and The Mandlorian are musically of a piece (especially since – and surely it’s been long enough that this is no longer legitimately a spoiler – two episodes out of seven are taken up by what even the show’s creators refer to as “The Mandalorian Season 2.5”, where the narrative momentum surrounding Fett himself comes to a grinding halt so we can catch up with the stars of the show from which this series was spun off). The lumbering theme Goransson coined for Fett in the second season of The Mandalorian also makes several appearances here.

One sound that The Book Of Boba Fett can claim all its own is an almost-guttural tribal sound, with low male vocals either supplanting or supplementing traditional orchestration. This is another element taking its lead from Goransson’s main theme, but it lends this show’s scores a very unique flavor. Combined with just the right level of low, threatening brass, as in the track “The Stranger”, this is an amazing sound. It’s not just an unbroken vowel sound, though; the vocals have wordless syllables that do a great deal of the rhythmic work, even if the vocals are not in the foreground of a given piece (such as “Fear Is A Safe Bet”). These elements convey a lot of the emotion as Fett joins the Tusken tribe and takes them on as his found family in the early episodes’ flashbacks. The vocal work reaches peak beauty with a passage toward the end of “Aliit Ori’shya Tal’din” that reaches for an almost religious feel.

The score also has a very modern edge, too; the “Road Rage” and “The Mod Parlour” tracks bring a trip-hop beat to the proceedings. This is particularly fun with “Road Rage”‘s extended chase scene – it’s some of the most fun action music I’ve heard since, honestly, The Matrix trilogy‘s Don Davis/Rob Dougan mash-ups. The orchestra gets its licks in, but the synth elements that almost wander into dubstep territory glue it all together, and it’s the standout action scene here. “The Mod Parlour” is a piece of source music, heard alongside the first appearance of a cybernetic modifier (think of it as the Star Wars universe’s answer to a tattoo artist) played by musician-turned-actor Thundercat, accompanying a montage of his working to save the life of Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) at Fett’s insistence; a well-known bassist, Thundercat actually plays the trippy descending bass riffs on the track itself.

If you’re looking for the music accompanying episode 2’s train heist as Fett and his found Tusken family finally take the fight to the Pykes, it’s a bonus track on the second volume. That may be a frustrating thing to move to a later release, but honestly, a lot of the best music happens before a show that’s nominally about Boba Fett suddenly gets hijacked for a check-in with Mando and Grogu.

4 out of 4If there’s anything I want out of a second season of The Book Of Boba Fett (something which, at this time, has yet to be announced officially), I want an entire season of Temuera Morrison as the show’s intense lead without the jarring “we interrupt this program for an urgent update from the Mandalorian” gear-shift of the first season, and I’m definitely ready to hear Joseph Shirley doing the music again.

  1. Rebirth (03:17)
  2. The Stranger (03:01)
  3. Normal Day at the Office (02:42)
  4. Fear Is a Sure Bet (03:48)
  5. Desert Walk (03:01)
  6. Boba’s Throne (03:45)
  7. The Twins (04:37)
  8. Stop That Train (04:06)
  9. Like a Bantha (02:03)
  10. The Ultimate Boon (05:08)
  11. Aliit Ori’shya Tal’din (06:12)
  12. Road Rage (04:57)
  13. The Mod Parlour (featuring Thundercat) (03:04)
  14. Fennec and Boba (02:09)
  15. You Fly, I’ll Shoot (05:34)
  16. The Families of Mos Espa (05:34)
  17. The Book of Boba Fett (02:56)

Released by: Disney Music
Release date: January 21, 2022
Total running time: 1:05:45

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2022 S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television

Star Trek: Picard – Season 2

4 min read

Order this CDThe jury will probably be out for quite a while on whether or not the second season of the Paramount+ series Star Trek: Picard was a creative success; the response to the show has definitely been in a love-it-or-hate-it mode, with very few critics choosing to stay in the middle ground. The return of Q, the time travel plotline, the on-the-nose “fascist future Earth” and the equally on-the-nose warnings that this, rather than Star Trek’s more inclusive future, could be where we’re headed if 21st century society is any indication… if there’s something that the second season of Picard may not have been in many places, it’s, in a word, subtle. (Of course, the argument could also be made that, after the past few years of real-life plot developments

The soundtrack opens with a more active, strident reading of the show’s established theme tune, before transitioning to a pair of wonderful orchestral tours-de-force, “Look Up” and “Let’s See What’s Out There”. The musical tone gets darker as the timeline takes a sudden shift, and here we run into one of my first complaints about this soundtrack. One of the highlights of the early part of the season was the revisiting of the sinister Borg theme from Star Trek: First Contact, here appearing in the show as the musical signature for the Borg Queen. And…those great new takes on that theme are nowhere to be found here. (It’s almost quoted – but not quite – in “Build Back Better Borg” later on in the album.)

The darker, more contemplative vibe continues, with some highlights including “Family Secrets”, “A Taste Of Freedom”, and “The Journey Inward”. Somewhere around “Build Back Better Borg”, the emphasis returns to action. The absence of the Borg theme becomes really baffling here, because the theme from Star Trek: First Contact itself is quoted in “Second Chances”, and Goldsmith’s theme from Star Trek: The Motion Picture (which Russo has decided is Picard’s theme) is quoted in “Guardian At The Gate”.

The end of the album is rounded out with music from the Europa Mission shindig, including the band’s instrumental cover of “Fly Me To The Moon”, and yes, from Benatar to the Borg-Queen-to-be, “Shadows Of The Night” sung (surprisingly well) by Alison Pill. Two different takes on the end credits music close things out.

It’s already known that Russo is handing the composing duties off to Stephen Barton and Freddie Wiedman for season three, which will apparently be heavy on quotations of The Motion Picture theme (and Blaster Beam!), so this is his last hurrah for Star 3 out of 4Trek: Picard. What I liked about this season’s music – as heard in the show – was that Russo did a magnificent job weaving legacy themes into his own work, musically putting this season in the greater context of Star Trek mythology as a whole. My singular beef with the album is that, for whatever reason (including the less generous running time as compared to the season one soundtrack album), as a pure listening experience, it doesn’t reflect the amazing job its obviously talented composer did with that.

  1. Season 2 Main Title (1:59)
  2. Look Up (1:21)
  3. Let’s See What’s Out There (3:54)
  4. The Pressure of Legacy (1:12)
  5. Penance (3:03)
  6. Seek The Watcher (5:06)
  7. Best Laid Plans (4:49)
  8. What’s My Full Name? (2:44)
  9. Disappointment In Leadership (4:24)
  10. Family Secrets (2:05)
  11. Your Ancestor (1:07)
  12. A Melancholy (2:29)
  13. A Taste of Freedom (3:54)
  14. Maximum Security Function (1:20)
  15. Lies Upon Lies (2:22)
  16. The Journey Inward (3:12)
  17. The True Monster (3:05)
  18. My Spaceship (1:30)
  19. Deepest Truth (2:32)
  20. My Truth (2:55)
  21. Build Back Better Borg (4:53)
  22. Opening the Door (4:06)
  23. Honoring the Deal (3:41)
  24. The Travelers (1:36)
  25. Where You Belong (3:03)
  26. Guardian at The Gate (3:43)
  27. Second Chances (3:13)
  28. Fly Me To The Moon (1:42)
  29. Shadows of the Night (featuring Alison Pill) (1:28)
  30. Season 2 End Credits (201) (0:54)
  31. Season 2 End Credits (209) (0:53)

Released by: Lakeshore Records
Release date: April 29, 2022
Total running time: 84:15

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2022 Film Music Reviews S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television Year

Star Trek Collection: The Final Frontier

2 min read

Order this CDI hit peak Star Trek superfandom in the late ’80s, just in time for the 1990s and the sudden rapid expansion of Star Trek as a genuine media franchise to kick in. There were so many shows on TV. A good few episodes of these various series had really good music. And the music…was nowhere to be found commercially. Star Trek: The Next Generation wound up with four individual CD releases through the end of the 1990s, while Deep Space Nine and Voyager merited one each, in each instance with (most of) the score from their pilot episodes. That pattern continued with the pilot episode of Enterprise in 2001, and then…it all went silent. Being in my early 20s, I didn’t get it. It seemed like GNP Crescendo had a license to print money – or at least a license to get their hands of copious amounts of my money – if only they’d keep releasing more Star Trek music. (I know nothing of musicians’ unions and re-use fees at the time, I just knew what I liked.) My attention drifted to other franchises that seemed to know full well that their fans wanted more music, not less – Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, the new Doctor Who… and then a magical thing happened in the late aughts. Suddenly Paramount seemed more open to the idea of mining its musical vaults. Long-out-of-print Star Trek movie soundtrack albums suddenly had newly expanded editions. On the television front, things went from famine to feast as massive box sets chronicled either the entire musical oeveure of the 1960s series, or the entire body of work of a beloved single Next Generation composer. And then all of the television series racked up not just one, but two 3-or-4-disc box sets covering music from their entire broadcast run. … Read more

Categories
2019 Film Soundtracks Star Trek W Year

What We Left Behind – music by Dennis McCarthy and Kevin Kiner

4 min read

If there was ever a way to gauge how passionately fans of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine were willing to go to bat for a series that remains something of the bastard stepchild of the franchise, all one had to do was promise a documentary interviewing all of the major players, and then crowdfund that documentary. Then you just sit back and watch how many of the stretch goals go whizzing by as the production is funded.

One of those stretch goals was to hire the original composer of the Deep Space Nine theme and most of the series’ episodes, Dennis McCarthy, to score the documentary, What We Left Behind. McCarthy was not only game for returning to the Star Trek universe, but he brought with him Kevin Kiner, a frequent collaborator from McCarthy’s years providing music for the ratings-challenged, budget-addled Star Trek: Enterprise. As that show’s music budget was repeatedly slashed, McCarthy would lean on Kiner to bring the music to life electronically, since the money for an orchestra was no longer necessarily on the table. By the time McCarthy brought Kiner in the perform much the same function on What We Left Behind, Kiner was a composer in his own right, having scored nearly the entirety of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, numerous early episodes of Stargate SG-1, and a second animated series, Star Wars: Rebels.

There’s one component of the documentary where bringing McCarthy back into the fold really pays major dividends. The show’s storied writers’ room is reassembled – a room now made not of rookie TV writers, but of high-powered Hollywood showrunners in their own right – with their old boss, Ira Steven Behr (also the frequent narrator/muse of the documentary), to break down the story for an entirely hypothetical season 8 premiere. As they devise the story, it’s brought to life by artwork and by McCarthy’s music, which is authentic as one could get without actually digging up McCarthy’s 1990s session tapes. The result is an authentic Deep Space Nine story with authentic Deep Space Nine music, one of the highlights of the whole project. In a few other cases, McCarthy ends up rescoring scenes he originally scored in the ’90s. With Kiner’s considerable skill at electronically recreating orchestral bombast, the results are genuinely thrilling.

McCarthy and Kiner bring more modern sensibilities to tracks like “Mr. Brooks”, “Killing Will Robinson”, and “Racial Inequalities”. From the jauntiness to the electronic percussion elements of these tracks, there’s a clear musical dividing line between “documentary” and “breaking the story for an unmade season 8 premiere”.

The all-star barbershop quartet of DS9 veterans – Casey Biggs, Jeffrey Combs, Armin Shimerman, and Max Grodenchik – also appear on the soundtrack with their renditions of classic standards (now with Deep-Space-Nine-inspired lyrics, i.e. “I Left My Quark And Captain Sisko” to the tune of “I Left My Heart In San Francisco”). These interludes were a highlight of a documentary that tried very hard to give the impression that it wasn’t taking itself too seriously, and is an extension of Biggs’ and Grodenchik’s convention party piece. (It’s especially nice to have these songs handy in a year where conventions have abruptly become as much a distant memory as the show itself.)

4 out of 4So if you were wondering why you should bother with a soundtrack that isn’t even from one of the Star Trek series, but rather a documentary about that series, it’s pretty simple: by bringing Dennis McCarthy and Kevin Kiner back into the Trek universe, the result is something that earns its place alongside the music from the series itself. Much like the entirely hypothetical season 8 premiere, it’s a tantalizing glimpse into a Star Trek tale that could’ve kept on going.

Order this CD

  1. Main Title (0:12)
  2. Through A Glass Darkly (0:57)
  3. I Left My Quark and Captain Sisko (2:10)
  4. Reunion (2:40)
  5. Big Space / Fun Voyages (0:37)
  6. Mr. Brooks (3:03)
  7. Concept Art / Production Design (2:47)
  8. Actor Interaction / DS9 Renaissance / Promise to be Back (3:05)
  9. Writers Intro / New Episode (4:58)
  10. Explosion (1:33)
  11. Evolving Characters I / Friendship to Romance (1:32)
  12. Grey Character (2:54)
  13. Evolving Characters II / Recurring Characters (1:46)
  14. Killing Will Robinson (2:29)
  15. Galactic War Saga / Sacrifice of Angels (3:04)
  16. Writers’ Room I (2:48)
  17. Haven’t Advanced Much (1:33)
  18. Racial Inequalities (1:45)
  19. Writers’ Room II (2:30)
  20. Action Barbie / Being Heard (3:03)
  21. Intro Ezri (1:28)
  22. Bashir (1:16)
  23. The Cost of War (1:16)
  24. Real World Issues (2:53)
  25. Section 31 (3:49)
  26. Finale (5:58)
  27. What We Left Behind (Vocal) (2:48)
  28. In Memorium (0:43)
  29. End Credits (3:12)
  30. DS9 Rocks (1:29)
  31. What We Left Behind Trailer (2:27)
  32. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Main Title for Solo Piano “After 3:00 AM at Quarks” (5:09)

Released by: BSX Records
Release date: October 11, 2019
Total running time: 1:17:54

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Film S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title

Space Station 76 – music by Marc & Steffan Fantini

2 min read

Ah, Space Station 76 – I hadn’t even thought about this movie in years when the soundtrack popped up out of nowhere in 2020, six years after the movie itself met with some minor film festival buzz before becoming a creature of the streaming media ecosystem. Filmed on a bunch of gorgeously retro-futuristic sets – evoking that ’70s sci-fi vision of what the future might be – Space Station 76 was a joy to look at, but there wasn’t much to actually watch. It was as much a retro sci-fi parody as it was a parody of the entire decade whose sci-fi it was spoofing, poking fun at the “I’m OK, you’re OK” vibe of the 1970s. It’s a pity it just wasn’t that funny, especially since it was billed as a comedy. The score, however, serves as a pleasant reminder that the movie’s music may have been even more successful than its look in evoking that decade.

While there are bits that sound like they’re reaching, in a tongue-in-cheek way, to meet the vibe of a serious sci-fi score of that era, much of the score takes on a laid-back, mellow, ’70s pop vibe, a sound carefully constructed to sit comfortably alongside several vintage slices of Todd Rundgren and Ambrosia that punctuate the proceedings. The blend of new score and older songs is reasonably successful, helping the movie to conjure a lot of its retro vibe. (The Rundgren and Ambrosia selections are not included here, and that’s okay; they’re readily available elsewhere.)

3 out of 4It’s perhaps not the best plaudit for a movie that its most memorable elements are its score and its production design (shame about the story and the characters, though), but the score’s release is a nice reminder that the movie was an audiovisual feast, even if it forgot to stick the landing with a satisfying story.

Order this CD

  1. Introduction (0:55)
  2. Title Sequence (Alien Ship) (1:55)
  3. Roller Skating (1:43)
  4. Irregularities (0:33)
  5. Stressing Me (0:35)
  6. Here Comes The Delivery Man (0:42)
  7. 70’s Joy’nt (0:53)
  8. World Of Fantasy (0:47)
  9. Hello (0:38)
  10. Sunshine, No (0:45)
  11. Asteroidal Pocket (2:18)
  12. Sex and Death (1:09)
  13. Never Been To Earth (1:09)
  14. Romantic Joy’nt (0:51)
  15. Last Gerbil (1:25)
  16. Mail’s Here (0:29)
  17. Home Movies (1:08)
  18. Mom In Pod (1:07)
  19. Budding Romance (1:19)
  20. Logan Is Coming (0:16)
  21. Asteroid Hits (2:25)
  22. Asteroid Misses (2:15)
  23. Sunshine Floats (0:51)

Released by: Madison Gate Records
Release date: April 3, 2020
Total running time: 26:06

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2017 Film S Soundtracks Star Wars

Star Wars: The Last Jedi – music by John Williams

4 min read

Star Wars fandom may never be a cohesive whole again once the post-original-trilogy trilogy wraps up. The Force Awakens was knowingly derivative – on purpose, so we’re told in hindsight – to bring a new, younger audience into the familiar story beats of a Star Wars movie, while The Last Jedi‘s iconoclastic approach to the story’s remaining original trilogy characters seemed to split Star Wars fandom down the middle. The one unchanging constant in this whirlwind, however, has been John Williams, the architect of the orchestral Star Wars sound.

The soundtrack from The Last Jedi, appropriately for the middle chapter of a trilogy, leans heavily on themes already established. Themes for Rey, Kylo Ren/the First Order, and Poe/the Resistance are holdovers from The Force Awakens, with Rey’s theme given a great deal of development here. From the original trilogy, the Force theme (also frequently associated with Obi-Wan Kenobi) gets plenty of play here, as does a theme for another Jedi Master long past. The TIE Fighter battle theme is back as the Millennium Falcon shakes off its pursuers on Crait, with maybe two seconds of whimsy dropped in for Chewie’s new Porg sidekick. (Not heard on the album: the re-use of the Emperor’s theme for Snoke – perhaps a tacitly tuneful admission that the two were nearly interchangeable?) Luke and Leia’s reunion gets a somber, low-key treatment of their theme from Return Of The Jedi, tagged out by a short reference to Han and Leia’s love theme before Luke strides into battle against Kylo Ren.

Virtually the only truly new theme here is reserved for Finn’s winsome new partner, Rose (though that description should, perhaps, be the other way around). This leaves the movie’s major action setpieces for the majority of “new” material – percussive, raging battle music for Rey and Ren’s fight against Snoke’s guards, Finn’s final fight with Phasma, and naturally Luke’s climcactic duel with Kylo Ren. “The Battle Of Crait” rolls out a low, threatening motif for the oncoming First Order forces, as well as a choral interlude for Finn’s futile attempt to sacrifice himself for the Rebel cause.

The introduction to Canto Bight has an opulent opening (hearkening back to some of the “Coruscant” music from the prequel trilogy, which then segues into a boisterous jazz tune that sounds like it’s played by the same ensemble as the original Star Wars‘ Cantina Band music. It’s not a callback to that specific tune, but very much a delightful callback to its style. “The Fathiers”, accompanying the scenes of Finn and Rose lowering Canto Bight’s property value with large, four-legged help, is a callback of another kind – it sounds like a theme from an Indiana Jones movie slipped into the Star Wars universe.

I can handle a soundtrack falling back on old favorites more gracefully than I can handle the entire script of a movie doing so, and – spoiler alert – John Williams gives Luke Skywalker and Leia a truly epic sendoff, the 5 out of 4former with a mythic choral treatment, and the latter with her theme from Star Wars arranged for piano during the end credit tribute to the late Carrie Fisher.

With J.J. Abrams back in the driver’s seat for Episode IX, the question isn’t whether John Williams’ final Star Wars outing is worthy of the franchise. The question now becomes whether or not the movie itself will be worthy of Williams’ grand finale.

Order this CD

  1. Main Title and Escape (7:26)
  2. Ahch-To Island (4:23)
  3. Revisiting Snoke (3:29)
  4. The Supremacy (4:01)
  5. Fun with Finn and Rose (2:34)
  6. Old Friends (4:29)
  7. The Rebellion is Reborn (4:00)
  8. Lesson One (2:10)
  9. Canto Bight (2:38)
  10. Who Are You? (3:04)
  11. The Fathiers (2:42)
  12. The Cave (3:00)
  13. The Sacred Jedi Texts (3:33)
  14. A New Alliance (3:13)
  15. Chrome Dome (2:03)
  16. The Battle of Crait (6:48)
  17. The Spark (3:36)
  18. The Last Jedi (3:04)
  19. Peace and Purpose (3:08)
  20. Finale (8:28)

Released by: Walt Disney Records
Release date: December 15, 2017
Total running time: 77:49

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Categories
2017 S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Stargate Television Year

Stargate SG-1: Music From Selected Episodes

4 min read

If there’s a property I didn’t expect to resurface in the soundtrack world in the summer of 2017, it’s the Stargate TV franchise. In hindsight, though, I wasn’t paying attention to the clues – Intrada has long championed the musical output of Richard Band, brother of Full Moon Pictures producer Charles Band, and composer-in-residence on Full Moon’s extensive slate of low-to-mid-budget horror movies. And, patterned somewhat after the arrangement that governed music during the entirety of spinoff-era Star Trek, Band alternated on episodes of Stargate SG-1 with Joel Goldsmith for the show’s first two years on the Showtime pay cable channel, with other composers occasionally filling in (including, ironically, Star Trek’s Dennis McCarthy). This 2-CD set from Intrada gather’s Band’s carefully selected highlights from his time with the Stargate franchise.

The episodes for which Band felt he’d done his best work were Cold Lazarus, In The Line Of Duty, In The Serpent’s Lair, and Singularity – oddly enough, all early favorites of mine. Listening to the scores Band composed for these episodes, which feature small orchestral ensembles attempting to fill out and deepen the sound of synthesizers and samples, it’s easy to tell the real musicians from the electronic sounds. With the show opening every week with an adapted version of David Arnold’s theme from the original Stargate movie (for which Arnold had to be paid for every usage), the rest of the music budget – especially before Stargate SG-1 found its legs and popularity with its audience – was tightly constrained. But even when roughly half of what you hear is synthesized, it’s still a fun listen. Military drums, low, urgent brass ostinatos, and actual recurring themes (including quotes of Arnold’s theme) – the music of SG-1 was everything that the music of the show’s Star Trek contemporaries usually wasn’t: propulsive and threatening and dangerous. Stuff was happening in the music rather than it being relegated to background wallpaper. Nowhere is this better exemplified than in the nearly-nine-minute solid cue covering the entire final act of In The Serpent’s Lair: literally wall-to-wall music for the show’s climax.

Cold Lazarus, which uncovers a painful incident from Jack O’Neill’s past, is the outlier here, with gentle piano accompanying the unfolding revelation that Jack had lost a child. In The Line Of Duty and Singularity are far more representative of the musical sound of Stargate SG-1 as a whole, with both quiet passages, mysterious music for the team’s discoveries of ancient (or is that Ancient?) mysteries, and gung-ho action music where needed.

3 out of 4I remember, when first seeing that Intrada was releasing a new round of Stargate TV scores, being a bit let down that Joel Goldsmith’s work wasn’t represented. Now I realize this wasn’t a downside: Richard Band was as much a part of SG-1’s sound in those heady formative years of the show – where anything was possible and the Stargate franchise had yet to fall into the trap that befalls many a long-running series, namely slipping its neck into the noose of ever-thickening continuity – as Joel Goldsmith’s sound was. Much like the Star Trek: The Next Generation box sets that finally gave Dennis McCarthy’s work exposure in the wake of a massive all-Ron-Jones soundtrack box set, this SG-1 soundtrack set redresses an imbalance and is worth a listen.

Order this CD

    Disc One
    Cold Lazarus
  1. Teaser (3:42)
  2. Is It Really Jack? (3:53)
  3. Jack At Ex-Wife’s House (3:25)
  4. Jack Visits Charlie’s Room (3:24)
  5. The Crystals (2:14)
  6. The Crystal Monitor (2:18)
  7. Jack And Wife On Park Bench (3:08)
  8. They Re-Activate The Crystal Monitor (2:03)
  9. Pushing Back Through Gate To Hospital (3:53)
  10. Jack Meets Alien Self And Finale (9:10)

    In The Line Of Duty

  11. Teaser (2:50)
  12. Medical Time (3:12)
  13. O’Neill Comforts Cassie (3:05)
  14. O’Neill To Burn Victim (0:38)
  15. Teal’c Gives O’Neill Advice (2:28)
  16. Daniel Talks To Girl Survivor (2:07)
  17. Bad Guy Bandages Doc (2:20)
  18. Daniel Talks To Alien Carter (2:26)
  19. Finale – Daniel And Then Others Visit (10:11)
    Disc Two
    In The Serpent’s Lair
  1. Finale (8:50)

    Singularity

  2. Teaser (3:34)
  3. From Stargate To New World (2:36)
  4. Sam With Girl And Back Through Gate (2:49)
  5. Sam And Little Girl Get Closer (2:58)
  6. Heart Attack And Operation (3:36)
  7. Jack And Teal’c Escaping Battle (4:22)
  8. To The Underground Site (2:35)
  9. Time Is Up And Finale (8:26)

Released by: Intrada
Release date: June 27, 2017
Disc one total running time: 67:01
Disc two total running time: 40:01

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Categories
2016 Film S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Year

Star Trek Beyond (Deluxe) – music by Michael Giacchino

4 min read

Varese Sarabande’s handling of the soundtracks from the modern Star Trek movies has made me wise up: I didn’t even bother with Michael Giacchino’s score from Star Trek Beyond until the 2-CD Deluxe Edition was released. I’m just not in a position to fall for the double dip every time.

Sadly, the irony is that, while Beyond got the current iteration of Star Trek back “on message”, preaching the virtues of peace and compassion over the values of a violent, twisted being out for revenge, Giacchino’s third visit to the Trek well seems to be his least inspired of the three movies he’s scored to date.

That’s somewhat understandable: the after-the-fact heaping of criticism on the second movie, Star Trek Into Darkness, had to have a palpable effect on those involved in making it. (Ironically, Giacchino’s score from Into Darkness was one of the very, very few things I could find to enjoy about that otherwise lamentably derivative entry in the franchise.) It could be that his creative energies were sapped by the time he went to work on Beyond.

There are highlights, though. The appearances of Starbase Yorktown, a marvel of alternative-23rd-century Starfleet construction that would dwarf a 24th century Borg cube, are graced with a gorgeous fanfare, featuring a long melody line of the kind that seems like it went out of style after John Williams re-educated everyone about uses of the leitmotif. There are some nice cues covering the series of vignettes following the surviving members of the Enterprise crew trying to simply survive on the surface of the planet over which their ship was brought down, though those tend toward brevity.

The action scenes involving Krall’s attack on the Enterprise are frenetic and noisy, probably with the idea that they’d be competing with frenetic and noisy sound effects for dominance in the movie’s audio mix. As a listening experience with no accompanying visuals, they’re a bit much – compare to Giacchino’s more gracefully Williams-esque action scenes from Rogue One for an exercise in contrast.

Though I know some uppity Star Trek fans may recoil against the thought of including a track that could be even remotely considered R&B on their precious soundtrack albums – one can still hear the howls of protest over “Ooby Dooby” and “Magic Carpet Ride” 20 years after Star Trek: First Contact – I’m a bit disappointed to find that, even with a second disc worth of material and more breathing room – Rihanna’s “Sledgehammer” single wasn’t included here. I know there’s licensing, label politics, and yes, that whole blow-up among fans about whether the singer had any business dipping her toe into the world of Star Trek, a pointless
2 out of 4kerfuffle that, let’s face it, exposed some shocking racism among fans of a franchise that rails against racism at every turn. The song still belonged here, and I was disappointed to see it omitted.

At the time of this writing, there’s still no solid word on whether or not there will be a fourth movie with this cast, or indeed a fourth movie with Giacchino at the podium. In that context, it’s a bit of a bummer that he may well be leaving the Star Trek franchise on the weakest note that he had yet provided for it.

Order this CD

    Disc 1
  1. Logo And Prosper (1:47)
  2. Trick Or Treaty (:45)
  3. We Come In Pieces (1:17)
  4. Thank Your Lucky Star Date (2:14)
  5. Night On The Yorktown (5:36)
  6. To Thine Own Death Be True (3:32)
  7. We Make A Good Team (:22)
  8. The Dance Of The Nebula (2:22)
  9. A Swarm Reception (2:30)
  10. Krall Hell Breaks Loose (3:04)
  11. The Evacuation Variations (2:47)
  12. Hitting The Saucer A Little Hard (6:10)
  13. Scotland’s Worst Cliffhanger (:23)
  14. A Hive And Kicking (3:30)
  15. Port Of Krall (:52)
  16. Jaylah Damage (2:50)
  17. No Enterprise For Guessing (:37)
  18. In Artifacts As In Life (1:51)
  19. She’s One Hell Of A Dish (1:26)
  20. Make No Escape About It (2:04)
  21. Eat My Thrusters (3:56)
  22. The Krall Of The Wild (2:10)
  23. Spock’s Vulcan Grip On Death (1:31)
  24. Captain On Ice (:42)

    Disc 2

  25. Franklin, My Dear (2:50)
  26. Transporting Good Time (3:43)
  27. Krall Work And No Play (:37)
  28. A Lesson in Vulcan Mineralogy (5:17)
  29. The Cost Of Abronath (2:35)
  30. MotorCycles Of Relief (3:18)
  31. Mocking Jaylah (3:27)
  32. Jaylah House Rock (3:18)
  33. Bright Lights Big Velocity (Part 1) (:57)
  34. Bright Lights Big Velocity (Part 2) (2:59)
  35. Spock Speaks Hive (3:10)
  36. Crash Decisions (3:16)
  37. Krall-y Krall-y Oxen Free (4:23)
  38. Shutdown Happens (4:35)
  39. The Root Of Krall Evil (1:31)
  40. Cater-Krall In Zero G (2:17)
  41. The Dreaded Rear Admiral (2:02)
  42. Par-tay For The Course (2:46)
  43. Space, The Final Frontier (2:42)
  44. Jaylah’s Theme (2:36)
  45. Yorktown Theme (4:32)
  46. Star Trek Main Theme* (3:44)
  47. Krall Things Being Equal (4:25)

Released by: Varese Sarabande
Release date: December 12, 2016
Disc one total running time: 54:42
Disc two total running time: 1:11:18

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Categories
2016 Compilation Film S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television Tribute / Reinterpretation Video Game / Computer Game

Star Trek: The 50th Anniversary Collection

9 min read

In the early ’90s, I was positively obsessed with Star Trek music – every new movie score released, any new television soundtracks that came along, anything was a cause for celebration, because I was in “maximum Trekkie” mode, and there never seemed to be enough of it.

Fast-forward a bit to the 21st century, in an era where we’re starving for the seemingly perpetually-delayed first new Star Trek TV series in a decade…and yet we’re positively drowning in music from the franchise’s glory days. I’ve gone from “not being to get enough Star Trek music” to “how in the hell do I organize this huge glut of music when I rip the latest box set worth of CDs to my hard drive straight out of the mail?”

Not that I’m complaining. The 50th Anniversary Collection from La-La Land Records is a fine buffet line adding to the embarrassment of riches we’ve gotten since 2009, a year during which the first J.J. Abrams movie (and yes, its soundtrack) came along, revitalized Trek as a media juggernaut, and convinced new Paramount music executive Randy Spendlove that maybe, just maybe, he should license some of the gems from the Trek music vaults to these specialty soundtrack labels that are clamoring to release it.

Rather than a laser-like focus on any one series, this four-disc set tries to patch some holes, right some wrongs, and answer some fannish prayers. The first disc consists, mostly, of remastered selections from the original series, piece of music of which better copies have been found since La-La Land’s monumental 2012 box set release of every note of music recorded for classic Trek. There are a few new 1960s gems as well: Wilbur Hatch’s “bumper” music, played over still slides of the Enterprise and the Star Trek logo as the show went to commercial during its broadcast premieres, is something I don’t think I’ve ever heard before. An alternate take of a cue from Star Trek: The Motion Picture also appears, but the big takeaway from disc one is the dialogue-free version of the end credits from Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, a track which had previously only appeared on CD with the late Leonard Nimoy’s ethereal narration. Fans have been demanding this since Film Score Monthly released an otherwise complete Star Trek II score on CD in 2009, and at last, here it is.

The second disc, however, contains the box set’s biggest knock-me-over-with-a-feather surprises: virtually the entire music library from the 1973-74 Filmation animated Star Trek series, a segment of the franchise that’s often overlooked for no readily justifiable reason. These selections come courtesy not of a miraculous session tape find (stories have circulated for years about how the original tapes no longer exist), but from the box set’s restoration experts and producers painstakingly editing together all of the cues from the audio of the episodes themselves, meticulously splicing together dialogue-and-FX-free sections of music until they had the entire piece of music reconstructed. Fans have been trying to do this since the days of cassette tapes with moderate success, so to hear an expert reconstruction of this music is nothing short of amazing. (Sharp-eared Filmation fans will also recognize a lot of this music from its later reuse in the live-action series Jason Of Star Command.)

As the animated series’ music consists primarily of fairly short cues, the second disc is rounded out with Dennis McCarthy’s all-synth score from the PC game Star Trek: Borg (previously heard on a private-release CD sold by McCarthy himself) and something that I never would’ve anticipated hearing: new Ron Jones Star Trek music. Let me repeat, for emphasis: new Ron Jones Star Trek music. In 1991, Jones was effectively “let go” by the TNG producers for consistently pushing the bounds of both the show’s creative parameters and its music budget, and aside from scoring a couple of late ’90s computer games, Star Trek has been a thing that’s in Jones’ past…until he composed an original three-part concert suite that, free of having to match the timing or editing of film, simply conveys the spirit of Trek as Jones interpreted it. That music makes its debut as a recorded piece here, tacking a new coda onto Jones’ musical legacy with the franchise.

Discs three and four stay with TNG, offering highlights or nearly-complete scores from such episodes as Coming Of Age, Symbiosis, Contagion, The Bonding, The Hunted, Qpid, Tapestry, Parallels, and even the McCarthy-arranged cutdowns of Jerry Goldsmith’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture theme. There’s a nice slice of unreleased tracks from Jay Chattaway’s sophomore TNG effort, Tin Man (a score which, in many ways, he never topped); combined with the tracks released on CD by GNP Crescendo in the 1990s, you now have the entire score from Tin Man. The original synth demos for the Deep Space Nine and Voyager themes are heard for the first time, as well as the premiere of Jay Chattaway’s music from the “Klingon Encounter” ride at the much-missed Star Trek: The Experience attraction at the Las Vegas Hilton. A variety of source music is also made available – Q’s mariachi band from Deja Q, the Brahms string quartet piece from Sarek, and oddball source music from Voyager and Enterprise.

4 out of 4If nothing else on this box set has convinced you what a delightful dive into Trek’s musical deep cuts it is, the last track of the last disc should do it: it’s “Comminique (C)”, the piece of 1988 library techno music that graced TNG’s “next week” trailers in the early 1990s. Were thousands of Trek fans clamoring for this? Probably not, but La-La Land identified and licensed it for this set anyway.

The Star Trek 50th Anniversary Collection probably isn’t for the casual fan of Star Trek soundtracks. It’s for the obsessives, the diehards – the people who are still in “maximum Trekkie” mode and still can’t get enough of it.

Order this CDDisc 1 – Star Trek: The Original Series

  1. Third Season Theme Music – Main Title/End Title (soprano version, stereo) (1:14)
  2. Love Scene (1:15)
  3. Ship in Orbit (Big) (0:40)
  4. Sad and Thoughtful on Captain’s Theme (2:30)
  5. Captain Playoff No. 1 (Heavy) (0:08)
  6. Smooth Neutral Ship Theme (0:41)
  7. Playoff on M.T. Theme (0:23)
  8. Fight on Captain’s Theme (1:50)
  9. Captain Playoff No. 2 (Neutral—Slightly Ominous) (0:12)
  10. Stingers (0:51)
  11. New Sexy Exotic (2:17)
  12. Captain Playoff No. 3 (Sad and Alone) (0:20)
  13. Prime Specimen (“The Cage”) (3:13)
  14. Monster Illusion (“The Cage”) (2:34)
  15. Mr. Spock (“Captain’s Wig” From “The Naked Time”) (3:27)
  16. The Big Go (“The Naked Time”) (2:30)
  17. Mudd’s Perfidy (0:33)
  18. Zap the Cap (1:34)
  19. Zap the Cap take 1 (0:08)
  20. Zap the Cap take 2 (0:06)
  21. Zap the Spaceship (1:28)
  22. Zap the Spaceship (0:34)
  23. Zap the Spaceship (0:08)
  24. Ruk Attacks (1:41)
  25. 2nd Ruth (2:35)
  26. No Mind / Tense Meeting / Tracking the Alien / The Question (2:31)
  27. Survivors (1:42)
  28. Bottled (1:52)
  29. Monster Illusion (2:46)
  30. Monster Illusion (tag) (0:10)
  31. The Kibitzers (0:41)
  32. Vina’s Punishment (1:54)
  33. Vina’s Dance (1:53)
  34. Wrong Think (0:43)
  35. Act 1 Card (0:38)
  36. Crippled Ship (0:55)
  37. Speedy Reader (1:06)
  38. End Title (0:24)
  39. First Goner take 3 (0:48)
  40. First Goner take 4 (0:49)
  41. Dressing Down (0:08)
  42. Monitor Gizzard (0:14)
  43. Monitor Gizzard (0:09)
  44. Lazer Dazer (2:44)
  45. Dodo Girl (0:09)
  46. Drugged (1:23)
  47. Mace Fight (0:59)
  48. Mace Fight (0:18)
  49. Down the Throat (1:13)
  50. Arrows (1:25)
  51. Bumper (broadcast edit) (0:06)
  52. Bumpers (alternates) (0:25)
  53. Paramount Television I.D. (0:05)
  54. Paramount Television I.D. (alternate) (0:04)
  55. Inner Workings (alternate mix) (4:03)
  56. Star Trek II Epilogue / End Title (sans narration) (8:41)

Disc 2 – Star Trek: The Animated Series

  1. Title Theme (1:01)
  2. Captain’s Log (1:19)
  3. Something Ahead (0:54)
  4. Evasive Maneuvers (1:07)
  5. Sensor Data (1:07)
  6. Intercept Course (0:14)
  7. Fire Phasers (0:50)
  8. Enterprise Attacked (1:32)
  9. Illogical (0:13)
  10. Briefing (0:43)
  11. On the Viewscreen (1:02)
  12. New Heading (0:19)
  13. Scanning (0:54)
  14. Deflector Shields (0:19)
  15. Red Alert (0:33)
  16. Battle Stations (0:41)
  17. Surprise (0:07)
  18. Supplemental Log (0:49)
  19. Kirk’s Command (1:11)
  20. Sickbay (0:28)
  21. Library Computer (0:44)
  22. Full Power (0:28)
  23. Approaching Coordinates (0:08)
  24. The Bigger Meaning (1:15)
  25. Trouble in Engineering (0:29)
  26. Spock’s Analysis (0:42)
  27. Enterprise Wins the Space Race (0:43)
  28. McCoy’s Summary (0:16)
  29. Just Another Stardate (0:39)
  30. Ongoing Mission (0:18)
  31. Title Theme (alternate mix) (1:01)
  32. Sensor Data (alternate mix) (1:02)
  33. Enterprise Attacked (alternate opening) (1:42)
  34. Scanning (alternate mix) (0:54)
  35. Turbolift Music (0:29)
  36. Mr. Arex Lends an Extra Hand (0:38)
  37. Fascinating (0:17)
  38. Don’t Mess With M’Ress (0:22)
  39. Oh My (0:17)
  40. Spock’s Quick Analysis (0:22)
  41. Yellow Alert (0:26)
  42. Off Duty (0:15)
  43. Suite: Stingers and Act-Out Music (2:03)
    Music inspired by Star Trek – Ron Jones
  44. The Ascent (7:43)
  45. Meaning (2:27)
  46. Pathway to the Stars (3:17)
    Star Trek: Borg – Dennis McCarthy
  47. Main Theme (1:02)
  48. The Legend of the Borg (1:24)
  49. Battle at Wolf 359 (2:58)
  50. The Battle Rages (0:58)
  51. Club Q (0:55)
  52. I Am Berman of Borg (1:36)
  53. Goldsmith Has Been Assimilated! (1:37)
  54. Welcome to the Collective Cadet (2:22)
  55. Searching the Borg Ship (2:20)
  56. Time Is Running Out (1:17)
  57. Escape From the Borg Collective (1:42)
  58. Borg Hell (2:03)
  59. You Will Be Assimilated, Have a Nice Day (2:21)
  60. “Resistance Is Futile, My Ass!” / Finale (7:25)
  61. End Titles (1:03)

Disc 3 – Star Trek: The Next Generation

  1. Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title (1st season, alternate take) (1:48)
    Coming Of Age
  2. Physics / Shuttle Fuss (3:35)
  3. Air Bounce (2:04)
  4. Competition (2:14)
  5. Decisions (2:04)
    Symbisos
  6. Flares (3:04)
  7. Precious Cargo (2:10)
  8. Four Out of Six (1:03)
    Unnatural Selection
  9. Searchin’ (1:10)
    The Measure Of A Man
  10. Memories (1:19)
    Contagion
  11. U.S.S. Yamato / Vaporized (1:22)
  12. Floral Tea / Otis’ Revenge (2:07)
  13. Romulan Misfire / Phasers / Escape / Goodbye Iconia (2:27)
    The Survivors
  14. Diversion (2:16)
    The Bonding
  15. Dad / Mom’s Double (2:04)
  16. Release / Ceremonial Worf / Off Into Space (4:01)
    The Enemy
  17. Into the Pit (3:01)
    The Hunted
  18. Escape Artist / Melee (3:28)
  19. Breakout (0:32)
  20. Phased / Geordi (4:14)
  21. Confronted / To the Stars (3:30)
    Sins Of The Father
  22. Condemned (1:22)
    Transfigurations
  23. Lookin’ Fine (1:44)
  24. Lazarus (3:48)
  25. Choke Hold / Explanatory / El Ascencio (5:11)
    Future Imperfect
  26. Delusionary (4:08)
    Tapestry
  27. Saint Q (2:05)
  28. It’s a Wonderful Life / Deja Vuosity / War Stories (3:18)
    Parallels
  29. Instant Family (2:42)
  30. Wolfman Riker (3:09)
    Trailer music
  31. Theme From Star Trek: The Motion Picture (30-second version) (0:33)

Disc 4

    Theme From Star Trek (“Gene Roddenberry 1921–1991” unused alternate) (0:10)
    Tin Man

  1. Soft / Student (1:04)
  2. Unique / Welcome / Data (0:48)
  3. Problems / Land of Living (1:41)
  4. Scared (broadcast version) (0:47)
  5. One Way Trip (1:08)
  6. All of It (0:57)
    Deja Q
  7. Tractor Moon / Hoisted (2:58)
  8. La Paloma (traditional) (1:13)
  9. Coffin Spike (0:45)
    Captain’s Holiday
  10. Planet Vegas (1:12)
    Qpid
  11. Hat Trick / Sir Guy / Nottingham Castle / Maid Marian (unused) / Betrayed (3:21)
  12. To the Block / Swordplay / Game’s Over (4:16)
  13. Adieu (1:04)
  14. Plucking Three (0:13)
    Elementary, Dear Data
  15. Sherlock Tones (0:55)
  16. Dead End / Turtleback (2:36)
  17. Short Goodbye (1:21)
    Ship In A Bottle
  18. Holo Tolodo! (4:02)
    Clues
  19. Peace Dividends / Gloria / Blown Away (1:39)
    Manhunt
  20. Juke Boxer (3:29)
  21. How High the Moon (3:36)
    Star Trek: First Contact
  22. Moonlight Becomes You (2:55)
    Unification II
  23. Andorian Blues (0:37)
  24. Aktuh and Maylota (0:49)
  25. Melor Famigal (0:58)
    Lessons
  26. Picard and Nella, Date #1 (Picard’s Cabin) (2:43)
  27. Picard and Nella, Date #2 (Jefferies Tube) (2:22)
    Sarek
  28. Sextet #1 in B-flat Major, Op. 18 (II, Andante) (1:53)
    Star Trek: The Experience
  29. Klingon Encounter (4:24)
  30. Borg Invasion 4D (7:22)
    Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
  31. Main Title Demo (1:59)
  32. Single Bridge Demo (2:24)
    Star Trek: Voyager
  33. Main Title Demo (1:51)
  34. Lookover / Maiden Voyager (1:34)
  35. Opera Alla Alienosity (1:11)
    Star Trek: Enterprise
  36. Dance-O-Matic (2:28)
    Trailer music
  37. Communique (C) (2:33)

Released by: La-La Land Record
Release date: November 25, 2016
Disc one total running time: 1:16:13
Disc two total running time: 1:17:23
Disc three total running time: 1:18:57
Disc four total running time: 1:18:57
Box set total running time: 5:16:50

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