Category: 2022

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2022 B Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Wars Year

The Book Of Boba Fett Volume 2 – music by Joseph Shirley

4 min read

Order this CDHey, remember that crazy turn that The Book Of Boba Fett took when it suddenly went all “we interrupt this broadcast to bring you an important message from the Mandalorian”? I’ll forgo my musings on that perhaps being why we’ve never gotten a season two, and just talk about the music.

Since this second volume of score from The Book Of Boba Fett covers the fourth through seventh episodes, the sudden shift from Boba Fett’s narrative to Mando’s is precisely where we pick up. It sounds more like music from The Mandalorian at this point, but the interesting thing happening here is that we’re getting Mando music a la Joseph Shirley. It doesn’t sound terribly different from Ludwig Goransson’s style, but considering that Joseph Shirley graduated from scoring this series to scoring the third season of The Mandalorian, it’s tempting to think of it as an audition piece. A jaunty pace creeps into the proceedings in “Faster Than A Fathier” as Mando tries out his new ship, and that tone becomes triumphant in “Maiden Voyage” as the space pedal is duly applied to the space metal. “It’s A Family Affair” shifts to a more pastoral – and more John-Williams-esque – feel as Mando goes to pay Grogu a visit at Skywalker’s School for Tiny Jedi. The Williams influence becomes overt in “Life Lessons”, complete with quotation of Williams’ themes for Yoda, Luke, and the Force itself. Like Goransson before him, Shirley proves that while he’s comfortable making the sound of Star Wars more percussive and electronic, he’s equally adept at layering in the classics of the Star Wars playbook very authentically.

Shirley also plays nicely with Goransson’s themes, delivering a more playful rendition of the piece last heard when Luke rescued Grogu at the end of The Mandalorian’s second season (a piece that was positively mournful in its original application). The setting returns to Tatooine for “From The Desert Comes A Stranger”, and stays there as much of the rest of the album concentrates on music from the final episode. Fett’s theme proper doesn’t come back with a vengeance until “Battle For Mos Espa”, and it remains at the forefront in “A Town Beiseged” and “Final Showdown”. With “A Town At Peace”, things calm down considerably and bring us to the end of the series.

4 out of 4The four tracks at the end of the album feature music from earlier in the series, with some of the show’s key scenes that mysteriously didn’t make the first album appearing here, including “The Reign of Boba Fett”, the six-plus-minute “Train Heist”, and “The Bonfire”. There’s also a source music track, “Hit It Max”, played by the remarkably bulletproof Max Rebo and his band – did he survive that bombing, or did his luck only get him as far as surviving the battle on Jabba’s sail barge? – which is no “Lapti Nek”, but at the very least I like it better than the number that replaced “Lapti Nek” in the Special Editions.

I really liked The Book Of Boba Fett while it was about, well, Boba Fett. It’s a pity that it didn’t get to even attempt to be its own thing for very long, especially with Temuera Morrison willing to don the armor again. But even if the series and its central character went no further than this, Joseph Shirley proved himself more than capable of providing music for wearers of Mandalorian armor everywhere.

  1. The Underworld (3:19)
  2. A Cautionary Tale (3:12)
  3. Faster Than A Fathier (4:59)
  4. Maiden Voyage (1:21)
  5. It’s A Family Affair (3:48)
  6. Life Lessons (3:56)
  7. A Gift (2:46)
  8. Teacher’s Pet (6:26)
  9. From The Desert Comes A Stranger (2:19)
  10. Two Paths Diverged (2:51)
  11. In The Name Of Honor (3:24)
  12. Battle For Mos Espa (2:30)
  13. A Town Besieged (6:46)
  14. Final Showdown (4:13)
  15. Goodnight (2:32)
  16. A Town At Peace (2:22)
  17. The Reign Of Boba Fett (1:22)
  18. Hit It Max (2:01)
  19. Train Heist (6:16)
  20. The Bonfire (1:41)

Released by: Disney Music
Release date: February 11, 2022
Total running time: 1:07:56

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2022 2023 D Doctor Who Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Television Year

Doctor Who: Legend Of The Sea Devils – music by Segun Akinola

3 min read

Order this CDWhen the modern revival of Doctor Who brought back the Silurians in 2010, their cousins, the raspy-voiced Sea Devils, were nowhere to be found. Like the Silurians, they were creations of the Jon Pertwee era and were last seen in the all-star indigenous-sentient-repitle team-up Warriors Of The Deep in 1984, joining forces against Peter Davison’s Doctor. But while the Silurians got a 21st century makeover, their cousins, the Sea Devils, remained in the show’s past – until they resurfaced, literally, in one of 2022’s run of special episodes. Interestingly, while the Silurians emerged with a very different look from their ’70s/’80s incarnations, the Sea Devils returned looking much the same as before, with obvious improvements in how their aquatic lizard look was achieved.

And they got a marvelous soundtrack too. The story’s setting deals with piracy in Chinese waters in the early 19th century. Segun Akinola, who wowed with his sensitive musical treatment of The Demons Of Punjab in Jodie Whittaker’s first season as the Doctor, deploys a similar musical strategy here: call in real live players for real live ethnic instruments, and save the synths for the purely synthetic elements of the story. The result is, again, a very nice mix with authenticity where it counts the most. The main thematic material for the episode reveals itself fairly quickly, and is repeated and riffed upon throughout, with a percolating synth bassline persisting in many of the tracks, its role in the tension depending on its prominence in the mix rather than in any changes in key or tempo; the pace really doesn’t quicken appreciably until “This Is Gonna Be Tricky”.

4 out of 4Things take a more sensitive turn halfway through “A Good Legend” with the scene that either launched a thousand gleeful fanfics or launched a thousand middle-aged male fan tantrums, as the Doctor and Yaz skip some rocks across the water and discuss whether there’s any “there” there. It’s a nicely understated closer for the show, though I’m still undecided on whether the Doctor somehow being aware of an impending regeneration (something that started with Tom Baker’s exit) becoming a recurring trope of the show (used in the last run of specials for both David Tennant and Jodie Whittaker). Either way, the music for the scene is easily the standout highlight of this soundtrack.

  1. You Have No Idea What You’re Doing (02:48)
  2. Catching A Whopper (03:56)
  3. Pirate Queen (07:33)
  4. Who Wants To Be Next (05:07)
  5. Celestial Navigation (04:00)
  6. Going Up (07:26)
  7. Say Hello To My Crew (05:18)
  8. This Is Gonna Be Tricky (04:49)
  9. A Good Legend (06:07)

Released by: Silva Screen Records
Release date: December 9, 2022
Total running time: 46:50

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1977 2022 C Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Television Year

Children Of The Stones – music by Sidney Sager

4 min read

Order this CDI discovered that there was a soundtrack for this 1977 children’s fantasy/horror series almost by accident, and when I recovered from the shock that it existed, it was an instant purchase. The opening theme of Children Of The Stones by itself is a classic of TV/film scoring in the horror genre: just the music is scary as hell, starting out with a hush of pleasant but eerie choral voices that becomes disharmonious, breaks up into chanting instead of singing, and then crescendoes in a massed scream before resuming singing something more akin to what most people would think as music. If you’re not ready for it, it’ll scare the piss out of you. That single piece of music is responsible for about 80% of the effectiveness of the show as a piece of scary television.

The soundtrack album then turns into a horror of its own for completely different reasons.

As was often the case with this particular genre of television – at which regional UK broadcaster Harlech Television (shortened to HTV) excelled – the composer behind the music was Sidney Sager, ho also contributed music with choral elements to such HTV children’s series as King Of The Castle and Into The Labyrinth, both utilizing the Ambrosian Singers, who are front-and-center in the Children Of The Stones score. With the story’s heavy reliance on druid lore, the singers spend as much time chanting as they do singing, and yes, the opening titles are not the only place that they reach a fever-pitched shriek. It’s amazingly unnerving music. (And this show was for kids?)

That’s the good horror. The bad horror began to set in with only the second track. At the end of “Mrs. Crabtree Views The Painting”, as the singers again reach an unnerving climax, there’s the sound of broken glass. Because in the show, Mrs. Crabtree drops an entire tea tray as the creepy painting that sets off the story gets into her head. But…that would mean…

Oh no. Yes. It means what you think it does. Later tracks include footsteps, doors opening/closing, rustling graas, rushing wind, even occasional non-musical voices. Yes, they just took the sound from the DVD, did some EQ, and released that as a download and a pricey limited-edition vinyl album with a poster of the aforementioned painting.

I could’ve pulled the DVD off the shelf and done that myself. And since I already bought the DVD, it wouldn’t have cost me seven-and-a-half quid for the privilege. Hell, I probably could’ve run it through some demixing software to at least attempt to remove the extraneous sounds from the show.

It’s not too much to expect that the original scoring tapes might still exist from a show of this vintage; look at the numerous releases of Doctor Who music from the ’60s and early ’70s, or even the BBC’s release, several years ago, of the complete score from the 1975 children’s fantasy series The Changes, also presented without the rest of the show’s sound mix intruding. There may be some notes about the production process of this album in the liner notes of the LP; I don’t know, I only got the download, and there was no warning that this was what the soundtrack collecting world refers to as “archival sound” – dialogue or effects stems that were part of the only available source media for the music. Yes, that is a thing that happens, on official releases, but I’m accustomed to labels warning me about that being the case.

2 out of 4Sidney Sager’s music is stunning, scary work – it’s the only reason this release gets as much as a two-star rating. But the lack of warning that this is basically an audio presentation of the musical moments of the show as-aired is infuriating. Let the buyer/listener beware.

  1. Children of the Stones (Opening Title) (1:15)
  2. Mrs Crabtree Views the Painting (0:06)
  3. Someone Who Is Happy (0:11)
  4. Matthew and Dai (0:35)
  5. Adam Touches the Stones (0:27)
  6. Circle of Fear (I Can’t Wait) (0:17)
  7. Nobody Ever Leaves (0:12)
  8. Being Alone (0:32)
  9. Within the Painting (0:33)
  10. Matthew’s Accident (1:29)
  11. Serpent in the Circle (0:46)
  12. Tom Browning (0:30)
  13. Looks, It’s Jimmo (0:16)
  14. Narrowing Circle (1:14)
  15. Premonition of Dr Lyle (0:22)
  16. Dai Casts the Bones (1:55)
  17. The Barber Surgeon’s Amulet (1:17)
  18. Never, It’s Mine (0:20)
  19. He’s Not There (0:35)
  20. Anger the Fire (0:27)
  21. Such Power (0:23)
  22. It Is Time (0:43)
  23. Squaring the Circle (1:16)
  24. We’ve Lost Them (0:18)
  25. Go Now and Be Happy (0:29)
  26. I’ll Return This at the Same Time (0:34)
  27. We’re Trapped (0:07)
  28. The Circle Is Complete (0:34)
  29. The Circle Is Broken (1:19)
  30. Children of the Stones (End Titles) (0:31)

Released by: Trunk Records
Release date: October 20, 2022
Total running time: 19:33

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2022 Music Reviews O Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Wars Television Year

Obi-Wan Kenobi – music by Natalie Holt, William Ross, and John Williams

5 min read

Order this CDWho scored this? The credits on the cover seem to make that an interesting question, as does the timeline of the public reveal that John Williams – who, we had already been told, was retiring from scoring Star Wars and from scoring films altogether – was contributing a new theme for Obi-Wan himself. Most of what is heard in the show and on this release is by Natalie Holt, who had already made a splash on another Disney Plus streaming series, Marvel’s Loki. But top billing goes to John Williams for the Obi-Wan theme, and the cover then tells us that theme has been adapted by William Ross. Anywhere Williams’ wistful new theme for the aging Jedi Knight appears in the show itself, it’s in a cue credited to Ross. One begins to suspect that Williams’ involvement (and therefore Ross’ involvement as well) happened at a very late stage, replacing work that had already been done by Natalie Holt. (A bit of research – and a bit of reading between the lines of all the industry-speak – reveals that this is precisely what happened. It’d be neat to hear Holt’s original theme and the replaced score cues to hear what the show would’ve sounded like before the guys dropped in to do a little of the work and claim a lot of the credit.)

Williams’ theme is nice, I will give it that. It does fit Obi-Wan where we find him in this movie – noble, but subdued. In the end credit rendition, there’s a big orchestral build-up that seems a little out of place, but otherwise a nice theme, and a bit more distinctive than the theme Williams penned for inclusion in John Powell’s Solo score (of which more another time). Its first major appearance as a piece of the score arrives in “Thr Journey Begins”; Ross’ adaptations of the Williams theme takes up five more tracks in the soundtrack outside of the opening titles and end credit theme.

The first score cue, “Order 66”, lurches from pastoral to relentless action on a dime for the prologue in which we see the moment that the Emperor’s order to rid the universe of the Jedi affects a class of young padawans. That same propulsive action then shifts down a gear or two into lurking menace as the show jumps to the present day for “Inquisitors’ Hunt”. Tracks like “Young Leia”, “Days of Alderaan” and “Bail and Leia” have a different feel entirely as, for the first time since a fleeting glimpse in the epilogue of Star Wars Episode III, we get to see Alderaan as a utopian world that somehow hung onto its idealistic identity well into the reign of the Empire. The tone darkens significant;y as Obi-Wan leaves the safe obscurity of Tatooine to begin his mission (“Daiyu”, “Cat And Mouse”). There’s an unexpected bit of electronic instrumentation in “Ready To Go” that almost sounds like something that escaped from the Tron Legacy soundtrack; it’s not unwelcome, but does stick out a bit in a score that’s doing its best to stay in Star Wars‘ traditionally orchestral wheelhouse.

Some more exotic flavors creep in as Obi-Wan’s quest takes him further afield (“Spice Den”, “Mapuzo”, “The Path”), and things again take a dark turn as master and apprentice once again find themselves in the other’s proximity (“Sensing Vader”, “Stormtrooper Patrol”, “Hangar Escape”, “Empire ARrival”), the latter of which introduces a strident march that screams “the Empire is here” without just quoting Williams’ “Imperial March”. Holt even sneaks a quotation of Williams’ series theme into “Dark Side Assault” – see, she didn’t need outside help with that, did she?

After Ross shows up to drench another major Kenobi/Vader confrontation with buckets of synthesized choir in “I Will Do What I Must”, Holt gives us a brief reprieve from the action music with the quieter “Sacrifice”, before resuming the chase and finally getting a hint of “The Imperial March” in (“No Further Use”). As is typical, the major action setpiece (“Overcoming The Past”) is handed off to Ross’ arrangement of Williams’ theme, elevated to a grand level as Obi-Wan finally finds his footing within the Force again, leaving Vader in a weakened state both physically and emotionally. Two more Holt cues (“Tatooine Desert Chase”, “Who You Become”) tie off the story of Reva, an Imperial Inquisitor obsessed with tracking down Obi-Wan, with Ross again getting the last word with “Saying Goodbye”, which quotes both Williams’ newly-minted Obi-Wan theme and the original trilogy’s theme for Leia.

4 out of 4It’s all fine music. Despite the number of cooks in the kitchen, it does all integrate better than one might expect. Some of you reading this are probably shouting at your screens something along the lines of “We’re privileged to be getting even one new piece of Star Wars music from John Williams!” And there may be something to that, but as solid as Holt’s work is throughout, why was it not good enough for nearly a quarter of the score, if the soundtrack’s track listing is any indication? It’s a little unsettling to think that while the casting of the Star Wars steaming shows is growing more diverse (though, as the unfortunate pushback against the amazing Moses Ingram demonstrated, not without difficulty), other elements of production very much present the appearance of keeping the glass ceiling in place with Imperial zeal.

  1. Obi-Wan (4:06)
  2. Order 66 (1:40)
  3. Inquistors’ Hunt (3:09)
  4. Young Leia (1:04)
  5. Days of Alderaan (1:38)
  6. The Journey Begins (2:57)
  7. Bail and Leia (2:19)
  8. Nari’s Shadow (1:14)
  9. Ready to Go (2:26)
  10. Daiyu (2:25)
  11. Cat and Mouse (3:10)
  12. Spice Den (1:10)
  13. First Rescue (3:10)
  14. Mapuzo (1:17)
  15. The Path (1:35)
  16. Sensing Vader (2:49)
  17. Parallel Lines (2:12)
  18. Some Things Can’t Be Forgotten (4:47)
  19. Stormtrooper Patrol (2:34)
  20. Hangar Escape (2:33)
  21. Hold Hands (1:39)
  22. Empire Arrival (2:04)
  23. Dark Side Assault (2:37)
  24. I Will Do What I Must (2:48)
  25. Sacrifice (1:41)
  26. No Further Use (3:39)
  27. Overcoming the Past (4:28)
  28. Tatooine Desert Chase (2:19)
  29. Who You Become (3:36)
  30. Saying Goodbye (5:26)
  31. End Credit (4:02)

Released by: Disney Music
Release date: June 27, 2022
Total running time: 82:34

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2022 Artists (by group or surname) Music Reviews Non-Soundtrack Music R Todd Rundgren Year

Todd Rundgren – Space Force

4 min read

Order this CDA kind of follow-up to 2017’s White Knight album, Space Force is an entire album of collaborations between Todd Rundgren and, one suspects, whoever picked up the phone and said “yes”. This includes some serious talent – The Roots, Adrian Belew, Thomas Dolby, Steve Vai, Neil Finn, to name just a few – and Rundgren’s attention to production detail lives up to its legendary reputation with each track. Musically speaking, this is the best stuff we’ve gotten out of Rundgren in years. Each song is a world unto itself, as the album hits as many genres and styles as possible, from “STFU”‘s in-your-face blues-rock stomp to the highlight of the album, “Espionage”, a delightfully atmospheric rap-pop crossover featuring Narcy. On some songs, Rundgren gracefully shares the limelight – I mean, who doesn’t want to harmonize with Neil Finn? – and on others, he’s very much at the forefront. The music resulting from this wildly diverse series of collaborations is absolutely fantastic.

If there’s a weak point to Space Force, it’s in the lyrics department. Some of them are sublimely heartfelt, such as the lead track. But Rundgren’s got a tendency to embrace satirical material and that side of him is much more hit-or-miss. “Down With The Ship” and “STFU” are just goofy; “Godiva Girl” is well one its way to being a blue-eyed soul number for the ages until, on its way to the exit, lyrics like “you gave me love diabetes” and “I got your sweet caramel stuck up in my grill” start creeping in. Comparing the subject of the song to candy is one thing, but then he’s got to get goofy on the off-ramp to the fade-out. Dude, you had it! You’d nailed it! It was a great song! And then…that. (Then the next track is “Your Fandango”, which goes off the deep end.) The hell of it is, there are some amazing lyrics on here too – I’m looking at you, “Puzzle” and “Someday” – and every once in a while the satirical material manages to stick the landing, such as “I’m Leaving” and its skewering of men who expect women to wait on them hand-and-foot. And then there’s the stuff in the middle, like “I’m Not Your Dog”, that I can’t even decide if it works or not. Rundgren’s always had that side to him; it’s just frustrating to have an album that has a winning slate of songs, some of which have lyrics that don’t seem to do the rest of the song justice.

4 out of 4Not every song has to be a Serious Statement about something in particular, that’s not my beef. It’s just that… you get the Roots and Sparks and Thomas Dolby to come sit in on the sessions for your new record, at least have some meat ready for them to chew on, right? The good news is that, Rundgren being Rundgren, every song is at least performed well and produced gloriously, and you can sense Rundgren jumping gleefully from genre to genre with each song depending on who he’s lined up to guest on that track. Even with its nonsensical lyrics, “I’m Not Your Dog” is delivered with so much funky swagger that maybe the words don’t matter. It’s a fun listen from beginning to end, if just a little bit frustrating. I’m all for artists not taking themselves too seriously; my complaint here is really a matter of balance, and everyone else’s mileage may vary. I give this one four stars for some great music, but some of the lyrics here are…lamentable. An occasional “Lockjaw” or a “Bang The Drum All Day” here and there is a fun diversion, but half an album of that?

  1. Puzzle with Adrian Belew (04:48)
  2. Down With The Ship with Rivers Cuomo (02:56)
  3. Artist In Residence with Neil Finn (03:13)
  4. Godiva Girl with The Roots (04:21)
  5. Your Fandango with Sparks (04:24)
  6. Someday with Davey Lane (03:00)
  7. I’m Not Your Dog with Thomas Dolby (05:49)
  8. Espionage with Narcy (05:02)
  9. STFU with Rick Nielsen (03:17)
  10. Head in the Ocean with Alfie Templeman (03:30)
  11. I’m Leaving with The Lemon Twigs (02:57)
  12. Eco Warrior Goddess with Steve Vai (05:32)

Released by: Cleopatra Records
Release date: October 14, 2022
Total running time: 48:45

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2022 D Doctor Who Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Television Year

Doctor Who: Eve Of The Daleks – music by Segun Akinola

3 min read

Order this CDA bit of pastoral acoustic guitar is almost the last thing you’d expect to here from any soundtrack whose title ends in the words “…of the Daleks”, and yet here we are, with the first of the “series 13 specials” leading up to the end of Jodie Whittaker’s tenure as the Doctor (whose music has already been reviewed here).

Things quickly get more modern, though, with a sense of technological urgency defining much of the score to Eve Of The Daleks. The lower-register minimalism works wonders when contrasted with outbursts of menacing brass, but there’s another kind of minimalism on display in some tracks – particularly “Deja Vu” and “Not A Great Plan” – where things slow down, there’s a little bit more breathing room between notes rather than the insistent bass synth ostinato running through most of the tracks. Particularly in “Not A Great Plan” and “Took You Long Enough”, when the music resumes its slower, acoustic feel, with the addition of a double bass, it’s almost jazzy – might be Doctor Who, might be an episode of The Avengers.

Much of Eve Of The Daleks‘ musical landscape lies in the tension between those two modes: acoustic vs. electronic, less predictable rhythms vs. a steadily percolating synth bass line, and ultimately, as the story itself dictates, human vs. machine. Really a simple idea, but it serves the story remarkably well.

3 out of 4Though “A Brilliant Plan” and “Important Stuff To Do” shake things up with some rapid-fire strings to accompany the score’s synthetic pulse, and “Fireworks” closes things out with a more relaxed sense that all has turned out as it should (and the return of the jazzy acoustic motif), there just isn’t much of a musical exclamation point at the end. The previous end-of-year special (and previous Dalek episode score) Revolution Of The Daleks provided that kind of major shift to accompany the exit of Ryan and Graham, but Eve Of The Daleks just doesn’t have that kind of catharsis at the end of its story or its score. It’s just another day at the office, nobody’s leaving, and the status quo is restored. Without that, Eve Of The Daleks just quietly ends. An interesting episode, and an interesting score, but as a standalone listening experience, it’s the least remarkable of the series 13 specials.

  1. Here We Are Again (02:17)
  2. Out Of Service (03:27)
  3. I Am Not Nick (02:33)
  4. Deja Vu (03:39)
  5. The Correction (03:06)
  6. Sorry Sorry Sorry (01:09)
  7. Not A Great Plan (06:57)
  8. Took You Long Enough (08:44)
  9. We Will Not Stop (03:50)
  10. We Go Again And We Win (04:01)
  11. The Doctor Cannot Save You (03:29)
  12. A Brilliant Plan (03:56)
  13. Important Stuff To Do (04:11)
  14. Fireworks (03:06)

Released by: Silva Screen Records
Release date: December 2, 2022
Total running time: 54:21

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2022 A Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Television Year

Avenue 5 – music by Adem Ilhan

5 min read

Order this CDAs a fan, I could complain about how Avenue 5 was treated, but the truth is, it was a very quirky show filling a niche that wasn’t exactly huge. It made it all the way to production and distribution because creator Armando Iannuzzi had a sweetheart deal giving HBO the first crack at anything he created, and he created a caustic comedy about a space cruise ship gone astray. That it was a sci-fi comedy on a pay-cable-channel-morphing-into-a-streaming-service already put Avenue 5 at a disadvantage in terms of eyeballs; that it landed right at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic should’ve given it a chance to be sampled by more people… except that the same pandemic inevitably delayed production of a second season, making it easy to think the show was dead when it wasn’t. (When the second season did arrive, the lackadaisical promotional push for it pretty much confirmed that HBO, at least, had already decided the show was dead, and an official cancellation followed shortly thereafter.) It was impossible timing for a show that wanted to stick around, though one of its episodes – one in which the passengers, led by a particularly clueless rumormonger, ceases to even believe that the show is in space and starts demanding to walk out the airlocks – was one of the best-timed episodes in the history of television. Though written and shot nearly a year before COVID, and probably intended to target climate science denialists, it perfectly encapsulated everything about that early stage of the pandemic when disinformation was starting its alarming spread through the internet.

And the show’s music, seldom foregrounded, just seemed weird – intentionally dissonant, almost like it was sticking its tongue out at the kind of grand orchestrations that usually accompany lovingly detailed shots of massive spaceships on TV. It was far enough down in the show’s sound mix that it was hard to gauge sometimes, but I found it intriguing enough that I was delighted – and, to be honest, very surprised – to see a soundtrack release. And it surprised me even more when it actually stood up as a listening experience without the rest of the show. That’s not always the case with a sitcom. (Then again, there’s actually an album of all of those bass licks from Seinfeld, so what do I know?) Sitcom music tends to be transitional – it gets over a time jump in the story, but seldom serves a dramatic purpose, and isn’t necessarily memorable.

The music for Avenue 5 is different, because Iannuzzi specializes in biting satire. Better known for In The Thick Of It (the series that put Peter Capaldi on the radar as its foulmouthed breakout star) and Veep (an American take on In The Thick Of It, starring Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, produced for HBO), Iannuzzi sets up terrible situations, often full of terrible or incompetent people, winds them up, and lets them go. It’s baked into the cake of Avenue 5 that each episode will land on a schadenfreude-laden callback to every problem that everyone’s been warned about earlier in the show, and that’s usually where Ilhan made his musical presence known.

There are some tracks, such as “The Continuing Journey” and “Your Ears Are Beautiful, To Me”, which are just gorgeous – this is what you’re supposed to hear in a show where an enormous, luxurious spaceship lumbers past the camera! – but the “house style” for Avenue 5’s music seems to be more of a trippy flavor of sound collage. Incomplete vocal samples, chugging cellos and bassoons and bass clarinets that never quite seem to be perfectly in tune (very much like the characters aboard the aforementioned luxurious spaceship), and rapid-fire rhythms that remind me of some of Kronos Quartet’s more offbeat experiments. (I actually found myself thinking of Kronos Quartet a lot on the first listen; this is a compliment.) Some tracks start out as traditional pieces of dramatic scoring before oddball elements creep in and things get weird, such as “It’s All Gonna Be Fine” and “Orbiting”. Some tracks, like “Mmm Ba Deep” and “Newton’s… Third Law”, start weird and stay weird, in some cases pouring on additional weird. It all fits the show perfectly, but the surprising thing is how well it stands up as music. It helps if you’re an Avenue 5 fan going in, but it’s a fascinating set of musical experiments designed to tell the listener “something’s going wrong here, and it’s about to start going even wronger.”

4 out of 4As a soundtrack, Avenue 5 is as quirky, unconventional, and weird as the show this music accompanied – and that’s kind of a beautiful thing. It makes for a surprisingly effective standalone listen.

  1. The Continuing Journey (01:45)
  2. Mmm Ba Deep (02:19)
  3. Go Up There And Smile (00:54)
  4. Newton’s… Third Law (01:04)
  5. The Key Word Is Walk (01:59)
  6. Your Ears Are Beautiful, To Me (01:55)
  7. Inside (01:31)
  8. Bearing (02:27)
  9. It Stands For Visual Effects (01:03)
  10. Aaargh (01:20)
  11. Back On Earth (01:58)
  12. Big Yellow (01:17)
  13. It’s All Gonna Be Fine (01:10)
  14. Tense Is My Middle Name (01:36)
  15. I Don’t Want To Use My Sweet Moves (03:12)
  16. Oh Oh Oh Five (01:35)
  17. Walk With Me (02:37)
  18. Unclench Me (02:19)
  19. Knotted Bedsheets (01:58)
  20. Orbiting (03:39)
  21. Like Psychosis But With None Of The Benefits (01:16)

Released by: Lakeshore Records
Release date: November 3, 2022
Total running time: 38:36

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2022 D Doctor Who Music Reviews Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Television Year

Doctor Who: The Power Of The Doctor – music by Segun Akinola

1 min read

Order this CDIf there’s anything that draws wayward eyeballs back to Doctor Who, fans who have perhaps given up following the show’s every new adventure, it’s a regeneration episode. Right up there with round-number anniversary specials and holiday specials, they’re sure to reel in even the casually curious. And if you have a regeneration episode that coincides with either a round-number anniversary or a holiday special? That probably means even more curious viewers sampling the Doctor’s adventures than usual.

The Power Of The Doctor was already known to be the episode in which Jodie Whittaker, the first woman to play the Doctor on a regular, ongoing basis, would be bowing out, and it also coincided with the BBC’s centenary celebratory programming – as if it was a tacit admission that, no matter how aghast certain high-ranking members of BBC management past or present might view it, Doctor Who is one of the BBC’s more enduring contributions to popular entertainment and television over a century of broadcasting. (Spoiler: Doctor Who is, in fact, one of the BBC’s more enduring contributions to popular entertainment and television over a century of broadcasting.) This special automatically ticked two of the boxes right there. … Read more

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2022 Artists (by group or surname) Music Reviews Non-Soundtrack Music Royksopp Year

Röyksopp – Profound Mysteries III

4 min read

Order this CDNow that 2022 has reached its end, I can confidently look back and say that, despite being released really late in the year, and even though it was a year that saw new releases from the likes of Alan Parsons, Midnight Oil, Tim Finn, Tears For Fears, Soft Cell, and a new single from the Queen vaults, the thing I listened to and fixated on the most in 2022 was the third volume of Röyksopp’s Profound Mysteries trilogy. And yes, this has gotten more listen time than the first two entries in the trilogy. This is just peak Röyksopp.

Rewinding a bit, one might remember that in 2014, this was a duo that said it was giving in to the market reality that albums were no longer a thing in the age of music streaming and downloads, and that albums belonged to the age of the CD and the vinyl LP. And when seemingly random Röyksopp singles like “Something In My Heart” and “Never Ever” compelled more repeat listening than some bands’ entire albums, even an old-school album fan like myself had to confess that maybe they had a point, and I’d prefer sporadic singles to them simply going silent. But Profound Mysteries III is proof that a Röyksopp album is always going to be better than a Röyksopp single, because, hey, more Röyksopp. But where the first two Profound Mysteries releases were a bit hit-or-miss from song to song, the third one is their best release since The Inevitable End.

Where this album has its advantage is in the all-star roster of guest collaborators, some we’ve heard from before (Jamie Irrepressible co-writing the atmospheric instrumental “So Ambiguous” and “The Next Day”, and Susanne Sundfør’s vocal elevating “Stay Awhile” to one of the album’s best tracks), some new voices (Gunhild Ramsay Kovacs’s breathy vocals on the upbeat-yet-wistful “Me&Youphoria”), and people that it’s hard to believe hadn’t already collaborated with them (Alison Goldfrapp on “The Night”). Röyksopp really seems to be best-suited to women doing the guest vocals, and just about every song with that element is a standout; surprisingly, as much of a slam-dunk as one would expect it to be, the Alison Goldfrapp collaboration makes the least impact of the bunch. “Me&Youphoria”, “Stay Awhile”, and “Lights Out” are the album’s highlights, with “Just Wanted To Know” featuring Astrid S and a slinky slow groove not far behind. “Feel It” featuring Maurissa Rose is no slouch either; I suppose I should just give in to the obvious and say there’s not a dud track on this album. Some just command more attention than others.

If you’re looking for something that leans into Röyksopp’s history of doing straight-up electro that isn’t quite so downtempo, the ten-minute epic “Speed King” is there for you. Jamie Irrepressible brings a bit of a somber tone to “The Next Day”, and the whole thing wraps up with “Like An Old Dog”, again featuring Pixx, a curious but compelling mix of moody electronics and a wide-screen orchestral backing, an element it shares with “So Ambiguous”, which means that you can shamelessly and almost seamlessly hit repeat on the whole thing.

4 out of 4If Susanne Sundfør’s “Tell Him” had been held over from Profound Mysteries II and added to this album, it’d probably be a strong contender for the best album that this decade will produce, and Röyksopp’s best album ever. But even without it, it’s easily the best thing I listened to in 2022. It’s that good. More like this, please, Röyksopp & friends.

  1. So Ambiguous featuring Jamie Irrepressible (6:06)
  2. Me&Youphoria featuring Gunhild Ramsay Kovacs (4:41)
  3. Stay Awhile featuring Susanne Sundfør (6:11)
  4. The Night featuring Alison Goldfrapp (7:38)
  5. Lights Out featuring Pixx (5:27)
  6. Speed King (9:53)
  7. The Next Day featuring Jamie Irrepressible (4:16)
  8. Just Wanted To Know featuring Astrid S (4:13)
  9. Feel It featuring Maurissa Rose (8:14)
  10. Like An Old Dog featuring Pixx (3:55)

Released by: Dog Triumph Records
Release date: November 18, 2022
Total running time: 60:34

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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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