Intrada Soundtrack Forum

Hi all,
Here's something I've been wondering...
Are there any scores that, even though you knew you liked the film's music enough to purchase the OST, you were still surprised at the power/creativity/nuances that revealed themselves on your first listen?
My latest is Marco Beltrami's "Scream" score. I had been looking for so long but could only find CDs with the "pop music" (ie., a cover of "Don't Fear the Reaper", etc.). I was thrilled to finally find a release of the composer's instrumental contribution. Now, naturally I knew I already liked the music enough to seek out the OST, however, I had no idea just how brilliant this material is. I highly recommend it. I have a new appreciation for what I already liked to begin with
I recall the first score to surprise me being Richard Bellis' "It". Some of Jerry Goldsmith's "Twilight Zone: The Movie" and quite of a bit of Dana Kaproff's "When a Stranger Calls" rate right up there too.
So, are there any scores that impressed you/had more to them than you expected?

There are quite a few scores that I initially passed off as "OK" but have come to really appreciate upon second viewing or listen.

Dave Grusin's score for The Heart is a Lonely Hunter is one of them. It took me a second time (and a better mood perhaps) to be fully receptive to the score's amazing emotional grip highlighted by Grusin's affection for brilliant use of harpsichord in key cues, as well as its musically satisfying source material. I now recognize it as one of the best soundtracks for a serious drama.

John Powell's score for Paycheck is another one. It's a well-structured and exciting action score that for some reason didn't really resonate with me until having listened to the music away from the film.

Yep. Even with some of the oldest scores I can't imagine what instruments were used to create some effects in some scores. Then there are nice moments now and then when something's included that was cut/muted in a film. I'm just getting more and more interested and appreciative of the work composers do.

The recent score THE LEGEND OF HERCULES by Tuomas Kantelinen. It didn't impress me at first, with too much of the moaning women at the beginning, but it won me over to the point where I listened to the final cue about twelve times over! Great stuff.

Bis for Tuomas Kantelinen and his Hercules. At first it sounds like anotherremotecontrolscore and then when you can go beyond the "saturating the mix of the orchestra making it sound like samples" aspect, it delivers a real magic, especially towards the end!

The ones that come to mind are the scores from two re-make film classics. I had never seen the films at the time I bought the cd's and was pleasantly surprised how good the music is.

"The Old Man and the Sea" - Bruce Broughton
"Lord of the Flies" - Philippe Sarde

"Life is like a big ol' box of soundtracks, ya don't know what yer gonna git." -Mama Gump (If I'm not mistaken)

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"I used to worry about losing my mind. Now that I've lost it I don't worry about it anymore." -Wavy Gravy

No it's Forrest's mum actually...

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"I used to worry about losing my mind. Now that I've lost it I don't worry about it anymore." -Wavy Gravy

Off the top of my head, Marco Beltrami's score for the "Flight of the Phoenix" has some glorious noise in it. He even managed to acquit himself well aping that accursed Massive Attack track that was in EVERYTHING around that time.

I never in a zillion years thought I would enjoy "Fierce Creatures" as much as I do. I'm one of the few who liked the film just fine but I've listened to Jerry Goldsmith's music far more times than I've revisited it's inspiration.

There's some fun BIG stuff in "Virus", that I always forget about somehow until I play it again. Joel McNeely had skills, no doubt about it.

Most delightful blind buy has to have been Alessio Vlad and Claudio Capponi's score for... was it Franco Zeffirelli's film of "Jane Eyre" from the late '90s? Not much that gets written these days can be described as rapturous, but I'd happily label this like that.

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Karl Morton IV

"Enjoy every sandwich."
-- Warren Zevon