By Michael W. Harris
It is a fact that bears repeating: Elysium is Ryan Amon’s FIRST film score. Not like first as in he did some student projects in college, or he did some low-budget straight to DVD films, no FIRST feature film score…ever. Continue reading “Look, up in the sky, it’s the 1%!!: Ryan Amon and Elysium”
By Michael W. Harris
I feel the need to begin this review with a disclaimer: I have not read The Great Gatsby in fourteen years. I know this figure so precisely because the first and only time I ever read F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel was in the summer of 1999, the summer after I graduated from high school. Continue reading “What’s Eating Jay Gatsby?: Music and Spectacle in a Jazz Age”
By Michael W. Harris
Some of my earliest posts here at The Temp Track dealt with movie trailers and how they used music (here and here). I would like to briefly return to this topic and discuss some new thoughts. Continue reading “In a world…: Trailer Music”
By Michael Harris
In my previous rants about this blog, culture, etc. (here, here, and here) I talked a lot about many subject, but really gave few answers, or at least deftly avoided any concrete ideas on what should be done. Part of the reason is that while complaining about things is easy, providing solutions is hard. Continue reading “Where Do We Go From Here? Part IV of My Rants (aka: The Beer and Physics Post)”
By Michael Harris
Finally, after the woeful X-Men: The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine, the world has finally been given another great appearance of Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine on-screen, not counting his hysterical one line cameo in X-Men: First Class. Continue reading “Logan Does Japan: Marco Beltrami’s score for The Wolverine”
By Michael Harris
So last Friday, with the words from my overly long post on modern music still ringing in my ears, I went and saw Pacific Rim with a good friend, Andy Lee, whose recordings of lesser known minimalist composers you should really check out. Anyway, I started to think, while watching giant robots fight giant monsters, how I might discuss this film in context of what I had just written. Would this film be an example of recycled Hollywood schlock, opiate for the masses, art of death? (Which on the surface it would seem to be.) Or is it life affirming, truly creative, and something that helps to contribute to the on-going dialogue amongst creators; the art of life? For me, it is quite assuredly in the latter category, and I’ll explain why shortly. First, though, a brief review. Continue reading “Pacific Rim and the Art of Life”
By Michael Harris
Six years ago, I made a decision to return to school to study musicology, and in doing so I applied to six different graduate programs spread around the middle portion of the United States—stretching from Indiana to Colorado, and Wisconsin to Oklahoma. In the end, probably due to a number of factors, I was only accepted in two places: University of Colorado, where I ended up, and University of Oklahoma. Continue reading “The Music of Life, the Music of Death: In Defense of Contemporary Art Music”
By Michael Harris
One of my most anticipated movies of the summer, Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim, is set to drop in a week and you better believe I will be there opening weekend. Late last week I bought the score off iTunes and began listening to it. Continue reading “First Impressions: Pacific Rim by Ramin Djawadi”
By Michael Harris
In my previous post (here) I detailed some of the creation behind Joss Whedon’s new film, Much Ado About Nothing and also why he decided to score it himself—namely that everything about this film was done on the cheap, so Joss decided to tackle the music himself. The question of if he was successful I was leaving open until I saw the film.[1] I have now viewed Whedon’s masterful Shakespeare adaptation, and am pleased to say that the score is a total success. Continue reading “Much Ado About Scoring: Joss Whedon’s Score to Much Ado About Nothing”
By Michael Harris
This site was re-launched amidst the release of Man of Steel, and for my second score review, hopefully to be posted this weekend or early next week, I’ll be reviewing the score for Joss Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing, written by the director. Within these two scores, and films, we have an interesting case study about the current state of Hollywood. On the one hand you have a big studio effects film designed to draw in large crowds with a score by one of film music’s biggest names, and on the other, you have a nearly no budget, passion project done by one of Hollywood’s biggest directors and writers, but also one of its biggest rebels. Leaving the subject of big Hollywood and Team Zimmer aside for now (this will hopefully be the topic of The Temp Track’s first podcast next month), let us ponder the case of Team Whedon and what he has done that points the way for what I feel is the future of creativity, the internet, and the new idea economy. (Warning: This is a much larger discussion then I do not have room for here, so look for these ideas to be expanded upon in future posts.) Continue reading “Temp Track 2.0 – A Manifesto”
