Temp Score Extravaganza Part 2/4

By Luke Goljan

Sam Raimi's buddy Joe LoDuca has made a career out of weaving temp-tracks together to create original scores. Check out his Army of Darkness score and right from the get-go you can spot Cape Fear, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Toy Soldiers, Aliens, Alien 3 and Die Hard. The Die Hard bit doesn't make it onto the soundtrack, but it appears in the film when the impossibly large fountain of blood erupts from "The Pit." LoDuca's score to the first Evil Dead film shares intentional similarities with Tobe Hooper's Texas Chainsaw Massacre, due to Raimi and crew's fascination with the film. Evil Dead 2's DVD commentary features Raimi himself claiming to hear a bit of score that sounds like Batman present when Ash is getting sucked out the door into the time portal ­ even though Elfman had yet to compose Batman's score when Evil Dead 2 was completed.

Trying to find all the temp-tracks present in the Hercules TV show is a difficult task, seeing as virtually all of the music was composed under the very strict TV music deadline that allows for a generous week at most. Not surprisingly, you can spot Demolition Man fairly easily in track 3 of Hercules Volume 1 (and let's just admit it, that theme sounds suspiciously Superman). Track 7 copies some Poledouris Robocop music, seemingly lifting the influence from the third installment in the franchise. Track 10 comes just about as close to stealing James Horner's Krull theme as it can. Demolition Man makes a brief encore performance in track 13 as does the Krull bit in track 18, right before it goes full on into ripping it off in orchestral and choral glory. Track 23 finally gets around to doing a knock-off on WaterWorld, while track 30 manages to sneak in Wojiech Killar's Dracula. And somewhere in all of that, I'm reasonably sure I heard a few takes on Graeme Revell's The Crow. Now keep in mind, all of these are expertly woven together with a quality surprising for a TV show. The music's influences, however, are not very well disguised. Xena makes out better, with only track 28 of Xena Volume 1 copying the Darkman theme (perhaps as a Raimi in-joke?) and track 29 sharing similarities with Silvestri's subway chase music from Predator 2.

Of course, latter Xenas don't hide their influences as well. Volume 2 contains a take on Goldsmith's Omen action music -- popular amongst temp-tracks it seems. Nine tracks later, track 12 knocks Patton, while track 21 manages to get both Batman and (perhaps) The X-Files. Finally, track 22 draws on Edward Scissorhands, and the theme is present again in track 23, along with a deliberate reference to Morricone's The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. LoDuca's love of The Omen carries over into Volume 3, since it makes another appearance in track 7. But the real enjoyment factor of this album is how much it sounds like a Disney musical. Influences from Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin are easy enough to spot ­ one song almost goes so far as to simply sing new words over "Kill the Beast." I'm sure the Disney vibe was intentional, and some of the more serious stuff even manages to evoke a fairly convincing Les Miserables feeling. Finally, Xena Volume 4 sticks to doing a few takes on Alan Silvestri's Back to the Future (track 4 is a good example), and LoDuca favorite, Demolition Man (track 24). As the show went on, LoDuca seemed to get quite adroit at hiding his influences (or could it be he's finally allowed enough time to be original?), at least until track 13 of Xena Vol. 6, which does variations on Basic Instinct for the entirety of the track. Pretty much note for note, too!

John Ottman has publicly stated on his website that he creates temp-tracks when he edits -- and he's been doing it since he was making movies in the garage with his next door neighbors. Knowing this, most of his influences seem to sneak by, though there are a few exceptions. Cable Guy was obviously inspired by Edward Scissorhands with its oohing chorus and music box feel. I would like to point out however, that I remember a review stating how annoying it is that Danny Elfman has virtually patented the use of the choir in modern scores. It seems that like it or not, any poor composer who writes voice lines runs the risk of getting the Scissorhands critique. Ottman's score is undeniably bittersweet in the same vibe as Elfman's, though, which makes the critique valid in this instance. Sadly, the poor thing was buried under a "hot" soundtrack after all was said and done, so I hesitate to criticize it further. Of further interest is the "Danger Music" Jim Carrey hums which Ottman cues up on the soundtrack -- it seems to be inspired by none other than Bernard Herrmann's North By Northwest. And of course, the music playing during the Star Trek inspired fight is intentionally borrowed from the episode the characters reference.

Urban Legends: Final Cut had an entire score made up of temp-tracks at one point, according to Ottman's website, where he stated that he was worried he might not be able to live up to the music he had selected. Aside from intentionally quoting Christopher Young's theme from the original, the only noticeable outside influences are present in track 2, which pounds along in a snarling Vertigo climactic way before it finally erupts into full-blown Poltergeist, the same portion every composer does variations on. After the prerequisite swells (with some added brass for unique flavor), it slips into the same orchestral frenzy Goldsmith's music does, going a little too far over the line of homage and straying into rip-off territory. The rest of the score manages to sound completely original, though my ex-girlfriend insisted that some crashing cymbals and brass sound too much like Sleepy Hollow.

Ottman's much-acclaimed music to The Usual Suspects contains a few temp-tracks that are surprisingly easy to spot (and surprisingly blatant). There's the climactic music accompanying the discovery of Keyser Soze's identity, which manages to be a total retread of the sex underscore from Basic Instinct. In other places the score ventures into Sneakers territory, and at one point is very obviously influenced by John Williams JFK, with ticking metronome to boot (this device was also used in Ennio Morricone's The Untouchables as well, but the scale seems to tip more towards Williams in this case). Finally, there's that mysterious theme shared by three other scores.

In another case of something that's just plain weird, John Williams' main theme to Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone sounds amazing similar in pacing and atmosphere to John Debney's The Halloween Tree. The likeness is close enough that when I first heard Williams' score in a preview, I mistook it for Debney's, thinking they were using Halloween Tree as trailer music. Debney's theme, however, predates Potter by several years. Both themes share the same sense of wonderment, for movies that are both about kids discovering extraordinary magical circumstances. More than likely it's a coincidence, since the only person I've ever heard John Williams really rip off is himself, but its worth tracking down a copy of the animated Halloween special just to hear the similarities. For those with deep pockets, Debney's score has also floated around as another of his exceedingly expensive promos ala Hocus Pocus.

James Horner follows suit with John Williams, sticking mostly to copying off himself (yes, not counting concert composers). However, his main theme to Honey, I Shrunk the Kids draws obvious influence from "The Breakfast Machine" in Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. Much of the beats line up the same and the harmonica line is pretty much identical to Elfman's music underscoring Pee-Wee's attempts at hitchhiking. The rest of the score stays close to this idea as well ­ every time the main theme kicks up it has an unmistakable Pee-Wee feel. But Elfman was not the only influence apparently, since at one point it all but copies Dave Grusin's still sadly unreleased The Goonies theme (underscoring the kids attempt at whistling to summon their dog). In Horner's defense, his score to Casper, obviously temped with Edward Scissorhands, repeats no thematic material and evokes a mood all it's own while still using the oohing chorus and tinkling piano.

David Arnold's exciting score to the Godzilla remake sounds great unless you own Mark Mancina's Speed, which shares it's sweeping love theme with the movie about the big lizard. This could be a case of an extraordinarily strange coincidence rather than a temp-track, since who would ever think to connect the two movies in any way? Trying vaguely for a degree of separation, I recall that Speed director Jan DeBont was once slated to direct Godzilla ­ but that's quite a stretch. Also, the original trailer music which plays under the Godzilla promo in which the fisherman is attacked ­ though not composed by Arnold ­ evokes a strong Home Alone sense, even copying it directly at one point when the fisherman sits down on the box at the end of the dock.

Arnold's Stargate score sounds very James Horner ­ not familiar with Arnold's work when I initially first saw Stargate in the theater, I was certain it was Horner who had composed it. Though it does not contain any obvious instances of sounding exactly like a specific cue, much of it is a sound-alike for Horner material. And for some reason ­ this must be unintentional ­ the creepy descending theme for the sun-god Ra appears in Jerry Goldsmith's Dennis The Menace as Switchblade Sam peers out over the neighborhood, menacing blue-screened in.

The exciting voices of John Powell and Harry Gregson-Williams from the Mediaventures school co-composed two of my favorite scores, Antz and Chicken Run, both with dangerously infectious themes. Antz however, like so many others, can't seem to keep it's hands off Danny Elfman's Edward Scissorhands score, mimicking the picnic music for a scene involving -- surprise -- a picnic (track 15). Chicken Run intentionally (so it seems) borrows a snippet from "Desert Chase" off Raiders of the Lost Ark for track 14, while the movie parodies the visual gag of risking safety to snag back a hat before a giant door shuts -- an Indy classic. Their score for Shrek also contains a soaring theme that sounds a lot like fellow Mediaventures teammate Trevor Rabin's Deep Blue Sea theme. It appears in track 14 as Shrek and Donkey run to escape the dragon (this track also sounds a lot like it was inspired by some of David Arnold's James Bond music) and then again in track 25 as Shrek and Donkey ride atop the dragon, racing to stop the wedding.

On his own, John Powell has developed a unique sound that's much richer and more developed than his Mediaventures brethren. His preference for orchestral flavor over synths has helped his voice emerge as a true talent. Predictably, his score to Evolution was preceded by music from another alien invasion comedy: Danny Elfman's Men in Black. He manages to avoid it for the most part, but track 2, accompanying David Duchovny peering into a microscope and being awed at what he sees, sounds like Elfman's music for Linda Fiorentino peering into the cat's collar adornment and being awed at what she sees in Men in Black (that's track 11 for those who need to know). The rest of his score sounds more like David Newman than Elfman, though, with bombastic crashes and lots of syncopation. Track 5, however, contains music for the military and in true Mediaventures fashion it can't go without sounding at least a little like The Rock. I can only wonder if this is an in-joke between everyone from the school of Zimmer, since it keeps appearing in everything military any of them do.

I had assumed Powell's energetic music to the hilarious Rat Race was inspired by Elfman's Pee-Wee music until I saw the "Making Of" special on the DVD. It used lots of Marc Shaiman's Addams Family Values score under various parts of the film, matching up perfectly and to a large extent sounding very similar. Suddenly it all made sense where Powell had drawn his influence. The off-beat tone and fast-paced music had the same sound and feel. Not a rip-off at all, but a sound-alike in tone only -- a perfect example of a composer following the temp-track but not just copying what he hears.

It seems poor Graeme Revell always gets the short end of the stick when it comes to composing. Whether he's called in at the last second and given a minimal budget or stuck with providing a less than memorable synth score for a less than memorable movie, Revell's name attached to a project usually means the producers didn't care too much when it came to throwing music under their movie. This sounds cruel, but is really unfortunately true. His two "biggest" (re: A-list) films have been Tomb Raider (he replaced Michael Kamen at the very last second) and The Crow (which producers figured would likely bomb due to the stigma of Brandon Lee's death and actually sat in post production for some time). The one time it seems Revell was actually allowed to flex his creative muscles with an actual budget was the miserable Street Fighter, which actually ends up featuring a blip of theme that sounds exactly like John William's Jurassic Park danger music. You can find it in track 6 and then not as prevalent but still there in track 18. And annoyingly enough, the opening logos and news intro carry similarities with the music to the identically styled opening of RoboCop. The rest of the score carries multiple variations of classical pieces, making this both Revell's richest sounding work and his most unoriginal.

Revell's all-synth score to the Vin Diesel-powered sci-fi hit Pitch Black contains a lot of music that sounds similar to director David Twohy's previous feature, The Arrival, scored by Arthur Kempel. Perhaps Twohy set it down as a temp-track or maybe he has a fascination with jungle drum beats. Either way the end results underscoring Vinnie D and Mr. Denise Richards sound alike.

Revell also has a fascination with Horner's Aliens score as well, since it appears all over From Dusk 'Til Dawn. Horner's music was used in trailers for the film as well, making the knock-off that much more obvious. And Revell actually samples Horner's music for Titan A.E., directly lifting the orchestral crash of score that was actually dropped from Aliens (the opening of track 9 on the original release) and ended up in Die Hard. Titan A.E. also features a sample of Event Horizon, most likely because both films are set in space, as well as a sample of Alan Silvestri's Judge Dredd, I suppose because it happened in the future. The only other artist I've ever heard do this is Walter Werzowa, who sampled Newt's stinger in Aliens for Cherry Falls and the stinger at the end of What Lies Beneath track 1 for Mimic 2. I think it's only fair to Mr. Revell to point out here what my friend Joe mentioned to me: "For someone who claims to not be that big a fan of his work, you sure have a lot of his cds." It's true. I do.

To Be Continued...

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