This is a pretty solid horror score. I still haven't watched the film yet (which is on Netflix), although most reports say it's quite bad, especially compared to the first two. I've read people around here complain that a lot of recent horror scores are boring, as they trot out the standard Bartok/Ligeti/Penderecki tropes, with added industrial sound design and maybe a pretty piano and strings family theme. This one rises above that cos of the added action element, which gives it some forward motion and likens it more to a Goldsmith or Horner horror score from the 80s or 90s. Well, to me at least. It does inherit the sound world of the first two JC films by Bennett Salvay, although I don't think it's as good as the second films' score...yet. It's impressively orchestrated and performed and is an old style fresh blast into the current horror score scene. It's available on CD from Quartet and worth a whack if you like your horror scores with a bit more kick. Any other thoughts or opinions?
Maybe i’ll need to give it a listen Kev. I saw the film a while back and wasn’t overly impressed, feeling it didn’t quite stand up with the other two. Don’t really remember the music and I think I was listening for it to see what a different composer would bring. Sometimes a stand-alone listen can be a revelation though.
I hear very little of Bartok in most current horror scores. Goldsmith or Morricone would be the last composers that drew from his harmonic and orchestration Palette. Same goes for Ligeti. No evidence of micropolyphonic writing. Most of what is composed is drawn from sample libraries that have coloristic Orchestral FX and stingers that might have origins in Varèse and Xenakis music but quite far removed from them intellectually.
No wonder you're not getting Big Hollywood Blockbuster movies to score, David. You're way too technical for Hollywood! You've just shat all over Lorne Balfe's very existence
Damn you Kev...this IS good!! Just my kinda stuff. Really didn't register it in the film. A definite cut above the average ( The Nun, anyone?) ....Another Cd to buy...... sheesh! :-)
Haha. Sorry mate. I actually had you and Sean (GoblinScore) in mind when I typed up my appraisal of it. I've read you lamenting the lack of spark in horror scores of late and this one has a drive to it that is quite invigorating. There's no BIG THEME and it does stray into familiar territory at times, but there's a sense of orchestral fun in it's tracks and a call out to the 'funner' horror scores of yore.
No wonder you're not getting Big Hollywood Blockbuster movies to score, David. You're way too technical for Hollywood! You've just shat all over Lorne Balfe's very existence
That and my winning personality. Haha.
On topic, I found this score to be well performed and recorded. It’s more Orchestral than what we normally get for this genre of late. More than competently composed though I wouldn’t say it oozes with character.
Never heard of it spook. I'm sure it's on Spotify or Youtube. I'll give it a listen when I get home. What's it like from your perspective? I'm guessing it's NOT the standard/norm shrieks/howls/rumbles/skitters that passes for most horror scores these days.
Its by Zacarías M. de la Riva. I bought it as part of a cheap bundle of CDs many years ago, never really having heard of the film but what a find this was. Some really beautiful moments and great orchestral darkness as just opposed to synth rumblings. Truly a score with soul and its never really left my playlist since ( also very much enjoyed the stylish film although it doesn't ever get very good reviews) I followed the composer's output after it and he's done some good stuff (Automata) and quite a few kids animated flicks but he's never quite hit the heights of this score for me again.I live in hope though on every one he does. ( I have similar feelings on Jan A.P. Kaczmarek's wonderful LOST SOULS) give it a go Kev and see what you think.
6am posting, nothing better! IMAGO MORTIS - I can vouch for this to the horror gang, it's a good one. I hate to give a backhanded endorsement but I will anyway - I dont recall the themes, but they are there, it's a long album and I dont tend to jump out of it or turn it off! Good composer, I like all I heard by de la Riva.
Jeepers, also very good, I need to pick it up still! Film was watchable, better than expected overall, not the disaster we'd heard about. Score is electronic I believe, didn't sound like it in the film! All 3 Jeepers scores were excellent in their own way, too bad Salvay kind of disappeared. Documentary on 1st score shows they put a lot of care into it - I heard Beltrami-lite at first listen, but there is certainly more there. 2nd has a lit of Shirley Walker feel to it thanks to her orchestrator gang working on it.
So there, great reminder to get 3 before it hibernates another 17 years when the 500 copy run is kaput....
Sean. It's fully orchestral. In a good old-school way. Just played the whole thing again and it's really growing on me. Some really great action/thriller/horror licks to be had.
spook. Thanks for the write-up. It is on Spotify, but I didn't have a chance to listen last night, but it's marked for a future listen.
Kev, I'm almost 100% positive that this score is done entirely or almost entirely with samples, end credits of the film denote that it was "performed by" Smith. Most composers of his generation spend 90% of their time making mock-ups sound as good as possible with proper reverbs and EQs to achieve a natural fidelity, and then about 10% on the actual composition, and it shows. It's easy to make short, stabbing phrases like the ones heard on this score sound real, but if you tried to write something long-lined or string/woodwind driven or whatever, it would immediately begin to fall apart and sound artificial.
Since someone mentioned Salvay's scores earlier, it's a damn shame the man hasn't gotten more work indeed, especially after THIS juggernaut:
Well I'll be Dam-Ned. If those are samples, they really got me! It's the most genuinely orchestral sounding score I've ever heard.
Despite apparently having a $3.6 million budget, this was a small, "locally produced" film done entirely in Louisiana by large contingents of production and post-production personnel who also work on those godawful Syfy channel movies, Smith included. Tax rebates ensure movies like this basically do everything, from shooting to scoring, in state, and unfortunately it tends to show in the quality of the final products (hence why you get a lot of rubbish TV movies and the like setting up shop there, where no one really cares about the quality of the end product, just so long as it makes the air date in time).
The film itself, by the way, is amazingly bad. Like in a really amusing, throw-back-and-drink-some-beers-with-the-boys-and-laugh-your-ass-off kind of way. The preceding JEEPERS CREEPERS 2 may not have been a high water mark of creative filmmaking, but damn was it a GOOD looking movie with terrific cinematography, visual effects, action set-pieces and so forth - it really felt like it had resources and craft behind it. This one looks so damn cheap and lazy by comparison. There's a death scene involving a kid on a dirt bike that needs to be seen to be believed - it's incomprehensibly silly!
Samples v. Orchestral - I was gobsmacked to see Performed by on the end titles, in the fuom it really sounds live, so dont feel bad McGann I was fooled too. Last time I was fooled was on Lux's eventually awful HALLOWEEN RESURRECTION. Synths have come a long way.
P.s. - Jeepers 2 is an early entry in the trend of casting totally unlikable people in horror. Continues to this day and starts me bemoaning the good old days when you cared about the cast...
I've played this CD about 6 times now and it never fails to amaze me that this ISN'T an actual, performed orchestral score! It's certainly the best (most authentic sounding) sample-based score I've ever heard. Whereas any number of RC/MV type score typically takes 50 to 100 players and processes them into sounding like a synthy, sample-based score, this one does the complete opposite. While it's not theme heavy, it creates a great moody atmosphere, fully in-keeping with the 'soundscapes' that have come before it in the JC world.
