Blade Runner 2049 [coll] – [Epic]

whngr   4/20/2023   12-inch, Soundtrack

Transcendent Cinematic Synthesizer (with a pinch of colorectal cancer)

An epic soundtrack that overshadows a film that needn’t have been made. What a disappointing end to a glorious intellectual property. One might call it… a travesty. Stunning in visual design and execution but devoid of the original film’s spirit and engaging storyline. The sound however was unbelievable. Absolutely beyond arresting, the swells and the timber, the power and ability to be evocative… just off the charts. It’s almost too much, and in a theatre with the full arsenal of professional acoustic implements, especially the subwoofers, fuck me, that was one of the best arual experiences I have had in the cinema. Lucky for me ’cause it won’t play again on a system of that quality in my (likely apocalyptic) near future but you’ll get a taste of it in Master studio (when everything is working), our monitors are pretty fucking good. Just peg the volume and drink in the bass on this one boys… you’ll get your fix. 

Lilting, pensive, dark, ethereal, futuristic, the full gamut of emotions are here, fear, hope, longing, regret, if it can happen in a world at the end of civilization, it is present in this soundtrack. It bears mentioning that these two wizards of the synthesizer do their absolute damndest to fill the impossibly magnificent boots worn by Vangelis on the original hauntingly beautiful soundtrack, even including a near reprisal on the track “Tears In the Rain” (D2), but to Zimmer and Wallfisch’s credit, Vangelis did have the incredible majesty of a genuine Science Fiction masterwork behind them. At least I thought it was… ’til I saw this load of codswallop. 

And on that note… the closing track, and the only reason this LP is filed under Collections and not where it belongs, in the Z’s is due to the utter abomination that is pinched off at the end of this album, the track “Almost Human” by, Nobody Givesatoss is such a wretched pile of highly commercial film industry pap that I have seriously considered taking a bit of 100 grit silicon carbide to the closing 3/4 inches of side D (though I have kept it on my hard drive to remember what I truly loathe) and if I hear you playing that piece of shit on my source… we are gonna have words. 

Hans Zimmer appears to be one of the current golden boys of the most bloated of Hollywood’s film industry franchise molesters and got his start on the 80’s television series, Moonlighting. Schoenfisch is a London-born composer who has also supped at the teat of Hollywood in recent years and though I have seen few of the other films they have scored, either individually or the other one they worked on together (maybe I should check it out), they are capable of making totally devastating sounds together. Hopefully they won’t be hired for Full Metal Jacket II: Afghanistan Now.

Hollywood – 2017