Ooo! More music!
_______
MP3: Killing of John Lennon, The (2006)
 
 
Review Rating:   Excellent
   
     
...back to Index
T to U
Label:
Film Music Downloads
Catalog #:
 
Format:
Stereo
 
...or start from scratch
A
Released:

January 8, 2008

Tracks / Album Length:

27 Tracks / (58:04)

 

 
   
Composer: Martin Kiszko
   

Special Notes:

Downloadable album only from Film Music Downloads
 
 
Comments :    

For a composer whose written some of the most lyrical music for documentaries about bugs (Alien Empire), it's a bit jarring how few feature film scores Martin Kiszko has written over the past 10 years. Skilled in orchestral writing and known for crafting evocative themes for human, animal, and insect characters, The Killing of John Lennon adds a period crime docu-drama to the composer's résumé, written in a very impressionistic style using orchestra and electronica, and some straightforward classical and jazz modes.

The most overtly tragic cues are the operatic lament “Headaches,” which features a soprano backed by small string orchestra, and “Hotel Room,” with fuses a small chamber string orchestra with celli. Like Alien Empire, there's a powerful emotional structure to the tragic theme in the latter, and the orchestrations really pull at our fears, and our knowledge of what's imminent in the story – John Lennon's inevitable assassination. “New York Streets” is equally gorgeous for long, elegiac string passages that rise and hover for extra beats before a slight reconfiguration and repeat of some emotionally strained passages.

A total contrast is “Gun Store,” which features a gentle folk piece on solo acoustic guitar, and “Skyscrapers,” with a short sax solo that's part blues and part east coast jazz.

Some of the more contemporary-styled cues are heavily atmospheric, and feature acoustic percussion, fat, droning analogue synth chords on shape-shifting keyboards, and lyrical jazzy bridges on piano or guitar. “Library” is a fine example of mood transitions, and of a shift in focus using instrumental subtleties that infer a kind of hypnotic fixation that rapidly accelerates towards an emotional rush. (Because the film hasn't been widely released in North America at this stage, it's tough to tell from track titles alone as to whether specific cues relate directly to Lennon's killer, or wholly different aspects or characters.)

“Street Girls” is slightly retro-eighties, with electronics mimicking vintage eighties percussion and keyboards without the rawness and sometimes unrefined timber typical of early synthesizers. Basically the same set of repeated bars, it's another example of the diverse styles within Kiszko's score that are unified by a peculiar combination of lightness (certainly in his rhythmic textures), dark tonal shades (mostly via electronica), and mounting tragedy (as with instrumental and lovely vocal solos).

The only drawback to the album is the brevity of most cues; it's a classic dilemma where great music runs too brief to create a solid listening experience, and a problem that plagued some of Tyler Bates' early scores (Rated X, and Get Carter). That said, there's much to admire in Kiszko's score, and his infectious mix of diverse styles and deliberate decision to avoid evoking the period and traces of Lennon's music, giving the score and album a strong coherent emotional drive that begins with a dark statement, and subsequently takes us on a deeply tragic journey that ultimately affection millions of Lennon's fans.

The nearly hour-long album from Film Music Downloads is very well mastered, and features a balanced mix, flattering the intricate nuances of Kiszko's fine score, and offering a warm range of frequencies appropriate to the composer's impressionistic use of electronica.

 

© 2008 Mark R. Hasan

 
 
 
Bzzz-bzz-bazzz-brzzoom!
   
_IMDB Entry______DVD Review_______Composer Filmography______CD/LP Release History
   
_IMDB Detailed Entry_____Read about the DVD!________Composer Filmography/Discography at Soundtrack Collector.com ___________Additional Related Sites
   
     
Brrr-boooshi-bzz-bazzah!
   
     
   
   
   
   
     
Vrrfpt-Voot-Voot-Voot!
   
     

Site designed for 1024 x 768 resolution, using 16M colours, and optimized for MS Explorer 6.0. KQEK Logo and All Original KQEK Art, Interviews, Profiles, and Reviews Copyright © 2001-Present by Mark R. Hasan. All Rights Reserved. Additional Review Content by Contributors 2001-Present used by Permission of Authors. Additional Art Copyrighted by Respective Owners. Reproduction of any Original KQEK Content Requires Written Permission from Copyright Holder and/or Author. Links to non-KQEK sites have been included for your convenience; KQEK is not responsible for their content nor their possible use of any pop-ups, cookies, or information gathering.

   
     
__