The Soundtrack Wars: Which works better?

THEHOOLIGANJEDI · Post by **THEHOOLIGANJEDI** » 2005-04-26 06:56pm

Film Scores or Various Artist compilations song?

In regards to Films and setting a mood which do you think works better.

I generally think Scores work better but, there have been occasions when a nice song has worked, But i gotta say that in the past 10 years, song comps have really gotten bad. (maybe it's the music)

Post your opinions and reasons.

Stravo · Post by **Stravo** » 2005-04-26 07:00pm

I'm usually disappointed by film artist compilation albums, you usually get only one or two songs that are any good and the rest are awful filler songs. One of the few artist compilation soundtracks I truly enjoyed was the original Crow compilation soundtrack. It was fantastic.

I'm a film score guy all the way.

Rogue 9 · Post by **Rogue 9** » 2005-04-26 07:14pm

Presuming a competent composer, film scores, uniformly and without exception.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2005-04-26 07:27pm

Compilations can work, and have worked, but that was a long time ago. Besides, I love instrumentals so scores all the way.

Post by **RogueIce** » 2005-04-27 05:49am

I'm going with scores, since I'm an instrumental guy myself. But the songs can work too, if done right. Usually in a scene with no dialogue, just visual stuff happening.

As to actually buying the actual CD later on, I'm certainly going for a score over various "albums" out there, especially the "Music from and inspired by" stuff. Why the fuck do I care about the song if it wasn't even in the movie?

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2005-04-27 12:50pm

i've pretty much lost faith in the american motion picture industry to put out good soundtracks. every once in a rare while it happens, but more often than not the soundtracks tend to take a second seat to the movie itself, which is a shame since a good soundtrack can really enhance it. the japanese manage to do this pretty good, imo though. *eyes his massive collection of anime soundtracks and image albums*. given that oftentimes a really good soundtrack can help a show from being unwatchable to tolerable, and can make a good show really shine out among the rest.

Dangermouse · Post by **Dangermouse** » 2005-04-27 02:33pm

Generally film scores as well since various soundtracks tend to also have pace/flow issues. However, two recent various artist soundtracks that I really like are Kill Bill Vols 1 and 2. Two allbums that I can listen all of the way through.

Rogue 9 · Post by **Rogue 9** » 2005-04-27 02:36pm

Darth_Zod wrote:i've pretty much lost faith in the american motion picture industry to put out good soundtracks.

*Points to Pirates of the Caribbean and Lord of the Rings.* Maybe I've just gotten lucky, but the few movies I go to see nowadays have had good soundtracks.

Post by **Zaia** » 2005-04-27 02:41pm

Hmm, I don't know; if done right, compilations work quite well. For instance, "The Big Chill," "The Wedding Singer," the fairly recent version of "Great Expectations," and "Forrest Gump" all have great soundtracks. I almost (not quite but almost) have more respect for those soundtracks than the scores because it is so damn hard to put together a bunch of songs that help tell the story while being rockin' songs. I mean, I can throw together some chord progressions and come up with your generic tense-and-scary score music, or your build-up-to-love score music, or the non-stop-action-sequence score music (which would be admittedly a little more difficult but not much), but to do all that well is about as hard as pulling different pieces of music together to make them work as a whole for a soundtrack.

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2005-04-27 03:02pm

Rogue 9 wrote:
Darth_Zod wrote:i've pretty much lost faith in the american motion picture industry to put out good soundtracks.
*Points to Pirates of the Caribbean and Lord of the Rings.* Maybe I've just gotten lucky, but the few movies I go to see nowadays have had good soundtracks.

see my bit right after where i said "every rare once in awhile they'll put out a good one."

Durandal · Post by **Durandal** » 2005-04-27 03:26pm

Rogue 9 wrote:
Darth_Zod wrote:i've pretty much lost faith in the american motion picture industry to put out good soundtracks.
*Points to Pirates of the Caribbean and Lord of the Rings.* Maybe I've just gotten lucky, but the few movies I go to see nowadays have had good soundtracks.

Whoever mastered the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack needs to be drawn and quartered. It's full of clicks and artifacts.

Bob the Gunslinger · Post by **Bob the Gunslinger** » 2005-04-27 05:32pm

Batman wrote:Compilations can work, and have worked, but that was a long time ago. Besides, I love instrumentals so scores all the way.

I think the only times they work are when the movie is set back in the times when compilations worked. In other words, if it's an 80s compilation for an 80s movie, it might work. A 50s compilation for a 50s movie works much better.

The one exception that springs to mind right away is Shrek 2.

felineki · Post by **felineki** » 2005-05-03 03:03am

Original film score, definitely. Sometimes one or two complied artist songs can work if used correctly, (on very rare occasions, a good soundtrack can be made completely from compiled songs, but most attempts at this fail) but I generally prefer original instrumental scores.

NeoGoomba · Post by **NeoGoomba** » 2005-05-03 11:24am

Definately a film score.

Hell, the only two compilations I can think of that work are "Old School" (my love of Whitesnake of course drives this

) and "The Big Lebowski".

But for its era, "Platoon" had a decent compilation