[Thor Joachim Haga]

I agree, Gerate. And some of those “static” elements in his music are further exaggerated when they’re stretched out over soooooo long soundtrack releases. You almost always need to whittle McCreary soundtracks. Thankfully, he DID curate a wonderful album for OUTLANDER (the first volume), as well as the spin-off album OUTLANDER: BLOOD OF MY BLOOD. These two are all I need from this franchise.

But I’ve had to make my own playlists of DA VINCI’S DEMONS (whittling the three volumes down to one 58-minute album), the amusing, Oingo Boingo-ish score for THIS GAME’S CALLED MURDER (down to 42 minutes) and RINGS OF POWER (down to 63 minutes). There are some definite highlights in RINGS OF POWER, but it’s not the “Second Coming” like many make it out to be. In LOTR terms, I place it way below Shore’s original LOTR trilogy, but slightly ahead of his lacklustre HOBBIT scores.

I remember owning a whittled playlist of BLACK SAILS too at some point, it’s gone from my collection now, for some reason. Had some bits from BATTLESTAR GALACTICA once too (loved the series!), but also gone.

By the way, I’m currently watching through THE WALKING DEAD again, from the beginning, on Disney+, but while I dig the show, I don’t want to own the music on CD.