Do you like synth scores?
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I also think synthesisers are like any other musical instrument. I quite like scores with analogue moog synths from the 1960s and early 1970s. I also like some recent film scores using analogue or digital synths.
However, on the other forum, 99% of the time synth scores are mentioned, it refers to Hollywood synth scores from the 1980s. I don’t have any affinities with these scores, so I usually avoid discussions on synth scores for that reason. The main issues is that many of them sound the same to me.
I think you’d love Yannick Dupont’s CAMPING DU LAC from 2024, slint, with its Wendy Carlos vibes.
More appropriate here than in the “Now Playing” thread. This is interesting on many levels. A 2021 documentary on women in electronic music, with a beautiful, original electronic score by a female composer (of course!). Wasn’t familiar with Kate Simko before. Obviously not on the level of the existing music played in the film, but it can hold its own.
Such a wonderful, playful synthwave score that I recommend. Somehow, it passed me by when it came out in 2015, but I was alerted to it recently.
Thanks for the recommendation.
I’ve been listening to some of the synth scores by Maurice Jarre lately, just because I like to keep track of French composers, and not because I have a particular affinity with these films. I can’t say I was impressed, even though I kind of like the Twin Peaks sound, there is thin line between great and new agey.
I have also listened to some of the synth scores by Michel Colombier, again just because I like his earlier French work, but I also wasn’t impressed, it is trying to be too big and bold, and in the end sounds dated with breakbeat dance stuff.
As you know I like the analogue synths of Francois de Roubaix or Piero Umiliani, but I’m also fine with some of the Goblin, Fabio Frizzi action and rhythmical Horror scores from the 1980s.
Any suggestions for Hollywood synth scores are welcome.
Yes, there’s a lot of great French electronic music, slint. It’s one of the world’s foremost countries when it comes to that, after all.
My exposure to Francois de Roubaix is fairly limited. I have LE SAMOURAI and LES AVENTURIERS, obviously, but not a lot of synth in them. He died so young, yet managed to compose a lot of stuff in his lifetime. I’ve always wanted to check out more.
As for Umiliani, I’m embarassed to say that I don’t own anything by him (I think, maybe some themes somewhere).
Goblin is of course a legendary band. While I’ve been a fan of SUSPIRIA since the 90s, I haven’t really found any other scores by them that I’ve enjoyed as a whole. Only individual themes, which I’ve assembled in a digital album (PROFONDO ROSSO, JENNIFER, ROLLER etc.). It’s strange that I’ve never latched on them that much, since I’m a prog rock fan.
I’ll see if I can think of some recommendations for you. But definitely check out the aforementioned CAMPING DU LAC by Yannick Dupont, as well as the scores by Forever Pavot to get that loungey (and occasionally synth-y) 60s vibe from contemporary composers.
Here are some titles of lesser known synth scores that I really like. For example, I was shocked (in a good way, of course) when I came across TRANCERS. It’s an incredibly cool score with a very catchy main theme in a minor key. I’d even bet that most film score fans have never even heard of Mark Ryder and Phil Davis. There’s virtually no information about them. Judging by their names, they’re probably British. This is indicated by the fact that their scores Trancers and Society were recorded in London. They worked together on a few B-movies from 1984 to 1989, and then kind of disappeared after the 90s… Overall, I like what they’ve managed to do. I hope their Society score gets released in some form someday. (If even the primitive score to C.H.U.D. was released.).
Louis Febre’s early scores (they were mostly synth-based) are also hardly mentioned. But I like them: there’s something new, he has his own style…
As for Mann, I was surprised that he wrote an electronic score. Brokedown Palace seems to be his only work in this format.Maybe some of this will be interesting to someone…
Here are the links to these scores:
1. Hello Again (William Goldstein)
2. Trancers (Mark Ryder and Phil Davies)
3. Fists of Iron (Louis Febre)
4. A Time to Die (Louis Febre)
5. Brokedown Palace (Hummie Mann)
1. Trancers I-III (Mark Ryder & Phil Davies)
2. Hello Again (William Goldstein)
3. Internal Affairs (Mike Figgis, Anthony Marinelli, Brian Banks)
4. A Time To Die (Louis Febre)
5. Fists Of Iron (Louis Febre)
6. Brokedown Palace (Hummie Mann)
7. Call Me (David Michael Frank)
8. Rumpelstiltskin (Charles Bernstein)Updated
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