Infant Sorrow - Get Him to the Greek (2010) (OST)

British comedian/actor/seasoned TV presenter Russell Brand first introduced audiences to waifish, blown-out retro-rocker Aldous Snow in the 2008 comedy Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Brand’s heroin-chic, hedonistic yet good-natured Lothario felt like an amalgamation of Mick Jagger, Johnny Rotten, David Bowie, Robert Plant, and Axl Rose, and the character proved popular enough with moviegoers to spawn a sequel of sorts, only this time around, it’s Snow’s turn in the spotlight. 2010’s Get Him to the Greek reunited Brand with Marshall director Nicholas Stoller and producer Judd Apatow, and Snow’s band, Infant Sorrow (named after a poem by William Blake), provided the film’s soundtrack. Part Spinal Tap, part Tenacious D and a whole lot of Buckcherry and the Darkness, Infant Sorrow’s 15-track “debut” sounds like something fellow fictional rock star Billy Mack (played by Bill Nighy in the 2003 film Love Actually) would have put out in his Dionysian heydays. With track titles like “The Clap,” “African Child (Trapped in Me),” “Bangers, Beans & Mash,” “Riding Daphne,” and “Furry Walls,” it’s easy to write the whole affair off as pure novelty. While that’s a fairly apt summation of the final product, the songs, which were penned by Brand, Jarvis Cocker (Pulp), Carl Barat (Libertines), singer/songwriter Dan Bern, and actor/musician Jason Segal, the latter of whom provided Sarah Marshall with the brilliant Dracula puppet rock opera, A Taste of Love, are immaculately stupid/clever, paying homage to the hard rock greats (and their myriad sexual deviances) while providing enough hooks to land Moby Dick, as well as his less famous father, Papa Boner.

by James Christopher Monger

Shutter Island [Music from the Motion Picture]

Director Martin Scorsese’s films have never used music as mere background noise. His attention to detail, especially when delving into a period piece, does not distinguish between the audible and the visual, a characteristic applied with great care on the two-disc soundtrack to 2010’s Shutter Island. Produced by longtime collaborator Robbie Robertson, the tale of two U.S. Marshals sent to a remote Massachusetts island to investigate a murder is lent enormous weight by a score cobbled from the dismal atmospherics (the majority of the film takes place in a hospital for the criminally insane) of modern classical heavyweights like John Cage, Ingram Marshall, Max Richter, John Adams, and Brian Eno. Peppered between the long slabs of ominous avant-garde minimalist chamber music are fleeting rays of light from period radio crooners Kay Starr, Lonnie Johnson, and Johnnie Ray, resulting in a harrowing listening experience in its own right, and one that further cements the filmmaker’s reputation as one of American cinema’s most original voices.

by James Christopher Monger

Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows, Pt. 1 [Original Score]

The seventh and penultimate entry into the internationally successful Harry Potter franchise is also one of the series’ darkest, and composer Alexander Desplat (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Queen, The Painted Veil) infuses the young wizard’s world with the appropriate amount of gravitas. It’s been a decade since John Williams set the tone for the films, and his original theme exists only in the shadows of Harry Potter & Deathly Hallows, Pt. 1. Desplat’s score is both subtle and huge, lending quiet emotional depth (“Harry & Ginny”), playful wickedness (“Death Eaters”), and tense, robust action (“The Oblivation”) with masterful precision. Film series that employ this many different composers (and directors, for that matter) rarely find cohesion, and this first installment of Deathly Hallows does nothing in the way to tarnish that achievement.

by James Christopher Monger

Hans Zimmer - Inception (2010)

Between 1988 and 2010, composer Hanz Zimmer has had a hand in nearly every major action film, whether it’s him behind the keys or one of his numerous, Remote Control Productions (formerly known as Media Ventures) protégés like John Powell, Harry Gregson-Williams, or Klaus Badelt. His excellent work on director Christopher Nolan’s 2008 international blockbuster The Dark Knight, was disqualified for Oscar consideration due to too many cooks (composers) in the kitchen, a handicap that doesn’t apply to Nolan’s 2010 follow-up, Inception. Zimmer’s signature move, a four- to eight-chord round that builds from a subtle breeze to an F5 tornado, serves as the foundation for Inception’s dizzying score, and the addition of Smiths/Cribs guitarist Johnny Marr, who appears on eight of the twelve cuts, dutifully expands the layers of Zimmer’s melodies, much like the dream building that occurs onscreen. There are moments that bring to mind Vangelis' moody, jazz-kissed work on Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, but Inception's backbone is pure Zimmer. It’s beautiful and heroic, unhinged and unspeakably melancholy, and the finest and most fully realized soundtrack this prolific composer has crafted to date.

by James Christopher Monger