It seems that recently I’ve found myself listening to a lot of
\nmusic related to science-fiction television shows or movies. (Memo
\nto Beth: yes, I know the reason why this is so… and I am
\nthankful.) While I never was the biggest sci-fi fan in the world
\n(c’mon, I
\nslept<\/i> through
\nStar Wars<\/i> when I first saw it… but, hey, I was six years
\nold!), I have admired some of the efforts I’ve listened to for
\ntrying to present the future in the music of today. Other efforts,
\nwell, haven’t been quite as impressive.<\/p>\n
Then, we check out
\nFarscape<\/i>, a collection of songs from the first two seasons
\nof this show. (Eye-opener time, since I never have seen the show.)
\nOn first listen, I had to wonder how they got Peter Gabriel to do
\nsome of the music.<\/p>\n
Of course, Gabriel is nowhere to be found on this set, but this
\ndisc is like having two soundtracks in one. One part almost merges
\nworld-beat music with traditional sci-fi; the other half is the
\nmore down-to-earth science fiction music fans are used to. Question
\nis, which effort is better?<\/p>\n
To my ears, that distinction is won by SubVision – Chris, Tony
\nand Braedy Neal – who manage to wake people up from the traditional
\nstereotype of sci-fi music they might have been used to and dare to
\nthrow in tribal beats, vocal chanting (as heard in the “Theme From
\nFarscape”) and even a smidgen of Celtic influences. Tracks like
\n“Time Trouble,” “Wormholes!,” “Fields Of Joy” and “Namtar’s Magic”
\nprove one thing beyond a doubt: this musical marriage
\nworks<\/i>, and it works well. (I kidded with the woman working
\npublicity for this disc that this half of the disc sounded like
\nwhat they were trying to do with
\nHighlander: Endgame<\/i>.)<\/p>\n
So why in the second season were SubVision dropped and Guy Gross
\nbrought in to handle the music? I don’t want to belittle Gross’s
\ncontributions to the
\nFarscape<\/i> series, but the change in musical approach is
\nalmost like doing 120 in a Ferrari and slamming on the brakes to
\navoid hitting a turtle in the road. It’s just something you’re not
\nready for, especially when you found yourself getting caught up in
\nthe different styles of the music previously.<\/p>\n
Needless to say, Gross returns to a more traditional sci-fi
\nbacking track – as he describes it, his music is written to work
\nwith the character’s dialog. Okay, maybe these tracks work in that
\nregard – but on their own, tracks like “Crichton’s Daughter,”
\n“Peace Keeping” and “Goodbye Caveman” don’t work as well. And just
\nwhen Gross seems like he’s getting the hang of things (as on
\n“Crichton’s Wedding”), the disc comes to an end.<\/p>\n
There’s still a lot to
\nFarscape<\/i> that makes me recommend this disc to people,
\nespecially for those who say that all music from this genre sounds
\nthe same. Listen to the first half of this disc, and discover that
\nthis just isn’t the case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25794,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5729],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-37000","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-soundtrack","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37000"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37000"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}