Tag: Dennis McCarthy

Categories
2022 Film Music Reviews S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television Year

Star Trek Collection: The Final Frontier

2 min read

Order this CDI hit peak Star Trek superfandom in the late ’80s, just in time for the 1990s and the sudden rapid expansion of Star Trek as a genuine media franchise to kick in. There were so many shows on TV. A good few episodes of these various series had really good music. And the music…was nowhere to be found commercially. Star Trek: The Next Generation wound up with four individual CD releases through the end of the 1990s, while Deep Space Nine and Voyager merited one each, in each instance with (most of) the score from their pilot episodes. That pattern continued with the pilot episode of Enterprise in 2001, and then…it all went silent. Being in my early 20s, I didn’t get it. It seemed like GNP Crescendo had a license to print money – or at least a license to get their hands of copious amounts of my money – if only they’d keep releasing more Star Trek music. (I know nothing of musicians’ unions and re-use fees at the time, I just knew what I liked.) My attention drifted to other franchises that seemed to know full well that their fans wanted more music, not less – Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, the new Doctor Who… and then a magical thing happened in the late aughts. Suddenly Paramount seemed more open to the idea of mining its musical vaults. Long-out-of-print Star Trek movie soundtrack albums suddenly had newly expanded editions. On the television front, things went from famine to feast as massive box sets chronicled either the entire musical oeveure of the 1960s series, or the entire body of work of a beloved single Next Generation composer. And then all of the television series racked up not just one, but two 3-or-4-disc box sets covering music from their entire broadcast run. … Read more

Categories
2019 Film Soundtracks Star Trek W Year

What We Left Behind – music by Dennis McCarthy and Kevin Kiner

4 min read

If there was ever a way to gauge how passionately fans of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine were willing to go to bat for a series that remains something of the bastard stepchild of the franchise, all one had to do was promise a documentary interviewing all of the major players, and then crowdfund that documentary. Then you just sit back and watch how many of the stretch goals go whizzing by as the production is funded.

One of those stretch goals was to hire the original composer of the Deep Space Nine theme and most of the series’ episodes, Dennis McCarthy, to score the documentary, What We Left Behind. McCarthy was not only game for returning to the Star Trek universe, but he brought with him Kevin Kiner, a frequent collaborator from McCarthy’s years providing music for the ratings-challenged, budget-addled Star Trek: Enterprise. As that show’s music budget was repeatedly slashed, McCarthy would lean on Kiner to bring the music to life electronically, since the money for an orchestra was no longer necessarily on the table. By the time McCarthy brought Kiner in the perform much the same function on What We Left Behind, Kiner was a composer in his own right, having scored nearly the entirety of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, numerous early episodes of Stargate SG-1, and a second animated series, Star Wars: Rebels.

There’s one component of the documentary where bringing McCarthy back into the fold really pays major dividends. The show’s storied writers’ room is reassembled – a room now made not of rookie TV writers, but of high-powered Hollywood showrunners in their own right – with their old boss, Ira Steven Behr (also the frequent narrator/muse of the documentary), to break down the story for an entirely hypothetical season 8 premiere. As they devise the story, it’s brought to life by artwork and by McCarthy’s music, which is authentic as one could get without actually digging up McCarthy’s 1990s session tapes. The result is an authentic Deep Space Nine story with authentic Deep Space Nine music, one of the highlights of the whole project. In a few other cases, McCarthy ends up rescoring scenes he originally scored in the ’90s. With Kiner’s considerable skill at electronically recreating orchestral bombast, the results are genuinely thrilling.

McCarthy and Kiner bring more modern sensibilities to tracks like “Mr. Brooks”, “Killing Will Robinson”, and “Racial Inequalities”. From the jauntiness to the electronic percussion elements of these tracks, there’s a clear musical dividing line between “documentary” and “breaking the story for an unmade season 8 premiere”.

The all-star barbershop quartet of DS9 veterans – Casey Biggs, Jeffrey Combs, Armin Shimerman, and Max Grodenchik – also appear on the soundtrack with their renditions of classic standards (now with Deep-Space-Nine-inspired lyrics, i.e. “I Left My Quark And Captain Sisko” to the tune of “I Left My Heart In San Francisco”). These interludes were a highlight of a documentary that tried very hard to give the impression that it wasn’t taking itself too seriously, and is an extension of Biggs’ and Grodenchik’s convention party piece. (It’s especially nice to have these songs handy in a year where conventions have abruptly become as much a distant memory as the show itself.)

4 out of 4So if you were wondering why you should bother with a soundtrack that isn’t even from one of the Star Trek series, but rather a documentary about that series, it’s pretty simple: by bringing Dennis McCarthy and Kevin Kiner back into the Trek universe, the result is something that earns its place alongside the music from the series itself. Much like the entirely hypothetical season 8 premiere, it’s a tantalizing glimpse into a Star Trek tale that could’ve kept on going.

Order this CD

  1. Main Title (0:12)
  2. Through A Glass Darkly (0:57)
  3. I Left My Quark and Captain Sisko (2:10)
  4. Reunion (2:40)
  5. Big Space / Fun Voyages (0:37)
  6. Mr. Brooks (3:03)
  7. Concept Art / Production Design (2:47)
  8. Actor Interaction / DS9 Renaissance / Promise to be Back (3:05)
  9. Writers Intro / New Episode (4:58)
  10. Explosion (1:33)
  11. Evolving Characters I / Friendship to Romance (1:32)
  12. Grey Character (2:54)
  13. Evolving Characters II / Recurring Characters (1:46)
  14. Killing Will Robinson (2:29)
  15. Galactic War Saga / Sacrifice of Angels (3:04)
  16. Writers’ Room I (2:48)
  17. Haven’t Advanced Much (1:33)
  18. Racial Inequalities (1:45)
  19. Writers’ Room II (2:30)
  20. Action Barbie / Being Heard (3:03)
  21. Intro Ezri (1:28)
  22. Bashir (1:16)
  23. The Cost of War (1:16)
  24. Real World Issues (2:53)
  25. Section 31 (3:49)
  26. Finale (5:58)
  27. What We Left Behind (Vocal) (2:48)
  28. In Memorium (0:43)
  29. End Credits (3:12)
  30. DS9 Rocks (1:29)
  31. What We Left Behind Trailer (2:27)
  32. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Main Title for Solo Piano “After 3:00 AM at Quarks” (5:09)

Released by: BSX Records
Release date: October 11, 2019
Total running time: 1:17:54

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Categories
2016 Compilation Film S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television Tribute / Reinterpretation Video Game / Computer Game

Star Trek: The 50th Anniversary Collection

9 min read

In the early ’90s, I was positively obsessed with Star Trek music – every new movie score released, any new television soundtracks that came along, anything was a cause for celebration, because I was in “maximum Trekkie” mode, and there never seemed to be enough of it.

Fast-forward a bit to the 21st century, in an era where we’re starving for the seemingly perpetually-delayed first new Star Trek TV series in a decade…and yet we’re positively drowning in music from the franchise’s glory days. I’ve gone from “not being to get enough Star Trek music” to “how in the hell do I organize this huge glut of music when I rip the latest box set worth of CDs to my hard drive straight out of the mail?”

Not that I’m complaining. The 50th Anniversary Collection from La-La Land Records is a fine buffet line adding to the embarrassment of riches we’ve gotten since 2009, a year during which the first J.J. Abrams movie (and yes, its soundtrack) came along, revitalized Trek as a media juggernaut, and convinced new Paramount music executive Randy Spendlove that maybe, just maybe, he should license some of the gems from the Trek music vaults to these specialty soundtrack labels that are clamoring to release it.

Rather than a laser-like focus on any one series, this four-disc set tries to patch some holes, right some wrongs, and answer some fannish prayers. The first disc consists, mostly, of remastered selections from the original series, piece of music of which better copies have been found since La-La Land’s monumental 2012 box set release of every note of music recorded for classic Trek. There are a few new 1960s gems as well: Wilbur Hatch’s “bumper” music, played over still slides of the Enterprise and the Star Trek logo as the show went to commercial during its broadcast premieres, is something I don’t think I’ve ever heard before. An alternate take of a cue from Star Trek: The Motion Picture also appears, but the big takeaway from disc one is the dialogue-free version of the end credits from Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, a track which had previously only appeared on CD with the late Leonard Nimoy’s ethereal narration. Fans have been demanding this since Film Score Monthly released an otherwise complete Star Trek II score on CD in 2009, and at last, here it is.

The second disc, however, contains the box set’s biggest knock-me-over-with-a-feather surprises: virtually the entire music library from the 1973-74 Filmation animated Star Trek series, a segment of the franchise that’s often overlooked for no readily justifiable reason. These selections come courtesy not of a miraculous session tape find (stories have circulated for years about how the original tapes no longer exist), but from the box set’s restoration experts and producers painstakingly editing together all of the cues from the audio of the episodes themselves, meticulously splicing together dialogue-and-FX-free sections of music until they had the entire piece of music reconstructed. Fans have been trying to do this since the days of cassette tapes with moderate success, so to hear an expert reconstruction of this music is nothing short of amazing. (Sharp-eared Filmation fans will also recognize a lot of this music from its later reuse in the live-action series Jason Of Star Command.)

As the animated series’ music consists primarily of fairly short cues, the second disc is rounded out with Dennis McCarthy’s all-synth score from the PC game Star Trek: Borg (previously heard on a private-release CD sold by McCarthy himself) and something that I never would’ve anticipated hearing: new Ron Jones Star Trek music. Let me repeat, for emphasis: new Ron Jones Star Trek music. In 1991, Jones was effectively “let go” by the TNG producers for consistently pushing the bounds of both the show’s creative parameters and its music budget, and aside from scoring a couple of late ’90s computer games, Star Trek has been a thing that’s in Jones’ past…until he composed an original three-part concert suite that, free of having to match the timing or editing of film, simply conveys the spirit of Trek as Jones interpreted it. That music makes its debut as a recorded piece here, tacking a new coda onto Jones’ musical legacy with the franchise.

Discs three and four stay with TNG, offering highlights or nearly-complete scores from such episodes as Coming Of Age, Symbiosis, Contagion, The Bonding, The Hunted, Qpid, Tapestry, Parallels, and even the McCarthy-arranged cutdowns of Jerry Goldsmith’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture theme. There’s a nice slice of unreleased tracks from Jay Chattaway’s sophomore TNG effort, Tin Man (a score which, in many ways, he never topped); combined with the tracks released on CD by GNP Crescendo in the 1990s, you now have the entire score from Tin Man. The original synth demos for the Deep Space Nine and Voyager themes are heard for the first time, as well as the premiere of Jay Chattaway’s music from the “Klingon Encounter” ride at the much-missed Star Trek: The Experience attraction at the Las Vegas Hilton. A variety of source music is also made available – Q’s mariachi band from Deja Q, the Brahms string quartet piece from Sarek, and oddball source music from Voyager and Enterprise.

4 out of 4If nothing else on this box set has convinced you what a delightful dive into Trek’s musical deep cuts it is, the last track of the last disc should do it: it’s “Comminique (C)”, the piece of 1988 library techno music that graced TNG’s “next week” trailers in the early 1990s. Were thousands of Trek fans clamoring for this? Probably not, but La-La Land identified and licensed it for this set anyway.

The Star Trek 50th Anniversary Collection probably isn’t for the casual fan of Star Trek soundtracks. It’s for the obsessives, the diehards – the people who are still in “maximum Trekkie” mode and still can’t get enough of it.

Order this CDDisc 1 – Star Trek: The Original Series

  1. Third Season Theme Music – Main Title/End Title (soprano version, stereo) (1:14)
  2. Love Scene (1:15)
  3. Ship in Orbit (Big) (0:40)
  4. Sad and Thoughtful on Captain’s Theme (2:30)
  5. Captain Playoff No. 1 (Heavy) (0:08)
  6. Smooth Neutral Ship Theme (0:41)
  7. Playoff on M.T. Theme (0:23)
  8. Fight on Captain’s Theme (1:50)
  9. Captain Playoff No. 2 (Neutral—Slightly Ominous) (0:12)
  10. Stingers (0:51)
  11. New Sexy Exotic (2:17)
  12. Captain Playoff No. 3 (Sad and Alone) (0:20)
  13. Prime Specimen (“The Cage”) (3:13)
  14. Monster Illusion (“The Cage”) (2:34)
  15. Mr. Spock (“Captain’s Wig” From “The Naked Time”) (3:27)
  16. The Big Go (“The Naked Time”) (2:30)
  17. Mudd’s Perfidy (0:33)
  18. Zap the Cap (1:34)
  19. Zap the Cap take 1 (0:08)
  20. Zap the Cap take 2 (0:06)
  21. Zap the Spaceship (1:28)
  22. Zap the Spaceship (0:34)
  23. Zap the Spaceship (0:08)
  24. Ruk Attacks (1:41)
  25. 2nd Ruth (2:35)
  26. No Mind / Tense Meeting / Tracking the Alien / The Question (2:31)
  27. Survivors (1:42)
  28. Bottled (1:52)
  29. Monster Illusion (2:46)
  30. Monster Illusion (tag) (0:10)
  31. The Kibitzers (0:41)
  32. Vina’s Punishment (1:54)
  33. Vina’s Dance (1:53)
  34. Wrong Think (0:43)
  35. Act 1 Card (0:38)
  36. Crippled Ship (0:55)
  37. Speedy Reader (1:06)
  38. End Title (0:24)
  39. First Goner take 3 (0:48)
  40. First Goner take 4 (0:49)
  41. Dressing Down (0:08)
  42. Monitor Gizzard (0:14)
  43. Monitor Gizzard (0:09)
  44. Lazer Dazer (2:44)
  45. Dodo Girl (0:09)
  46. Drugged (1:23)
  47. Mace Fight (0:59)
  48. Mace Fight (0:18)
  49. Down the Throat (1:13)
  50. Arrows (1:25)
  51. Bumper (broadcast edit) (0:06)
  52. Bumpers (alternates) (0:25)
  53. Paramount Television I.D. (0:05)
  54. Paramount Television I.D. (alternate) (0:04)
  55. Inner Workings (alternate mix) (4:03)
  56. Star Trek II Epilogue / End Title (sans narration) (8:41)

Disc 2 – Star Trek: The Animated Series

  1. Title Theme (1:01)
  2. Captain’s Log (1:19)
  3. Something Ahead (0:54)
  4. Evasive Maneuvers (1:07)
  5. Sensor Data (1:07)
  6. Intercept Course (0:14)
  7. Fire Phasers (0:50)
  8. Enterprise Attacked (1:32)
  9. Illogical (0:13)
  10. Briefing (0:43)
  11. On the Viewscreen (1:02)
  12. New Heading (0:19)
  13. Scanning (0:54)
  14. Deflector Shields (0:19)
  15. Red Alert (0:33)
  16. Battle Stations (0:41)
  17. Surprise (0:07)
  18. Supplemental Log (0:49)
  19. Kirk’s Command (1:11)
  20. Sickbay (0:28)
  21. Library Computer (0:44)
  22. Full Power (0:28)
  23. Approaching Coordinates (0:08)
  24. The Bigger Meaning (1:15)
  25. Trouble in Engineering (0:29)
  26. Spock’s Analysis (0:42)
  27. Enterprise Wins the Space Race (0:43)
  28. McCoy’s Summary (0:16)
  29. Just Another Stardate (0:39)
  30. Ongoing Mission (0:18)
  31. Title Theme (alternate mix) (1:01)
  32. Sensor Data (alternate mix) (1:02)
  33. Enterprise Attacked (alternate opening) (1:42)
  34. Scanning (alternate mix) (0:54)
  35. Turbolift Music (0:29)
  36. Mr. Arex Lends an Extra Hand (0:38)
  37. Fascinating (0:17)
  38. Don’t Mess With M’Ress (0:22)
  39. Oh My (0:17)
  40. Spock’s Quick Analysis (0:22)
  41. Yellow Alert (0:26)
  42. Off Duty (0:15)
  43. Suite: Stingers and Act-Out Music (2:03)
    Music inspired by Star Trek – Ron Jones
  44. The Ascent (7:43)
  45. Meaning (2:27)
  46. Pathway to the Stars (3:17)
    Star Trek: Borg – Dennis McCarthy
  47. Main Theme (1:02)
  48. The Legend of the Borg (1:24)
  49. Battle at Wolf 359 (2:58)
  50. The Battle Rages (0:58)
  51. Club Q (0:55)
  52. I Am Berman of Borg (1:36)
  53. Goldsmith Has Been Assimilated! (1:37)
  54. Welcome to the Collective Cadet (2:22)
  55. Searching the Borg Ship (2:20)
  56. Time Is Running Out (1:17)
  57. Escape From the Borg Collective (1:42)
  58. Borg Hell (2:03)
  59. You Will Be Assimilated, Have a Nice Day (2:21)
  60. “Resistance Is Futile, My Ass!” / Finale (7:25)
  61. End Titles (1:03)

Disc 3 – Star Trek: The Next Generation

  1. Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title (1st season, alternate take) (1:48)
    Coming Of Age
  2. Physics / Shuttle Fuss (3:35)
  3. Air Bounce (2:04)
  4. Competition (2:14)
  5. Decisions (2:04)
    Symbisos
  6. Flares (3:04)
  7. Precious Cargo (2:10)
  8. Four Out of Six (1:03)
    Unnatural Selection
  9. Searchin’ (1:10)
    The Measure Of A Man
  10. Memories (1:19)
    Contagion
  11. U.S.S. Yamato / Vaporized (1:22)
  12. Floral Tea / Otis’ Revenge (2:07)
  13. Romulan Misfire / Phasers / Escape / Goodbye Iconia (2:27)
    The Survivors
  14. Diversion (2:16)
    The Bonding
  15. Dad / Mom’s Double (2:04)
  16. Release / Ceremonial Worf / Off Into Space (4:01)
    The Enemy
  17. Into the Pit (3:01)
    The Hunted
  18. Escape Artist / Melee (3:28)
  19. Breakout (0:32)
  20. Phased / Geordi (4:14)
  21. Confronted / To the Stars (3:30)
    Sins Of The Father
  22. Condemned (1:22)
    Transfigurations
  23. Lookin’ Fine (1:44)
  24. Lazarus (3:48)
  25. Choke Hold / Explanatory / El Ascencio (5:11)
    Future Imperfect
  26. Delusionary (4:08)
    Tapestry
  27. Saint Q (2:05)
  28. It’s a Wonderful Life / Deja Vuosity / War Stories (3:18)
    Parallels
  29. Instant Family (2:42)
  30. Wolfman Riker (3:09)
    Trailer music
  31. Theme From Star Trek: The Motion Picture (30-second version) (0:33)

Disc 4

    Theme From Star Trek (“Gene Roddenberry 1921–1991” unused alternate) (0:10)
    Tin Man

  1. Soft / Student (1:04)
  2. Unique / Welcome / Data (0:48)
  3. Problems / Land of Living (1:41)
  4. Scared (broadcast version) (0:47)
  5. One Way Trip (1:08)
  6. All of It (0:57)
    Deja Q
  7. Tractor Moon / Hoisted (2:58)
  8. La Paloma (traditional) (1:13)
  9. Coffin Spike (0:45)
    Captain’s Holiday
  10. Planet Vegas (1:12)
    Qpid
  11. Hat Trick / Sir Guy / Nottingham Castle / Maid Marian (unused) / Betrayed (3:21)
  12. To the Block / Swordplay / Game’s Over (4:16)
  13. Adieu (1:04)
  14. Plucking Three (0:13)
    Elementary, Dear Data
  15. Sherlock Tones (0:55)
  16. Dead End / Turtleback (2:36)
  17. Short Goodbye (1:21)
    Ship In A Bottle
  18. Holo Tolodo! (4:02)
    Clues
  19. Peace Dividends / Gloria / Blown Away (1:39)
    Manhunt
  20. Juke Boxer (3:29)
  21. How High the Moon (3:36)
    Star Trek: First Contact
  22. Moonlight Becomes You (2:55)
    Unification II
  23. Andorian Blues (0:37)
  24. Aktuh and Maylota (0:49)
  25. Melor Famigal (0:58)
    Lessons
  26. Picard and Nella, Date #1 (Picard’s Cabin) (2:43)
  27. Picard and Nella, Date #2 (Jefferies Tube) (2:22)
    Sarek
  28. Sextet #1 in B-flat Major, Op. 18 (II, Andante) (1:53)
    Star Trek: The Experience
  29. Klingon Encounter (4:24)
  30. Borg Invasion 4D (7:22)
    Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
  31. Main Title Demo (1:59)
  32. Single Bridge Demo (2:24)
    Star Trek: Voyager
  33. Main Title Demo (1:51)
  34. Lookover / Maiden Voyager (1:34)
  35. Opera Alla Alienosity (1:11)
    Star Trek: Enterprise
  36. Dance-O-Matic (2:28)
    Trailer music
  37. Communique (C) (2:33)

Released by: La-La Land Record
Release date: November 25, 2016
Disc one total running time: 1:16:13
Disc two total running time: 1:17:23
Disc three total running time: 1:18:57
Disc four total running time: 1:18:57
Box set total running time: 5:16:50

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Categories
S Soundtracks Star Trek Video Game / Computer Game

Star Trek: Music From The Video Games

3 min read

BSX Records has made something of a niche for itself with its series of re-arrangements (or more sweeping reinterpretations) of soundtrack music, whether its albums fixate on specific franchises such as Battlestar Galactica or Twilight, or the works of specific composers. One of BSX’s primary collaborators on these “cover” albums, synth wizard Dominik Hauser, turns his attention to the playable side of the Star Trek franchise with Star Trek: Music From The Video Games.

A long overdue side-step into the non-televised Trek universe, this collection focuses primarily on the games’ theme music, with only one game (Star Trek: Borg, composed by Trek TV composer Dennis McCarthy) deemed worthy of wider exposure. This is a bit of a pity: the original recordings of Star Trek: Borg‘s entire score have already been released by McCarthy, while games with very nice scores (Elite Force springs instantly to mind, since its theme music is represented here) still have no official score release. Hauser’s modern takes on McCarthy’s Borg soundtrack are quite nice, since he’s working with better synths and samples than McCarthy had at his disposal in the 1990s, but some of the other games’ scores could’ve used some of the same TLC.

Another oddity I have to question is the Star Trek: Bridge Commander theme – it’s basically the end credit suite from Star Trek: The Motion Picture, with no original material specific to the game. Surely something that isn’t already in wide release could have filled that space.

3 out of 4BSX could mine this corner of the Star Trek universe again easily. Most of the Star Trek video and computer games have fine scores that have not been released in any way that the average Trek music fan can access, leaving a rich vein of material to choose from. Despite my reservations about this release, though it’s expertly arranged and performed, I hope it is but the first of a series whose future volumes may prove to be much more interesting.

Order this CD

  1. Star Trek: Online Main Title (2:41)
  2. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Main Title (4:08)
  3. Star Trek: Starfleet Command Main Title (3:53)
  4. Star Trek: Starfleet Command III Main Title (1:11)
  5. Star Trek: Legacy Main Title (2:24)
  6. Star Trek: Legacy – Kirk’s Theme (2:34)
  7. Star Trek: Aramada II Main Title (2:03)
  8. Star Trek The Next Generation: Birth of the Federation (1:19)
  9. Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force Main Title (1:50)
  10. Star Trek: Away Team – Introduction (1:47)
  11. Star Trek: Klingon Honor Guard – Kelshar (2:44)
  12. Star Trek: Klingon – Warrior’s Poem (2:19)
  13. Star Trek: Bridge Commander Main Title (4:07)

    Complete score from Star Trek: Borg

  14. Main Title (1:05)
  15. Legend of the Borg (1:25)
  16. Battle at Wolf 359 (2:57)
  17. The Battle Rages (0:58)
  18. Club Q (1:00)
  19. I Am Berman of Borg (1:39)
  20. Goldsmith Has Been Assimilated (1:38)
  21. Welcome to the Collective, Cadet (2:25)
  22. Searching the Borg Ship (2:23)
  23. Time is Running Out (1:19)
  24. Escape from the Borg Collective (1:45)
  25. Borg Hell (2:02)
  26. You Will be Assimilated. Have a Nice Day (2:24)
  27. Resistance is Futile, My Ass! (2:57)
  28. Finale (4:33)
  29. End Title (1:04)

Released by: BSX Records / Buysoundtrax.com
Release date: 2013
Total running time: 64:34

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Categories
Film S Soundtracks Star Trek

Star Trek: Generations (Newly Expanded Edition)

Let’s be clear – the Star Trek: Generations soundtrack that was released in 1994 was no slouch, featuring around 45 minutes of music, a collection of Generations and Star Trek: TNG sound effects, and a fridge magnet of the CD cover (no joke!). The soundtrack consumer demands a bit more these days, however, so the miraculously revived GNP Crescendo label has traded in the fridge magnet for an extra disc featuring the complete score from beginning to end.

And let’s be clear about another thing – this has always been one of the two best soundtracks from the TNG movies, demonstrating that Dennis McCarthy was not simply phoning in sonic wallpaper for TNG on TV (at least not willingly). Generations gives us McCarthy at his thunderous best, composing music with a real melody behind it and then giving a truly widescreen treatment. Of the previously unavailable cues, the one I was looking forward to hearing the most was “Distress Call / Harriman and the Ribbon”, whose first glimpse of the Nexus is a masterpiece of spine-tingling, otherworldly foreboding – the sound of laying eyes on something dangerously beyond comprehension.

The highlight of Generations remains “The Nexus / A Christmas Hug”, an eerily beautiful choral piece accompanying Picard’s disorienting fantasy of a perfect Christmas with a family that his Starfleet lifestyle would never allow him to have. McCarthy himself has always been justifiably proud of this piece, and the bonus tracks present us with this selection in choir-only form, with the orchestra mixed out completely (and it still holds up as a great piece of music).

Between this and the recent release of box sets of music from Star Trek: TNG and Deep Space Nine (each of which devote at least one CD to McCarthy’s best from each series), I’d like to think that these 4 out of 4releases of his work are earning Dennis McCarthy a long-overdue reappraisal from Star Trek fandom, which seemed to indict him of the crime of not being Ron Jones for many years. McCarthy could always crank out a great tune; the strictures placed on Star Trek’s composers by its showrunner kept the music to a very dull roar (in every sense of the word “dull”). This is why you don’t have a 14-disc box set of McCarthy’s music. The expanded Generations soundtrack is a good start on redressing that balance, though.

Order this CD

    Disc One
  1. Main Title (2:54)
  2. Past Glory (1:19)
  3. The Enterprise B (0:42)
  4. Distress Call / Harriman and the Ribbon (4:27)
  5. Kirk Saves the Day / Deck 15 / HMS Enterprise (4:50)
  6. Picard’s Message / Raid Post Mortem (4:43)
  7. Data and the Emotions (0:54)
  8. Time is Running Out (1:11)
  9. Data Malfunctions (2:29)
  10. Soran Kidnaps Geordi (2:44)
  11. Guinan and the Nexus (2:47)
  12. Torture (1:37)
  13. Soran’s Plan Revealed (1:49)
  14. Prisoner Exchange (2:59)
  15. Outgunned (3:22)
  16. The Gap / Coolant Leak / Appointment with Eternity / Out of Control / Blasted / The Crash (5:43)
  17. Coming to Rest (1:00)
  18. The Nexus (1:32)
  19. A Christmas Hug / The Kitchen Debate (8:03)
  20. Coming to Rest (1:38)
  21. Two Captains / Crash Recap (2:04)
  22. The Final Fight (6:15)
  23. The Captain of the Enterprise (Kirk’s Death) (2:45)
  24. To Live Forever (2:40)
  25. Star Trek: Generations Overture (4:13)
    Disc Two
    Original 1994 album remastered
  1. Star Trek: Generations Overture (4:13)
  2. Main Title (2:54)
  3. The Enterprise B / Kirk Saves the Day (3:13)
  4. Deck 15 (1:41)
  5. Time is Running Out (1:11)
  6. Prisoner Exchange (2:58)
  7. Outgunned (3:22)
  8. Out of Control / The Crash (2:05)
  9. Coming to Rest (1:00)
  10. The Nexus / A Christmas Hug (7:07)
  11. Jumping the Ravine (1:38)
  12. Two Captains (1:34)
  13. The Final Fight (6:15)
  14. Kirk’s Death (2:45)
  15. To Live Forever (2:40)

    16. Sound Effects

  16. Enterprise B Bridge (3:13)
  17. Enterprise B Doors Open (0:13)
  18. Distress Call Alert (0:10)
  19. Enterprise B Helm Controls (0:16)
  20. Nexus Energy Ribbon (1:38)
  21. Enterprise B Deflector Beam (0:08)
  22. Enterprise B Warp Pass-by (0:14)
  23. Enterprise B Transporter (0:12)
  24. Tricorder (0:30)
  25. Hypo Injector (0:03)
  26. Communicator Chirp (0:06)
  27. Door Chime (0:07)
  28. Enterprise D Warp Out #1 (0:22)
  29. Bird of Prey Bridge / Explosion (2:51)
  30. Klingon Sensor Alert (0:08)
  31. Bird of Prey Cloaks (0:04)
  32. Bird of Prey De-cloaks (0:10)
  33. Klingon Transporter (0:12)
  34. Soran’s Gun (0:11)
  35. Soran’s Rocket De-cloaks (0:05)
  36. Shuttlecraft Pass-by (0:21)
  37. Enterprise D Bridge / Crash Sequence (3:21)
  38. Enterprise D Warp-Out #2 (0:09)

    39. Bonus Tracks

  39. Prisoner Exchange (film version) (2:59)
  40. A Christmas Hug (choir only) (1:22)
  41. Lifeforms (Vocal: Brent Spiner) (0:17)

Released by: GNP Crescendo
Release date: October 15, 2012
Disc one total running time: 75:39
Disc two total running time: 66:11

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Categories
2011 S Soundtracks Soundtracks by Title Star Trek Television

Star Trek: The Next Generation Collection Volume 1

8 min read

In 2010, when Film Score Monthly took a huge financial gamble on the release of a lavish 14-disc box set chronicling all of composer Ron Jones’ contributions to Star Trek: The Next Generation, the label found itself having to fight not just protests about the price tag, but the commonly held misconception that TNG’s music, from its first season to its last, was a wall of droning synth music. (In fact, the show frequently boasted one of the biggest music budgets in TV, with at least a partial orchestra booked for most episodes.)

Weighing in at three discs, La-La Land’s Star Trek: The Next Generation Collection Volume 1 devotes one disc to a broad selection of music by Dennis McCarthy, another disc to Jay Chattway, and a third disc to composers whose stints on TNG proved to be one-offs. This is far from an indication that these musicians were never invited back, however – rather, they soon became far too busy on other projects. These one-off composers include John Debney (seaQuest DSV, Doctor Who, The Passion Of The Christ), Don Davis (the Matrix trilogy) and the late Fred Steiner (the only composer to score both original TV Star Trek and TNG).

This set puts the lie to the “wall of synths” accusation often unfairly leveled at the series’ music by fans who either have a short memory or simply don’t know any better, but one of the three discs proves the critics’ point about droning.

Dennis McCarthy remains the alpha and omega of post-original-series Star Trek music: he scored the pilot episode of TNG in 1987 and the series finale of Star Trek: Enterprise in 2005. In between, he scored computer games, theme park rides and one movie based on the series. McCarthy’s sound is expansive, with French horns frequently sounding almost heraldic chord changes and strings arranged to give the show a widescreen, cinematic sound. While Ron Jones’ music may have been more “involved,” it’s hard to argue that McCarthy’s often comes across as more sophisticated. This first disc is full of series highlights, among them my favorite early episode, Conspiracy, which seemed on the surface like it should have spun the entire rest of the show in a different direction. Other big, brassy, noteworthy McCarthy scores include Sarek, Time Squared and The Child. Some of the cues where McCarthy eschews his usual style are among the most effective in the entire three-disc set, with The Survivors and The Big Goodbye being particularly worth a listen.

With Jones vanishing halfway through the series – having irked executive producer Rick Berman one too many times – the fourth season saw the introduction of his replacement, Jay Chattaway, who had filled in for Jones on the episodes Tin Man (already released by GNP Crescendo) and Remember Me (included here). Though those two early entries were very strong, Chattaway settled into a groove – or, perhaps arguably, a rut – where he frequently reused chord progressions. Some of Chattaway’s work used interesting, almost eastern chords, while other pieces went heavy on dissonance.

The problem with Chattaway’s disc is also the problem with his scoring of the series: the reuse of material is very noticeable. Episodes like Starship Mine, Journey’s End and I, Borg, which feature scenes that should crank up the action or the menace, are lulled into a somnolent daze where the music says “nothing is happening here.” Chattaway is at his best with more contemplative, exotic episodes as Darmok and The Inner Light. Also featured on the Chattaway disc, mainly because the fans would form a lynching party if it wasn’t included, is the “Scotty on the holodeck bridge” music from Relics.

The third disc is the most eye-opening surprise. Original series composer Fred Steiner wakes up everyone who fell asleep during the second disc with Code Of Honor, a busy, boisterous score that would’ve been right at home on Kirk’s Enterprise, and sadly represents Steiner’s only voyage aboard Picard’s Enterprise. Had Steiner stayed on, creating a McCarthy-Jones-Steiner rotation, the show would’ve benefitted greatly – and Steiner likely would’ve been spaced long before Jones. Code Of Honor boasts some great music (pity about the script it accompanied, though).

Fred Steiner sadly died just before this set was released.

Don Davis’ Face Of The Enemy isn’t quite as stunning, but compared to the state of TNG’s music circa season 6 (the almost complete lack of music from that season from either McCarthy or Chattaway is both conspicuous and telling), it stands out almost as much as Code Of Honor did in season one, with bold flourishes and a big sound. Less surprising is John Debney’s The Pegasus, which almost sounds like a McCarthy score. Debney’s score is at its best when illustrating the episode’s dark moral dilemma for Commander Riker.

Rounding things off are various arrangements of the opening titles, end credits, and even the post-fade-out “bumpers” that were seen and heard at the end of each act before the commercial break (now forever consigned to the aging memories of those of us who saw the show before it was on DVD). Two oddball arrangements of the original series theme are on disc three – the liner notes reveal that these were recorded for use on the gag reels shown at the cast and crew’s private end-of-season wrap parties.

3 out of 4This would be a four-star collection, except that a bizarre choice of Chattaway material makes the composer sound sleepy, when a different selection of episodes would’ve yielded much better music (Chain Of Command is very conspicuous by its absence). And again, La-La Land Records has found itself battling the age-old perception of TNG’s music as synthesized dreck – after an impressive initial burst of sales (including the set’s debut at the 2011 San Diego Comic Con), much of the inventory remained in the warehouse, casting doubt on the label’s promise to mine the Deep Space Nine and Voyager music vaults. This nicely-prepared collection didn’t deserve that fate, as a lot of it (chiefly discs 1 and 3) is better than even I remembered.

Order this CD

    Music by Dennis McCarthy
  1. Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title Season 3 (1:49)

    Haven

  2. Haven / Harpies / Gifts (2:06)
  3. Starship / Lost Love / Wyatt & Troi / Mom Arrives (3:26)
  4. In Practice / Tradition / Cuestosity (Not Used) / Mental Flame / Leper Colony (4:44)
  5. Petty (0:54)
  6. Desert Panorama / Proposal / Tractor Beam (2:51)
  7. Ariana / Plan to Die / Preparation / Alien Vessel / Departure / Next Adventure (7:54)

    Hide and Q

  8. Miracle Worker / Lights Out / Time Lapse (5:24)

    The Big Goodbye

  9. (You Came Along From) Out of Nowhere (3:24)

    Conspiracy

  10. Worf Down / Invader / Dinner Treats / Retching Remmick / Recovery / Cliff Hanger (7:44)

    The Child

  11. Rendezvous / Liaison (2:15)
  12. Aucdet IX / Containment Out / The Birth Growth Spurt (5:11)

    Elementary, Dear Data

  13. Stardate / Holmes’s Pipe / Holmes’s Pipe 2 (0:54)
  14. Denouement / The Challenge (0:57)

    Time Squared

  15. P-2 Arises / Hall Twins / P-2 Dies / Escape / No Repeat (6:08)

    The Survivors

  16. Music Boxer (1:03)
  17. Telepathic / Kevin’s Waltz / Unbridged (4:36)
  18. Music Box (0:39)

    Sarek

  19. Logging / Solution / Mind Meld / Angstosity / Back to Reality / Goodbyes (6:26)

    Conundrum

  20. MacDuff Exposed / Meeting the Girls / Confused (4:40)

    All Good Things…

  21. Saved Again (2:27)
  22. I Have a Gun (0:52)
  23. Star Trek: The Next Generation End Title: Season 3 Long Version (1:55)
    Music By Jay Chattaway
  1. Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title Season 2 (1:39)

    Remember Me

  2. Old Friend / Return to Starbase (1:06)
  3. The Traveler / Through the Bubble (7:08)

    The Host

  4. Sorry / Jay (3:34)
  5. No Pain, No Gain (2:04)
  6. Can’t Be Apart (2:18)
  7. Surprised / Last Waist Kiss (1:12)

    Darmok

  8. Doo Doo Occurs (3:04)
  9. Telling a Story / Gone Forever (4:07)
  10. Tired of Sitting Around / What’s a Life Worth? (4:55)

    Silicon Avatar

  11. Running for Cover / Someone’s Comin’ (3:25)
  12. So, We Finally Meet (3:51)

    The Perfect Mate

  13. Hard to Resist (3:07)
  14. I’ve Bonded With You (1:19)

    I Borg

  15. The Borg Pick Up Hugh (2:40)

    The Inner Light

  16. Lullaby #1 (0:50)
  17. Naming Dance #1: alternate (1:15)
  18. The Answer to a Mystery / Lullaby #1A (4:20)

    Relics

  19. Scotty’s Bridge (0:40)
  20. Captain in Rank Only / Scotty to the Rescue / Mister Good Hands (4:43)

    Starship Mine

  21. Greedy Double Crosser / Fight to the Death (6:51)

    The Chase

  22. Message Received (2:50)

    Journey’s End

  23. War or Peace / Wes Goes on His Way (6:08)

    Bonus Tracks from The Inner Light:

  24. Naming Ceremony, Alternate (Not Used)

    25. (1:20)

  25. Naming Dance, Up-Tempo Version (Not Used) (1:08)
  26. Star Trek: The Next Generation End Title: Season 3 Short Version Alternate (0:48)
    Other Composers
  1. Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title Season 3 (1:49)

    Code of Honor – music by Fred Steiner

  2. Sky and Starship / Meet Lutan / Lutan Impressed (2:43)
  3. Bronze Horse / To the Holodeck / Snatch Tasha (1:50)
  4. Waiting / Code of Honor II (1:39)
  5. Chez Lutan / Lutan’s Honor / The Centerpiece / Yareena Upset / Combat Ready / Hatching a Plan / Code of Honor Again (4:16)
  6. Code of Honor (Not Used) / Yareena’s Threat / The Glavin (2:12)
  7. Officer’s Log / Competition / Deadly Blow / She Lives / Poor Lutan / Mission Accomplished (6:39)

    Face of the Enemy – music by Don Davis

  8. Troi Delirious (1:35)
  9. Ear Trauma / Romulans in Romuland / Troi Trouble (1:29)
  10. It’s Huge / Riker Ridiculous (Not Used) / Jean-Luc Benign / Romulan Dissident Mummies / N’Vek Trek (3:32)
  11. Clash of the British Titans / Placating Picard / Untitled / Face of the Enemy (Act Out) (3:27)
  12. Toreth’s Revenge / N’Vek Nervosa (5:48)
  13. Destructed Plan / Another Cruel Hoax / Noble N’Vek Dies for Our Sins (8:15)

    The Pegasus – music by John Debney

  14. New Orders / Pegasus (0:22)
  15. On Impulse /Romulans Appear: alternate / Stand Down / Pressman Plots (2:06)
  16. Act In / Scanning the Belt: alternate (3:31)
  17. Romulans Depart / Duty Calls / Riker’s Dilemma /Relieved of Command (2:43)
  18. The Discovery / Trapped (5:12)
  19. Secret Weapon / Federation Cloak / Second Chance (6:57)
  20. New Orders: alternate (0:22)
  21. Romulans Appear: alternate (1:03)
  22. Stand Down: alternate (0:38)
  23. Scanning the Belt: alternate (3:17)
  24. Secret Weapon: alternate (3:53)
  25. Star Trek: The Next Generation Bumper Season 1 (0:06)
  26. Star Trek: The Next Generation Bumper Season 3 (0:08)
  27. Theme From Star Trek – Polka Version (0:55)
  28. Theme From Star Trek – Torch Song Version (1:34)
  29. Star Trek: The Next Generation End Title: Season 3 Short Version (0:48)

Released by: La-La Land Records
Release date: 2011
Disc one total running time: 79:06
Disc two total running time: 77:17
Disc three total running time: 79:32

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Categories
2007 S Soundtracks Star Trek Television

Sliders – Music By Dennis McCarthy

3 min read

Released through composer Dennis McCarthy’s web site, the music from the first and last episodes of the first season of Fox’s 1995 SF series Sliders will probably sound familiar to fans of McCarthy’s Star Trek work. It’s more of the same of McCarthy’s signature style, though it’s just possible that he gets to cut loose a bit more here – there are more action setpieces in the music than one would expect to find in the average episode of Next Generation or Deep Space Nine. This CD includes selections from the two episodes McCarthy scored in the first season – the two-hour pilot movie and the season finale Luck Of The Draw.

McCarthy’s trademark foreboding style is all over the pilot; with the exception of a few more exciting than usual action cues, much of his pilot score might as well be a Star Trek score, if a slightly more energetic one than usual. Cues like “The Ice Tornado” are big, bustling action cues of precisely the kind that executive producer Rick Berman discouraged at nearly all costs on Trek; fortunately, though, this isn’t Trek.

McCarthy splits the difference between his orchestral style and something a bit more contemporary with the cues from Luck Of The Draw, the first season finale episode which involved a parallel Earth that uses lotttery-selected suicide as a means of population control. For action cues that don’t have to musically illustrate that society, McCarthy slips back into full orchestral mode, again a little more boisterously than he generally would’ve been allowed to be in that other SF universe.

The rest of the first season was scored by Mark Mothersbaugh (of Devo fame), who also composed the series’ main theme; his contributions don’t appear here.

Wrapping up the Sliders CD is a McCarthy original, “Past, Present & Future Suite”, which combines a wild electric guitar intro with some of the composer’s favorite Trek cues, including the heroic opening from the second season opener The Child, and some completely original “rock” material. The opening minute or so of this piece is just awe-inspiring, but its more contemporary middle section peters out about before getting back to business. Still, it’s basically a piece of Next Generation music that hasn’t been heard elsewhere, which is why I’ve got this in the database as a Star Trek soundtrack.

3 out of 4The Sliders soundtrack is an interesting piece of work, and fans of his work (or even listeners who thought he was playing action sequences awfully tame on Star Trek) will probably dig it, whether they’ve seen the show in question or not.

  1. Main Title (1:38)
  2. The Wormhole (1:56)
  3. The First Slide (4:42)
  4. The Ice World (3:16)
  5. Ice Tornado (4:11)
  6. Strange Land (3:33)
  7. The Rescue (2:23)
  8. Wade’s Death? (1:46)
  9. Sliders Escape (2:28)
  10. Interlude (1:11)
  11. Finale / End Credits (1:38)
  12. Slide In (0:29)
  13. A New World (1:15)
  14. The Girl’s Suicide (2:51)
  15. Jail Break (2:26)
  16. Wade In Danger (1:23)
  17. Slide Out / Quinn Shot (3:12)
  18. Past, Present And Future Suite (2:40)

Released by: Dennis McCarthy
Release date: 2007
Total running time: 42:58

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Categories
2007 S Soundtracks Star Trek Video Game / Computer Game

Star Trek: Borg – music by Dennis McCarthy

Star Trek: BorgComposed to accompany the 1996 CD-ROM game Star Trek: Borg, the music on this CD was recently released by Dennis McCarthy, who also composed more episodes of the various Star Trek spinoffs than anyone else. However, if you’re expecting more of that relatively sedate sound here, you may be in for a shock. Star Trek: Borg may have looked like a television episode, what with John de Lancie starring and Jonathan Frakes directing, but freed from the restrictions usually placed on the scoring of Star Trek TV episodes, the music is quite a bit more involved than you may be expecting.

While Borg lacked the restrictions of the TV series’ music, it also lacked the budget that the TV series – at least in 1996 – lavished on music. McCarthy relies on frequent-flyer collaborator Kevin Kiner to bring his orchestrated score to life, and if there’s really a weak point with the Borg soundtrack, that’s where it is, but more due to the state of synthesizer/sequencer technology than the talent involved. (McCarthy and Kiner collaborated on many future projects where their music had to be synthesized instead of played by a real orchestra, including McCarthy’s Stargate SG-1 scores and, ultimately, the reduced-budget final season of Star Trek: Enterprise.) The orchestral textures just aren’t quite “real,” though it’s no exaggeration to say that the technology to achieve this has improved by leaps and bounds since 1996.

The style is also very different from McCarthy’s usual Trek “house style,” with some of the short cues almost resembling some of Jerry Goldsmith’s “spacedock” music from the first Star Trek movie (including one cue explicitly labeled “Goldsmith Has Been Assimilated”). The synth-chorus as a signature sound for the Borg is also revived here as well. There’s a recurring “orchestral stab” sound also used in conjunction with the Borg, but without the accompanying visuals, this makes the music sound like a late ’80s/early ’90s horror movie score. There are a few hints of McCarthy’s trademark panoramic chords from his TV Treks, but overall it’s very different.

The final three tracks are comprised of music McCarthy created for the “Borg Invasion 4-D” ride at the Las Vegas Hilton’s Star Trek Experience, and there’s a huge world of difference here (then again, we’re talking about an 8-year gap). The Borg Invasion suites are some of the most invigorating music I’ve heard from Dennis McCarthy, sounding both more like his usual Trek TV music and less like it (with pulsating guitar samples and almost Matrix-y passages) at the same time. The series would’ve benefitted tremendously from allowing him to cut loose on the music like this.

One can only hope that maybe the composer can sneak out some of the better examples of his Star Trek TV music on CD in private pressings like this, though from a rights perspective, there’s probably a vast difference 3 out of 4in doing that with this material and music composed for TV shows that are still, on DVD at least, a going concern. There are quite a few I could nominate (namely “The Homecoming” / “The Circle” / “The Siege” trilogy that opened Deep Space Nine’s second season) but only time will tell if Dennis McCarthy will keep sneaking gems from the Star Trek music archives out of the vaults for us. At the time of this writing, Star Trek: Borg is still available from the composer’s web site.

Order this CD

  1. Main Theme (1:02)
  2. The Legend Of The Borg (1:24)
  3. Battle At Wolf 359 (2:58)
  4. The Battle Rages (0:58)
  5. Club Q (0:55)
  6. “I Am Berman Of Borg” (1:37)
  7. “Goldsmith Has Been Assimilated!” (1:37)
  8. “Welcome To The Collective, Cadet” (2:21)
  9. Searching The Borg Ship (2:21)
  10. Time Is Running Out (1:17)
  11. Escape From The Borg Collective (1:44)
  12. Borg Hell (2:03)
  13. “You Will Be Assimilated, Have A Nice Day” (2:21)
  14. “Resistance Is Futile, My Ass!” / Finale (7:28)
  15. End Titles (1:02)
  16. Borg Invasion Suite Part 1 (6:32)
  17. Borg Invasion Suite Part 2 (2:51)
  18. Borg Invasion Suite Part 3 (7:24)

Released by: DennisMcCarthy.com
Release date: 2007
Total running time: 48:21

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Categories
2001 S Soundtracks Stargate Television

The Best Of Stargate SG-1

4 min read

Order this CDA collection of suites from the first season of the show, The Best Of Stargate SG-1 paints a picture of the show in its infancy – and before Joel Goldsmith had cemented his place as the franchise’s composer-in-residence. Though after listening to the CD several times, it’s just possible that a case could be made that this CD shows why Goldsmith became the solo voice of Stargate.

Naturally, the CD opens with Goldsmith’s main theme for the movie, adapted from David Arnold’s original Stargate score. The first few tracks, however, present us with a completely different sound than what we’ve grown accustomed to. First up is a suite from The Enemy Within, composed by Star Trek’s Dennis McCarthy and frequent collaborator Kevin Kiner (who McCarthy came to rely on heavily during the last season of Star Trek: Enterprise, when budget constraints forced that series to all but abandon full orchestral scores). This music also sounds synthesized/sampled, but even so, it bears many of the hallmarks of McCarthy’s Star Trek scores – it’s rather nice, and maybe a bit more colorful than McCarthy was generally allowed to be with his Star Trek music.

Richard Band, who began his film scoring career with Joel Goldsmith on the movie Laserblast, contributes a score to Cold Lazarus, but in places it suffers from some slight cheesy-sounding synthesized instrument sounds; that wouldn’t be so distracting, except that the rest of the suites presented here seem to be a notch above it. (To be fair to Mr. Band, however, while this may stick out like a sore thumb on CD, I don’t recall it detracting from the episode itself.) Kevin Kiner flies solo with the scores for two episodes, Emancipation and The Torment Of Tantalus, the latter of which is up there with the best scores that the series has had. Its music is truly varied enough to merit this suite being the longest track on the CD, with the 1940s “period” scenes getting a touch of saxophone.

Longtime fans won’t find the sound they’re used to until the next track, Thor’s Hammer, which introduces a series of suites by Joel Goldsmith. Thor’s Hammer has a chaotic chorus that livens things up, and some passages strongly reminiscent of sections of the music from the then-recent Star Trek: First Contact, on which the junior Goldsmith collaborated with his father. The Nox has some lovely thematic material for the Nox themselves, with some shades of First Contact again creeping into the scenes featuring the Goa’uld. Hathor and Tin Man both show a playful side to Goldsmith’s scoring. Within The Serpent’s Grasp stands as Goldsmith’s crowning achievement of the first year, however, with outstanding action and suspense sections, and as a season cliffhanger it’s practically required to kick ass, and Goldsmith delivers. That’s why he’s got the job.

rating: 4 out of 4Overall, it’s a nice little selection of music from some of the first season’s standout episodes, displaying a musical diversity that the Stargate franchise has since abandoned. Though I might criticize them on their own musical merits, I find all of the tracks here enjoyable, and I sometimes wonder why some of these other composers haven’t been heard from again (aside from these scores being recycled into virtual “library music” for the first two seasons, a la the original Star Trek) – not that I’m complaining about Joel Goldsmith, mind you. Even just from Goldsmith’s scores, I could rattle off a list of 10 or 15 scores off the top of my head which could comprise a second Best Of Stargate SG-1 volume, though whether or not there’d be enough of a market to support it would be another question.

  1. Main Title (1:03)
  2. The Enemy Within (6:46)
  3. Cold Lazarus (6:10)
  4. Emancipation (3:36)
  5. Torment Of Tantalus (10:14)
  6. Thor’s Hammer (7:33)
  7. The Nox (10:02)
  8. Hathor (6:45)
  9. Tin Man (6:57)
  10. Within The Serpent’s Grasp (8:43)
  11. Stargate SG-1 End Credits (0:58)

Released by: GNP Crescendo
Release date: 2001
Total running time: 59:27

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Categories
2002 E S Soundtracks Star Trek Television

Star Trek: Enterprise – music by Dennis McCarthy

5 min read

Order this CDMy sincere apologies to Dennis McCarthy. I initially shrugged off the music from Enterprise when I watched the pilot movie – I liked the theme song and opening credits (and, by the sound of things, I’m one of approximately five people who openly admit to liking the song, and one of the others is Rick Berman, if that tells you anything). Now I realize that my beef is with Berman, not McCarthy. The newly released soundtrack from the pilot movie is actually a fine addition to the musical canon of Star Trek.

Topped and tailed with two different versions of Russell Watson’s rendition of “Where My Heart Will Take Me” (originally written by Diane Warren), the Enterprise soundtrack CD features most of the hour-long score, excluding a few source music cues, recorded for the two-hour episode. One of the nicer things about the score from Broken Bow, the two-hour pilot movie, is the all-American-flavored theme used for both Captain Archer and the Enterprise herself (which you do actually get to hear in the show each week – as the end credit music, on the rare occasion that UPN doesn’t do the annoying but almost ubiquitous credit squeeze). Like the theme McCarthy coined for Captain Picard some 15 years ago, Archer’s theme fits perfectly and has its own grand sweep (though sadly, like Picard’s theme, it seems to have disappeared from regular use over the course of the show’s first season, probably due to Berman’s aversion to any of the composers creating specific themes associated with any character). Many of the tracks are infused with an edgy energy that may come from the musicians’ and conductor’s reactions to other events that occurred on the second day of the scoring sessions for the pilot: September 11th, 2001. (In his liner notes, McCarthy dedicates the music on this CD to victims of that tragedy.)

Some of the music will sound familiar – “Klingon Chase / Shotgunned” in particular, though it’s among my favorite tracks, sounds like it could easily be slotted into the soundtrack from Star Trek: Generations. (I do like that menacing downbeat chord combination, though.) McCarthy even steps right up to the edge of quoting his own theme music from Deep Space Nine in the next-to-last track, “New Horizons”. The music also gets slimy, low-key and discordant for scenes involving the shape-shifting Suliban, and downright weird (but in a good way) for the climactic, time-warped fight in the track “Temporal Battle”.

Some fans – those other four people out there who like the song (and I’m sure Berman’s already gotten his copy of the CD) – will also be pleased to hear both the long album version and the shortened TV version of “Where My Heart Will Take Me”. I still find it to be an inspiring little number, especially when combined with the show’s opening title montage. Quite why fandom has bared its teeth at this song and the opening credits, I just haven’t managed to comprehend yet. I actually thought it was a nice switch from the usual Goldsmithian-sounding opening credits that have become de rigeur for Star Trek spinoffs.

I was surprised to see this album appear on Decca, rather than GNP/Crescendo, which has done an excellent job of giving us one to two Star Trek (or related) CDs a year since 1991 or so. From what I understand, this is more to do with the behind-the-scenes negotiating needed to include Russell Watson’s theme song on the CD, not a reflection of any kind of dissatisfaction on Paramount’s part with Crescendo Records. GNP/Crescendo certainly could have done better with the packaging, which is kind of bland here – though there’s only so much you can do with those pre-launch publicity photos where the crew looks like they’re standing inside the round-patterned walls of Doctor Who’s TARDIS.

Hopefully more Enterprise music will be forthcoming, whether Decca or Crescendo issues it. Some of the first season’s episodes have had very interesting music, with the most notable being the surprisingly melodic Vox Sola, with its sly, sinewy theme for the parasitic life form. Crescendo has already turned out a “Best Of Season One” CD for Stargate SG-1, and hopefully they may follow suit with Enterprise – even if it means ditching “Where My Heart Will Take Me” from future releases; after all, we have it on this CD. (Sadly missing, however, is the 4 out of 4acoustic guitar rendition of that song which was heard only on the un-squished end credits of the pilot episode; the track “Archer’s Theme” is now used as the end credit music.)

Love it or hate it, Enterprise is worth a listen. Kudos to Dennis McCarthy for introducing some new energy and material into his Trek repertoire – don’t stop now, Dennis! The show desperately needs it.

  1. Where My Heart Will Take Me – Album Version (4:09)
  2. New Enterprise (1:40)
  3. Klingon Chase / Shotgunned (2:05)
  4. Enterprise First Flight (2:50)
  5. Klang-Napped (2:10)
  6. Morph-o-Mama / Suli-Nabbed (2:45)
  7. Phaser Fight (5:53)
  8. Breakthrough (2:01)
  9. Grappled (4:09)
  10. The Rescue (6:40)
  11. Temporal Battle (8:05)
  12. Blood Work (2:11)
  13. New Horizons (1:26)
  14. Archer’s Theme (1:24)
  15. Where My Heart Will Take Me – TV Version (1:28)

Released by: Decca / Universal
Release date: 2002
Total running time: 49:22

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