Adam Salsman [dot] com

Have I mentioned I love BSG?

I don’t think there’s a whole lot that I can say about season 3’s score that I haven’t said about season 2’s. It’s good music, solid orchestration, blah, blah, blah.

Oh. Wait. This was Season 3. This had the greatest cover song/musical reveal I’ve seen in years.

All Along the Watchtower.

That’s right. In the alternate universe that contains the Battlestar Galactica and all the survivors of the 12 Colonies, someone managed to write the same song Bob Dylan did.

Of course, in our world, Jimi Hendrix took and it made it even better.

In theirs, it just turned on four of the final five Cylons. Not a big difference, sure, but still.

My excitement over the release of the score was almost exclusively wrapped around getting Watchtower in a listenable format. But after listening to the album, as a whole, I found I was ever so slightly disappointed.

When Bear McCreary did things right in the season 3 score, he did them very right. Of course, the converse feels very true, too.

The first 5 tracks, Violence and Variations, The Dance, Battlestar Sonatica, Dirty Hands, and Heeding the Call all do it very right. They convey, better than most, the tone, the energy (or lack there of), and a bit of the scene.

Under the Wing, Kat’s Sacrifice, Someone to Trust, and Deathbed And Maelstrom all feel like they fall flat. Maybe it’s just that they can’t manage the visual as well, and this makes them weaker in my mind. In any event, these are often missed when listening to the score because they get mentally passed by. Mean, I know, but it’s what happens.

In the end: Bear’s score did exactly what Season 3 did, when it got it right, it got it very right. The rest of the time, it felt lacking. This may just as well be the fault of the story writers. In any event, all the things done wrong on this score are strongly obscured by the many, many things done quite right.

I won’t lie. This is a chance for me to write about two things I love: BSG and TV/Film scores.

Bear McCreary, for 3 seasons has been tasked with producing the scores to Battlestar Galactica. Building on what was created by Richard Gibbs in the Miniseries, McCreary’s work has touched on nearly all aspects of world music to create a lush, exciting musical background for TV’s best SciFi (and, arguably, best drama).

Season 2’s disc starts out with a rework of the old (70s) Battlestar Galactica’s theme to play the part of the Colonial Anthem, and suddenly, what was once hokey is now a beautifully orchestrated and arranged piece of music.

Many of the album’s tracks, including A Promise to Return, Allegro, Reuniting the Fleet, and Worthy of Survival, all build on themes which McCreary original composed in Season 1. They tend to feel a bit repetitive in the scheme of things, but are no less beautiful.

Some of the more original tracks are the reason this is one of my most listened to albums week after week. The musical theme for the not-allowed-to-happen relationship between Roslin and Adama is beautiful, crafted to convey love, and also containing a pinch of the pain that comes from knowing that love will never be.

Meanwhile, the main theme to episode 16 in Season 2 is Black Market, which meshes hard rock with beautiful middle eastern tones to create what I can only describe as “bad-ass.”

Of course, my hands-down-favourite track on the disc is Prelude to War. The track builds in a way which can, in fact, be described as preparing for battle (or, yes, a prelude to war). The use of drums and strings in the piece create a tense, high energy 8.5 minutes which, if you ever have watched the show, make you wish you were in the cockpit of a viper. I know I drive my car that way.

In the end: Obviously this is a niche piece. I get that. But, if you’ve never seen BSG but still enjoy TV/Movie scores, check it out. Of course, if you’re as hooked as I am, you’ll do anything you can do to get any and every piece of BSG action.

Technorati Tagged: Bear McCreary | Battlestar Galactica | TV Score | 2006