MP3: Mad as Hell (2014)
Score: Very Good
Label: Ronen Landa / Bandcamp
Released: February 11, 2015
Tracks / Album Length: 19 tracks / 39 mins.
Composer: Ronen Landa
Special Notes: n/a
Review:
Most of the cues in Ronen Landa’s score are brisk, kinetic pieces that make their strategic mark by capturing the audaciousness of the films’ central figure, Young Turks creator Cenk Uygur, as he navigates from YouTube sensation to a new career as an MSNBC host, and it’s unsurprising Landa’s instrumentation features an up-tempo electric guitar, a very active electric bass, and occasionally a flanging backbeat in tracks like “Shut Up Juice,” or punchy drums and string bass in the jazzy “Of Course! (Funk the Turks)” and “Norma.”
Less upbeat cues include the synth tapping “The Show Sucked” with its sustained bass and alternating piano hits, and the synth and very eighties electric guitar lament “Old Media vs. New Media,” but Mad as Hell’s design is generally comprised of recurring jazz-funk tracks, rock styled theme variations, and rhythmic extrapolations from the main theme emphasizing synths and keyboards. It’s a solid score that manages to retain a dramatic drive towards the triumphant “Truth to Power” closing cue, which recaps small portions of the main theme variations heard in shorter guises.
In spite of the album’s brief running time and the relative brevity of its cues (a good third hover around 1.5 minutes), Landa’s score is very satisfying, especially in his rhythmic textures and use of heavy bass lines which convey the central subject’s attitude and head-butting with more traditional MSNBC brass.
Note: several cues are preceded by short dialogue extracts
© 2015 Mark R. Hasan
Additional Links:
Editor’s Blog — Composer on IMDB — Composer Filmography — Soundtrack Album
Select Merchants:
Amazon.ca
Category: Soundtrack Reviews
Connect