{"id":6806,"date":"2013-07-08T14:10:29","date_gmt":"2013-07-08T18:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=6806"},"modified":"2013-07-08T15:00:51","modified_gmt":"2013-07-08T19:00:51","slug":"mp3-only-god-forgives-2013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=6806","title":{"rendered":"MP3: Only God Forgives (2013)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Return to<\/strong>:\u00a0Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Soundtrack \u00a0Reviews<\/a> \/ <\/em>N to O<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Rating: Excellent<\/p>\n

Label: Milan Records\/ Released: July 16, 2013<\/p>\n

Tracks & Album Length: 17 tracks \u00a0\/ (57:50)<\/p>\n

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Special Notes: Available digitally, on CD, and as a limted LP pressing.<\/p>\n

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Composer: Cliff Martinez<\/p>\n

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Review:<\/p>\n

Reuniting with Drive <\/a><\/strong>[M<\/a>] (2011) director Nicolas Winding Refn, Cliff Martinez creates another delicate, almost silent score with a minimalist main theme, a rhythmic motor, and impressions from the folk and pop music heritage of Thailand. OGF is still a work with heavy electronic ingredients, but most of the discretely rendered sounds pulse, shimmer, curve, reverberate, and drone against an occasional orchestral veneer.<\/p>\n

Just as Contagion <\/a><\/strong>[M<\/a>] (2011) pushed Martinez to refine ideas from multiple styles \u2013 a \u2018dirty\u2019 orchestral jazz style, seventies funk, and hints of vintage Tangerine Dream \u2013 here the composer\u2019s expanded on some of those ideas, minus the jazz (although a pop-jazz element is present in \u201cCan\u2019t Forget,\u201d a great Thai source song that has an alluring jazz lounge style).<\/p>\n

\u201cChang Vision\u201d and \u201cMore Hands\u201d for example, have silky strings playing a sad, almost Herrmannesque theme fragment in the far off distance; and as a contrast the blurred string chords in the first half of \u201cDo As Thou Will\u201d are heavily Morriconesque, which Martinez soon shifts to percussion textures that span a broad spectrum of fine and course sounds.<\/p>\n

More vintage synth emulations dominate \u201cSister Part 1,\u201d where Martinez opts for heavy synth chords that undulate in cyclical fashion whenever they\u2019re sustained, and the harmonic structure is very evocative of liturgical music, but with a slight twist \u2013 in \u201cWanna Fight,\u201d the organ chords and vintage synths tones recall John Carpenter\u2019s Escape from New York<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Deep bass pulses and frayed tones make up the percussion track \u201cChang and Sword,\u201d which is given a meatier rendition in \u201cTake It Off.\u201d Martinez\u2019 percussion beats include metal rapping, submarine sonar pings, and sustained echo loops that convey a sense of being submerged in some ghostly world on the fringe of Hell. The cue ends with an oscillating tone that becomes increasing frayed before it quickly evaporates into silence.<\/p>\n

Fans of Martinez\u2019 Solaris <\/a><\/strong>[M<\/a>] (2002) will find a few cues bearing a similar use of the Crystal Baschet <\/a>chimes and tones which shimmer and intensify but remain wholly soothing, and while the chimes may not recur frequently, their harmonic parameters are impressionistically carried on in a few cues. A contrast to the glass tones is the increasingly grungy style that takes over the score, especially \u201cLadies Close Your Eyes\u201d with wheezing metallic scrapes and distortion.<\/p>\n

A few tracks run around 3-4 minutes (“Ladies Close Your Eyes” runs a solid 8 mins.), but as with most of Martinez\u2019 scores, the music eases in and gets out fast, always strategic, and never staying in one sonic zone for long. The constant change within OGF gives it a definite dramatic arc, and director Refn seems to bring out the edgier side of the composer. With Thai percussion added to Martinez\u2019 palette, OGF is an understated gem offering a hypnotic mix of elegiac and the profane sounds.<\/p>\n

Only God Knows<\/strong> is also available on LP (limited to 4000 copies), and July 19th in a digital deluxe edition featuring 6 bonus tracks (including \u201cBride of Chang\u201d remixed by Mac Quayle).<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 2013 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

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External References:<\/p>\n

IMDB <\/a>— Soundtrack Album<\/a> — Composer Filmography<\/a><\/p>\n

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Select Merchants:<\/p>\n

Amazon.ca<\/a>\"\" —<\/span> Amazon.com<\/a>\"\" —<\/span> Amazon.co.uk<\/a>\"\" —\u00a0BSX<\/a> —\u00a0Intrada<\/a> —\u00a0SAE<\/a><\/p>\n

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Return to<\/strong>:\u00a0Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Soundtrack Reviews<\/a> <\/em>\/\u00a0N to O<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Return to:\u00a0Home \/\u00a0Soundtrack \u00a0Reviews \/ N to O . Rating: Excellent Label: Milan Records\/ Released: July 16, 2013 Tracks & Album Length: 17 tracks \u00a0\/ (57:50) . Special Notes: Available digitally, on CD, and as a limted LP pressing. . Composer: Cliff Martinez . . Review: Reuniting with Drive [M] (2011) director Nicolas Winding Refn, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[301,779,2108],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-1LM","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6806"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6806"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6812,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6806\/revisions\/6812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}