I should be writing and practising a German oral (good grief, YES, Firefox, "practise" is a word), but I need me some procrastination. And I can hear the groans already. Yeah, Batman.
So, last Saturday, I saw The Dark Knight with Jordan and Pris before Rice Rally. (She has a brief recount here.) And for some reason, the thing that stuck with me most was The Note. Y'know, that one distorted note which yells "the Joker is in control here"? So the day after, I fired up BitTorrent and nabbed the soundtracks of both Chris Nolan Batman films. Awesome, awesome listening. So much so, that when Pris said to me on Friday that she'd be going to the city tomorrow, and was I looking for any music in particular?, I asked if she could find either of those CDs. (Basically, I download CDs to see if they're worth buying.)
So, I now own two film soundtracks, both of which Hans Zimmer has contributed to in some degree: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and The Dark Knight (incidentally, the former is another great CD); And am hunting around for the soundtrack of Batman Begins. I'd say "dang, I feel geeky", but that's better saved for a recount further down the page.
It's weird, given the degree to which the two Batman soundtracks are ... atmospheric (rather than melodic), that they've been sitting in my various Now Playing displays almost exclusively for the past week. Took a while to get used to, and tracks like "Why so serious" are probably never going to make it into my main rotation - have a listen and you'll see why - but I'm still not sick of the music. I should mention here that I typically tire of an album within a week, due in part to a good ear and musical memory, so I guess the lack of prominent themes (the pointed near-total absence of a heroic I'M BATMAN theme, for instance) has been challenging for my ... learning, I guess, of the tracks. Although that said, the motifs of the scores are extrordinarily brief. The main theme (if you can call it that) of the films is just a drawn out minor third (D... F...), Gotham's theme (which I initially thought was Batman's theme, then Harvey Dent's theme... but I digress) is a six-note progression (F E D G, F E), and then there's of course the Joker's one Note. The slightly more lengthy piano motifs (in particular, Begins' Wayne theme, and what I think are Rachel's theme and a passage denoting death) are beautiful, but almost frustratingly short. Either way, it's a far cry from Pirates of the Caribbean's (at least) twenty-seven-note main theme.
I was going to mention an incident which makes me feel ridiculously geeky, but couldn't find anywhere in the admittedly nonexistent flow of this post, so it gets stuck here. I was rewatching Batman Begins last night, trying to pinpoint tracks on the soundtrack, identify musical themes, and so on. And got annoyed about the fact that the music which plays in the credits isn't on the soundtrack. Long story short, I eventually got hold of an .MP3 of said music, given the title "End Credits". Now, the track names of the Batman Begins soundtrack follow an odd naming convention - bat genera. Eptesicus, Myotis, Corynorhinus, Molossus, and so on. My inner neatness freak (which manifests when it comes to file organisation, particularly music, but not the state of my room) found this intolerable, so I looked up bat genera and eventually settled on Scotoecus. A friend I mentioned this to probably puts it best:
So, last Saturday, I saw The Dark Knight with Jordan and Pris before Rice Rally. (She has a brief recount here.) And for some reason, the thing that stuck with me most was The Note. Y'know, that one distorted note which yells "the Joker is in control here"? So the day after, I fired up BitTorrent and nabbed the soundtracks of both Chris Nolan Batman films. Awesome, awesome listening. So much so, that when Pris said to me on Friday that she'd be going to the city tomorrow, and was I looking for any music in particular?, I asked if she could find either of those CDs. (Basically, I download CDs to see if they're worth buying.)
So, I now own two film soundtracks, both of which Hans Zimmer has contributed to in some degree: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and The Dark Knight (incidentally, the former is another great CD); And am hunting around for the soundtrack of Batman Begins. I'd say "dang, I feel geeky", but that's better saved for a recount further down the page.
It's weird, given the degree to which the two Batman soundtracks are ... atmospheric (rather than melodic), that they've been sitting in my various Now Playing displays almost exclusively for the past week. Took a while to get used to, and tracks like "Why so serious" are probably never going to make it into my main rotation - have a listen and you'll see why - but I'm still not sick of the music. I should mention here that I typically tire of an album within a week, due in part to a good ear and musical memory, so I guess the lack of prominent themes (the pointed near-total absence of a heroic I'M BATMAN theme, for instance) has been challenging for my ... learning, I guess, of the tracks. Although that said, the motifs of the scores are extrordinarily brief. The main theme (if you can call it that) of the films is just a drawn out minor third (D... F...), Gotham's theme (which I initially thought was Batman's theme, then Harvey Dent's theme... but I digress) is a six-note progression (F E D G, F E), and then there's of course the Joker's one Note. The slightly more lengthy piano motifs (in particular, Begins' Wayne theme, and what I think are Rachel's theme and a passage denoting death) are beautiful, but almost frustratingly short. Either way, it's a far cry from Pirates of the Caribbean's (at least) twenty-seven-note main theme.
I was going to mention an incident which makes me feel ridiculously geeky, but couldn't find anywhere in the admittedly nonexistent flow of this post, so it gets stuck here. I was rewatching Batman Begins last night, trying to pinpoint tracks on the soundtrack, identify musical themes, and so on. And got annoyed about the fact that the music which plays in the credits isn't on the soundtrack. Long story short, I eventually got hold of an .MP3 of said music, given the title "End Credits". Now, the track names of the Batman Begins soundtrack follow an odd naming convention - bat genera. Eptesicus, Myotis, Corynorhinus, Molossus, and so on. My inner neatness freak (which manifests when it comes to file organisation, particularly music, but not the state of my room) found this intolerable, so I looked up bat genera and eventually settled on Scotoecus. A friend I mentioned this to probably puts it best:
(0231) Barnabas: Hmm. Geekiness is finding a name for a rip of the ending credits music which fits in with the rest of the album's naming scheme. Especially if said naming scheme is "bat genera". ¬¬Just felt like musing on that topic. Hopefully no brains have been liquidated by the inanity. If you have time, some awesome tracks off these two soundtracks:
(0232) Gobolt: >_>
I'd better get back to my discussion of globale Erwärmung. Joy!Like a dog chasing cars - action track off The Dark Knight.
8 comments:
Wooo! Chance aimlessly surfing the net brought me to a new post by Trend! NO WAI!
'neways. I feel verily exclusive that I know exactly what you're talking about =O. Also, you really can't get any more geeky than naming the end credits after bat genera as well! /fwAP
POTC is noticeably more fun to listen to. Batman would be lovely going-to-sleep music if it wasn't so creepy half the time. I lack a musical (or creative) sense to remember this one Note you speak of >_>
in short:
GO BATMAN GO!! /epic
[P]ris
I dunno, the soft, emotional passages of Pirates don't hold a candle to Eptesicus or Corynorhinus.
And you don't remember the Note?!
B
I likes BB better =O
Mainly coz it's got a little more than DK. Still haven't had the chance to listen to it enough to really get much.
Creepy high strings does wonders for one's atmosphere tho O_O
that's alot of wooorrdssds,
what does 'epic' mean? :D!
<3looouuuuease
@L
...I honestly can't define it. I use it to mean "awesome", with a sense of "that explosion was freaking AWESOME", but that seems to imply some sort of cinematic quality...
Hmm. What saith the Dic?
adjective Also, ep·i·cal.
1. noting or pertaining to a long poetic composition, usually centered upon a hero, in which a series of great achievements or events is narrated in elevated style: Homer's Iliad is an epic poem.
2. resembling or suggesting such poetry: an epic novel on the founding of the country.
3. heroic; majestic; impressively great: the epic events of the war.
4. of unusually great size or extent: a crime wave of epic proportions.
Definition three of that, then. (Which I gather stems from def. two, which stems from def. one.)
And yes, that is a lot of words. Have I succeeded in melting your brain? Do I still need to try harder?
B
PS. Dangit, Blogger doesn't let comments include <quote></quote> tags.
PPS. Hahaha, "epical". Haha. Hah. Ha. H-*gack*
here's to hoping louise was actually joking and her question was artistically rhetorical o_O
Oh egads, I forgot to reread the preceding comments.
Louise is free to bludgeon me over the head with a rubber hammer. ONCE ONLY. ¬¬
B
PS. Pris, what does "to epic" mean?
" (Which I gather stems from def. two, which stems from def. one.)"
o.o
amd,
suuree, yups.. it was totally rhetorical and artsy... (*murdermurdermuhahahaaahstuffchuuprisssssluff*)
can i still take the op. of hitting uwith the hammer???!? :D
nps thanx for the def. trend <3
/LLLLLLLLLLL
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