The Daily Spin, April 13
Bear McCreary | The Rings of Power OST
Welcome back to the Daily Spin, the series in which I review 365 albums during 2023.
Each album will be given a rating on a scale from 0 to 10. You can look at the entire set here. Additionally, you can check out a list of my favorite song from each album right here.
If you want to suggest an album, good news! You can do so right here!
Album: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power OST
Artist: Bear McCreary
Link:
I’d been doing so well with the timing of it all and then someone had to go and recommend a two-and-a-half hour album.
Bear McCreary has a hell of a legacy to live up to - Howard Shore’s original scores for the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit film series are among the finest ever made to accompany film. It would take a truly monumental effort to outdo this, and I can’t say with confidence that McCreary manages.
What he does accomplish, however, is a near-perfect score for HBO’s The Rings of Power, an extension of the universe that J.R.R. Tolkien brought to so many of us, the one that Peter Jackson and company perfected and then bludgeoned through the Lord Of The Rings and later the Hobbit series.
When I hear this music, I think of Middle Earth - the same way that Nicholas Britell’s Succession score has become iconic, or the way that the Avengers have locked in that singular pattern of notes as a motif so uniquely theirs. It’s not quite at the level of pop culture infiltration as, say, Jaws, but I’m not sure anything will ever quite reach that point.
For a score that is extensive as it is - again, this is comfortably the longest album we’ve reviewed so far - this is remarkably deft, cohesive without sameness and controlled but free - it’s just enough to take the edge off, put you in the right state of mind, but never so much so that it feels hokey. This isn’t a theme park attraction, this is the gentle noise of life in a fantasy land, converted so that our mortal ears may enjoy it.
Rating: 8.8/10
Best Tracks: In the Mines; The Stranger; The Boat
Worst Tracks: Nori Brandyfoot; Where the Shadows Lie