Defiance Television Series Original Soundtrack by Bear McCreary (album review)
Designed as a companion piece to the ‘Defiance’ video game soundtrack, Bear McCreary has obviously steered clear of repetition and looked to make something different for the show soundtrack about humans embracing a brave new frontier.
For the ‘Defiance’ TV series score, McCreary has attempted to create a sound that mixes Earth and Votan tastes. It’s a huge undertaking given the Votan culture has a different, specially created language but somehow it works.
With this soundtrack, he has made something that the characters would actually listen to. Sure, some songs such as poppy ‘Terraform My Heart’ will never reach number one in the charts but it doesn’t really matter because it’s all good fun.
Around half the tracks are upbeat pop songs while the other half is certainly more gritty and dramatic, the incidental background music.
A later track, ‘Lawkeeper’ does have the hallmarks of a McCreary industrial number but the rest of the non-pop songs are very guitar heavy.
On the whole, the album is great funs and highly engaging with the vocal tracks offering something very different. You’ll find yourself going back to these cheesy tracks again and again, especially the sweet cover of ‘Time After Time’.
Great fun and worth a listen. Other TV soundtrack composers should take notes from Bear McCreary.
Aidan Fortune
July 2013
(pub: Sparks & Shadows. 76 minutes, 22 tracks 1 CD. Price: $ 8.99 (US), £ 7.49 (UK) ASIN: B00D8O172U)
check out website: www.sparksandshadows.net
