Various Artists
Nonplace Soundtracks / Scenes 1-25
Nonplace
While this is officially a “Various Artist” collection, it’s principally the work of electronic composer Burnt Friedman working with a group called The Embassadors. All 25 of these tracks were part of various movies, and like all movie sound tracks since talkies debuted they stand better in their cinematic nests than as an independent experience. They are not bad as background music, but unlike most compositions that have strong beginnings and ends, sound tracks tend to span scenes and situations that are outside of themselves, or move an audience from one emotional state to another.
Exactly what movies if any these hail from is unclear, but they are all rather short, clocking in between 0:45 and 2:37. While they tend toward percussion, a double bass and a cello make these sounds full and weighty. Freidman tosses in election fillips and squeaks; occasionally we feel Hollywood fear or migratory suspense. An occasional crescendo ends cuts; arpeggios of radio waves skitter around and hide under the couch, begging you to chase them further into their dust bunny filled retreat. Tracks are numbered with no hint as to function or intent, I imaging this is what a blind person would experience at a late 1990’s Siggraph session on animation. This is music for a future past, steeped in classical structure and post-modernist structural decomposition. Or so I’ve heard.
