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| Album Information |
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Star Trek: The Next Generation Collection, Volume 1 |
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2011 |
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Soundtrack |
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B005FX58OA |
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Dave11 |
| Reviewers Rating |
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| 1 reviews done for this album. |
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| Very entertaining album |
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| By: | dave11 |
| Date: | 27 May 2012 |
| Rating: | |
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I was very excited to see this album come out, I didn't expect any release like this at all anymore after all these years.
CD 1: I've always been a big fan of Dennis McCarthy's music since I was a kid and heard his work on the MacGyver series. While I think that they could have made some better choices as to which of McCarthy's pieces to release on this album, it's nevertheless well worth it. The music for 'Haven', McCarthy's first episode after scoring the pilot, is unusual for Star Trek, very romantic and melodic, really beautiful. I didn't care much for the actual episode, but the music is some of McCarthy's best. For 'Hide and Q' they only chose to release the music from one scene, in my opinion they should have chosen a few more scenes from this episode which featured some really great dramatic action music in earlier parts of the episode. The same goes for 'Conspiracy', a very dark and tense episode with great music especially during the first part of the episode, but again they chose to release only the last part with very disharmonic music, interesting and very effective in the episode but not exactly what I would like to listen to for enjoyment. 'The Child' is one of the best choices they could have made, already years ago I thought this should be released. A full orchestral celebratory grand opening, after that some mysterious and dark moments when the life form enters the Enterprise searching for a host. In the second part there is a nice mix of dramatic music and a joyful moment when Troi's child is born, back to McCarthy's typically dramatic underscoring where you can feel the danger and tension when the containment is about to breach. 'Time Squared' is again very dark and mysterious with a wonderful action sequence at the end, this part reminds very much of McCarthy's dramatic underscoring with rhythmic string and brass combinations much like the MacGyver episodes he scored in the late 80's and early 90's, finishing with the 4-chord sequence from the opening of the episode 'The Child'. About 'The Survivors', another score I had been hoping for for the longest time, I was extremely thrilled and at the the same time a bit disappointed. In this episode there are three attacks on the Enterprise by an unidentified warship, all these scenes are accompanied by some of McCarthy's greatest action music ever. Unfortunately only one of these scenes is released here, about 1 min 40 sec into track 17 (unbridged). Track 17 also starts with a great, haunting piece while Troi is being tortured by telepathically transmitted music. I think rather than releasing 3 variations of the waltz/music box, they should have included another ship attack scene instead.. 'Sarek' is an outstanding score, mostly dissonant, very emotional while Sarek's emotions are out of control within Picard's mind during the mind meld. In 'Conundrum' we're back to an exciting action cue while the crew is forced to launch an attack against an unknown civilization while suffering from amnesia, with an evil alien crew member is hiding among the crew. Overall a very enjoyable selection with many good moments, not a perfect selection of music but far from bad.
CD 2: Jay Chattaway was a great addition to the composer team of TNG. His music was unusual for TNG but very fitting. 'Remember Me', the second episode he scored as a guest composer, was extremely well made, and the music was perfect for it. 'The Host', 'Darmok' and 'Silicon Avatar', some of Chattaway's first episodes after replacing Ron Jones as a regular composer, feature some very exciting, rhythmic action music. In later episodes, especially in the 6th and 7th season I always felt that Chattaway was unable to get variety into his compositions, for sure partly because the producers wanted the music to be less prominent in the episodes, unfortunately it took a lot of the excitement out of Chattaway's music (McCarthy's as well, but to a lesser degree). Especially tracks 15 and 21 completely lack excitement. From Chattaway's Disc (disc #2) I would recommend to stick to tracks 2-11, and then track 20 is quite good as well, reminds me a bit of ST Voyager-'Caretaker'.
CD 3: Very interesting and exciting was the release of three scores composed by guest composers:
1. Fred Steiner, a regular composer of the original series, was brought back for one of the very first episodes of TNG, and while his music was quite entertaining, it was not much different than his scores from the original series, for TNG it was way too old fashioned in my opinion.
2. Don Davis' score is one of a kind for TNG, it's composed more like a movie than an episode, which is what makes it very interesting to listen to. In my opinion it's very suitable for this particular episode because it's an unusually "big" story, and the sound is equally big, much more prominent than McCarthy's and Chattaway's scores from season 6 and 7. A great choice by the album makers.
3. John Debney did a wonderful Job as well in the episode 'The Pegasus'. If I didn't know I would have thought that this is a McCarthy score, I assume that Debney's purpose here was to adjust to TNG scoring requirements. But also like Davis' score for 'Face of the Enemy', Debney's score is a bit more prominent, quite melodic at times and extremely enjoyable.
To summarize, most of this album is really great and enjoyable, hope you guys enjoy it as well.
4 of 4 found this review helpful
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