12/4/2023 0 Comments Freedom planet 2 alpha soundtrack![]() ![]() Knorr’s work is very much his own, and this is a very welcome development. There are a few vague hints of Brian Tyler, possibly James Newton Howard, maybe a little bit of Cliff Martinez in the synth textures, and some allusions to the better proponents of Hans Zimmer’s style-du-jour, but it’s never overt, and you never get the sense that the producers of the game gave Knorr a stack of popular film music hits and said “do that”. What’s interesting to me is that, throughout the score, you never get a sense that Knorr is ‘ripping anyone off’. ![]() When the choir and cello combine in the sumptuous “Xenomalleum” and the album’s conclusive cue, “The Future of Mankind,” the effect is sublime. The mixed-voice choir adds a whole new dimension to the score, and reveals a true lyricism in Knorr’s writing that packs a mighty emotional wallop. ![]() ![]() However, the most notable parts of Knorr’s contributions are the religioso duo “Lux Perpetua” and “Benedicite,” which mixes the orchestra in with a much more prominent choir to truly spectacular effect. More kinetic action music appears in the powerful “Destroyer,” a very impressive cue which takes thematic ideas from earlier in the score and combines them with strong rhythmic orchestral ideas and a contemporary electronic undercurrent that puts some of today’s most successful film music action practitioners to shame. “The Fungal Planet,” “Acclimation” and “Promethean” all revisit the spectacular solo cello performance from the opening cue, which pleases me immensely as I’m a huge fan of that instrument’s haunting, poignant timbre. A larger sense of scope reveals itself in cues such as “Beauty in the Eye of the Orbiter,” the soaring “Our New World,” and the wondrous “A New Beginning,” mainly through a more strident brass section. Calmness and serenity permeate cues such as “Beyond Earth” and “The Lush Planet”. Gorgeous orchestral textures represent the journey of humanity, hopeful and expectant electronic accents speak to the technology at work in building the futuristic civilizations and angelic voices illustrate the sheer scale and magnitude of the cosmos, and the sense of awe and wonderment felt when confronted by its immensity. Beginning with “The Seeding,” which features a beautiful solo cello part, Knorr’s pieces capture perfectly the scope and vastness of space. Geoff Knorr’s work takes up the majority of this promo album’s gargantuan three-hour running time, and his music is consistently superb. Performed by a full orchestra in Prague – and recorded at the Rudolfinum’s Dvořák Hall, no less! – Beyond Earth is massively impressive from start to finish. Finally, 20 minutes of score was composed by Scottish-born BAFTA-nominated composer Grant Kirkhope, a game music veteran best known for his work on such popular games as GoldenEye, Banjo Kazooie, Viva Piñata, and Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, and several of whose works are listed in Classic FM’s Hall of Fame. An additional 27 minutes of score was composed by Michael Curran, one of Firaxis’s other in-house composers. 57 minutes was composed by Griffin Cohen, a young New York-born composer, who is one of Firaxis’s other in-house audio designers and composers who specializes in electronic music. 62 minutes of score was composed by Geoff Knorr, the lead composer for the Firaxis Games company which produces the Civilization series, and who has received a great deal of critical acclaim for his work on previous Civilization games. Original Review by Jonathan Broxton The music compositional duties for Beyond Earth were split between four composers. ![]()
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