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Man, I wish I still lived in LA! I like that piece of artwork behind Chattaway's head, whatever it is.
I had to double-check, but that's the map from Time Bandits (a score that sorely need to be on CD).
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Always cool to see pics of our favorite composers and these signing events. They look like they are having a great time which is just awesome.
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Posted: |
Aug 7, 2011 - 5:36 PM
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By: |
Tom Servo
(Member)
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It was indeed a lot of fun at the signing, great to finally meet Dennis and Jay. I have been able to meet and chat with Ron Jones on several occasions around town and it's very cool to know that I have now met with the top three composers on one of my favorite series, ST:TNG. Dennis and I talked about the sheer number of notes he's composed for the various Trek series, his music for GENERATIONS and also V: The Final Battle mini-series. Jay and I talked about concert music in general, that of Stravinsky and studying the scores themselves, plus his great music for DS9.
The 3-disc set itself is really stellar, no pun intended. It's so amazing to think that in the span of a year we've had all of Ron Jones's efforts on TNG released and now additional music from McCarthy, Chattaway, Steiner, Davis and Debney. It's a wealth of riches for fans of the series!
Personally, I'm happy to have more of McCarthy's early TNG scores on disc, since all we had until now was "Encounter at Farpoint". "Haven" is a lovely score and "Conspiracy" has some great, unsettling passages. The Chattaway disc has some real highlights as well. I thought I knew these scores well enough from episode viewings, but color me surprised at lovely and subtly melancholy themes he wrote for "The Host" and "The Perfect Mate" in addition to the bristling action in "Darmok", "Relics" and "Starship Mine" and sublime tones in "The Chase". It really makes for a great album listen, from start to finish.
Disc three I have only perused briefly, but the Steiner score kicks ass for sure! 
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It was sooooo much fun to finally meet these guys. I am so very grateful!!
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If you guys who went have any more photos, I would LOVE to see them as well as probably the rest of us.
Post away guys and gals.
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Posted: |
Aug 17, 2011 - 2:29 PM
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By: |
Francis
(Member)
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Ok, finally received this courtesy of Creature Features! Great set and a nice addition to the TNG collection!
So far I've gone through discs 1 and 2. The Mccarthy material gets better the later the episodes (a little too much 'haven' for my taste), so for me disc 1 really gets going when it gets to 'Conspiracy', on to 'Time Squared' and 'Conundrum'. I love these mini-suites and selections as I think they really represent the core of the episodes. Some of his suspense cues are reminiscent of Generations. To me Dennis Mccarthy is the best at scoring Star Trek on TV, even when he's being accused of writing 'wallpaper' music. He is the best composer at giving TNG the bare necessity score and still make things intriguing and worth paying attention too. All the other composers want to push their material too much, Mccarthy knows where the boundaries lie.
Disc 2 featuring Chattaway's music is better in terms of selections (and memorable episodes) and is definitely heavier on thematic and solo material than Mccarthy's disc. I love Chattaway's action writing and when it comes to mystery and suspense, he knows to push the right buttons. 'Darmok', 'The Inner Light', 'Relics', ... are all memorable episodes and the music matches that. Also that typical synth use for that decade which I love.
I think this set is a great way to revisit the music of the series and perhaps for those unfamiliar with it, to the sound of TNG. Thank you La La for making this set happen!
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Got my set from LLL this week and listened to disc 1 last night. Tremendous. Now I have to buy the Ron Jones Box...sigh....
Its a great set to have...and if you are a hardcore Trekkie like me then its a no brainer LOL
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Posted: |
Aug 18, 2011 - 3:00 PM
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By: |
CrazyQuark
(Member)
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Well, I got this set too recently (which was surprisingly fast I might add... I seriously didn't expected to get it until next week O_o) so I thought I might try some kind of review of it or something... never really did that before, but anyway - I'm starting with disc 1 for now, more to come when I have more time listening to the music... 
Here we go:
Disc 1:
HAVEN
Well, thanks to the complete presentation of the score on this set the differences between Jones' and McCarthy's approach to the episodes get very obvious right from the start: While Jones scored each episode as a movie for itself, McCarthy's episode scores doesn't really come across as "complete" scores, more like a single chapter of the greater whole. As a result "Haven" doesn't seem to form a coherent whole, there are just too much different ideas thrown into it, but if you look at it as a chapter from the series, it works, but you definitely need more music from other episodes to see (and appreciate) it. Well, when it comes to the music for itself, I like it and I think especially the instrumentation here is great. However I fail to recognise a theme in McCarthy's romantic material, so the cues I remember (and like) the most are the ones when he gets more action-oriented/swashbuckling and of course, when he uses his so-called "Picard's theme", which I like quite a lot.
HIDE AND Q
Well, I think after ~20 minutes of "Haven" I would have loved some action-music for a change of pace. "Hide And Q" would have been the perfect choice for that. Sadly, this didn't happen and if you ask me this is a missed oppurtunity, not only because of adding some variety to the disc (and therefore enhancing the listening experience) but also because I think this episode had some really great action-cues. From the cues presented on this disc, I like "Time Lapse" the most - "Picard's Theme" sounds absolutely amazing here in this arrangement.
THE BIG GOODBYE
I never really was the biggest fan of source music, so this track won't do much for me - but maybe I had just a bit too much jazzy source-music after the recent releases for Star Trek III and the Ron Jones Project (11001001).
CONSPIRACY
This is probably one of McCarthy's most unusual Star Trek scores and it sounds really unique (and quite unsettling at parts). Definitely a welcome addition on this set.
THE CHILD
The opening cue was always one of my favourite tracks in TNG (and I would assume I'm not the only one who thinks that) so it's great to finally have it presented here - the rest from this episode's selection isn't too bad either, but I sure could have lived without it.
ELEMENTARY, DEAR DATA
This is the part where this disc gets really fun for me. While all the tracks here are awefully short and end rather abrupt, they are still great and a lot of fun to listen to. This is also another good example of McCarthy's "chapter"-approach, since the opening fanfare from "The Child" appears here as well (once again to open up the episode) and it also appears later again in...
TIME SQUARED
This track is probably my favourite from the disc. Everything here is simply great. Awesome music!
THE SURVIVORS
And we move on to season 3. By this point, McCarthy's musical style had changed quite a lot, and during that season his music became less melodic and swashbuckling, and his theme for Picard almost disappeared. When it comes to the music for "The Survivors" once again I don't care much for the source music cues (but I can see why they are included - they aren't really that bad and unlike the track from "The Big Goodbye" it's at least a McCarthy-composition and of course the music box has a very important part in the story, so I won't complain about the inclusion of these cues.  ) The standout-track for me here is track 17 ("Telepathic - Kevin's Waltz - Unbridged") which is great from the beginning to the end - I love it!
SAREK
I think this is the track that reminded Francis of "Generations", because I had the same feeling here.
At parts the track gets more melodic and it sounds indeed like something out of "Generations" but not only that; I think the whole track would fit quite nicely at the scene when Picard is inside the Nexus. Overall, this is yet another track I like quite a lot and I found this much more emotional (and better) than McCarthy's music for "Haven".
CONUNDRUM
From season 3 we move right into the middle of season 5 with the music for "Conundrum" and one time more this track is a very pleasant surprise. Great stuff!
ALL GOOD THINGS...
Hm... I don't really know what to say here. First, music from this episode was released before so I wasn't really all that excited about these tracks here, but besides that both tracks never really did much for me. Yes, I know these tracks are kind of important because they are the last tracks from TNG and they sure have some nice usages of the Courage-fanfare but aside from that... I just never really found them special or outstanding enough... but hey, I'm guess I'm the only one who thinks that, so what?
So, overall I think this disc is quite nice and has lots of great tracks, but like Francis I think it starts a bit mediocre and gets better and better after Season 1 is over.
What I would love to see/hear on a second volume:
more of McCarthy's "early" action music which i think is rather underpresented on this disc.
I wouldn't mind seeing some more quotes of "Picard's Theme" of course, some examples which comes to mind are in "The Last Outpost": There's a scene in the engine room where Riker and Geordi trying to figure out what to do next and at one point Riker gets an idea, and the music starts playing: it's a powerful, march-like version of "Picard's Theme" but unfortunetely heavily buried under dialogue. A more obvious quote I remember right now would appear in "Pen Pals": there's a scene where Data and Worf (I think) checking out some quarters looking for someone/something, and during that scene there's some more action-oriented music which also includes the theme very prominently.
When it comes to "Picard's Theme" there's another thing I would like to adress: For a while I thought the last time McCarthy used this theme was during season 3 - at least that's the last time I noticed it - however for a while I've read in an interview that he sneaked it into "Rascals", a season 6-episode. I haven't checked so I don't know if the particular track is worth including but if yes I sure would love to see it on Volume 2 (and maybe there are other examples from later seasons?) - I think that would bring some more continuity to the disc and would bridge McCarthy's "early" style with his more contempory style quite nicely.
Last but not least I would love to get the last track from "Time's Arrow Part II". This is one of the tracks which really stood out for me while watching the show, it sounds very melodic (and actually very DS9-ish).
Well that's it for Disc 1 and McCarthy! Next time, disc 2!
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