CD/DIGITAL ALBUM REVIEW - FASTER


Faster
Music by Clint Mansell
Lakeshore Records
16 Tracks 54:06 mins

Composer Clint Mansell has two films currently showing, the Natalie Portman starrer Black Swan and the Dwayne Johnson thriller Faster. The score for the latter has been released by Lakeshore Records, both on CD and as a digital download.
The first six tracks on the album feature various vocal numbers, the most interesting being the DeAngelis brothers' "Goodbye My Friend," and Kenny Rogers' version of "Just Dropped In." After that, it's score all the way, with Mansell evoking a typically contemporary urban sound, all electric guitars and percussion. At times, the music is dark, dramatic and atmospheric, and sometimes quite mournful; at others it's hi-octane, like the highly percussive "History Lesson" and the opening of "The Driver Drives." There is very little light to be found, though "Lovers" does provide a piano-lead interlude. But even this develops a pounding drumbeat as it progresses.
The penultimate track, "On a Mission," brings matters to a fatalistic close, before "Redemption" builds from a quiet opening to a big, dramatic conclusion.
I am not a great lover of this genre, but I have to say, as contemporary urban-styled scores go, this one has more to offer than many I have heard in recent years.