Trailerhead: Saga
Trailerhead:SAGA is the second installment of public releases from the highly prolific production music company Immediate Music. The album contains 14 powerful tracks selected from Immediate’s previously studio released Themes for Orchestra and Choir series one through three. For those that don’t know or in case this is your first review of an album of such, allow me to briefly explain just who Immediate Music are and what it is they do.
Immediate Music are a production music company based in Los Angeles, California who specialize in composing and arranging music to score trailers for major motion pictures. Their music has only ever been available exclusively for studios and trailer houses. With an ever growing fan base of this genre of music, a small potential niche on the commercial market opened up. With Immediate leading the way, they released their first public album in 2008 entitled Trailerhead of which Saga is the follow up.
The tracks in question have been literally striped bare from their original versions and remixed and rearranged with brand new choral and instrumental pieces added in. One can even hear the “Globus” influence on a particular track. Trailerhead:Saga is arranged in such a way that it comes across as though the tracks are individual chapters, all of which contribute to a greater musical story. This story is never actually stated or defined as such by Immediate but instead allows the listener to tap into their own imagination and take on that responsibility.
What Immediate have done here is a very intelligent arrangement, as many of the tracks featured do not suit as listening material in their original versions as that was not the intention of the composer who wrote the track. The reason for this is perfectly stated by Yoav Goren in The Story Behind Trailer Music Live:
"Music for movie trailers is a unique genre, it has to invoke emotion a
completely different way than that of a pop song or a classical symphony.
With trailers I get to tap into the most intense emotions, the medias pieces
in a very short amount of time"
The album opens with Hymnus Orbis [Original track: Hymn-Themes for Orchestra & Choir].The track acts as a perfect intro with a gentle choir taking control and a slow moving instrumental piece acting as a backing giving the track the perfect stability it needs.
Glory Seeker [Original track: Def Con-Themes for Orchestra & Choir 2] arrives reminding the audience just what Immediate are all about. The track opens with heavy brass and underlying drums setting the mood before proceeding into the def con rhythm and choir showcasing the epic ness of the piece. Things die down to a somber of swellings and hisses only to rise again at 1:53 to repeat the motions of the opening of the track this time with the inclusions of more instruments and takes on a tone of epic proportions before coming to a close.
Libertas [Liberty - Themes for Orchestra and Choir] opens with a single guitar set to a gentle instrumental and choral backing before suffering severely from a possible Globus influenced heavy electric guitar which to me sounds completely out of place here especially since the original track is one of my favorites and electric guitars are not an instrument that I would associate with the arrangement of this piece. After that slight mishap we are back on form with the continuity of the track remaining true to the original with the choir slightly heavier in tone and orchestra respectively lighter, both of which compliment each other rather nicely.
Invictus [ Divide and Conquer - Themes for Orchestras and Choir 3] differs slightly from previous tracks, it allows the orchestra to be the dominant driving force with the choir acting as back up this time round. The track really just sounds as a mix of the choir and non- choir versions from its original counterpart. In terms of listening enjoyment, in contrast to other tracks it is probably the most bland track on the album as it becomes quite repetitive from the 1:50mark.
Oration Sanctus [Holy - Themes for Orchestra and Choir] starts with a slow piano melody with various instruments gradually been added before joined by a gentle choir which takes a more bold tone around the 2:00 min mark with the final build coming in at 2:30.
Emergence of Empire [Rising Empire - themes for Orchestra and Choir 2]. My favorite track on the album and by far the most cleverly arranged. It starts off identical to Rising Empire but unlike Rising Empire it contains two builds. At the start we have both the choir and orchestra in harmony with each other slowly rising to the first build at 0:45 where the orchestra takes stage showcasing impressive strings and heavy percussion until the second build at 2:10 where both choir and orchestra play out and eventually bring this epic piece to a close.
In league with Cerberus [Final Omen and Blasphemy 2.0 - Themes for Orchestra and Choir] This particular track is again cleverly arranged with two original tracks from TFOAC merged together into one. It actually took me a few repeat listens before I realized as such. A revved up Final Omen with a synthesized touch leads the way with an early build from the start. The track dies to an underscore of swells and hisses at the 1:20mark before blasting into Blasphemy 2.0 at 2:00.
Darkness on the Edge of Power [Dark Side of Power - Themes for Orchestra and Choir 3] This track is building from the start with the immediate stabbing choir then the deep piano giving way for heavy strings to dominate your ears with the brass ever to teasing in the background. When the choir have had their say, we get thrown full swing into the melody of the piece with heavy percussion being an ever dominant force in conjunction with the strings. The choir comes back in on the final build at 2:13and continues on in full power for the minute before promptly coming to a close.
Ashes of War [Love and War - Themes for Orchestra and Choir] is a brilliant sweeping track driven mostly by the orchestra. It really does depict something epic. Epic in a more subtle way as it does not share the same bombastic properties of some of the other tracks on here. To me its the track that allows one to reflect on the story of the album so far and brings you back down after the high of Darkness on the Edge of Power giving the album the correct balance it needs up to this point.
World On A String [Global Crisis - Themes for Orchestra and Choir 3] brings us back to the epic orchestra and choir. The track doesn't really differ much form the original until about the 2:30mark where the high octane rhythm is set against a slightly electronic influenced backing.
Salvation for a Proud Nation [Proud Nation - Themes for Orchestra and Choir 2] is a track that seemed to please many fans when it was revealed that it would be featured on the album...........and for good reason. The title pretty much sums up the tone of this piece. A gentle opening melody begins before being joined by a very simple drum rhythm with tribal vocals backing it up. It then bursts into full orchestra up until the 5:05mark before being toned down slightly for the outro to take stage, gracefully bringing this piece to a close
Fatum Plebis is the only track on the album with a heavy electronic influence. You would think that because of that it would suffer severely. One will probably be thinking is this another orchestral piece ruined by people remixing it? Ruined? no. Remixed? yes.....but to a rather good effect.
Darkness On the Edge of Power is featured again here only as a live version which really just showcases how immediate sees this piece as such a pivotal track for the album.
Surrender To Hope [ Believe -Themes for Orchestra and Choir 2] is the ideal track to finish off the album on. In its own way the arrangement gives a synopsis of the album by its use of instruments in question as they were all featured in most tracks. It is the perfect piece for the Immediate team to bow out on and some what tease the listener that there is more to come and that this part of the saga is over so keep a sharp eye on the horizon.
Overall, Trailerhead:Saga delivers on all levels. For the die hard trailer fan to the occasional listener, it provides a unique listening experience and truly showcases how powerful this genre is becoming. With track arrangements cleverly thought out and planned for listening enjoyment, Immediate Music have set the bar as to how a public album is to be presented and once again proved that they are king and give Two Steps From Hell a run for their money showing them that they might not be the Invincible company on top this year. I await anxiously for their next installment.
TrailerHead:Saga Review
Trailerhead:SAGA is the second installment of public releases from the highly prolific production music company Immediate Music. The album contains 14 powerful tracks selected from Immediate’s previously studio released Themes for Orchestra and Choir series one through three. For those that don’t know or in case this is your first review of an album of such, allow me to briefly explain just who Immediate Music are and what it is they do.
Immediate Music are a production music company based in Los Angeles, California who specialize in composing and arranging music to score trailers for major motion pictures. Their music has only ever been available exclusively for studios and trailer houses. With an ever growing fan base of this genre of music, a small potential niche on the commercial market opened up. With Immediate leading the way, they released their first public album in 2008 entitled Trailerhead of which Saga is the follow up. Read more>>
The Aleksandar Dimitrijevic live chat: yes, it did happen!
Well, this is quite embarrassing, but I wanted to finish up this story. For those that don't remember, because it was so long ago, we did a live chat with Aleksandar Dimitrijevic, via webcam (below is a picture to prove it!). It was a first for us, and I was hoping that things would go perfectly. They didn't, and that's why there was never a follow up article with a video of the interview. Actually, there could have been that; it just would have been without audio.
That said, I wanted to have something posted that kind of summarized what was said. It's a little silly to do this when it happened so long ago, but I did promise this, and I'd like some closure. I'm sorry to that those that missed it who won't have the opportunity to see it. To give you a picture of what happened, I asked Aleksandar often clumsy questions as I struggled with the few second delay, and Aleksandar provided some wonderful insight and thoughts about himself and trailer music.
I get into more detail, after the jump...
Trailerhead: Saga is now available for preorder!
While we may not have the CD in our hands as we had initially hoped, preorders are finally open for the next chapter in the Trailerhead Saga! As you can tell by the beautiful cover art, the music should evoke images of gods holding flaming planets on their shoulders. That's what I've been thinking ever since i first heard "Dark Side of Power"! Honest!
Update: " The first 50 orders will receive the bonus DVDs. That has already been
completed. All orders from now until July 20 will be included in a drawing which
will have 5 winners." - Yoav Goren
Update 2: Thanks to everyone who have pre-ordered TRAILERHEAD:SAGA.
Bonus DVDs have been allocated to all confirmed orders up until 11:00PST July 6 (even though more than 50). Any order during the next two weeks is automatically eligible for a drawing to receive the Bonus DVD of Immediate performing live at the Trailer Music Live event.
Immediate Music again...
And because a bad news (see Trailerhead: Saga has been delayed!) never comes alone, here is the last news from Immediate Music's Facebook:
All good things must pass. The set of releases named "Themes For Orchestra & Choir", of which there are 3, has ended its run. Immediate is distributing the TFOAC4 music to its clients under a different branding. Still the same kind of orchestral and choral music, but a more specific response to our clients musical needs. Some of the titles however will surface on future "Trailerhead" commercial CDs.
The great news is: there is a TFOAC 4 around here...
The bad one is: it's not really a TFOAC.
So, what are the plans of Immediate Music? Will there be a serie that will replace the so acclaimed high-end Themes For Orchestra And Choir serie?
Wait and see...
Trailerhead: Saga has been delayed!
My friends, I bear unfortunate news: Trailerhead: Saga has been delayed and will now be releasing near the end of the month. Yoav explained the delay on facebook when he said:
"Strategically, decision has been made to delay release by a couple of weeks for various reasons. So now, looks like end of July :-( Sorry, but there's a coordinated PR effort that hopefully will expose this music to a lot more potential fans, and it's worth building a bit over the next... See few weeks. iTunes looking like July 20 or 27. CDs around the same time. Hang in there guys- we'll get there! Will set up the pre-order page and send an email and Facebook announcement on July 4" - Yoav Goren
Hopefully, the PR effort will succeed and even more people will get a chance to hear the album and possibly become trailer music fans. This delay may in fact be a very good thing!
Don't be sad, because we are giving away delicious slices of cake to anyone who stops by TMN's headquarters! How can you have a care in the world or desire music when your mouth is full of my homemade chocolate icing? Just make sure i give you cake and not one of my "special" brownies. That would be very, very bad.
Trailerhead: Saga Track List!
Immediate Music has posted the tracklist to their upcoming album, Trailerhead: Saga, which releases on July 6!
- Hymnus Orbis
- Glory Seeker
- Libertas
- Invictus
- Oratio Sanctus
- Emergence Of Empire
- In League With Cerberus
- Darkness On The Edge Of Power
- Ashes Of War
- World On A String
- Salvation For A Proud Nation
- Fatum Plebis
- Darkness On The Edge Of Power (Live)
- Surrender To Hope
I wrote to president Obama to make the 6th a national holiday, and given an event of this magnitude he will surely comply! Right?!
Immediate, Globus and City of the Fallen are now on TMN Radio!
Is it possible to get tired of Future World Music, Fired Earth Music and Brickwall Audio? While its clear that the answer is no, you've been testing the limits of how much of such an awesome cocktail the human body can withstand ever since we launched our online radio. While our clinical trials on this magical cure to everyday dulldrums and boredom has acheived wonderful results, we've managed to improve the formula significantly thanks to the generosity of our friends at Immediate Music, Globus and City of the Fallen. All of them have been generous enough to allow us to play some of their music on our station! We have added Trailerhead, Epicon, Epic Live! and 11 tracks from City of the Fallen Vol. 1-3 to our radio! If you like what you hear, we urge you to buy all of Immediate and Globus' public releases, including the upcoming Trailerhead: Saga!
In addition, while percussion-only mixes of existing tracks are really cool, labratory results showed they only improved the awesomeness of the average person's day by a mere 29.84%, well below our target figure of 76.48%. Therefore, we've removed them from the radio. We're hoping that along with Immediate, Globus and City of the Fallen, that your day will be 80% better! We're always working to get more music for the radio, so stay tuned!
The next challenge awaiting us is compressing this radio into pill form, which we are confident will allow us to cure all known diseases and therefore begin our plan for world domination make life wonderful. Thanks are also in order to Jack, who has kindly been hosting the radio for us!
Trailerhead: Saga releases on July 06, and a humbling message from Globus
After three long years, Yoav Goren has unexpectedy updated his long forgotten blog with a brand new update on Trailerhead: Saga and the next Globus Album! Start marking down your calendars now, because the sequel to one of 2008's best releases arrives on July 06! Throw a party! I'll even bring plates, if anybody can actually make a giant trailerhead cake! And no, I can't bake a cake. My last one became sentient and devoured my oven before i put it down.
In all seriousness however, Yoav's message is a very humbling read that gives us a picture of just how devoted Yoav and the entire Immediate Music/Globus crew are to releasing their music. Today's music industry is in terrible shape in terms of sales compared to ten years ago. There is a reason that we don't hear more rock bands employing full orchestras and choirs: It's just too expensive. Yoav sums it up when he says that:
"It just doesn't make sense to sink all that time and money into creating an album which has no hope of ever recouping it's cost, let alone earning a profit. Thankfully, the creative outrules the business side, and this music must emerge for the artist in me to continue breathing"
Globus and the Immediate Music crew are sacrificing the well deserved money they make from their hard work creating fantastic trailer cues to bring us fans more then just copied tracks from their library, but something new altogether. The world needs more artists like this. I hope everyone reading this will support them and buy both Trailerhead: Saga and Globus' next album. I have no doubt they will be worth every penny and more.
The Trailerhead Saga
We've known for quite a while now that Immediate Music has been working on their sequel to Trailerhead, but the name of the album has remained ellusive. You have all weighed in, and at last the name of the album has been revealed! Before the end of the month, you will be able to hold a shiny new copy of Trailerhead: Saga in your hands! I'm dissapointed that my idea of "The Epic Drama Invincible Trailerhead Has A Good Idea During The Cataclysm" wasn't picked.....something to do with the name having already been used before. I'm not sure what they were talking about there. I know it all sounds too good to be true, but Immediate has posted a short clip of the mastering session on facebook!
The album will feature 13 tracks, all of which have been extensively extended and re-cut to provide for the best listening experience - these aren't just trailer cues anymore! It will be availible as both a physical CD from Imperativa Records and as a download from all the major mp3 stores! Get ready to wage the dramatic battle you've always wanted to have with your neighbors annoying chihuahua, because some top-notch epicness is coming your way!
