Yo, ho, holy crap... it's The Rock as pirate music. I could probably stop there as that one sentence sums my entire feelings and contains an adequate description of Klaus Badelt's score. However, that would be a touch unprofessional, not that I get paid to type this drivel. It's only fair to open by saying that I was one of the many who was thoroughly disappointed that Alan Silvestri's participation on this project fell through. After his terrific effort for The Mummy Returns, he seemed a great choice to tackle another attempt to revive the once popular swashbuckler, this time based on a theme park ride; Hollywood, desperate? Surely not. However, as a Jerry Bruckheimer film, the music moved in a Media Ventures direction and one of the new rising stars, Klaus Badelt. He seems more capable than many of his MV colleagues to pen halfway decent music, but Pirates of the Caribbean is a blaring and soulless creation that doesn't sparkle, it just shouts, constantly.

The press release that I received with the album states that Badelt was invited to Hollywood by Hans Zimmer after scoring many films in Germany. It seems likely that he had his own style before arriving in America, but despite having started promisingly, Pirates of the Caribbean leaves the distinct impression of a temp track botch job. This perhaps isn't surprising, since the moniker of "Music by Klaus Badelt" largely ignores the list of additional music credits: Ramin Djawadi, James Dooley, Nick Glennie-Smith, Steve Jablonsky, Blake Neely, James McKee Smith, and Geoff Zanelli. Many of those also contributed to "Hans Zimmer's" Tears of the Sun and there the results were often extremely good, particularly those by Steve Jablonsky. However, here each track seems to just thunder and grind its way through the usual mix of pounding synth percussion, blaring brass (possibly synthetic, it's hard to tell these days) and often topped out with a chorus. Only the opening track and its jaunty jig tune offers any feeling for the genre or period. A couple of other tracks reprise the material, but aside from a few fleeting quiet cues, or part cues (usually a subdued final 30 seconds or less), offer any respite from the onslaught.

If Erich Wolfgang Korngold were alive, he'd be rolling in his grave and frankly I wouldn't blame him. As Media Ventures scores go, this is at the distinctly obnoxious end of the spectrum and aside from the jig, you'd be hard pressed to tell it's from a pirate movie. I was pretty scathing about Harry Gregson-Williams' score to the animated Sinbad released around the same time, but in comparison, it's a beacon of subtlety and imagination. At first I was disappointed that the Pirates of the Caribbean album is relatively brief, but by about halfway through I'd already had more than enough. There's no let up, almost no change in tempo, volume or drama. I suppose you could argue that there are no dull moments and the jig tune is rather nice, but otherwise, there's not much in the way of redeeming features. It is possible to produce a pirate movie with the Hans Zimmer/Media Ventures sound and as such, I recommend Muppet Treasure Island instead. Plus it has a frog duetting with a pig. What more could you want?

Rating ~

1. Fog Bound (2:17)
2. The Medallion Calls (1:53)
3. The Black Pearl (2:17)
4. Will and Elizabeth (2:08)
5. Swords Crossed (3:16)
6. Walk the Plank (1:59)
7. Barbosa is Hungry (4:06)
8. Blood Ritual (3:33)
9. Moonlight Serenade (2:09)
10. To the Pirates' Cave (3:31)
11. Skull and Crossbones (3:24)
12. Bootstrap's Bootstrap (2:39)
13. Underwater March (4:13)
14. One Last Shot (4:46)
15. He's a Pirate (1:31)

Total Time ~ 43:37