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Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... only if you are a James Horner completist and you don't mind his blatant re-use of lovable themes from his previous children's scores. Avoid it... if only twenty minutes of Horner material (re-used or not) mixed in between vintage jazz songs isn't worth the price of the out-of-print album. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
Horner's contribution in underscore to Once Around is not that great in length; only 20 minutes of his recordings made it onto album, and even at running time, the repetition is notable. Lightly orchestral in its majority, the four major cues are dominated by "Big Band on Ice," the big band jazz piece that opens the album and serves as the only true highlight for fans looking for any music that'll get the pulse pounding. Three other cues are soft, lovable Horner underscore at its most sensitive, with warm and fuzzy feelings at every moment. A light electronic choir lends a bit of magic to a score otherwise defined by piano, solo woodwind, and small grouping of strings. Prevalent in all four of Horner's score cues are two themes he weaves into nearly every moment; in fact, one of the more interesting aspects of Once Around is to hear these delicate pieces pumped up and adapted into the opening jazz cue. The major problem with these two themes is the extremely obvious fact that they are both rip-offs from two previous, well-respected Horner scores. If you take the final cue, "The Passage of Time," as an example, the cue opens up with the first sub-theme heard in The Land Before Time (usually performed by horns), with absolutely no care whatsoever taken by Horner to manipulate the theme into something fresh for Once Around. At the two-minute mark in that same track, you hear several minutes of what is likely the primary theme for Once Around, which is unfortunately a regurgitation of "Somewhere Out There" from An American Tail. Hearing these two children's themes from Horner's staple scores may be odd in a family drama, but for listening sake, they are both beautiful themes. Quartet style minimalism takes its turns in that final track, but in "The Apology" and "The Arrival," the choral effect over these re-used themes makes for simple bliss. Not so blissful, however, is Varèse Sarabande's album release for Once Around, which disperses Horner's music in between classic jazz pieces. One awkward (although enjoyable in and of its own funkiness) is the Arabic "Sulu Kule" song, which despite its ability to make you want to crank up the volume, has absolutely nothing to do with the score or the other songs. Overall, this album contains pleasant restatements of Horner's previous thematic tenderness, one roaring jazz cue from Horner among a handful of decent vintage jazz songs, and that crazy Arabic piece. Only the true Horner fanatic will find much merit in the price of this out-of-print product.
Score as Heard on Album: * Overall: **
* original score by James Horner
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