> Not helping matters is that minutes of score are embedded within the
> songs, so there really is no way to have a 'score only' experience.
Oh yeah... that's true. Rats. I'd be willing to have a complete release with songs included (just not the 'extra' songs), but I'm sure that would be a complete nightmare to license.
> I'm intrigued to hear how The Ring sounds in more complete form now
> that I'm finally allowing myself to listen to the La-La Land expansion
> that's been sitting on a shelf for months.
If you liked the material as heard on the Ring/Ring 2 album or especially within the film, then you'll love it. There's nothing to surprisingly revelatory on the complete presentation outside of the original versions of some cues compared to their film counterparts (included on the second disc of extras).
> It's too bad Hans still despises the film Broken Arrow so. That
> music would be perfect for his concerts.
That is too bad as his score is a ton of fun, even if it was written in contempt of the film itself.
> Hannibal wasn't the first instance of Hans emphasizing low strings
> in his ensemble (that may have been The Fan), but he did start
> using that technique with greater frequency after that movie. Heck, he
> talked about it in an interview for The Ring the very next year!
It's a sound that is now 'so Zimmer' that it's hard to believe there was a genesis point for it. 
> Funny enough, I'm in the middle of my first listen to Black Rain as
> I write this and I totally understand what you were saying earlier about
> bits of it showing up in the Bond score. Quite humorous indeed.
Haha, yep. It also popped up at the end of 'Molossus' in Batman Begins and 'Soccent Attack' in Jablonsky's Transformers. It's fun action/drama material but after seeing Black Rain, it always sticks out to me.
> As a film it's not outright bad, but it never feels like it's living up to
> its potential, and the animation is ugly compared to what Disney was
> churning out that year (Tangled and Toy Story 3).
> The music plays much better in expanded format - but even most
> unmentionables on the internet don't include the terrific climactic fight
> music, which only seems to exist on Lorne's webpage.
Well, that's disappointing.
