Filmtracks Traffic Rank: #1,880
Written 10/6/10
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Buy it... on either of its nearly identical, rare score-only albums
if you seek a pleasantly undemanding children's score that will meet
your expectations but not exceed them.
Avoid it... if even a heartfelt primary theme of sincere character
cannot salvage a listening experience that does apply necessary Carl
Stalling/Warner Brothers cartoon techniques for the squeaky
protagonists' activities.
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| Lennertz |
Alvin and the Chipmunks: (Christopher Lennertz)
Regardless of the disdain that many feel towards the high-pitched vocal
manipulations that made these memorable chipmunks famous in the 1960's,
their longevity and popularity continue to impress. Songwriter Ross
Bagdasarian's 1958 creations translated their Grammy-winning success
into a 1961 television show that became a staple of children's viewing
for decades. Songs performed by Alvin, Simon, and Theodore linger in the
memory because of their uniquely tweaked vocalizations, obnoxious pop
culture icons resurrected in part by Bagdasarian's son for a 2007
animated feature. Fox's adaptation of the idea mixed animated and live
action elements, telling of the story of how the three famous chipmunks
used their speaking abilities to become famous. The plot of Alvin and
the Chipmunks reboots the concept in modern times, largely ignoring
the long history of the characters until an overview of their many cover
versions of songs at the end. Their relationship with their surrogate
human father and battles with an evil music executive determined to use
them to his advantage prove the heart and foil of what otherwise is an
excuse to give their high pitched squeaking opportunities to mangle
songs. Incredibly, the film was a monumental fiscal success, finishing
in the top 10 highest grossing films of 2007 and returning over $360
million on an investment of $60 million. It definitely helped composer
Christopher Lennertz continue his transition from television and video
game scores to mainstream feature projects; within just a few years, he
would become not only a reliable provider of innocuous children's music
similar to his work for Alvin and the Chipmunks, but also a
source of intriguingly superior parody music for wretched cultural
comedies. A few unique challenges faced Lennertz when writing for
Alvin and the Chipmunks, the first obviously the task of
balancing the wacky personality of the characters' singing personas with
a score that was genuine enough to lend the concept some sense of warmth
and heart. Avoiding a straight Carl Stalling/Warner Brothers rip-off is
always a difficult aspect of such assignments, too. There are the
inevitable Stalling-like passages of whirlwind orchestral mayhem, the
action sequences begging for familiar material in this regard. But the
most interesting hurdle to jump for this score was the fact that the
music's instrumental tone couldn't interfere with dialogue that exists
in the highest registers of the soundscape (rather than usual human
pitch). With sincerity and a bit of technical creativity, Lennertz
succeeds in providing the film with what it needed, though the result is
still somewhat generic genre fodder when presented alone on album.
Not all of the pitfalls of hyperactive children's
scores are avoided by Lennertz in
Alvin and the Chipmunks, but
it's a generally pleasing listening experience. The attractive aspects
of the score are its attempts to bring sympathy to the film's primary
human character, Dave. Lennertz focuses his thematic content on that
character, yielding a soothingly tender theme for acoustic guitar,
piano, and sometimes the full orchestral ensemble. The composer's
ability to balance his orchestral sections with neatly wrapped
counterpoint and melody assignment is one of his career distinctions,
and "Main Title" is an outstanding example of this talent. The score's
mannerisms (and especially the applications of unobtrusive brass
counterpoint) place it close to David Newman's lengthy career sound for
similar assignments (Newman would not surprisingly score the 2009 sequel
in this franchise), while a generally hopelessly optimistic tone will
remind of Mark McKenzie's softer character scores of a decade prior.
Some of the plucked, staggered movements in the flowing portions pull a
few techniques from the Thomas Newman playbook. The resulting balance
sometimes features shades of Jerry Goldsmith's fluffier, later material
and for true film score collectors may even recall Basil Poledouris'
extremely limited forays into this kind of sound (perhaps just a
coincidence even given Lennertz's association with the late composer).
The press materials for
Alvin and the Chipmunks always made note
of Lennertz's creative employment of processed or altered percussion to
represent the chipmunks' forest heritage. These include backwards
renditions of metallic percussive hits and various struck wooden accents
to mimic falling acorns and the likes. While seemingly a good initial
idea, the finished score really doesn't flaunt these contributions with
enough clarity in the mix to make them much of a factor. In fact, some
listeners may not even notice them. The backwards triangle edits sound
like a cliche given their all-too frequent employment in sampled (or at
least partially electronic) scores of the 2000's. Such sounds would be
more at home in parody music like Lennertz's
Vampires Suck. The
personality of
Alvin and the Chipmunks remains overwhelmingly
orchestral, however, and its brief, 35-minute running time on album is
as easy as it is workmanlike and predictable. Aside from the obligatory
song compilation soundtrack album, the score alone was released twice
soon after its debut. It was first pressed as a composer promo at the
time of the film's release and was then afforded a 1,000-copy run by
La-La Land Records in 2008. The contents (and sound quality) of these
two albums are roughly the same, with some merging and slight
rearranging of shorter cues on the latter album. Either way, it's an
effortless 35 minutes of fun that will meet but not necessarily exceed
your expectations.
*** @Amazon.com: CD or
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