Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs Soundtrack Review
Typically Solid, Charming Animation Score by John Powell
Jul 19, 2009
In a flourishing career filled with animation projects, John Powell is a man who will seemingly never run out of musical ideas. Scores for Bolt, Horton Hears a Who!, Happy Feet, Robots, Shrek, The Road to El Dorado and Antz have proved his boundless creativity even as they have aided the evolution of his own distinct compositional voice since he departed from Hans Zimmer’s Remote Control Productions.
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs happily continues the trend with a score bubbling over with warm charisma and lovable energy, soaring with support of full orchestra and choir. The overall sound of the production will be very familiar to collectors of the man’s music, but the distinct appeal of his themes (carried over from his equally entertaining Ice Age 2: The Meltdown) and the memorable style with which they are orchestrated and developed make the score as fresh and enjoyable as any Powell score to date.
Ice Age 3 Soundtrack Neatly Avoids Slapstick Pitfalls
It being a score for an animated comedy, however, there is certainly a fair amount of “mickey mousing” in the music, a scurrying, zany stop-and-go momentum in the music which is perfectly timed to the slapstick events on screen, but potentially fragmented and disjointed as a standalone experience on album.
Unlike Michael Giacchino’s concurrent score to Land of the Lost, Powell’s score still succeeds because of his warm, attractive themes and conservative, digestible instrumentation.
Genre-Bending Variations in Powell's Ice Age 3 Score
Despite much of the initial portion of the score being comprised of laid-back variations on some of the softer ideas in Ice Age 2, Powell throws a good amount of thunderously epic percussive and choral cues to represent the dinosaur world and characters (the trio of cues “Momma,” “Entry to Lost World” and “Dinosaur Vista” are perfect introductions to this aspect of the score).
Powell also employs some genius Golden-Age romance throwback moments: “Scrat Finds Furry Love” is a short but dramatically emotional piano variation of the classic “You’ll Never Find Another Love Like Mine,” supported by full orchestra, choir and tolling bells. “The Call of the Siren Acorn” and “True Love for Our Hero” make brief but amusing use of “Adagio from Spartacus”, while the beginning of the wonderfully satisfying “End Credits” sounds remarkably like a beefed-up, humorously tongue-in-cheek variation of the “Jupiter” movement from Holst’s classical suite, The Planets.
Powell's Diverse and Lengthy Score
With 44 tracks and a running time of almost 74 minutes, it would be too great a chore to exhaustively describe all aspects of John Powell’s work. Like many animated scores, Ice Age 3 crosses genres in hyper, parody form quite often, and in this case many of the tracks are very short (13 seconds in one instance!).
Again, while the score does admittedly suffer from many problems common to animation soundtracks (lack of fluidity, fragmented presentation of themes, etc.), Powell’s score manages to maintain a very respectable entertainment level, due partly to his fine orchestrations and partly to the sheer energy with which the music rendered.
Conclusion
Powell’s score has a warmth, enchanting charm and beauty which is extremely refreshing to hear from a Hollywood composer, which, combined with its innate exuberance and surprising emotional and intellectual depth, makes it a solid and winning experience.
Some listeners may desire to hear Powell explore new genres (or to hear up-and-coming composers get a chance to tackle these animated projects), but Powell’s consistently high-quality output in the genre cannot be denied, and every incarnation of his musical voice in this category proves delightful. This score is highly recommended!
See Also: Bolt Soundtrack Review, Kung Fu Panda Soundtrack Review
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