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Bryan Tyler’s Universal Logo arrangement

Discussion in 'Tips, Tricks & Talk' started by Jeff Laity, Jan 7, 2018.

  1. #1 Jeff Laity, Jan 7, 2018


    Seems like a mess to me. The 8th note strings just march along over everything, there are a few disjointed ideas, feels like they just wanted to turn up the EPIC knob. He also managed to make the Hollywood Symphony play out of time. I guess this has been around for a while but it’s new to me.

    Reminds me of when my dance teacher cousin in NJ asked for a stompy remix of the Williams Superman theme. I did it but I felt horrible afterwards. She was happy though.
     
  2. #2 Mike Verta, Jan 7, 2018
    What a fucking travesty. Lord Christ how do you fuck up the Universal Logo? Unbelievable.
     
    Mike Worth likes this.
  3. #3 Sam Miller, Jan 7, 2018
    That's rough. You could repost the video as 'Brian Tyler Shreds' with no changes. Kill it with fire.
     
    Si Withenshaw likes this.
  4. #4 Matthias Calis, Jan 8, 2018
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2018
    Ok, my opinion of Mr. "Studio cleff" is becoming increasingly... skeptical. The playing out of time is very noticeable and given the quality of these players this can only be the conductor's fault. Now, considering Brian usually conducts himself...

    Well...

    Now I feel like trying my hand to try and mockup something better.
     
    Phillip J. Faddoul likes this.
  5. #5 Phillip J. Faddoul, Jan 8, 2018
    Swatting flies...
     
  6. #6 Alexander Schiborr, Jan 8, 2018
    Hey Guys,
    Apart from all the critic I read: is there anything actually you did like on his take? I listened a couple of times through his piece and some stuff or ideas and what repurposed from the original motif I actually don´t find that bad. Sure the structure is here not that 100 percent maybe, but the orchestration is nice. His ideas of putting the logo theme in different contexts is well..you know I could start criticing here also, but let ask a question which is aimed not only at you but also to myself: Can I do that better? Or can I do a descent workover of the theme? I didn´t tried it out yet. So I thought maybe before slamming Bryan Tyler to the floor: How about that we practise and do something on our own. Speaking no good words about someones else work is fair and everybody is free to express his opinion, still: Can we do that better? Hmm:D Just a thought..
     
    Matthias Calis likes this.
  7. #7 Matthias Calis, Jan 8, 2018
    You're right @Alexander Schiborr, and that's why I edited in that I wanted to give it a try to make my own version. It's quite easy to hate, and I am not innocent of that, though I always try to be careful with my judgements. That said, my tone here was probably fairly judgemental, and large part of that stems that I keep encountering Brian's name in less than favourable contexts.

    Then again, I was rummagin through some old files today and I realized that I had the Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag score on my old phone, which I quite liked listening to and which was composed by... you guessed it, Brian Tyler.

    So yeah, while I don't retract my statement about the musicians being off the beat (they clearly are), I shall withold further judgement of the man until I've given it a try myself. It's tempting to edit my not-so-flattering comment, but I'm going to leave it as-is.

    Now it's time to put my money where my mouth is.
     
    Alexander Schiborr likes this.
  8. #8 Alexander Schiborr, Jan 8, 2018
    Exactly. I mean considering in what times we live with the current and foremost epic soundtracks this is a track which utilizes a lot of different colors in the orchestra this track is prety cool. So kudos to him. You know it is like: We can hate everything what is done there or we can say: So what is good about what he did and in particular: Can we do it also and can we do it better? I have my doubts? I would not say of myself that I shit out a version which is superior to his one. What I wanted so say by that: It is easier to critic than to realize if you can do it better or in general. Sure Mike can do for sure a great impression with that. But not everybody is a Mike with 30 years of experience. And I bet even he would put his skill to a challenge to make a descent workover of this theme. I bet he can. But maybe oyu get point :D
     
  9. #9 Alexander Schiborr, Jan 8, 2018
    I would just appreciate that will still be fair with what we say. I know I have my moments too where I slamdunk certain things to the ground but actually I feel that he tried to make something good and even if he doesn´t succeed to the art of "longform" motif development architecture it is still for me a nice thing to see somehone utilizes orchestral colors. I do want to prevent that we are getting here a crowd of elitist composers who are having to critic everything which is done nowadays but without proving we could maybe do better. But yeah..I know..I am no saint and still that is my feeling so I say it to you, my friends.
     
    Matthias Calis likes this.
  10. #10 Jeff Laity, Jan 8, 2018
    I think it would be fair to critique this even if you couldn’t play a note. It might be a fun exercise to try it when I have the time. But I would want to be respectful of Goldsmith’s version, which is a classic. You can’t just throw staccato strings and Hiroshima toms on top of it and get a modern-sounding track.

    I guess part of the problem is that Goldsmith sounded like Hollywood 20 years ago, but now Hollywood sounds like Tyler. But this is trying to be both and ends up being neither.
     
  11. #11 Alexander Schiborr, Jan 8, 2018
    And Williams, Silvestri..Horner..and many more. Well I mean sure..you don´t need to play a note on the piano to be eligible to say your opinion. Actually here in our little forum I thought maybe we should at least be fair. So I ask you: what do you think about that theme B Tyler did? Do you like it? or if not what you miss?
     
  12. #12 Alexander Schiborr, Jan 8, 2018
    Hi Mike,

    Well, you are without any doubt the guy with the most skill and experience of us all here. Actually I thought a lot about your comment. I listened to his theme and while I think it is has structural problems I still got some parts where I think he did some nice stuff. So...what is actually the most thing what you didn´t like there? As I am not a capacity like you I would like to know what you miss and how we or also myself could learn to make it different. Your statements reads like on scale from 1 - 10 that Bryan Tyler got 1 Point out of 10. So I am interested what you miss there. Thank you. And Happy New Year to you too! :)
     
  13. #13 Patrick McClanahan, Jan 8, 2018
    You make a good point. I actually like Brian Tyler, but I am not a fan of his version of the Universal Logo. Having said that, I don't think I could do better! I really enjoy some of his other work like the following -

     
  14. #14 Sam Miller, Jan 8, 2018
    Asking yourself, "can I do better?" might be useful, but I think we're missing the underlying issue here - did it need to be redone? If there answer is yes, then you're up against some big problems. The original theme is iconic, it's familiar and it's memorable. Anyone doing a new version needs to overcome those three issues and I don't think Tyler does.

    His version was hard to lock on to and hard to get in my head. It felt like there were a couple of ideas he liked and then proceeded to bridged his way between them with bland filler. Overall it's just not compelling enough for me to go, "Yup, I'd rather hear that than the original." What's frustrating is that Tyler isn't necessarily a bad composer. Sure, he's done some pretty run-of-the-mill popcorn movies, but I'm sure he's capable of doing better.
     
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