After some truly lackluster scores in the past few years, James Newton Howard has given us The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep to show us that he hasn’t lost the touch that made us all love his music in the first place. The Water Horse is one of the best scores of 2007 and easily Howard’s best since last year’s Lady in the Water. It’s fun, emotional, and joy to listen to.
Before I go any further, I must admit that I’m a huge fan of Celtic music and my review will obviously reflect that. While this is primarily an orchestral score, there is still a good deal of Celtic influence and instrumentation performed wonderfully by the Chieftains. It firmly evokes the idyllic Scottish countryside where the film takes place.
The album opens with Sinéad O'Connor’s song “Back Where You Belong.” Simply put, this is a horrible song. O’Connor has a fairly unique voice, but for some reason or another it doesn’t mesh well with this song. It sounds as if she straining to hit the notes. Matters certainly don’t improve when speaking of the lyrics; they’re laughable. This is only the second song I’ve heard from O’Connor. The other, and far superior, is “One More Day” from Harry Gregson-Williams’ Veronica Guerin.
“Main Title” beings the score portion of the album. It presents a lovely theme on solo violin that only makes an appearance a few times on the album. The first half of the album is nicely balanced bouncing back and forth between warm thematic underscore and Celtic jollies. In these first cues, there a few minor themes presented such as the Lady in the Water like “Angus Feeds Crusoe.” Most predominant however is the theme for Angus and Crusoe. It’s this theme that continues to come back in various iterations throughout the entire score.
“Swimming”, a 6.5 minute cue halfway through the album, is one of the finest tracks of the year. Angus and Crusoe’s theme is presented quietly on woodwind and acoustic guitar before racing strings and brass stir up the musical pot and move into a jaunty Celtic style jig. This then gives way to a stunningly beautiful bit of music with predominant cello and choir before bursting into the first grandiose statement of the Angus and Crusoe theme.
Besides having one the best tracks of the year, Water Horse also has one of the best finales as well. Beginning with “Saving Crusoe” this action oriented portion of the album showcases Howard’s big orchestral sound at it’s finest. Of particular interest is gorgeous buildup in the final minute of “The Net” with choir, brass and strings.
The Water Horse is most likely not a score you will truly appreciate on first listen. It takes multiple listens to pick up on it’s thematic subtlety. Make no mistake though, this is one of the best albums of 2007, and after a particularly poor year for original and genuine film music, it’s great to have a score like this come in and save the day.
4/5
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