• Composed by Tyler Bates
• Lakeshore Records / 2012 / 50:08

Aliens attack earth by using the power supply in The Darkest Hour.  The inconvenience of not being able to watch television in this nightmare scenario is hard to imagine, but at least my electric toothbrush holds its charge for a couple of weeks, so I’d still have minty fresh breath every morning for that period.  The musical accompaniment for this exciting enterprise comes from Tyler Bates – his fourth new film score of 2011 (and he’s done some television work too).  It is largely electronic and I can’t help but wonder whether someone attacked the power supply during either its composition or recording (possibly both).

Bleep!  Squeeeeeee…dit!  BAM!  Never before has it been so easy to write out how a film score sounds.  Apart from that highly-descriptive effort, perhaps the other best way I could describe it is as a collection of noises – some of which occur at the same time, others occur at different times.  I suppose some people might call it music, but then some people call McDonald’s a restaurant.  I was widely pilloried earlier in the year when I not only found some redeeming features in this composer’s Conan the Barbarian, I actually quite enjoyed it.  Redeeming features are notable by their absence in The Darkest Hour, easily the most unimpressive film score album I’ve heard in a very long time.  It might work wonders as accompaniment to the film, but the only thing it works away from it is my patience.  The darkest hour, indeed.  NO STARS

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