CD Review: STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (Complete Score) - Original Soundtrack

There are some soundtracks that signal a truly major voice in film scoring has arrived- like the time you heard the raging brass of Max Steiner’s KING KONG, the sultry jazz of Alex North’s A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE, Jerry Goldsmith’s PATTON march or the trumpeting first bars of John Williams’ STAR WARS (younger geeks could probably add the Egyptian adventure of David Arnold’s STARGATE and the spy super-heroics of Michael Giacchino’s THE INCREDIBLES to that spectacular mix tape). But for my geek generation, a huge bolt from the blue was hearing the nautical space adventure stylings of James Horner’s STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN. It was a score (not to mention movie) that stands as a highpoint in science fiction, bold writing that would blast Horner off to become one of the dominant musical forces in Hollywood.

Not that his low budget scores for such Roger Corman films as UP FROM THE DEPTHS and THE LADY IN RED showed talent you’d sneeze at. But it was doubtless the thematic scope that Horner gave to the terrifically enjoyable BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS that got the notice of director Nicholas Meyer, who gave the 28 year-old Horner the budget to take his epic sound to the next level. It certainly must have been more than a bit imposing for Horner to follow on the footsteps of Jerry Goldsmith’s score for STAR TREK- THE MOTION PICTURE, music whose cosmic grandeur was recognized as a classic even if that film was not.


But this time, Paramount, and Meyer were certainly after something more visceral after the visually awe-inspiring, if emotionally cold TMP. And Horner delivered the sauce with goods big time, creating a rousing, brassy score that would set the tone for a career that would include such genre masterworks as COCOON, THE ROCKETEER and HONEY, I SHRUNK THE KIDS (not to mention such dramas as GLORY, APOLLO 13 and the Oscar-winning TITANIC).


First released on vinyl by Atlantic Records, and then on CD by GNP / Crescendo, Horner’s score for KHAN was one of the better-assembled soundtracks for the time, taking the film’s best cues to create a cohesive, 44 minute album that didn’t make listeners feel they lacked for something. But now Film Score Monthly has come along 27 years after the great genre cinema Summer of 1982 to release STAR TREK II in all of it’s dramatic, hollow planetoid screaming glory, showing off KHAN as even more of a landscape-altering score than ever before. Better yet, it’s not a limited edition, leaving this CD open for a whole new, J.J. Abrams-obsessed universe of Trekkies to discover.


While Goldsmith included a necessary smattering of Alexander Courage’s TV TREK theme, Horner was smart enough to make even more use of it in the score before going into his own “Main Title.” Taking a lot of the notes out of the kind of seafaring, “old fashioned” sound inspired by the likes of Claude Debussy’s “La Mer.” The Enterprise turned into a noble, symphonic ship sailing on a twinkling bed of “stars”- fulfilling Meyer’s, and Gene Roddenberry’s vision of Kirk as a futuristic Captain Horatio Hornblower.
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For a composer who first fancied himself a concert hall composer, Horner’s knowledge, and brilliant talent of the use of leitmotifs would fill KHAN with the kind of connective, thematic tissue that’s almost a thing of the past today, with each major character or plot device having a recognizable sound to it. Spock would have ethereal, “alien” feel, Khan’s menace simmering percussion and Kirk noble brass. Horner has a constant, energetic flow of his musical ideas throughout KHAN, with cues that go for extended lengths with end of diverse interest. This was the kind of pulse-racing excitement that inspired kids to race around their rooms with toy spaceship in hand as the soundtrack blared, music that immediately brought the thrill of heroic combat back into the TREK universe.


Cues like “Surprise Attack,” “Kirk’s Explosive Reply,” “Battle in the Mutara Nebula” and “Genesis Countdown” are already the stuff of legend, textbook demonstrations on how to thematically build excitement to a cosmic fever pitch. What this KHAN CD offers for the first time is more than twenty minutes of previously unheard music, beginning with the creeping threat of “Khan’s Pets,” music that set forth the kind of building suspense that he’d use for the even nastier critters in ALIENS. Hammering percussion then sends “The Eels of Ceti Alpha V” into Chekov and Captain Terrell’s ears. Spock ethereal, electronic theme is also more present, as his meditative synths break into a noble, military march as “Kirk Takes Command.” But synth composer (and former Trek actor) Craig Huxley is also on the bridge with the eerie electronic wash for “The Genesis Project.” Where Goldsmith had made notable use of Huxley’s “blaster beam” in his TMP score, Horner had also run with this growlingly resonating instrument for BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS before using it here.


This expanded KHAN opens up plenty more of it’s villain’s brassy menace, if not horror movie terror as Kirk and company discover his victims “Inside Regula I,” suspenseful menace that grows slyly as it’s revealed that Chekov and Terrell have been “Brainwashed.” In one of the best “new” cues here, the gnarly anguish of the eel victims grows before the dark, sacrificial “triumph” against Khan with “Captain Terrell’s Death.” Khan’s dark, two-note theme rips with orchestral exclamation points that gives Kirk the chance for his equally infamous yell during “Buried Alive” all before Horner engages in the sparkling revelation of “The Genesis Cave,” showing the kind of magical orchestral wonder that would become part and parcel of such fantasy scores as KRULL, JUMANJI and THE SPIDERWICK CHRONICLES.


With “Battle in the Mutara Nebula,” Horner employs a penny whistle, percussive military rhythms and dissonant suspense that plays the final combat between the Enterprise and the Reliant not so much as some cat-and-mouse spacefight as it Horner’s intention of a slow-moving submarine duel. This cue is one of the cannons in Horner’s oeuvre, yet one that has always been missing the Enterprise’s coup de grace over Khan. That is until now, as “Enterprise Attacks Reliant” trumpets the photon blasts that put an end to ship, Khan’s theme crashing in around him. Another major cue that’s amazingly been unheard until now is “Spock (Dies).” For what might be the most emotional goodbye in sci-fi history, Horner employs Spock’s theme, its flute-like sound dying away to be replaced by the Courage theme, and then Kirk’s with a poignant realization that his universe will never be the same again- or at least until Horner helped resurrect Spock for STAR TREK III.


The remaining treats of this unabashed KHAN are the bagpipes of “Amazing Grace” as Spock is sent to his sequel reward, the orchestra taking over the theme to turn the Vulcan into the stuff of legend. For a label known for its slavish devotion to music, the inclusion of Nimoy’s voiceover on the films “Epilogue / End Title” almost comes as a shock- until the same piece plays over again sans dialogue as an eight-minute bonus track. This music accompanied the original end of the film, sans the additional footage of a photon torpedo enclosing Spock’s yet-to-rise body.


Captain Kirk may have had a five-year mission when he set out on NBC. But there’s no doubt that FSM head Lukas Kendall has accomplished a major part of his label’s goal with this long-awaited release, especially since it doesn’t have a finite number to encourage the Khans of Ebay. Indeed, STAR TREK II has never been more of a masterwork than with this CD’s terrific sound, or explained as well with the liner notes by Kendall, Jeff Bond and Alexander Kaplan. One can only hope that the first, truly complete release of a TREK film score somehow signals that more might be released from The Great Licensing Barrier. But for now at least, the needs of the many Trekkie and Horner fans have outweighed the few.

http://www.ifmagazine.com/review.asp?article=3383