Jared Egol
I had an absolutely miserable day, but evolved it into an unforgettable evening by picking this album up, turning it on in the dark, and rewatching SOLARIS through this aural refraction. It made the work newly elliptical for me.
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Acclaimed UK electronic musician Kevin Richard Martin (The Bug, King Midas Sound) releases a stunningly powerful rescore of Andrei Tarkovsky’s seminal 1972 movie Solaris on Phantom Limb.
In May 2020, British musician Kevin Martin was invited by the Vooruit arts centre in Gent, Belgium to compose a new score for a film of his choice. Having been long inspired by pioneering Soviet filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky, Martin tells us that his 1972 masterpiece Solaris was the “natural choice”. The film is an unattested giant, not only of science fiction and Soviet film, but also in the annals cinematic history. And its original score, composed by regular Tarkovsky collaborator and early Soviet electronic musician Eduard Artemyev, is a magnificent work of haunting majesty, a key element to the film’s brilliance. Martin’s challenge was great: “it was with a certain amount of trepidation I stepped into such large footprints,” he writes.
The results - Return to Solaris - are breathtaking. The film is intense, psychologically devastating and bleakly compelling. Interweaving themes of love, horror, sorrow, nostalgia, memory and dystopia, Martin’s score expertly mirrors this expansive breadth of psychic weight, from existential dread to heartbreaking poignancy, with immense emotional gravity. Drawn to its “narrative struggle between organic, pastoral memories of a lost past, and the harsh, dystopian realities of a futuristic hell,” Martin employs atonal noise, simmering waves of distorted synthesis, undulating drones and otherworldly, astronomic sound-design to crushing effect. Subtly submerged recurring motifs - reflections of individual characters - rise and fall amidst the fog, occasionally illuminating the doom like motes of starlight, before settling back into the density of space.
Tarkovsky’s Solaris won the Grand Prix Spécial du Jury at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival and was screened for an incredible fifteen years uninterrupted in the Soviet Union. It is placed highly in “greatest movies of all time” lists published by Empire and the BBC, among others. Steven Soderburgh directed a Hollywood remake in 2002, starring George Clooney, and scored by Cliff Martinez.
credits
released June 25, 2021
Music performed, produced and composed by Kevin Richard Martin
Mastered by Stefan Betke
Artwork by Simon Fowler
supported by 104 fans who also own “Return to Solaris”
Absolutely love this album. I’ve been listening to it constantly as I write my podcast. The compositions are perfect. Creating just the right balance of moods and introspection. By far the best collection of ambience I’ve listened to this year. ES
supported by 91 fans who also own “Return to Solaris”
The perfect accompaniment to reading Shirley Jackson's short stories. A creeping unease....granular, twitchy, lengthening moans (or am I 'hearing' things?!?), mournful beauty. Utterly magnificent. jahrigsby
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