After 11 or so years of composing lushly cinematic CDs, I feel that Midnight Syndicate have finally managed to release the album that they have always dreamed of doing, but that until now has eluded them. Until ‘Rage’, Midnight Syndicate had always applied their darkened, classically styled and deeply atmospheric compositions to imaginary settings, scenarios or even as a soundtrack to the Dungeons and Dragons role-playing game, but never an actual film itself. These scores have always been soundtracks for the imagination, if you will. But that was then and this is now. With the release of the modern B movie-styled horror flick ‘Rage’, Midnight Syndicate have finally had the opportunity to utilise their craftsman-like skills in producing beautifully haunting and captivating symphonic pieces of music and apply them to the movie, in the shape of its soundtrack.

As you’d expect from MS, the progression from imaginary soundtrack to actual soundtrack isn’t the biggest of leaps, but being able to apply their composing skills to mirroring the movie’s action and intensifying the atmosphere it produces is still somewhat of a challenge. Yet with gauntlet thrown down, they somehow manage to expand the dynamic nature of their previous works to produce a huge, bombastic and intensely stimulating soundtrack, which is as hauntingly majestic and deeply engrossing as you’d expect to find accompanying any horror movie worth its pound of flesh, as it were.

Musically, as you’d expect not just from a soundtrack, but from a group that has become part of the Halloween tradition in the US, and which specialises in crafting hauntingly atmospheric classical and dark ambient-esque compositions, they would be able to accommodate this project with ease, and this shows in the wonderfully deep and exhilarating displays of spine-tingling music that fill this CD. Sitting somewhere in between richly layered dark ambient soundscapes and majestically classical pieces, MS produce a rich, passionate and highly gripping tone that reverberates from the amalgamation of the two styles, and the densely populated aura it produces.

With crystal-clear production and a minute attention to detail, it’s immensely easy to get drawn deeply into the haunting keys, heavenly choral renditions, sporadic industrial noise, intensely pitch-black atmosphere and bittersweet melodies, that are all produced and displayed with a huge amount of charm and charisma throughout the entire soundtrack. Just the music alone is dynamic and menacing enough to make you jump and get your pulse racing, which is exactly what you want and expect from a soundtrack of this nature.

There is a common understanding that soundtracks help escalate the atmosphere and horror projected on the screen in a way that adds a heart-pounding edge to the images they accompany. Without music, the sudden jumps, shocks and scares just wouldn’t be the same. You’d lose that edge of intensity. And when you listen to a soundtrack like ‘Rage’, you can understand why this is, as it works even without visuals. It has the strength, presence and depth to produce an immensely dark and compelling rollercoaster of suspense and anticipation on its own merits. It ticks all of the boxes that a good soundtrack should, and is a credit to the writing skills of Edward Douglas and Midnight Syndicate.

My only slight quibble is that it would perhaps have been interesting to have had a dual release here. The actual movie in DVD format and the accompanying soundtrack on CD would have been great. Perhaps this is in the planning, or perhaps not. Either way, it’s still a fantastic soundtrack, one that Midnight Syndicate needed to produce, and produce it they did, in a way that only they could pull off in such a successful and well executed manner. 

www.midnightsydicate.com

www.myspace.commidnightsyndicate

www.thedeadmatter.com

www.ragefilm.com

www.p13entertainment.com