August 16, 2018
MANDY: Jóhann Jóhannsson’s Highly-Anticipated Final Score – Exclusive Soundtrack Preview at The Playlist
Lakeshore Records in conjunction with Invada Records will release Jóhann Jóhannsson’s final work, his original score to the forthcoming horror thriller MANDY, on September 14, seven months after his heartbreaking and untimely death last February. Jóhannsson’s manager, Tim Husom, remembers Jóhann and how the project came about: “My friend and client Jóhann Jóhannsson passed away on February 9, 2018. The last music he created before his death was the score to MANDY. We were working on it right up until the film was delivered to Sundance in early January, 2018. Back in August of 2016 we received a call from Daniel Noah at SpectreVision about this crazy new horror film they were starting that starred Nicolas Cage, Andrea Riseborough, Linus Roach, and directed by Panos Cosmatos. Jóhann had just finished his score for Denis Villeneuve’s film, ARRIVAL, when the MANDY mood boards were sent over to us. They were unbelievably cool and scary. Our interest was hooked immediately. Jóhann’s first email response to me about the project was ‘Seriously, his (Panos’) BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW film is a masterpiece! I love it. And the way he uses music.’ To Jóhann, the idea of working on MANDY with Panos and SpectreVision was bringing some much needed balance to his score career and a perfect next step.”
MANDY is set in the primal wilderness of 1983 where Red Miller, a broken and haunted man hunts an unhinged religious sect who slaughtered the love of his life (IMDB).
In the liner notes Cosmatos states: “Jóhann went above and beyond, and I suspect to the limits of his sanity, to make the music for this movie. His words and his actions made him more than a great collaborator, they made him like a brother to me. I’m sad our time together was so brief but I’m very proud of what he accomplished on MANDY and I believe he was too.”
In addition to the stellar album review, the article covers the early days of the collaboration between Director Panos Cosmatos and the late composer, and the newly-formed Johann Johannsson Foundation.
“Jóhannsson was at the top of his game when working on this highly-anticipated film,” wrote Charles Barfield on The Playlist web site. “The preview gives listeners examples of the beauty, dread, tension, and horror that can be found in the film, but just with the use of the incredible score.”
The Jóhann Jóhannsson Foundation was created by his family and agent Kevin Korn in memory of Jóhannsson to foster and enhance appreciation, education and achievement in the areas of composition, music, and art around the world through educational outreach, a composer scholarship foundation, an annual composer gala event, and international festivals.
Venture over to The Playlist to read more and listen to a 5-minute video sampler of Johannsson’s final score.
The film score was co-produced by Jóhannsson and Randall Dunn and features guitarist Stephen O’Malley from Seattle experimental metal band, Sunn O))) (pronounced “sun”), and the soundtrack album was assembled posthumously in March 2018 with the help of co-producers Pepijn Caudron (Kreng) and Yair Glotman.
Pre-ordering the album from Apple Music and iTunes will garner you two instant-grat tracks as well as an exclusive Bonus Track.
Lakeshore Records and Invada Records released two digital singles from the soundtrack, “Children of the New Dawn” and “Forging The Beast” – listen to them below.
