Speed Racer: Music Composed By Michael Giacchino

Michael Giacchino is our greatest modern film composer since Danny Elfman.

Giacchino first caught my ear and heart with his jazzy score to The Incredibles, and while he's done lots of great work since then (including the scores to Ratatouille and Mission Impossible III), I'm just over the moon about his score for the unjustly maligned Speed Racer.

I really dug his score when I saw the film two months ago. But now that I've heard it on CD sans the groundbreaking, hallucinatory visuals competing for attention, I'm truly impressed.

Giacchino's jazzy roots are still evident in Speed Racer, but he's done a marvelous thing: he's paid tribute to the original Speed Racer composer, Nobuyoshi Koshibe, and expanded the orchestrations and arrangements to include some really original ideas. Tracks like "Thunderhead," "Casa Cristo" and especially "Grand Ol' Prix" include shifting meters, exotic modes, and dissonant passages. Very cool stuff indeed.

But don't just take my word for it. Swing by Amazon or iTunes and sample some of his stuff.

I can't wait to hear what he does next.