The new Watchmen series on HBO is now a few weeks in, and today we get to finally hear the first volume of the score put together by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. Of course, if you've been watching the show, you've been hearing pieces of this anyway.
The music is now streaming on all platforms. Here are the Spotify and Apple Music embeds:
https://open.spotify.com/album/3TB6SKSLA7zUN1jIKwO31e#=
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kal9OQPEfthsvjRM5q7TCMELggfBzrCK0
More services can be found here.
In related news, Reznor spoke to Rolling Stone, and it's a great interview covering a lot of topics.
In the interview, he explained why he decided to hop on this score:
“It would be a lot easier for [Watchmen show runner] Damon [Lindelof] to make something that was not called Watchmen than it is to make something for fans that are unpleasable,” he says on a call from his California home. “Just taking on the IP doesn’t feel safe, so Atticus and I are all in with this show. We think it’s interesting, important storytelling — and it’s entertaining and it’s risky.”
Later he added:
[I]n the first 10 minutes of meeting Damon in person and speaking with him, my suspicions about who I thought he was — an intelligent deep thinker — were confirmed. In addition to that, Atticus and I walked out of the meeting thinking, “OK, he’s one of us.” We’re operating on the same kind of wavelength in terms of, “We’re here to do the best job that we can. There’s no ego at the door. Let’s take our gloves off and just get down to business and let’s push each other to make the best thing we can.”
As for why it's being released in three volumes:
Well, we’re having some fun with the way that it’s released. There are a number of reasons behind doing that. One is there is quite a bit of music, and I think when you drop a big chunk — a couple hours’ worth of music — on the public these days, that’s a good way to get 90 percent of it ignored. So breaking it up is good. The motivation wasn’t to monetize it three times; that wasn’t what the deciding factor was. And we’re putting it out on vinyl because we’ve been on a physical-object kick. Speaking for myself, that’s for nostalgic reasons. I’m looking at a shelf full of vinyl albums right now, and it that feels a little different than something that’s a cloud-based file, which feels a little disposable. They also tie into Watchmen. Let’s put it this way: We overthought it.
