With Gareth Evans’ utterly spectacular sequel The Raid 2 gearing up for an expanded theatrical release this weekend, we thought this would be a perfect opportunity to catch up with the film’s composer Joseph Trapanese, whose sonic contributions to the film were just as integral as anything that was happening visually on the screen throughout Evans’ epic actioner.
And while Trapanese may not be a name that necessarily jumps out at you, the highly talented composer has racked up quite the resume in just eight short years, working on films like TRON: Legacy, Oblivion, Fast Five, The Bourne Legacy as well as The Raid: Redemption, where he collaborated with Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda. During our interview, Trapanese discussed his approach to the score for The Raid 2, his approach to creating timeless but modern film music, his thoughts on working on studio albums versus creating music for film and more.
Let’s start off by talking about the approach you and Gareth took towards The Raid 2. Not to downplay the first Raid, but this one is such a bigger movie in almost every way. What was your approach to tackling a film that’s two and a half hours like this that has so many intricacies in both the scenes and the story as well? Did you collaborate with Gareth on ideas for the score throughout production or did he just let you go wild with everything?
Joseph Trapanese: Well, we watched the film and we talked about some of the things early on that were important for Gareth to address in The Raid 2 in order to find those key scenes that really open up those doors. Because that was the key, and you nailed it perfectly- this is a two and a half hour film and if we just think about it that way, I’m going to just go crazy. So luckily, Gareth was very helpful after the film was wrapped because he knew exactly which scenes we needed to look at first.
I think the first scene we approached was the one with Rama and his wife early on in the film so that was the first door we wanted to open. What does that side of Rama sound like? And so then we took those sounds, that music, and continued to develop it throughout the film as Rama’s story continues to build. In the same way, two of the first full scenes that we scored were the warehouse fight towards the end and one of the fights with Hammer Girl and Baseball Bat Boy; because those two were so penultimate, we knew we could go pedal to the metal and really explore the fighting styles of The Raid 2 sonically in those and then bring those materials into the other fight sequences in the film.
I’d say what I really appreciated about both The Raid 2 or even Oblivion is that both have these timeless qualities to them but also feel very modern as well and there haven’t been many scores recently that have been able to pull that off. Is there a trick to balancing everything out?
Joseph Trapanese: I often say that I’m the luckiest guy in the world because I’ve had the opportunity to work with great pleasure on some of these really amazing and varied projects which has allowed me to bring my unique artistic spin to all of them. I haven’t been pigeonholed just yet. I’ve been lucky to have been spread across all these genres or getting to work on studio albums as well because I’ve been trained by some of the very best composers in the world. I think that’s one facet of why I’ve been so lucky so far and have been able to add these little timeless touches to my work here and there.
I think the other thing is the fact that I spent two years in the studio working with Daft Punk on TRON: Legacy and those guys are just titans in so many ways, artistically and any other way you could think of right up to their ability to manage these sort of public personas. It’s all brilliant and so I’ve been lucky enough to learn from the best on how to create these really incredible electronic scores that also feel timeless too. I think my goal has always been, when approaching pretty much any of these projects, that it was never about what I wanted to do musically. It’s always in the back of my head but what I’m actively always thinking about is telling a story and getting those emotions across in a way that feels organic to the director’s vision.
You just mentioned working with Daft Punk and another group I know you’ve worked with recently that I was just blown away by is M83 for the Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming double album. Because you work in the world of popular music as well as film composing, do you have to differentiate your approach at all depending on if you’re working on one type of a project versus the other at all?
Joseph Trapanese: Thank you so much- that was an amazing project to be a part of. I think for me, the idea of collaboration is really about understanding what your collaborators are bringing to the table and what you can bring to the table that will best compliment all of that and then make it all work together. The people may change, the budgets may change, the scope of the projects may change but the only constant from project to project is me so I try to bring my sensibility in while being very respectful of the talent I’m working with.
Would you say that we’re seeing a bit of a resurgence now in regards to the celebration of film scores and recognizing their importance? That seemed to go by the wayside for a while but now it really seems like filmmakers, studios and even fans are paying more attention- especially in the world of vinyl recordings and classic film scores.
Joseph Trapanese: I would definitely say that in terms of what I’ve seen from working with the directors that I’ve worked with over the last few years, I think there is a resurgence in understanding what a score can do for a film and how important it can be. A lot of projects I’ve worked on which were the most rewarding were the ones where the score wasn’t something that got added on in the end; it wasn’t an afterthought. Like for TRON: Legacy, we started writing music on that two years before a frame of picture was ever shot.
From what I’ve seen with the directors and the creatives I’ve worked with is that they want their composers to be just as integral to the film as every other person who worked on the film is. Film scores in their own way are ‘actors,’ meaning they become another character of the film in their own right when done well and I think a lot of directors are now truly realizing the power in creating the right film score and how detrimental it can be when you don’t support a film the right way sonically.
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Heather A. Wixson was born and raised in the Chicago suburbs, until she followed her dreams and moved to Los Angeles in 2009. A 14-year veteran in the world of horror entertainment journalism, Wixson fell in love with genre films at a very early age, and has spent more than a decade as a writer and supporter of preserving the history of horror and science fiction cinema. Throughout her career, Wixson has contributed to several notable websites, including Fangoria, Dread Central, Terror Tube, and FEARnet, and she currently serves as the Managing Editor for Daily Dead, which has been her home since 2013. She's also written for both Fangoria Magazine & ReMind Magazine, and her latest book project, Monsters, Makeup & Effects: Volume One will be released on October 20, 2021.
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