Tyler Bates | Movie-Music Maestro

Apr 1, 2009 12:00 PM, By Mike Levine

           
 

INSIDE THE WORLD OF HOLLYWOOD FILM SCORING WITH WATCHMEN COMPOSER TYLER BATES

FIG. A: Matthes with his Synthesis Technology MOTM analog modular synth.

Let's forget scoring for a minute. Musically, if you had to say where you're coming from, where would that be?

The answer to that question is a cliché waiting to happen. I would say that inherently I am always looking to experience that feeling I had as a kid when I put on a new record. It gave the space I was in — usually my bedroom — an ambience that was specific to that record. I desperately attempt to channel that s--t every day. And once in a great while, it actually happens. There is plenty of music that immediately triggers that feeling for me, like Stevie Wonder and Sly and the Family Stone, and even Kiss! There are composers who dredge up that feeling in me, like Samuel Barber. Don Ellis's scores for The French Connection movies get me pretty worked up also. And, of course, those who embrace dissonance and beauty in the same frame, like Bartok, Ligeti, Gang of Four — all the great masters of jagged rhythm and sadness.

Do you have a classical background?

Not in the formal sense. But after I heard the cannon blast in Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture for the first time, I learned that you can kick some serious butt with an orchestra.

But you do have a rock background.

You could say that I do, but to be honest, before I ever became a rock musician, I was exposed to a broad spectrum of music of all genres. I spent a lot of time as a kid listening to records with my mother, who was a music freak. She would buy 10 or 12 records a week, and listened to music nonstop. She read the liner notes to me until I learned to read them myself. I memorized the arrangements, musicians, and producers, but for whatever reason, not so much the lyrics. I didn't give much thought to doing film music until I was in my twenties, but I have always loved instrumental music that provided an escape from reality.

How did you get started doing scoring?

I was in a studio in Chicago working on a project, and my brother called from L.A. He was line producing a low-budget film that ran out of money and needed some rock cues. They gave me the lengths of the cues and where they wanted changes to occur in the arrangements. I turned them around in a day, and $300 later I had my first film credit. If only it were always that easy! The producer of that film asked if I was interested in scoring a movie he was directing, so I said, “Sure.” I moved to L.A. and got started. Fortunately, one led to the next, and probably my first 15 movies happened in the first three years I lived in L.A., which kept my rent paid while my band, Pet, pursued the rock 'n' roll dream [laughs]. All of these films were super-low-budget. If you were to listen to any of those scores, I would seriously have to apologize.

I bet it was a good way to hone your chops.

Sure. It was great. Most of the time, I was paid enough to make my rent and to eat. I learned along the way from directors, producers, mixers, and music supervisors. I was fortunate that most people I encountered were gracious and patient with me. I didn't meet an actual film composer until I had done nearly 20 film scores. I was pretty clueless for a while. After I did a couple of movies, I was like, “Oh yeah, I guess I need a computer, don't I?” [Laughs.] Then I got an [Alesis] ADAT and started from there. I did a bebop film called The Last Time I Committed Suicide [Tapestry Films, 1997], just after my band signed to Atlantic Records. After seeing a screening of the film, my manager, Arthur Spivak, said, “Tyler, you should do movies. The rock business is for s--t.” I thought about it, but my band was just about to make a record, so that remained my priority for a while.

Was this the deal that Tori Amos helped you with?

Yeah. She happened to be in town at the time that our band was signing to Atlantic Records, and she came to one of our shows and flipped out over us. And she was like, “You guys have to do a record now! I will finance your f--king career if I have to!” That was a nice bump for us at the time.

So what happened next?

Things went pretty well for a while. We recorded our record at her place in Ireland. We managed to get a song on the soundtrack album of The Crow: City of Angels [Dimension Films, 1996]. That album went Platinum, which was cool. We toured with some pretty big-name bands before the rock 'n' roll clichés got the better of us and we fell off the tracks. But the experience forced me to really consider the film-scoring thing seriously. I knew at that point that I didn't want to work within the confines of a band.

Let's talk about the creative pressure of scoring. Songwriters generally have the luxury of waiting for inspiration to hit before they write something. Whereas in scoring, you basically have to create on demand, right?

In the scoring world, especially television, there are no days off where you're like, “I'm not feeling it.” You have to come up with two minutes a day or else you'll end up behind the eight ball and the music will suffer terribly.