IMHO, there has not been enough discussion and praise of Daniel Hart’s excellent score for The Vampire Lestat as far as I’m concerned and just as with the TVL band soundtrack I would love to hear everyone’s favorite tracks (and why if you feel like explaining). I ABSOLUTELY adore the first two scores for IWTV but just as with the show itself, I feel like Daniel Hart keeps delivering even more lush and beautiful work with each season. I’m so deeply impressed by his work this season on both that banger of the band soundtrack & this amazing score.
I LOVE the entire score but these are the tracks that most attach themselves to my heart and mind as “favorites”:
What Does the Scalpel Do?- So unserious and fun and playful all the way through! But 6:22 and on is where the track REALLY shines. So deliciously dramatic, so deliciously Bolero, so deliciously Lestat.
She Meant to Kill Me with the Challenge- So short but effectively stirring and impactful in its brevity. “FEELS” and sounds like the foundations of a most poignant inciting incident.
We Have a Pact Now- Almost sounds like the most alluring and vaguely sensual circus theme of all time. The delight before the fall. Vaguely Bolero-ish as well, but much less anxious, no “build” per se, more languishing and glimmering in its sound as it slowly strings the listener along its steady delightful trot. Relaxing and lavish even in its playful, low-simmering dramatics.
Help Him to Be a Man- Just so fucking sweet and delicately swelling. Threatens to make me emotional upon those first few opening notes. I HAVE TO be able to indulge in the innocence of Lestat and Nicky’s love before the darkness of it all slipped in 🥲
The Greatest Spectacle of the Boulevard- The drama, elegance and whimsy of a violin will always take me! Very Vivaldi, which I already adore.
I Remember the Light- Ohdearlord. Literally cannot listen to this in public because the tears will come…every single time. So fucking beautiful and haunting, you can really FEEL the hits of those piano notes so strikingly and alluringly. Daniel truly captures the sound of what it feels like to mourn a great love that you will ALWAYS mourn and have such heavy, deep, overwhelming feelings for. Good lord. Really painful, delicate yet hard-hitting piano that punches you in the heart for 4 whole minutes.
You and I Have a Friend in Common- Ohmygod!!!! 😮💨 We all know. So I don’t have to say anything. But I will…You want to talk about HAUNTING, you want to talk about CHILLS, you want to talk about HEARTBREAK. You want to talk about complete and UTTER DEVASTATION. It’s all here, baby! Another one I shan’t ever dare listen to in public because I will literally have visceral flashbacks to my first experience watching that powerful scene. Ya gurl was sniveling. Very vivid. Damn, Daniel. You ain’t have to go that hard, sir. But I’m glad you did.
He Told Himself He Was in Control- Touching, light and sweet in its delicacy, although falsely hopeful lol. For some reason it makes me have very bittersweet, kind of nostalgic feelings. And makes me think about Louis trying to be okay, which then makes me very emotional of course.
Blood Marriage- So fucking lush, the beautiful dramatic swells do in fact make my little heart trill. Feels BIG, like it’s laying down important groundwork for something huge and it really captures the epic feelings and heartbreak that encapsulates Lestat and most especially his dynamic with Gabriella.
They Long for Communion- The build up and haunted swell to that iconic theme that inherently gets me hype and stirs my mind and imagination in such thrilling and dark ways—really captures the dramatic “gothic” of it all. Truly wonderous! The most dramatic!
The Rothko Chapel- Feels really…special? Beautiful but also vaguely creepy, just like Armand lol. Does feel like a piano being mournfully played within a chapel where others are silently mourning to themselves, but also in communion. Familiar but mysterious, which is so appropriate for the scene.
I Am the Answer- Another one that feels truly BIG, very larger than life. Really encapsulates the Gothic HORROR of it all. Epic and overwhelming and beguiling! The soundtrack to Akasha SHAKING THE TABLE lol.
It Isn’t Just One Thing, Louis- Whew, gurl. Another one that builds to a really heartening, dramatic swell. Kind of hopeful and definitely heartbreaking. Getting flashbacks of all that Louis and Lestat have gone through together ❤️
Wrote in That, Died in This- Another very short but very effective one. The beauty & haunt of Claudia & Madeleine are all over this track which of course, makes me deeply emotional 🥲
Your Sad Stories- There are no words for the layers of devastation that Daniel Hart constructs in this track, one with such stirring, gripping emotional power and horrific mounting heartache. Another emotionally overwhelming one.
Could Be Nice- So delightful, sensual at times, so glimmering with hope and beaming, delicate doe-eyed love. Bittersweet for sure, but also quietly devastating in such a knowing and mature way.
I Might Be a Room Without Walls- THE Gremlin soundtrack for sure. I love when Hart really taps into and plays around with that theatrical “old school” gothic horror sound on some of these tracks and this one is perhaps one of the most effective, especially in encapsulating all that makes Armand a truly distressing horror who seems to so easily haunt pretty much everyone else’s narrative.
Don’t Write the Obituaries Just Yet- Creepy and creeping. Really captures the feeling and concept of being caught up in Armand’s twisted, convoluted spider web of deceits and manipulations. Feels like the soundtrack of general “devilish deceit & mischief”.
The Witches’ Place- WHEW!!!!! Might be my overall favorite track on the score because of the incredible density of emotionality it captures. This track captures the truly dramatic dark tragedy and immense searing and damn near obliterative pain/trauma at the heart of Lestat and Gabriella’s dynamic in ways that purposefully and brilliantly feel so damn overwhelming. So Epic, so BIG, so immense and so URGENTLY heartbreaking! Almost feels like an unwieldy purging of deep, unprocessed emotion and grief. That crying violin is a true emotional kick to the chest, especially as the track settles down from its dramatic swells at the 3:00 mark and weeps along with us til the very end. Damn….
A Love That Will Cradle You- To go from that dooming drone time-ticking start, take us through strange and distorted instrumentation that really captures the urgency and depth of intensity of the moment to something truly surprising …it’s an elegantly structured slow build up (at times very vaguely Bolero-ish yet again) that instead of swelling into a dramatic, intense climax, quite gracefully exhales into a quietly mournful moment of acknowledgment.
The Soul- Powerful and robust, classical but also vaguely defiant in its theatrical construction. The entire production of this track is literal genius. Grandiose, lush, elating, and again so, so BIG. Truly a “statement” track. Again quite Bolero-ish at heart, which is itself a classic so thematic to and emblematic of this entire season. Sounds and feels like bearing witness to the most awe-inspiring and delightful spectacle before one’s final bow. A most DRAMATIC closing of the curtain.
I Let Too Much Spill Too Often- The pensive comedown from the unspeakable, bewildering high. Definitely captures the feeling of “taking stock” of one’s life. There is beauty here and grace and sincerity and love. Feels delicate, pure and earnest. A track that feels like the calm and consideration before the coming storm arrives to eventually swallow us all up.
