Currently enjoying the approval of much of the pro audio indusry, the James Bond film Skyfall has given up another of its secrets – that Hollywood composer Thomas Newman relied on a pair of PMC IB2S XBD-Active loudspeakers during his work on the film.
Newman, who was offered the job on Skyfall by Director Sam Mendes, moved to London temporarily from to write the score and in preparation – having used PMC loudspeakers in his Los Angeles writing room for more than 15 years – auditioned the recently launched active IB2s in LA before departing.
‘Recently I started to get more of a relationship with PMC through their US sales guys, and they offered to set me up with some speakers for my writing room in London during the Bond project,’ he says. ‘But for the first 15 years of using PMC speakers, I had no real relationship with the company; I was just a user of their loudspeakers. That’s always the better way for it to be. I haven’t just started using PMCs because I’ve got to know the guys from the company; I’m a genuine advocate of their products.’
Skyfall – Newman’s first Bond score – turned out to be one of the most intensive projects he has worked on: ‘I don’t think I’ve ever written as much music for a movie – there’s 95 minutes of it. Much of it was action cues, where there are a lot more notes. And of course, it’s the 50th anniversary Bond film, too…’
With time to complete the score running out, most of the music for the film was composed and arranged in Avid Pro Tools, together with MOTU Digital Performer. ‘I did have another room with a piano – but most of the music for this film was created at the computer,’ he admits. The PMCs in the writing room were therefore an essential part of the early composition process.
‘I’ve always been impressed with the ability their speakers have to handle kick drums and the low end of things – sounds that hit a speaker hard,’ Newman says. ‘But the main thing about them, for me, is that they make speakers that I forget are there. You stop thinking of them as speakers – they’re a conduit for music and sound, and you just believe what you’re hearing.’
With Skyfall the most successful Bond film to date and calls for Sam Mendes to return to direct the next instalments in the franchise, does Thomas Newman think he might be back with Bond next time too? ‘I’ve not even thought about it,’ he says. ‘It would be lovely to be asked – but I would never want to assume that I would be.’
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