ANNA MEREDITH
The End We Start From (Mercury Classics)
Anna Meredith, the most confident and assured voice in British contemporary music, has supplied a moving and arresting soundtrack to the post-cataclysmic film The End We Start From, starring Killing Eve’s Jodie Comer.
Reminiscent of Philip Glass’ score for The Hours, Meredith has managed to marry clarity, emotion and foreboding in the short excerpts that are included on this soundtrack album. Pulsing rhythms that scatter around the sonic field like a William Orbit mix are juxtaposed with fanfare like woodwind refrains while strings pulse underneath. The whole effect is minimalist, but not in the calculated way you may expect.
Throughout the soundtrack, Meredith demonstrates that you can be contemporary without being cold, and unnerving without resorting to the distorted trombone flares of the many Hans Zimmer clones out there. Imaginative, fresh and unsettling.
words JOHN-PAUL DAVIES