MOVIE MUSIC UK

THROWBACK THIRTY

Original Review by Jonathan Broxton

Species is a science fiction horror film that blends alien-invasion tropes with creature-feature thrills. Directed by Roger Donaldson from a screenplay by Dennis Feldman, the story begins with a top-secret government project called SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence), which receives a transmission from outer space containing DNA instructions for creating a hybrid organism – part human, part alien. Scientists follow the instructions and create a girl named Sil, who appears human but matures at an astonishing rate and soon exhibits alarming, inhuman traits. When the SETI lead scientist Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley) deems her too dangerous, they attempt to terminate her, but she escapes from the lab; now fully grown and played by Natasha Henstridge, Sil goes on the run in Los Angeles, driven by a primal urge to reproduce. Her alien DNA pushes her to find a mate, but any man she deems genetically unfit meets a gruesome end. A team is assembled to track her down, including an empath (Forest Whitaker), a molecular biologist (Alfred Molina), an anthropologist (Marg Helgenberger), and a government assassin (Michael Madsen), and as Sil leaves a trail of bodies behind her, the team races against time to prevent her from mating and giving birth to a potentially unstoppable alien species.

Species was a moderate box office success, thanks to its unusual combination of sci-fi, horror, and eroticism, and was especially praised for its creature design: the alien form of Sil was designed by legendary Swiss artist H.R. Giger, best known for creating the iconic xenomorph in Alien, and Giger’s sexy biomechanical aesthetic was a major influence on the film’s horror elements, especially in Sil’s transformation scenes. While it’s all complete hokum, of course, personally I enjoyed it a great deal, and it generated enough of a cult following that is spawned three sequels: Species II in 1998, Species III in 2004, and Species: The Awakening in 2007, though these were less well-received.

The score for Species was written by Christopher Young, who by the mid-1990s was a well-respected and seasoned film composer of horror and thriller scores, notably things like Hellraiser, The Fly II, and Jennifer 8. His music for Species is excellent, a crucial element in sustaining the film’s tense, eerie atmosphere and enhancing its mix of sci-fi intrigue and erotic horror. Species is somewhat unusual in Young’s filmography, because for all his experience in genre movies, he very rarely scored ‘space films,’ and so for that reason this score is worth exploring. Young’s score blends orchestral textures with electronic and ambient elements, reflecting both the film’s scientific setting and its alien menace. It’s a moody, suspense-driven soundtrack that avoids overt melodies in favor of creeping dissonance, ominous pulses, and sudden bursts of aggression that underscore Sil’s violent and unpredictable behavior.

The main title theme, as presented in the opening cue “Species,” is elegant and ethereal, with a definite feminine quality that speaks to Sil’s dual nature – she is seductive and alluring, yest desperately dangerous. Young uses slow, sinuous strings backed by a soothing choir, brass harmonies, and tick-tock percussion rhythms passed between a marimba and a woodblock. Tonally the theme comes across as a combination of the more ambient parts of James Horner’s Aliens, the string phrasing of Jerry Goldsmith’s Basic Instinct, and his own score for Hellraiser, which on paper shouldn’t work, but in reality really does. This theme re-occurs several times in the rest of the score, notably in the moody “Bax Max” the ominously chilly “Son of Sil,” and the spookily gorgeous end titles cue “Star Bright,” and it is always impressive when it does. “Bax Max,” by the way, is another one of Young’s ‘hidden name’ cue titles of a composer he admires, in this instance English classical Sir Arnold Bax, who wrote scores for director David Lean in the 1940s.

Elsewhere, the lovely “Protostar” adopts the tiniest hint of warmth and romance with some seductive writing for strings and breathy vocalizations that recall Young’s contemporary writing from scores like Jennifer 8. Meanwhile, the outstanding “Fever” is actually something of a bonus track, as it is actually Young’s original pass at the main title music, before the director chose the chillier sounds of “Species” instead. The more prominent dancing elegance of the strings, the enticing coolness of the vocals, the Horner-style percussion hits, and the emergence or a recognizable melodic line carried through the cue, really make the track stand out as an album highlight.

The more horrific moments of Sil-related backbone-ripping skull-crushing horror come via cues like “A Vibrant Slime,” “Species Faeces,” the brilliantly-named “Milky Way Breasts,” and the magnificently aggressive “Worm Hole.” In these tracks Young often engages in some quite brutal orchestral writing that emphasizes the power of the brass section, and is often accompanied by an apocalyptic choir, or rampaging piano clusters, or moments of propulsive percussive deliciousness, or all of the above. There is a sequence towards the end of “Worm Hole” that rivals “Bishop’s Countdown” from Aliens in its intensity. Fans of earlier Young scores like Hellraiser II, The Fly II, The Dark Half, and even some of his earliest efforts like The Dorm That Dripped Blood, will find themselves inhabiting a similar sonic territory in these cues, and enjoying it too.

The creepy ambiences that run through large parts of cues like “Ring Nebula” the aforementioned “Species Faeces,” and the skittery, agitated “Safe Sex” add a level of unsettling eeriness to the score, and again often revisit the James Horner Aliens sound in the way the elongated string textures and electronic tonalities are offset against shrill, echoing woodwind flutters. This flute motif runs through the film as recurring idea that apparently represents Sil’s unquenchable desire to procreate, and often appears in the ‘calm before the storm’ moments before she violently attack the hapless man she had been seducing mere moments earlier. Bon appetit.

Despite the comparative popularity of the film, the Young’s score for Species was not commercially released until quite some time after the film was released. Young himself released a 12-track 40-minute CD promo of the score on his own, and for years this expensive collectable was the only legitimate release of the score; eventually, in 2008, Intrada Records released the first official commercial album of the score, which took Young’s original promo presentation and expanded it to just over an hour three additional score cues (“Are You Out There Somewhere,” “Fever’s Fever,” “and “The Alien Underground”) and a couple of bonus synthesizer tracks. Then, in 2024, Intrada went one step further by releasing a second soundtrack of the complete expanded score tracks as heard in the film, with Young’s original presentation as a bonus second disc.

Species is an impressive score, which will especially appeal to anyone who wants to hear an expansion on Christopher Young’s excellent horror stylistics blended with some of the compositional techniques James Horner brought to scores like Aliens and other similarly-themed space movies. The album representation is notably excellent, with Intrada’s Special Collection edition finally offers fans a definitive version of the score, making the widely circulated promo – previously the only way to hear it – largely obsolete. Fans of Species often point to the… ahem… visual charms of Natasha Henstridge as being one of the primary reasons for watching the film, but to his credit Christopher Young has provided an excellent audio accompaniment to go with it, one that is sometimes so good you can experience it without the other element, and not feel that it is lacking,

Buy the Species soundtrack from the Movie Music UK Store

Track Listing:

• 1995 PROMO RELEASE
• Species (3:38)
• A Vibrant Slime (3:29)
• Protostar (2:52)
• Ring Nebula (5:28)
• Fever (2:27)
• Species Feces (4:24)
• Bax Max (3:40)
• Milky Way Breasts (4:52)
• Safe Sex (2:32)
• Worm Hole (2:20)
• Son of Sil (1:50)
• Star Bright (5:01)

• 2008 ORIGINAL INTRADA RELEASE
• Species (3:38)
• A Vibrant Slime (3:29)
• Protostar (2:52)
• Ring Nebula (5:28)
• Fever (2:27)
• Are You Out There Somewhere? (5:17)
• Species Feces (4:24)
• Bax Max (3:40)
• Milky Way Breasts (4:52)
• Safe Sex (2:32)
• Fever’s Fever (3:40)
• The Alien Underground (3:57)
• Worm Hole (2:20)
• Son of Sil (1:50)
• Star Bright (5:01)
• Aetherian Universe (4:30) Bonus Synthesizer Track
• How To Defend Yourself Against Alien Abduction (3:07) Bonus Synthesizer Track
• Angel Hair (3:06) Bonus Synthesizer Track

• 2024 EXPANDED INTRADA RELEASE
• Main Title (Revised) (3:43)
• Sil Escapes Part 1 (2:57)
• Sil Escapes Part 2 (1:28)
• Sil’s Dream, Number 1 (0:26)
• Sil Gets Off Train (1:14)
• Track And Hunt Her Down #1 (1:06)
• Sil’s Dream, Number 4 (0:29)
• Young Sil Transforms (0:57)
• Dan The Psychic (Alternate) (1:27)
• Sil Grows Up (0:35)
• The Experiment (3:55)
• Battlefield L.A. (3:47)
• Sil In L.A. (1:20)
• Bad Experiment (Revised) (4:31)
• Manhunt Begins (0:55)
• Sil Stalks Her Prey/Ladies Room Killing (0:47)
• Sil Kills Robbie (2:58)
• More Docile (1:12)
• Sil’s Dream, Number 3 (0:41)
• Track and Hunt Her Down #2 (0:41)
• She’s So Lonely/Body Repair (2:27)
• Hospital Report (0:52)
• Dangerous Sex (5:42)
• Sil Follows Team (2:37)
• Sil’s Dream, Number 2 (0:38)
• The Set Up (Revised) (2:53)
• Sil Stages Her Death (3:57)
• Sil’s Disguise (4:02)
• Wrong Blond (0:34)
• Sil Follows Laura (0:42)
• Hole To Hell/Feminine Intuition (3:23)
• Fitch Gets It (0:54)
• Creature Watches Team (2:38)
• Baby Alien (1:28)
• The Baby’s Demise (4:16)
• Sil’s Demise (1:53)
• End Credits (5:07)
• Main Title (Original) (2:29) BONUS
• Dan The Psychic (Original) (1:25) BONUS
• Bad Experiment (Original) (4:29) BONUS
• The Set Up (Original) (3:01) BONUS

Running Time: 42 minutes 33 seconds – Promo
Running Time: 66 minutes 10 seconds – Original
Running Time: 156 minutes 36 seconds – Expanded

Ilsley Music Promo CD 96002 (1995) – Promo
Intrada Special Collection Volume 77 (1995/2008) – Original
Intrada Special Collection Volume ISC 506 (1995/2024 – Expanded

Music composed by Christopher Young. Conducted by Pete Anthony. Orchestrations by Christopher Young, Pete Anthony and Patrick Russ. Recorded and mixed by Robert Fernandez and Dan Wallin. Edited by Thomas Milano. Score produced by Christopher Young. Expanded albums produced by Christopher Young, Douglass Fake and Roger Feigelson.