As well as compiling lists of songs that feature in movies, from time to time I'd like the focus of this feature to be on composers and musicians who have an involvement in the movies. For the first of these articles I thought I'd focus it on the man who, in my view, has produced some of the finest soundtracks of the last ten years, Mr. Clint Mansell.

Prior to becoming a well-respected film composer, Clint Mansell was best known for being the front man of Stourbridge electronic punksters Pop Will Eat Itself. The band had an air of geekiness about them with numerous references to films (as well as samples) in a number of their songs.

Following the break up of Pop Will Eat Itself, Mansell moved to New York in 1996 and struggled to adapt to life outside of the band in which he spent 10 years of his life. Struggling to find focus and being unable to write anything his first five months in New York left Mansell broke, in a dark place personally. Things were soon to change when he met Darren Aronofsky through a mutual acquaintance and soon formed a partnership that would come to define both their careers.

Mansell has subsequently provided music for all of Aronofsky's movies and his work frequently has a leitmotif that runs through his work and the film that it accompanies.

Below are my favorite Mansell soundtracks:

Pi OST

Mansell was called upon by his friend, Darren Aronofsky, to provide the music for his excellent, feature length debut, which also saw the beginning of Mansell's film scoring career. Three Mansell tracks are included on the official soundtrack, the rest of it is made up by the likes of Aphex Twin, Orbital, Roni Size etc, but it's Mansell's work that provides a reoccurring theme throughout the film.

Requiem For A Dream OST

Aronofsky returned to Mansell to provide the music for his follow up to Pi , the bleak and brilliant Requiem For A Dream. Mansell teamed up with the Kronos Quartet and, classical composer, David Lang to provide one of the most iconic pieces of original music in modern cinema. The recognisable piece in question is Lux Aeterna (the eternal light) and the main riff is featured prominently throughout the film.

The piece will be recognisable to most people even if they don't necessarily associate it with Requiem For A Dream or Mansell and the Kronos Quartet. UK sports fans will, no doubt, know the piece from its use on Sky Sports News. Having been a fan of the film and owning the soundtrack for some time prior to this, it was a surprise to hear it when I tuned in to check the football scores. The track and variations of it have also been used in trailers for I Am Legend, Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers and Assassins Creed to name a few.

The Fountain OST

Having a significant gap between working on the Requiem For A Dream soundtrack and starting work on Aronofsky's follow up, The Fountain, Mansell was able to work on a number of other projects and gain significant experience working with other studios, directors etc. Mansell has stated that had he worked on the soundtrack for The Fountain immediately after Requiem For A Dream it would have turned out differently. Whilst I have no doubt it would have been interesting, it's clear that the experience Mansell gained during this period helped no end in creating another fantastic soundtrack for Aronofsky. It's widely known that David Bowie was pursued to contribute to the score, however, this, unfortunately, didn't work out. Instead Mansell teamed up with the Kronos Quartet again as well as enlisting the help of Scottish post rockers Mogwai (a favorite of mine). The soundtrack earned Mansell a Golden Globe nomination but, sadly, he lost out to Alexandre Desplat's soundtrack for The Painted Veil.

The Wrestler OST

Like the Pi soundtrack, the soundtrack is largely made up of songs from various artists, except here instead of electronica you've got a large helping of 80s hair metal and the title song provided by Bruce Springsteen, whose earlier Mansell reveals influenced his writing of the score. Mansell wrote the score but the guitar parts are played by Slash of Guns 'n' Roses and Velvet Revolver fame.

Moon OST

The music provided for the soundtrack to Moon is, in my opinion, Mansell's finest work to date. Not only does it provide a great accompaniment to the film it's a great album in its own right. At times it's moody, ambient, introspective and electronic and at others it's up-tempo and uplifting, the soundtrack matches the moods portrayed in the film perfectly. Having listened to the soundtrack a number of times I can say that as an album it holds its own against a number of post rock's big hitters like Mogwai or Godspeed (notably Can't Get There From Here and Sacrifice). The two variations of Welcome To Lunar Industries that bookend the soundtrack are particularly excellent and the simple piano riff that features makes numerous appearances throughout the soundtrack.

It's the track Memories (Someone We'll Never Know) that's my favourite, which is a beautiful piano based number with strings towards the end. Hopefully,the work on this soundtrack will finally see him win a major award. Sadly, this isn't looking likely as he's been overlooked for the Golden Globes.

Other works

Other than the five soundtracks mentioned above - Clint Mansell has worked on over 30 other projects since finishing work on Requiem for a Dream in 2000. Key among these would be his work for Man On Fire, Doom, Sahara, Smoking Aces, Blood: The Last Vampire and rather surprisingly last years Catherine Zeta-Jones starring rom-com The Rebound.

So, where next for Mansell? Well, another Aronofsy movie in the form of Black Swan means another soundtrack for Mansell to create. It's rumored that he will look to incorporate elements of Swan Lake (the third act of which is referred to as The Black Swan). The Mansell and Aronofsky combination has yet to fail so it's hard to see how the soundtrack for Black Swan will be anything other than excellent. Certainly something to look forward to.

The prospect of Mansell providing music to an Aronofsky version of Robocop is also exciting, however, it's unlikely that this will go ahead, due to the director's dispute with troubled studio MGM as reported here. With the Moon soundtrack being as good as it is, it's little surprise that Mansell is being rumored to be providing music for Duncan Jones' next project, Source Code.

Whatever projects Mansell is linked with in the future I for one will be looking forward to them. He has consistently created interesting and brilliant music that works perfectly in the movies that they accompany.

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