Year: 2003
Type: Original Soundtrack (OST)
Composer(s): Michael Giacchino
Number of tracks: 13

★★★★★

A cinematic war drama

There was a time when I played the Call of Duty-series because of its campaign. For war dramas that break down the trials and tribulations of a senseless conflict to a subjective level and let me participate in something much bigger. And because it was staged in a cool way and offered an unprecedented level of great scripted action. The storming of Normandy, the cold battle in the narrow streets of Stalingrad or the tank chase in Africa were all staged in an atmospheric way and treated with the necessary seriousness. This may still be true in parts today, but I haven't touched any of the games since 2008's Call of Duty: World at War . Somehow I felt I had lost interest after what felt like the twentieth installment.

Anyone familiar with games will not be new to this criticism, as the series has been accused for years of stagnating by telling the same old stories. And when it doesn't, the player is subjected to future bling and America-Fuck-Yeah pathos. Gone are the days of the simple soldier who somehow struggles to survive. No, now everyone has to be a hero and throw out cool one-liners. And where an explosion used to be something special, in modern CoDs something blows up every 20 meters. The new games are desperately trying to keep the player happy with bigger, flashier, epic, like a divorced father who has lost touch with his older son and is constantly showing him something 'cool new' without listening to what the child actually wants. But since the younger brother falls for the scam and buys the latest version of FIFA every year, the system works. Daddy Activision is happy and so the venerable shooting gallery has been bobbing around in narrative mediocrity for decades now.

That's a shame, but perhaps it's not just down to the visual staging. What do I mean by that? Here's a little look behind the scenes: For my reviews, I always listen to the entire soundtrack beforehand to get an idea. Would I give it the same rating today? How does the score in its entirety affect me? What stands out? At the same time, I look online for interesting facts and whether I have a score or a gamerip in front of me - classic school of journalism. I did the same with this soundtrack and was surprised by what I heard. Because it was great.

I didn't have high expectations because my original ratings for the individual tracks were 3-4 stars. These are by no means bad results, but they are not enough to land in my music rotation. That's why I was able to experience the score again and was thrilled. Now I have to say up front that the music in Call of Duty-games has always been very good. This is primarily due to the numerous well-known composers who have written for the action orgies: renowned music composers such as Lorne Balfe (Assassin’s Creed III), Jack Wall (Mass Effect) or Sarah Schachner (Assassin’s Creed Origins), but also film greats such as Joel Goldsmith (Stargate), Harry Gregson-Williams (The Chronicles of Narnia) or Hans Zimmer (almost every AAA movie). Or, as in this case, Michael Giacchino, who, like the latter, is primarily known from the film industry.

In my humble opinion, Giacchino is one of Hollywood's best composers. If you're looking for a justification, you can take a look at an analysis of his Star Wars: Rogue One- soundtrack , where someone who knows a lot more about music than I do explains how well it emulates grand master John Williams. Here I will continue with my critique of Giacchino's score for Call of Duty which is much more closely interwoven with my criticism of current games than the acoustic aesthetics of the soundtrack. What I mean is that this work does not sound like a video game and certainly not like one of the current Call of Dutys. This may seem contradictory, as it is the soundtrack to a video game, but it makes sense in view of Giacchino's film background. What we hear here sounds like action cinema from the 80s and 90s, like Indiana Jones or Star Wars ... like John Williams. And therefore not like a Michael Bay explosion orgy, but like 'classic' entertainment. Like cinema from back then. By that I don't mean that a Lawrence of Arabia is more entertaining than Lawrence of Arabia is more entertaining than The Dark Knight, or a Star Wars Episode IV better than an Episode VIII - although ... that's a bad example - but that they exude a different flair.

I love modern soundtracks, even all of the Marvel-movies, but I'm also a huge fan of classical music and Giacchino delivers that perfectly in this soundtrack. The fact that the music was recorded with a studio orchestra gives the whole thing a certain grandeur. We hear percussion, wind instruments, horns, trumpets and violins, which sometimes work together and sometimes individually with different motifs. Motifs that are spread over several tracks and are taken up again, as in "Red Square", which is based on a Welsh hymn from 1897 called 'Ebenezer'. Overall, we experience a self-contained soundtrack that was a novelty in 2003 and today, 19 years later and without ever having played the game, is thrilling to listen to. Giacchino himself says in an interview on Gamespot:

I feel as though the scores for the [Medal of Honor] series were based more in the adventure realm than the reality realm. With the exception of a few cues, the MoH-music always seemed to lack the ugliness of war in its more combat action moments. I really thought the Call of Duty score should be far more visceral and brutal. I want it to be more indicative of the chaos that surrounds you in times of combat and also of the millions of prayers that must have been said in the darkest of moments. In talking to people who have survived these experiences, the one thing that they all talk of in one way or another is the idea that in a war, you are in the eye of a chaotic storm, and you are struggling to control just one small piece of that chaos. It's about being uncomfortable, even when you have the upper hand. Heroics only play a part in the retelling of war stories. I want Call of Duty to be more about the actual experience of war.

Michael Giacchino on his Call of Duty-score, Gamespot

In my opinion, Giacchino has drawn the right conclusions from his work for the 2002 Medal of Honor: Frontline and created an absolutely exemplary composition. A composition that stands the test of time and makes some current soundtracks look pretty old. So for everyone who has read this far: An absolute listening recommendation! And if you are interested in the background and content of the individual tracks, you can check out the corresponding article on the website callofduty.fandom for further information.

Nr.	Title	Interpret(en)	Ratings
01	Call of Duty	Michael Giacchino	4
02	Pathfinder	Michael Giacchino	4
03	Countryside Drive	Michael Giacchino	4
04	Approaching the Tirpitz	Michael Giacchino	4
05	Below Deck	Michael Giacchino	4
06	Stuka's and Flakvierling's	Michael Giacchino	4
07	Eder Dam	Michael Giacchino	4
08	Taking Stalingrad	Michael Giacchino	4
09	Breaking Through	Michael Giacchino	4
10	Ebenezer (Red Square)	Michael Giacchino	5
11	Sewers Under Stalingrad	Michael Giacchino	4
12	Tanks a Lot	Michael Giacchino	4
13	Pegasus Bridge	Michael Giacchino	5