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Three composers, two soundtracks, one feeling

This is the music review of
Opposing Fronts (2007) | Tales of Valor (2009) | Eastern Front (2017).

It has now been a good 14 years since publisher THQ launched Company of Heroes from developer Relic Entertainment. And this game still haunts me to this day. Firstly, because it is one of the best, if not the best, real-time strategy game I have ever played. In my opinion, what it lacks in terms of strategic depth and game mechanics compared to other big brands - one of the reasons why I never played it online - it makes up for with its dense atmosphere.

Hardly any other strategy game I have played has been able to depict battles so intimately, so realistically. Every clash of units is full of tension. Where in Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars we can send our infantry squads into machine-gun fire without a care in the world, or in Supreme Commander literally throwing troops at the enemy non-stop, Company of Heroes forces us into the micro level by demanding clever tactics: Which is the best place to attack, which position is strategically important and provides enough cover for my squads and tanks? How do I use the scarce resources? Which unit is missing from my forces?

This feeling of being right in the thick of it is also supported by the fantastic sound design. Tank shots sound convincingly powerful, the great voice acting (at least in English) really brings out the radio messages of our boys - at a distance even with connection noise. And when the enemy machine gun fires volley after volley into the field, it's easy to understand why our lads ignore the marching orders and prefer to use their faces to explore the mud below instead. The World War II boom is supported by a beautiful soundtrack, which - and this brings us full circle - I still enjoy listening to today.

The OST for Company of Heroes was released in two albums: Songs from the Front with 36 tracks, which is a bit more up my alley thanks to its action-packed nature, and All Heroes Rise with 25. But because both belong to the same game and no songs appear twice, I'm treating both scores in this review as one coherent OST - purists may forgive me. Well, now that we've got that out of the way, let's move on to the originators.

Composerwise three heavyweights have joined forces for this score: Ian Livingstone, Inon Zur and Jeremy Soule. The names should be familiar to visitors of this blog, as at least two of them are real experts in my eyes. For an objectively subjective evaluation, I have calculated the average track ratings of the artists for fun. According to this, Zur (10 tracks) and Soule (26 tracks) each have an average rating of 2.5 stars, while Livingstone (25 tracks) really comes out on top with an average of 3.92 stars. But numbers alone say nothing without justification. So now we come to the actual review.

A quick reminder: we are in the Second World War as we play a large part of the campaign on the side of the Allies, predominantly the Americans. So it is hardly surprising that the musical connection to films and series such as Saving Privat Ryan or Band of Brothers becomes apparent from the very first track. Track 1, Sunrise on the Battlefield by Soule, initially brings back memories of his brother Julian Soule's work for Star Trek: New Worlds. A combination of strings and brass create a form of grounding, the mental image of a morning landscape is formed. After just under half a minute, we rise above the action in the best Elder Scrolls-manner with brighter sounds, look out into the vastness and the story can begin.

Let's stick with Soule at this point. His recognizable style and the associated similarity to other scores can often be found in this OST. Time and again, it feels as if you are listening to something familiar with a world war twist. Ruthless Tactic with its marching rhythms resembles Supreme Commander, gleicht Supreme Commander, Clash of Swords and Skirmish in the Woods The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. That can be irritating, though I like it. Apart from that, there's unfortunately only a lot of ambient stuff that works ingame, but not beyond that. As if in reconciliation, he also contributes the acoustic highlight of the score with the nameless track Untitled.

While researching for this review, I came across the soundtrack website VGMO which also writes reviews. Fortunately, my assessment of this coincides with Emily McMillan's, which is why I'll leave the technical description to her at this point:

Soule closes this soundtrack [Songs from the Front] with the imaginatively-named Untitled , which follows much like the opening — bright, complex, and emotional. It opens with a string pattern that ultimately develops into a countermelody, played under a horn that enters shortly and introduces a beautiful theme that ebbs and flows as the piece continues, undergoing both development and variations until it finally reaches its strongest point with the entrance of a choral setting of the melody.

Emily McMillan über Untitled

If you want, you can also read the rest of the article, which is very well written and goes into a bit more detail, even if I don't quite agree with the conclusion.

After Soule, let's move on to Inon Zur, who, with a meagre 10 tracks, makes the smallest contribution to the listening pleasure and doesn't score much in terms of points. Here we hear mostly familiar sounds, some of which sound like Fallout, others like Dragon Age or Baldur’s Gate. This is not a bad thing in itself, but the short durations, sometimes less than a minute, mean that there is little time to develop the motifs. This makes his compositions feel more like filler than real content. This is also one of my biggest criticisms, on which I agree with McMillan: In general, the pieces are far too short. With a total duration of one and three quarters of an hour, the 61 tracks result in an average song duration of just under 1.5 minutes. Considering that a third of them are just ambient tracks for background noise, a lot of potential has been squandered.

And last but not least, Ian Livingstone, who produced the other top tracks on the OST alongside Untitled by Soule, proves that the potential is definetly present. A total of 7 tracks get full marks from me, above all the fantastic The Month of Valiant Effort, which, with its opening violins, leaves little time for reflection - action is what's called for. Percussion follows and the march begins. Accompanied by the winds, a melody develops that drives the listener forward before the entire orchestra plays at 0:45 and announces epic and heroic efforts - hence the name. A fantastic theme, of which I would have liked more on the 61-track album.

Just like of On Guard for Liberty,, which also seems to shout "For king and country"! What is particularly nice here is that the leitmotif of Livingstone's compositions comes to the fore around the one minute mark, linking these tracks. We hear it again on the stately-sounding King and Country (min 1:08), the overture to the wonderful A Company of Heroes from min 0:27, which only just falls short of Untitled , and the plaintive but no less heroic To Those Who Rest (min 0:37).

The apparent lack of cooperation between the three artists is unfortunate and reminds me of the music for the Harry Potter-series, where each new composer moved further and further away from John Williams' familiar motifs until the films ended up resembling any random teen flick. Livingstone's dominant theme is great, and rediscovering it in his tracks is fun. In contrast, Soule's and Zur's disjointed pieces sound almost old-fashioned and well-worn. Fresh ideas like March of the Black Boots , on the other hand, set accents even within the rather uniform World War II military tropes and even seemingly boring gap fillers like Waiting for the Drop can be exciting.

What remains is a hodgepodge of action-packed and contemplative tracks in world war guise, a comparatively large amount of boring ambient music and three composers who have not found one another. The soundtrack as a whole does work, but could have been so much better considering its potential. If I were to be cynical, I could almost say that the soundtrack was created by Livingstone alone - but that's not me. Yet I do like the album as a whole and still enjoy listening to it today because it's nevertheless quite well done.

Company of Heroes: Songs from the Front

No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
01	Sunrise on the Battlefield	Jeremy Soule	4
02	Tales of the Front	Ian Livingstone	2
03	The End of B Company	Ian Livingstone	2
04	Survival Most Unlikely	Ian Livingstone	1
05	Courage to Stand	Inon Zur	3
06	The Month of Valiant Effort	Ian Livingstone	5
07	Ruthless Tactic	Jeremy Soule	3
08	At What Cost	Ian Livingstone	4
09	On Guard for Liberty	Ian Livingstone	5
10	Clash of Swords	Jeremy Soule	4
11	The Measure of One's Worth	Ian Livingstone	4
12	Danger on All Sides	Jeremy Soule	1
13	A Selfless Action	Ian Livingstone	4
14	Crossing the Rotting Battlefield	Jeremy Soule	2
15	All Plans in Motion	Ian Livingstone	4
16	Invasion by Moonlight	Jeremy Soule	2
17	Last Acts	Ian Livingstone	4
18	Critical Push	Ian Livingstone	5
19	Breaking Out	Ian Livingstone	4
20	Counter-Attack	Ian Livingstone	4
21	They're Out There Somewhere	Inon Zur	3
22	In the Eye of a Sniper	Inon Zur	1
23	Shattered	Jeremy Soule	3
24	Pushing the Lines	Jeremy Soule	3
25	Desperate Measures	Jeremy Soule	3
26	Skirmish in the Woods	Jeremy Soule	5
27	March of the Black Boots	Ian Livingstone	5
28	King and Country	Ian Livingstone	5
29	Opposing Fronts	Ian Livingstone	4
30	Trading Shells	Jeremy Soule	3
31	Planning of Fates	Ian Livingstone	3
32	Silent Battlefield	Jeremy Soule	2
33	Tiger in the Mist	Jeremy Soule	1
34	A Company of Heroes	Ian Livingstone	5
35	To Those Who Rest	Ian Livingstone	5
36	Untitled	Jeremy Soule	5

Company of Heroes: All Heroes Rise

No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
37	Twilight on Approach	Inon Zur	4
38	Surveying the Enemy	Jeremy Soule	4
39	Black Swarm	Inon Zur	3
40	Planning for Darkness	Ian Livingstone	3
41	Hunting the Hunter	Ian Livingstone	3
42	Blood in the Water	Jeremy Soule	1
43	Waiting for Those Who Will Not Return	Jeremy Soule	1
44	Marching for Vengeance	Jeremy Soule	2
45	Swiftly, Silently	Inon Zur	2
46	The Storm Approaches	Jeremy Soule	2
47	Cautious Advance	Jeremy Soule	3
48	The Wake of Battle	Ian Livingstone	3
49	Silent Call to Action	Ian Livingstone	3
50	Lit by the Fires of Battle	Jeremy Soule	1
51	Dark Desperation	Jeremy Soule	1
52	Peace at What Cost	Inon Zur	1
53	The Heavy Price of Victory	Inon Zur	1
54	A Moment of Clarity	Jeremy Soule	1
55	For Those Who Weren't There	Inon Zur	3
56	Waiting for the Drop	Ian Livingstone	5
57	We Came in the Night	Inon Zur	4
58	Push the Line	Jeremy Soule	4
59	Flash Thunder	Jeremy Soule	3
60	Ashes and Blood	Ian Livingstone	1
61	In Memory	Jeremy Soule	2

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Opposing Fronts

That Company of Heroes is a good game is something I have already mentioned a couple of times. The stand-alone add-on Opposing Fronts expands this fantastic real-time strategy game to include the British, who join the Allies as a playable faction, and also adds a dynamic weather system that looks nice, but unfortunately has no influence on the gameplay.There's also more of the same with an accompanying solo player campaign. Why am I mentioning all this? Because the game does the same with its soundtrack.

It was once again written by Ian Livingstone and Inon Zur, and therefore does without a contribution from Jeremy Soule, making it much more dramatic, triumphant and action-packed. You will look in vain for touching tunes, instead there are rousing fanfares and military epics. Much is made of the instrumental score of the main game and rather less of the melodies.

Here and there, there is a variation or a brief guest appearance of familiar motifs, such as in Armoured Assault, which adapts the fanfare melody from On Guard for Liberty after a sombre opening, only to stand on its own two feet again. All in all, a successful extension of the already fantastic score, the gamerip for Opposing Fronts offers few experiments and more of the familiar. Thumbs up for me, but it's certainly not for everyone.

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No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
01	Silent Descent	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
02	Pomp and Facing Stance	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
03	Panzer Elite Theme	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
04	Offensive Line	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
05	Iron Might	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
06	Commando Assault [On Guard for Liberty]	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	5
07	Armoured Assault	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
08	Building Storm [The Month of Valiant Effort Variation]	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
09	Convoy	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	4
10	Death from Above	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	3
11	Elite Fanfare	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	3
12	Force Beyond Reckoning	Ian Livingstone; Inon Zur	5

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Tales of Valor

Two years after Opposing Fronts, Tales of Valor was the second and last official expansion for Company of Heroes. Instead of new factions, we were served three short campaigns, including a brief excursion to the German side with the Tiger Ace - a first! On the soundtrack front, the score remains true to that of the main game and the first addon. After Inon Zur and Ian Livingstone worked in pairs in Opposing Fronts , Jeremy Soules was given the chance to go at it alone in Tales of Valor. Compensatory justice?

Musically, he relies on the familiar and presents us with an eight-piece gamerip. The highlights here are the Commenwealth-tracks, which come across as cheerfully royal and convey the propagandistic spirit of the British Royal Army... War can be fun after all. The remaining songs go in a fatalistic direction, which somehow doesn't really work: a little too much in the minor key for motivation, a little too brute for thoughtfulness. Nevertheless, a worthy conclusion to a truly fantastic musical world war drama.

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No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
1	Commonwealth 1	Jeremy Soule	5
2	Commonwealth 2 [King and Country]	Jeremy Soule	5
3	Commonwealth 3	Jeremy Soule	3
4	Commonwealth 4	Jeremy Soule	4
5	Panzer Elite 1	Jeremy Soule	3
6	Panzer Elite 2	Jeremy Soule	3
7	We Came in the Night [Variation]	Jeremy Soule	3
8	Sitereps	Jeremy Soule	3

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Eastern Front

With Company of Heroes: Eastern Front , the third and final add-on to the main game Company of Heroes is making an appearance ... Wait a minute: the third add-on? Didn't I say in my review of Tales of Valor that there were only two expansions in total? Good eye! Eastern Front is actually not a conventional add-on from the developer, but an extremely extensive and - according to the ratings - high-quality modification that expands the main game to include the Soviet Union as a playable faction as well as the eponymous Eastern Front. In fact, this privately programmed addition was so successful that THQ itself featured it on the main game's Steam page - so it can't be that bad. And since it fits in quite well with world politics and I just saw the score in front of me, I thought to myself: why not?

Probably because it's a fan product. Even if I hold modders and their creations in the highest honor and Eastern Front is probably a great expansion, the score falls well short of my expectations. Okay, compared to the main game and with top-class composers such as Jeremy Soule, Inon Zur and Ian Livingstone, they were in unattainable spheres anyway, but there was hope that something on a comparable level would be offered here. You don't. With his limited resources, Liverpool composer Alex Cottrell has probably done the best he could for the modification, but this is in a much lower league than the actual score.

We hear typical Russian/Eastern European tropes with a Kalinka and polka character, the melodies fluctuate between expectedly inciting and trying to be interesting, but are never really convincing. What particularly disturbed me was the attempt to integrate the classic male choir, as it spurs on heroic deeds in Empire Earth or Rome: Total War , for example, and is inextricably linked to the musical image of 'the Russian' in the music. Due to a lack of willing singers, a vocal track was apparently simply converted for Streets of Stalingrad in order to create the desired pitches and melodies. This not only sounds like little effort, but simply doesn't cut it. Even the little gimmicks such as the mixture of mischievous and serious sounds in Far from Over, Russia Waits don't help, as they lead us to expect more from the score than it can ultimately deliver.

All in all, it's a rather unimpressive composition, but its rating should not reflect on the quality of the mod or my respect for the work invested in it. I find the result of a 13 track long score impressive and quite presentable, but in the end it should be clear that we (unfortunately) do not have a masterpiece here, but a fan product for the showreel.

No.	Title	Artist(s)	Ratings
01	The Red Tide	Alex Cottrell	4
02	Streets of Stalingrad	Alex Cottrell	4
03	The Glorious Struggle	Alex Cottrell	3
04	Our Enemy's Pain	Alex Cottrell	2
05	Far from Over, Russia Waits	Alex Cottrell	3
06	Soviet Defeat	Alex Cottrell	1
07	Ostheer Defeat	Alex Cottrell	2
08	Soviet Victory	Alex Cottrell	3
09	Ostheer Victory	Alex Cottrell	3
10	Preparation	Alex Cottrell	3
11	Balalaika March	Alex Cottrell	3
12	Winter War	Alex Cottrell	3
13	Just Over That Hill...	Alex Cottrell	1