Plaza Mayor Company Ltd release Navid Hejazi's original score for The Breakout. A nerdy high school jazz band embarks on a journey to California for an international band competition. Their bus breaks down and they are forced to stay at a motel overnight. Trying to copy cool kids, they have an orgy and get into all kinds of mischief...

The synopsis to The Breakout makes it sounds a little like a modern day sex comedy in the vein of Porky's... However, Navid Hejazi's score is of a quality you'd expect from a more serious movie. Over the course of 22 tracks (44 min, 42 sec) the composer really just goes for it.

This is an album that's packed full of so many fun little themes and wonderful set pieces that you'll need quite a few listens in order to be able to appreciate the quality on display here.

I had to smile when I heard 'The Fight'. It's a wonderful homage to Alan Silvestri's score for Back to the Future.

Talking about the score, Hejazi said: "The main characters are members of a jazz band, so some tracks had to combine jazz and funk style. As for Morgan’s character, his thematic material had to do with the 'Intergalactic Friendship Alliance' story and the 'Pearl'. This required to be purely orchestral based in an old school way. 'Sneaking Out' and 'The Fight' have an intense orchestral marching tone related to Morgan and Jason’s “mission”. On 'Yvette At The Jacuzzi', Yvette is treated as a “siren” in Morgan’s magical fantasy world. Maddy’s theme is a simple piano solo tune that plays as her own composition and is used as source music along the movie. On the sad moments of her story the piano is used playing a small motif. Mr T’s theme has a different style approach, using more electronics and an electric bass, and a french horn solo for more positive moments in the story. On the other hand, Stephanie’s theme is more optimistic, acoustic guitar and strings based. 'The RV' track is a highly energetic piece that was treated almost as a pirate ship boarding scene as the crew restarts their crazy trip to the dance.

Such an interesting little score, and certainly one that's worth checking out.

8

Darren Rea