Girls Gone Canon Cast - HIS DARK MATERIALS Patreon Episode: The Music of His Dark Materials with The Dust Podcast

Episode Date: September 24, 2021

Due to some personal life updates, we're experiencing a few production delays—but that just means all of you get bonus episodes! Our regularly scheduled episode for The Amber Spyglass will be delayed a few days, for release between September 26-28, but until then, please enjoy this special episode brought to you by The Dust Podcast (check out their links below!) and our patrons.  When season/series 2 of the His Dark Materials show ended, we joined our good friends Matt (Double M) and Holly of The Dust Podcast to dissect some of our favorite musical moments in the show and what makes the music of His Dark Materials so good. This episode, though, is just a snippet, a taste of the sort of musical analysis and story analysis that you can get regularly from The Dust, so be sure to check them out and subscribe to them.  SPOILERS ALL THREE MAIN TRILOGY BOOKS AND SEASONS 1 AND 2 OF HIS DARK MATERIALS The Dust Podcast Twitter - https://twitter.com/thedustpodcast  Holly's Twitter - https://twitter.com/Huntpants  Matt's Twitter - https://twitter.com/musicalconcepts  Matt's Audio Blog - https://mattsaudioblog.com/  The Dust Podcast on Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-dust-a-his-dark-materials-podcast/id1466312718  Other Links Mentioned Æsahættr (metal band) - https://aesahaettr.bandcamp.com/  Philip Pullman's favorite songs - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09bbdlr  Cittàgazze by Portico Quartet - https://youtu.be/cN4kn7SdQq8 Jacob Collier songs -  https://youtu.be/RIZzsx52sPI Green Valley by Puscifer - https://youtu.be/Y4Y9TO3X5WM

Hello everyone, and welcome to Girls Gone Canon, Patreon episode 29. Patreon episode 29. The music of His Dark Materials with a special guest. The Dust Podcast. But also, I am one of your hosts. Oh wait, shit. Your other host wants to tell you about us all.

They know who we are. Oh my god, no. Eliana, they know who we are. It's us. It's not about us right now. It's about our friends Matt and Holly from the Dust Podcast. I am thrilled. This is a very exciting day.

Most pleasing to my His Dark Materials podcasting career. Thank you so much. How the hell are you two? I will say first, and then I will turn over to Holly. But I feel like the kitchen boy has finally been invited to the scholars table. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. This is Matt. For those of you who have not heard my voice before, Holly, how about you? How you feeling? I am feeling unqualified to be here. You're the music guy, but I am very, very happy to be here.

I've been longtime fans of you too so this is really exciting when worlds collide thank you again for coming i'm so excited you two are so silly you're cracking me up because matt is as much a scholar as any over here with all of his musical claim to fame all the i'm excited for all the takes on music and then holly and i are going to be shit posting in the margins during this episode and eliana and holly i feel like will be kindred souls shit posting in the margins which is what this is all about and i do have to say you're saying you're sitting at the scholars table but i want to remind folks at home that this is the podcast with the take that joppery was edging for many years

and that's why he was able to bring down the Zeppelins in the sky. I mean, it's true. I watched an anime meme and it said that you become a wizard if you're a virgin until you're 30. And that's what happened. Joppery. Will was immaculate, you know what I mean? Conception-wise. it's a religious joke.

Friends in the holiday season. If you don't get that one. Happy holidays from your podcast to ours. This is crazy. The season's done. The series, sorry. The series is done. Us Americans got to recall that it's a series, not a season.

And I know that you two have been slammed putting out not just first looks at episodes, but second looks. You crazy people. What is up with that? You're like going in depth. Every scene, every moment. Let us know what you've been up to. What's on the docket for next year for 2021? Holly, you got plans for, are you even staying with the podcast?

I mean. As long as we quit the three words, then I will stay. Oh, shit. Or what's worse. Actually, let's quit what's worse. That one's worse. Oh, my. Yeah. We've had a lot one's worse. Oh, my. Yeah.

We've had a lot of fun doing two episodes a week. It's just the sheer amount of feedback that we get, and especially with the delay between the UK airing and the US airing, it almost feels like it's doing a disservice to the American audience if we don't put a second episode out. Plus, being the music geek that I am, there's always more to talk about for each episode. Yeah, that delay has been killer, hasn't it? It's not a great choice for me, personally, gonna say. Yeah, it sucked.

Unfun. It was an unfun wait. Yeah, one day behind last season last series and now we're like two two whole episodes behind every week it's sad it's it's tough to be an american it's so hard actually in some ways real hard yeah uh i know we deserve it but i mean and you two understand with game of Thrones, obviously. We've been around from the Thrones days. All of us have been covering them, Thrones, for a bit. And I know that the UK got those like a day later.

And some people are trying to hold that against us. Be like, well, we got Game of Thrones a day later. And I'm like, I don't know. I don't know if that's going to make the cut for this argument for a good book to show adaptation. You know, the funny thing about this pairing up between HBO and BBC is it works out best for both companies either way. BBC can put it where they want. We're lucky that we're not in one of those situations where BBC puts it out in October and then we don't get it until March.

Because that gate has been swung that way sometimes with some franchises going the other way. Just because we Americans like to hold on to our rights to stuff longer, the British are much more generous than we are.

That's for sure. Yeah, I'm interested to see if there's ever any, I don't know, just public follow up on what happened. You know, what were the contract deals behind the scenes? Because as we know, especially from some famed movies like The Golden Compass, things happen behind the scenes. Things that we silly humans without our demons in this world do not get to be privy of it's interesting because i was looking at some of the viewership numbers and ratings for uh both of the seasons between like the uk and the us and i don't know if this like affected the decision but i don't know how many people watch i mean

probably not a lot of people watch it on hbo live and I don't know if the ratings are based on that or not, but it's like, in the UK, what? It was like in the six millions or something, right, for some of the episodes, and like half a million in the US. And I mean, this book series was also, I think, much more popular, perhaps, in the UK than it was necessarily in the US. So it seems like quite a few of us, you know, read it anyway. And it was on some school reading lists, interestingly, like it was for me, which is how I

came to it. It was like a suggestion. They're like, I don't know, pick one of these books. I was like, that's a cool sounding book. I actually didn't know anything about the Philip Pullman series until Holly suggested it to me and I found out that they were actually making it into a television series and then I went back and I watched the movie the Golden Compass movie wasn't all that impressed to be perfectly honest Chloe was like the only person impressed by that movie I've watched it too many times and it wasn't great but it wasn't the I think it's very obvious there was some shenanigans happening, some shenanigans afoot, so to speak. You know, I think that was very obvious, even as like a I don't know, it was what, 2007?

Yeah. So even as a oh, my God, I'm not going to age. I'm not going to say what my age is. Let's just say that even then even as a youngster I was like all right interesting I think I got it for Christmas that year it was like a five dollar Walmart bin pick oh that hurts to say yeah but even then I was like cool series but I just never came back to it and then Eliana of course uh was the holly in this scenario and put them in front of me and then i read all of them everything i could get my hands on faster

faster and i consumed them and uh now she still hasn't finished that one book that we won't even talk about yep i finished it on the way back from her house i thought that was the other book oh maybe that was labelle savage i finished it thinking of you does that count i saw the movie first actually um before the books and i was a young adult and i was inebriated with my friend when we saw the movie and we were just blown away by the idea of having demons in the form of animals. We loved it. So then after that, I discovered there was books. And then, like Chloe, consumed all of them fast as I possibly could. Ate them up.

For like the seventh time now, right? It's been a few reads, yeah. Damn. Well, you know, with all that, how do you guys feel? You know, you've been talking about it, obviously, on the cast, but I think you still haven't put out, right, your thoughts on the latest series slash season, depending on what cast but i think you still haven't put out right your thoughts on the latest series slash season depending on what side of the pond you're on

because i don't think you've put that episode out yet and what what do you think i think we both like it better than season one for sure yeah yeah it just great great i say a lot every episode this season everything new they added was fantastic maybe a little heavy on some magisterium scenes for me earlier on in this particular series but overall i thought it was great that lee and mrs coulter scene will live in my heart forever and i really like what they did in the last episode too with the changes between will and his dad i thought it was very well done, I never have a problem with changes in adaptation so much. I will go back and in our book reader sections and cite, well, this is what happened in the books as opposed to what happened in the show. But I believe that

Jack Thorne and Jane Tranter have really carried the spirit of this series of what I've read. And I've only read the trilogy. I have not read La Belle Sauvage or Secret Commonwealth. But the original trilogy, I feel like the spirit of those books just literally bleed through the television screen. And so any adaptation changes that they make have not bothered me in the least. I'm always pleasantly surprised by them. Well, I'm glad to hear that you too are in a similar state as me. I mean, I've made some of my way through the secret commonwealth, but, you know, it's going to just keep being a secret to you and me, I guess.

We have a commonwealth of secrets. I've been hoping out for long. We do. but we have a commonwealth of secrets. I've been hoping out for long. We do. Matt, Holly, this is great. I'm so freaking excited. This is going to be a stoop.

We're stupid. I can't wait. This is going to be silly, and I love it. Where can we find you on the internet? Tell everyone at home where they can log on on the World Wide Web and find your episodes. Well, I think you can find the Dust Podcast probably just about wherever you get your podcast episodes regularly. Our feed and all of our back episodes can be found at mattsaudioblog.com.

That's M-A-T-T-S-audioblog.com. audioblog.com and if you have trouble finding us that way then just hit us up on Twitter at the dust podcast and we'll be happy to direct you in a direction that works for you and your device wonderful you know to start us

all off I've already asked you all your thoughts on the season I did have some like overall other questions right more pointedly to the topic of our discussion for both of you, for Holly and Double M, as he likes to try and get us to call him on the cast. I'm hoping you have some doubles for us this episode. Oh, God. Holly will kill me if I do that to your guys' podcast.

She really will. No. I won't. I mean, maybe. Who knows? But, you know, I just want to get a sense. You know, you were saying that you like Season 2 already more than you liked Season 1. But I'm kind of curious how you both feel, like, that the soundtrack has evolved from Season 1 to Season 2, right?

feel like that the soundtrack has evolved from season one to season two right are there any changes that you've seen in the tone overall like or the composition that in the soundtrack between the seasons i think the tone i guess for the first season is a lot lighter and there's a lot more kind of fun things happening versus the season two soundtrack where it's it's scary and sad those are my very basic thoughts, like I said. I'm not qualified to be here. Totally qualified to be here because that's all the purpose of the music is, is to heighten our emotions of what we're seeing on screen. So I think that that's Balfe used, but he is kind of a stickler for what he feels like his sound is. You'll hear very similar orchestrations in his other soundtracks, like for Genius, like for Mission Impossible, like for The Crown Season 2. He was part of that.

And that's just kind of Lawrence Sound, where he comes from. He's originally, as he grew up, was very much a drummer. He's a multi-instrumentalist now, of course. But you'll find a lot of stylistically, like the cross-rhythm things where the lines kind of overlap each other a great deal and what I find most interesting about that is the way that he has used those types of things in both seasons or both series this series a lot more than in series one he's like look i'm a rhythmologist i'm gonna i'm gonna show you how to use some rhythms which i've loved for this particular soundtrack yeah he's

honestly a super popular composer right like he's kind of got his paws in everything uh if you go to his spotify page you're not just seeing his dark materials you're gonna see a lot of stuff that you didn't even realize lorne was doing i mean i think he's he's doing the black widow soundtrack yeah yeah yeah that's gonna be that's that's a reason i may be going to see black widow after one of the reasons is all i'm going to say that is that's one of the reasons why i've been waiting for a year for the darn thing to come out, it feels like. I know. I guess time's moving more slowly

here, as we're seeing, and I'm sure Will and Lyra could understand that whole time moving differently thing, so glad we're on board with it. I thought it was interesting that you were saying that Balfe was originally a drummer. He was talking about how his collaboration with, like this season, right, he brought on the drummer from the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Chad Smith. And he actually used him in the season one soundtrack, too. That was kind of the thing that finalized his feelings about the Mrs. Coulter theme. Right. You know, he felt like he'd really hit it right by the time that Chad came on board and worked on that. And on his Twitter, he posted video after video of Chad recording that. He's just so proud because I think Chad

is one of his heroes as a drummer. And so that had to be great fun for him. I asked him in our interview last year what it was like to play to hear his music played by world-class musicians which is nothing new to him of course because he's been doing soundtracks for everything from video games to movies for a long time now and he's been in hans zimmer's composer group forever uh the last 10-15 years so this is nothing new to him but there are moments like chad smith playing the drums for him that just makes uh his day which is really cool that's

awesome that's so cool that that's really fun to hear and you know we were talking a little bit about the soundtrack overall but zooming in on like some of you know what what chloe and i like to talk about a lot are um these really deep character moments right and i'm just kind of curious how you found that maybe some certain characters maybe their themes evolved or like what are some of your favorite ways i i know you talk about this a bit on your cast and some of the ways that you've seen things change but what are some of your favorite ways you've seen those themes evolve from season one to season two the most obvious? The most obvious one, the most overt one, is probably for me the treatment of Lee Scoresby's theme. Most of the

time in series one it was done with the same kind of instrumentation. It was a lot more guitar heavy in series one, which is fine. It represents the kind of that Western element that goes along with Lee. But to hear that theme throughout the course of this season, and especially given the result of the end with this piano tiny kind of thing or even with a theremin, but to hear it played with a French horn, to hear it played with a trombone, to hear the strings being used in the way that they are to harmonize it is something that we really didn't get really much of at all. We didn't get much of that at all in series one. So that's was a way that made Lee's whole storyline this particular series even more cinematic than maybe we're used to. Yeah, I think we have a lot to talk about, about Lee's themes today. I know that's probably our biggest uh everyone's got some stuff to say there and before we get into all of that i'm so excited to hear about that and i do want to know i know you have a bunch of ground rules matt for what you analyze a series

with when you and holly discuss the music of his dark materials over on the dust and kind of where it takes you so let us know what kind of the base foundational notes you have on music are when it comes to His Dark Materials. Sure. The thing that I like to do, because I'm a pretty simple person, is I like to bring everything down to the lowest common denominator so that I can talk about it. So one thing that we have to understand is we're going to be rattling off a lot of titles in this particular episode. The one thing that you have to understand is we're going to be rattling off a lot of titles in this particular episode. The one thing that you have to keep in mind is that there are cue titles, which are specifically things that you'll find in soundtracks that usually just point to a scene.

They're only titled that because of how the scene starts or the music that is accompanying a certain scene. That is not necessarily a theme. A theme is a piece of music that you might hear over several of these cue titles, just orchestrated in a different way or perhaps harmonized differently. A perfect example of this is that if you have, for instance, in the season two official television soundtrack, there's a cut called The Female Scholar, and that's a cute title. But it starts with Mary's theme, the theme that was created for the character Mary. And then it totally shifts gears, and it becomes the theme for The Shaman is played,

John Perry's theme. So when we say the female scholar, we'll probably be referencing either the first half or the second half simply by the cue title cut, but realize that there are different themes being played in all of these different cuts, because that's what narratively music does for television. It helps you inform whose point of view this is or who we're looking at or those types of things. And so kind of as a shorthand, most composers just say, OK, this is where Mary taps the computer. And so the cue title becomes taps the computer, which may not necessarily have anything to do with the music that's being played.

Another thing that I'd like to point out for sure is that not all of the cues that you hear on an official soundtrack actually make it into an episode. Sometimes things are either faded back to the point where you can't hear it or even cut off. And at the same time, sometimes there's music that ends up in an episode that does not make it into a soundtrack. In fact, just less than a month ago, Mr. Balfe was asking Twitter to help him make a decision on what their favorite cues from the series was so that he could help them get compiled into the soundtrack which I love that he is so fan friendly he'll answer any tweet that you send at him he's very cool with that and he actually asked for input for that and I'm sure that people's input actually helped him evaluate what he wanted to have put on the soundtrack by silver screen records and at the same time sometimes you might have something from one scene that's 15 seconds long

and another scene that's 30 seconds long and those things may be put together by music editors even though they may be in totally different episodes. So don't think that when we're talking about a particular title cut, if part of it relates to one episode of television, the other part of it might not even be the same episode, or let alone the corresponding scene. Oftentimes they try to put them together as much as they can but sometimes other considerations like are these two pieces in this are in the same key or are they the same tempo also come into play and that's not something that has happened a whole lot until maybe the last 15 years or so but cut length used to be sometimes you'd listen to an old official soundtrack and and some

cuts would be only 30 seconds long now they try to make them at least worth the money to buy a single mp3 for and that's why they're cut together that way now there's something i really noticed i spent a lot of time driving this week so i used that time wisely and had both series one and season two soundtracks playing on repeat got through them a handful of times but it was very obvious which songs were used before the intro when you get driving when you can literally physically recall watching the episode and going ah right that was the the open before the intro music played aha and that struck me while driving i could hear it and i just started jamming every time i'll do do do yeah you know you guys know the whole thing but yeah that that was pretty obvious and

it does seem that there are a couple things like you said that had some extension added to it or things that had to be trimmed down that were kind of uh or blended in right series one it feels like a lot of the music from series one didn't have uh it's not that the the transitions weren't seamless but some of the transitions were a little stiffer than i think series two was blended really seamlessly musically i think that uh it found its flow a lot more than season one, and not in a bad way, just series two evolved. It evolved to kind of incorporate all these sounds together and all these characters together, which is exactly where Mr. Balfe, I'm sure, is heading. Right. And there's such an infusion of new themes for this particular series. I mean,

seven or eight new themes. And we typically look for what those themes sound like in his anthology series, which he'll actually create a lot of music. And this is what ends up in his anthologies, volume one and two. He'll create music to send to the showrunners, to send to Jack and Jane and say, this is what I picture for the specters, or this is what I picture for, you know know the shaman or whatever and then they'll say yeah I like that no I don't really like that and and decisions are made from there and then when it goes to actually scoring he has a kind of a template with which to work is okay I'm going to take this music from here and this music from here. This music's for the knife. This music's for Lee. And he'll know how to combine them together. And ultimately, Mr. Balfe is very adamant about

this. Ultimately, all of that stuff in terms of what gets in and what doesn't get in is up to the director, which makes perfect sense because they're setting the overall tone of everything. Very, very interesting. And these are good ground rules and and a great primer as we head into the episode and talk a little bit more about our favorite musical moments of you know the whole entire series and this time when i'm saying series i'm saying it the way that americans mean it the whole show thus far both seasons so so you know start off um doesn't have to be in any order. What are some of your top musical moments? Yeah, let's start off talking about Lee Scoresby. I know we have a lot to talk

about when it comes to Lee, our dashing spaghetti Western hero who Lin-Manuel cuts a very nice, a little bit younger Once Upon a Time in the North, Lee Scoresby. And the themes for Lee are prominent. You'll know that when you hear them, we'll talk more about some of their possible origins as we tear in. But specifically, I think we're talking about what Lee's Choice, the tales of Lee Scoresby gateway to the north today. Yeah, Lee's Choice was absolutely one of my favorites and of course it didn't appear until the seventh episode it's it actually covers a couple of scenes it's used in two different scenes the first half is used in the scene where John Perry leaves him and well he sends John Perry away in the second half is used as he's calling to Serafina Peclo using the cloud pine.

And there's a very emotional type of harmonization that is used with that. And it's also what I like to think of as true Americana, which is the Copland kind of sound. Aaron Copland was a composer who is often associated with the quote-unquote American sound. And as we all know, Texas in Lyra's world is essentially all of the United States.

So it seems fitting that as a kind of a goodbye to Lee that this bag would be used by Balfe. The parallel, what we call parallel fourths, But this bag would be used by Balfe. The parallel, what we call parallel fourths, are very prominent. That's a Copland harmonizing technique, which makes you feel not just tense, but also sad. And if I had to pick one version of Lee's theme throughout either of the two series so far, this would definitely be my favorite. Hallie, I know that the Tales of Lee Scoresby is a favorite of yours from the series.

Yeah, it's fun talking after Matt when he goes into depth and I'm just going to be like, I like the way it sounds. And when I listen to the soundtrack, I want to just listen to this one on repeat. No, I really do like... to the soundtrack, I want to just listen to this one on repeat. No, I really do like... I like the, I just like the Western style piano. And not to talk about other composers from shows we like, but it just kind of reminds me of Romain Djuadi from Westworld. I really like his use of the same instrument in his score. But with this one, it does seem like not like American Western. It does feel otherworldly Western.

So I really believe it's not of this world, if that makes any sense. Yeah. Holly, one of the things that I love about you bringing that up is when we first meet Lee Scoresby, he's coming to Trollison basically to start trouble he's coming in as the cowboy who walks into the saloon and and is ready to challenge the nearest gunslinger more or less because he's looking for Yorick and he's trying to figure out what the heck's happened to his friend and it really sets up the fact that this theme, literally in everything that we've seen in terms of old Western movies,

has that kind of vibe, just like you mentioned, even Ramin with his Westworld soundtrack. But the other thing that I really like is the fact that he did evolve it all throughout series two uh to a point where it became bigger and just like he is crossing in different worlds so the orchestration is enlarging his universe as well i'm going to circle back to that exact point on a different track i'm going to talk about later because that's how i feel about some of some of my choices here interesting teaser teaser foreshadowing um no but uh yeah i i also had like tales of lee scorsese there because a friend of ours fred emailed the podcast and i think we said this on one of our earlier episodes and was comparing Lee Scoresby's

you know the way that the music goes and how it has that western genre vibe comes back to his theme referencing Enrico Morricone's composition The Ecstasy of Gold from the western The Good The Bad and The Ugly and

he sent us links to those here and we can link Morricone's the ecstasy of gold and you can all check out lauren balfe's thing on i don't know spotify or apple music or wherever people access music nowadays title i don't know if it's on there or not but yeah i thought that was a really really great great pickup that Fred found. Yeah. There are definitely some similar motives, Eliana. It's kind of an inverted one, but like the Lee Scoresby theme starts like this. Whereas Morricone starts like this.

Same notes, just going in a different direction and there's also that little motive in Morricone's like that and with with Lee it's very very similar so I did put a question into to Mr. Balfe when we first started talking about this, this email, because him and I messaged back and forth every once in a while, and he had not responded, unfortunately. There are things that could point to the fact that it might be coincidence, just because after Berg's 12-tone road there's no way to create anything actually original but it does seem way too similar to me to not think that it was something that he might have thought about or maybe even had watched some of that movie that that's from

on top of that as I mentioned at the top of the, Mr. Balfe for a long time was part of Hans Zimmer's composer group. And because of that, if you read interviews with Mr. Zimmer, Morikani is one of his absolute favorite composers and biggest influences. and biggest influences. So I can only imagine that as Balfe and Gregson Williams and Zimmer are sitting around, Zimmer's probably playing Encino all the time. So it might've come out of him just because, oh, that's the Western sound. So I think Fred's onto something. It could be just coincidence, but I think he's onto something. Yeah. I think Fred is 900% onto something for sure. It's definitely a reference. I mean, this is so we talked about the origins of Lee Scoresby's name and Lee Van Cleef is actually a Western character who he's named for one person he's named for. He's named for another explorer by the last name of Scoresby. We'll talk about some other time, but no music's original, for sure. Nothing's original. Movies are terrible. Everything's terrible.

But I think of that, what was it, Simpsons, yes, movies are terrible line. My fiance says that all the time, and we laugh about that whenever we talk to pretty much any media, because it's all awful. But Morricone started composing for Westerns in the 60s. You know that sound, the bow, bow, bow, with the tumbleweed going by? That's Morricone started composing for Westerns in the 60s. You know that sound, the bow, bow, bow, with the tumbleweed going by? That's Morricone. You know, like when you think, boom, exactly. Yeah.

Exactly. And that is what we're hearing here, right? Like that is straight up Western, whether it's exactly from Ecstasy of Gold, which let me just say Clint Eastwood is looking mighty Western fine if you ever want a nice Saturday watch. You know, I didn't get it when I was a kid. My dad watched a lot of Clint Eastwood and then he also watched Steven Seagal. So I don't know.

They don't really even out in my opinion. But my dad watched a ton of Clint Eastwood when I was a kid and I didn't get it. But now as an adult, I'm like, I get it, dad. I get it, pops. So yeah, that tumbleweed going by, you know, that's what you hear and you think that's Morricone. And he's composed so much. He's composed Good, Bad, the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in the West, which notable as Holly might appreciate, right? Because Once Upon a Time in the North with Lee.

You have a huge mishmash of movies he's been in, like Dueo Nei Texas, Bullets Don't Argue, Pistol for Ringo, Seven Guns for McGregor's, Julio Petroni's Death Rides a Horse, Bullet for the General, you name it. He's done music for it. But he was also, this is so crazy to me. When I learned this, I thought this was wild.

Morricone was an influence for Muse, City of Delusion, Hoodoo, and Knights of Cydonia, they have said, are influenced by Morricone. Is that not insane to you? Knights of Cydonia is influenced by Spaghetti Westerns, and it makes total sense when I think about it. I want to play Guitar Hero now. Yeah, me too. I'm like...

I thought that was just an anime. I'm not really into Muse. We'll work on it, Eliana. We'll work on it. I've tried, I've tried, but there's just something about the vocalist's voice that I can't... It was a high school thing for me.

In high school, it was just, they were the band. But, I don't know, Morricone's a big deal, right? Metallica uses Ecstasy of Gold as an intro to their concerts, and the Mars Volta uses, what do they use? They use Fistful of Dollars. Gnarls Barkley'sley's crazy that song that's influenced because of morricone he's literally said that's what inspired him to write it excellent that is cool the other thing that you might want to consider if you're looking for that kind of

western sound and you can go back even a little further of course is to copeland and you you hear a lot of copeland influences in what Balfe did, especially in this season, not just with Lee's theme, but also with a couple of renditions of John Perry's theme. But if you think back to that kind of sound, like Billy the Kid, Appalachian Spring, all of that kind of sound wasn't stolen by Morricone at all. Morricone was very much using Italian music and Italian musicians to create his scores which I found fantastic especially since we consider them spaghetti Westerns now. But the whole idea of that kind of sound has been around for quite a while, and many musicians have gone to those two kinds of influences

to create that sound. But I'm in total agreement with you here, Eliana. I feel like that some of these motives that Balfe put in Lee's theme, especially, have a direct correlation to Ecstasy of Gold. Thank you to our friend Fred for his insight there. And yeah, you know, we've been talking a lot about Lee's theme and the way that the instruments have changed and how it's evolved. And I'm just wondering, you know, is there anything that you might anticipate

for some ways that it could change to really play up some of the scenes that we'll see him again. You know, as book readers know, we are going to see, we probably should have put a spoiler thing at top of this episode. Well, we kind of did. You know, we're going to see Lee again in season three in the underworld. You know, what might that sound like? I think it will depend on the perspective. If this is something that's very emotional for Lyra or for Will or whoever, I don't know that you'll hear that much different. If Mr. Balfe wants to try and use

timbral changes, he could go back to the original kind of theremin sound that he was using. Do you think maybe it could be blended with the Shaman a little bit more as far as melodic themes? Because we'll probably see both of them in similar moments and it'll probably harken back to here where both of them have such horrid ends in so such sudden ends right in the same handful of scenes and moments and those two themes are already if you look at the the notes contained within those themes they are linked already uh if you just think about the motif of of lee just that little lick that's always in lee's guitar that same thing is used in john perry's theme They both have this melody part of it.

So all of those things are already interconnected a great deal. So you could definitely maybe have Lee Scoresby's harmony with John Perry's melody. The interesting thing about Balfe is that he always composed things with two layers. The interesting thing about Balfe is that he always composed things with two layers so that the harmony can stand by itself or so that the melody can stand by itself. And so that offers a lot of choices of versatility. And what he does with that timbrally then adds a whole third layer. So it's exciting to think about. It allows the focus to change pretty well, right?

Like it allows the camera, it allows the scene. And earlier we talked about how music, you know, it tells you more than just tone, right? It tells you what character's in charge of the scene. It tells you pretty much everything about the scene. If you take away the dialogue, you can still understand what's going on, everything about the scene if you take away the dialogue you can still understand what's going on mostly from whether it's just the physical whether it's just the the tone etc yeah agreed yeah you know i think we get a little bit of a sneak peek in terms of um your both reactions right to episode seven and how did you all feel how did you all feel um about the way that they executed that uh last those last moments of lee i mean i cried on did you all feel about the way that they executed that last, those last moments of Lee?

I mean, I cried on our podcast just talking about it, if that tells you anything. Same. Same, you cried during recording your podcast about it? I don't think it's very fair to ask that of anyone, first of all. Second of all, yes, I did, bitch. What of it? It's my podcast. I'll cry if I want to.

Fuck yeah, I cried. I was so sad. I cried. Eliana, did you hear me cry a little bit? Almost cry. Choke back tears. Almost cry. I mean, you called me like right after the episode finished. I was very emotional.

I did. I straight up like opened my phone got on discord called this bitch and i was like we have to talk about it she finished like half an hour before i did i cried a little bit in the episode where i held back tears about will and his dad actually same same i didn't really that was sad that part was sad but lee got me the most. Yeah, no, Lee hurt. Lee hurt. The music in the episode during Lee's choice, ha ha, no pun intended. Actually, no, the pun was absolutely intended. I don't know why I'm lying to you.

So the music there in Lee's choice, I caught something interesting. And like I said, shit posting in the margins. As you know, I am a very avid shipper, which is the fandom term for when you relationship with someone or when you want someone to be together very badly with all of your little broken, blackened, bruised soul and heart. And there's something between You Loved a Witch from series one, episode four, and there's something between you loved a witch from series one episode four and lee's choice throughout its couple of uses in the finale that we mentioned earlier in season one episode four armor you loved a witch plays when farter quorum tells lyra about his past right and tells

her how he loved a witch before the scene then changes and we get Lee scores these first entrance into a bar to cause trouble, as Matt said earlier. The first 15, 30, 45 seconds of You Loved a Witch is those sad, swelling, emotional, heavy strings, right? Let's fast forward to Lee's Choice. Starts out Lee's theme, which then gets bastardized into these sad, heavy, swelling, emotional strings by the mid-end of the song. It's going pretty hard, right? you mentioned the second time we hear Lee's choice the last time I guess I could say uh Serafina Pecola is receiving Lee's call you know why because you loved a witch I'm just saying Lauren Balfe ships it too okay I'm just saying these literally line up this is a parallel from series one to series two I'm I'm just saying am i wrong have you considered that the intermixing of lee's theme with john perry's theme could also get out eliana do not ruin this for me do not do this i like shipping that that's that's my thing right there i'm all for that well i think that's

the last smart thing i have so thanks here i am ruining Chloe's life Bringing in other people to ruin Chloe's life I think there's reason to ship the two of them I absolutely think there's reason to ship Serafina and Lee She didn't give anybody else No cloud pine I'm just saying as of series 2

It's a part of her right And there's that Scene of like A she kisses him on the forehead but then ruda garnitas right on her twitter she has like a she shared a picture of herself kissing a photo of lin-manuel or something it's canon that's all i'm saying it was pretty funny all jokes aside i thought that was an interesting parallel that like the first like we get obviously lee's entrance a little earlier in a hot air balloon singing another jam eliana and i know a little well but uh lee ends his plot with the witch calling for the witch and seraphina

like realizes what's going on to that end of his theme and that's actually how we hear lee's theme in the beginning i find that interesting good parallels yeah yeah moving on from our cowboys and our shamans let's talk a little bit about another one of our top musical moments which comes in the female scholar i guess i'm kind of slipping in a little bit of a write-in vote here underneath this title because we can consider that Mrs. Coulter always thought of herself as a scholar even though she wasn't rewarded as such. But for me, one of the most poignant versions of the Coulter theme this particular season was right at the beginning of the episode The The Scholar, where she was watching everybody on the outside. She was brand new in this world. She was in that car and she was watching everybody.

And as I mentioned before, Mr. Balfe does things where he can separate harmony from melody. He always writes in two layers. So you have the typical Mrs. Coulter harmony going on, which has just this descending bass line. Normally you would hear her melody be like this. But in that particular case, one of the things that I loved is we were seeing how she was so intrigued by it all, how she was happy to be seeing this different place. In psychoacoustics, we use what we call major chords to create feelings of happiness or lightness and we use minor to create sadness or we use it to create scariness

and he put a whole different melody on top of those chords at that beginning moment by going like this. The chords were telling you it was Mrs. Coulter, but the melody was telling you she was happy to be there, which I thought was just fascinating because we'd never heard Mrs. Coulter's theme done in that way. I thought that was a very poignant moment for the character and for our perspective of her, you know, as viewers. Yeah, it's amazing how much dissonance there was brought to both of those characters, right? there was brought to both of those characters, right? Both of their notes seemed to clash just like both of their characters would have clashed had Coulter not been putting on that happy Mrs. Scholar face, so to say. And this is one of those show invented scenes we kind of mentioned earlier

at the top of the episode. And I know, Holly, that you really enjoyed this episode among a couple of the other invented meetings so what what did you think about this meeting with Coulter and with Mary I really liked it I wish it would have happened in the book that's that's how I felt that's how I felt about a lot of these added scenes I'm like these this is my headcanon now like this actually happens yeah it's it was thrilling to watch Mrs. Coulter get to see what she's missed out on and all the opportunities she doesn't have. Um, I could say that because she's bad, right? Um, so I can not feel, I can, yeah, I can, I can say, Hey, yeah, you suck. You don't deserve any of this. Uh, you couldn't have it in your world anyway. Suck it. Uh, I don't know. I, I really did enjoy

that scene a lot. Yeah. It was one of, I think, the highlights of invented scenes. And I think, as you've said, you really like the way that they've been adapting Mary Malone throughout the series. So I think that's been really interesting. And yeah, that dissonance that you're talking about is interesting that it might be like happy because it feels like mrs coulter's acting right there isn't quite joy it's more like a uh i was actually for my thing i was actually referring to the very first scene of the episode uh which it is this this scene actually occurs much later when she's sitting in the car you mean and just like watching everybody and boreal she's sitting in the car watching everybody and waiting on boreal's coffee

that one had a sense of wonder to it which is interesting um and posed a very interesting like philosophical question of like or kind of a prop argument right that you know our world is less spiritual and therefore more corrupt but i don't know i don't know if it is or not i feel like she looked at that world too and she saw nothing but opportunities right where boreal said every moment charles just said oh this world's shit it's bullshit nothing's great about this world exactly and there's even something to it right that that music that uh that clashing that you played, that right there is her saying, I'm happy. I have everything I want.

Don't I? Question mark. Trailing off. And that's what the episode is all about. That misnomer of the scholar, as we mentioned in our show coverage. I think that is really brilliant just that you open the episode thinking we're gonna get all of this mary malone content but it opens with coulter and it's about coulter's journey seeing this and in her her parts of the music

is is more it's busier right it's more complicated complicated than Mary's Whimsical Theme that we'll talk about in a bit. And it still has those soaring strings that kind of indicate adventure. But like you said, Lauren admits that writing her theme was so hard, he rewrote it the most. It was the most challenging. And he mentioned that looking at full storyboards helps him write a theme, right? Like that when he's looking at writing music or themes, he's looking for color inspiration and flow of the story and being able to see the big picture at once. And there's this descending bit of the song where it slows down, right, to almost a complete soft lull of rushing strings and it changes from being so busy and it starts to get a little, I don't know, it starts from dark and then it light rushing strings and it changes from being so busy and it starts to get a little

i don't know it starts from dark and then it lightens up and it makes me think a little bit of her entire arc against this song right like it's busy it's full of mystery there's energy but there's also diligence and then it slows and crashes toward the middle and by the end it has a new direction it's softer and and brighter and it feels almost like Maryse's art put against it. I wish, I wish, I wish that that cut from the opening scene had been included in the soundtrack.

It was not. I think it totally paints Mrs. Coulter in a totally different light. And as for the scene that you brought up, Chloe, earlier about her meeting with Mary Malone, I mean, we don't praise Ruth Wilson enough, right? But we... Emmy, Emmy. BAFTA, BAFTA. BAFTA, Emmy, BAFTA, Emmy. Yeah, exactly. She, that just not only her acting but the continuity of seeing the realizing how kind of out of her league that she is with mary registering on her face slowly slowly slowly uh to the point that by the time later on in the episode when she's sitting with Boreal, you know, and he asks her to describe Malone, you could just see all of that happening again on her face. that I don't think direction and acting can ever be given enough credit for,

because you know they had to do a ton of shots, different directions, whatever, and it just seems so seamless. So I love that moment. That's a great time to move into a few songs from Series 2 specifically. Study the Dark Matter, Journey Ahead, Matter of Dust, to move into a few songs from series two specifically study the dark matter journey ahead matter of dust basically any scene with mary either communicating with dust or any parts of her journey uh very heavily include her theme and different bits i really loved the way that they did those scenes of mary um especially the ones in the cave uh in general across the season and

wrote in that music i think that in i don't remember which of it so it wasn't uh i think you matt were talking about how it was a play some of this music was a play on a song or one of the themes from the previous season and had been adjusted for it but like they really just interweave it with this like beeping instrument or bell is how i'm interpreting it as a unknowledgeable person and it feels like both technological but the way that it's like spaced out gives it this really sense of whimsy or of the divine to me and the way that it also goes in well with the sounds that the cave software is making and sort of meshes with that instrument.

And it's just... Yeah, you're spot on, Eliana, because using those bell kind of sounds, high bell tones, the actual waveforms, if you look at them on a computer the same way that we do when we edit our voices, you can tell whether a timbre is more pure or not simply by how smooth it is, whether there's more jagged edges in it or what have you. And bells typically, in most ranges until you get into the lower ranges, have very smooth, almost sign-like waveforms, which is literal sonic purity, which is a great way to show that this sound is kind of representing the angel's message to them

because they are coming from a place of divinity, of superiority. And I love that you threw in the whimsy bit because there is those spaces like the... Also just the distance when you go, when you jump things by octaves, this creates a huge amount of leaps, what we like to call the melodic shape. And when you have large melodic shapes like that, you think of Mary having to take a literal leap of faith in order to buy into all of this stuff. So I think that Mr. Balfe put a lot of thought into how he was going to approach Mary's theme in general. Yeah. And I mean, that makes sense because Mary does a lot of thought into how he was going to approach mary's theme in general yeah and i mean

that makes sense because mary does a lot of thought and thinking exactly you know the light bells are really prominent and the song is different than uh it's similar to like how we can discuss lee's theme and melody at length the way we did earlier that's how mary's is right it's so singular it's so specific it's different than anyone else's theme in the story and there were a few things i noticed in this uh it's not just the divine whimsy which in a way it also reminds me of chinese bells uh they used to be cast out of beaten copper most of them since the bronze age were cast out of regular metal but chinese hand bells were often used to communicate with ancestral spirits and it reminds me a bit of

that and there's also a bit of childlike whimsy right that mary is the keeper of the children through this whole series that it sounds like innocence her theme sounds like innocence the bells ring like innocence like children playing in the streets of shigatse uh and you even hear during these for example in i think study the dark matter lyra's theme right that overarching that overture of the oxford theme and lyra's theme joins into the bells at one point, which is significant of Lyra joining her plot. When you get to Journey Ahead, you have that similar background melody riding, but it's changed a bit because Lyra has changed Mary's journey. She's changed her theme. You hear these sounds start to kind of soar more and as you get to matter of dust it

sounds like a bigger soaring over sound right like there's all these strings and different things soaring above that are just slightly different from study the dark matter so it's almost like things are falling into place and all this understanding and it's really interesting i recommend listening to all three of them together Great point Holly, what did you think of Mary's scenes with the cave? I know that you read this book at around the same time I did So obviously me in 2003 had a really different conception Of what the cave would look like And this probably makes sense for our time

Well actually you read it a little after No, it's the same though I don't know what I imagine Like a big server box of computers or something silly. I and then I was just really blown away. I talked about it on our episode of the podcast of quantum computers. Like there's computers that look like that that really exists. And I was like, oh, I was blown away.

I had no idea. It's good. Absolutely. And I think there's a big journey. I had no idea. It's good. Absolutely. And I think there's a big journey. And I'm kind of curious, you know, what your thoughts are as well on like, you know, how did this evolve as she meets the children in It's the same kind of similar music when she's using the I Ching. So that's why I said communicating with dust earlier. But I don't know that it is the same when she's doing it in the world of Chittagatse. There are two different instances when we first see Mary in Chittagatse.

The one where she's using the I Ching. Again, this is where Valfe divides harmony and melody. So sometimes you don't hear that melody, but you'll hear this. And that was present when she was doing the I Ching almost everywhere but you don't necessarily hear the you know those types of melody parts and again Balfe can take one idea divide it up into several parts and that way he can use it for different situations I think you do hear the bell parts when she's sitting near the shore and we see the angel i think that you you hear them there uh and again the bells representing the divinity of the angels uh as they are protecting her speaking to her whatever yeah and that's a great point bringing in um the angels and of course

that's uh that is dust that's communicating with dust as well and i think we'll come back to that in a bit but first we're going to talk about our uh person who's you know the biggest expert that we have in the series when it comes to communicating the dust lyra yes the best song. Lyra has basically two themes, right? She's got the prophecy theme. And then she's got her more fun theme that we first heard with her and Roger in the very first episode.

Like that. So those are her two basic themes and they've both been used a whole lot. But I particularly, as far as picking a favorite of versions of Lyra's theme, it is that second version, the more fun version that I found in episode four, was it, of series one called Armor. And you have Lee Scoresby looking in the balloon overhead and he looks down, he sees the ship, and all of a sudden there's Lyra running through the ship and we hear that theme being played. And up until that time, I had kind of just associated this theme with her and Roger more so than just her on her own but obviously she's going to try and find Roger but Roger's nowhere around and she's having some fun on her own so Schoolastic Sanctuary was the name of it on the Anthology Volume 1 album

and it outgrew its namesake in that very scene, because now it became more of Lyra's fun theme, and we've heard that used a whole lot in Season 1, like when she was riding on York in the Season 1, Episode 6, but you even heard a whisper of it in the beginning of this series because she's been exploring a new world of Chittagaze and you hear the this part but then all of a sudden the theme for Chittagaze itself or the specter kicks in and in kind of an answer to it so that's kind of demonstrating that she's going to be exploring it didn't sound nearly as happy as it normally does either because of the different kinds of harmony from the chittagaze theme being played around it so that was beautiful but for me, the version at the

beginning of the armor episode is the one that I would definitely list as a favorite. So one of my favorites is in season two. I think that the ones that you were saying of Lyra, especially what I think the one with armor that was stuck in my head earlier today, but this is a different one. And in episode two, right, when Lyra's about to go into Will's Oxford, I think this might be one of her themes. It's a theme for her and Will, I believe. Yes. Beautiful. It's from the season two anthology.

If you look up Children of the Prophecy, you'll hear that melody played. But I know where you're going with this and I love it. Yeah, I love it. I love that they made new themes for the two of them. So beautiful. They deserve all of the themes together. But sorry, distracted by being sad. So sad.

All the time. And we're going to only get sadder as the episode goes and start talking about this more in depth. But this part's actually funny. the children of the prophecy theme right Lyra's like oh sick new door and just like runs through she's like yeah how hard can it be I've crossed worlds before and there's like the theme starts getting really like intense

and like there's this wonderful swelling of the music as though something amazing's about to happen and then it just immediately cuts off because Lyra gets hit by a car that's like how it ends and they just like use the music to this great comedic effect it's like in mulan where they're like all singing about a girl worth fighting for then something they're like oh fuck uh it was kind of like that but less less less like everyone died already yeah Unbelievable. So good. Just for folks' reference, the theme that she's talking about is this one. But she's talking also about how this chord builds up

at the end of that, because that happens as she's walking through the window, and Will's like, hey, wait, wait, wait. Then there's this big chord that builds up and all of a sudden bam she's she's sitting on the side of the road a car's hit her that was funny that was great and that that's another one of those uh things that you point out that's fantastic is how music can uh create a whole different vibe. What if he'd have played something really dark and ugly there? Would we have been more concerned for Lyra being hurt?

You know, all of those things can make a huge difference. But in the way that you put it and the way that he did it, just the push makes it comical to a point where it's like, see that's what you get for running out into a place that you don't know so love it and whom's amongst us has not almost been hit by a car oh it's happened to me oh definitely but at the same time do you guys think that this is foreshadowing lyra's treatment of pan this series the fact that several times she made pan jump in her bag or get hit by a car or uh treated pan very poorly is that foreshadowing for next season now i'm sad i said now now i'm sad because this is what makes me the saddest is Pan or Lyra. Lyra having to leave Pan is, that's the moment.

The end is sad too. It's very sad. But I lose it when she has to leave him on the shore. Every time. Every time. I can't take it. Who doesn't? Are you human? I mean, you have to. Sorry, I'm going to go on a tangent and chase that now.

Do you see that as the great betrayal because Philip Pullman does and I saw it as Roger interesting I think it's either I think Roger is almost like a red herring you know and you can believe it but this is even greater I don't know but I and she does this betrayal because she betrayed Roger like she's having she's just doing it to make oh I don't know it all all just comes around. She has to fix it. Yeah, it is all interconnected. Absolutely.

It is all connected. But damn. Yeah, I don't know. I thought you were saying that it was foreshadowing for me eventually getting hit by a car. I was like, damn, Chloe, what the fuck? No, oh my god. I was, I don't know unbelievable

in the words of piana layman in season two unbelievable that is that episode that is that episode um i'm still saying that to my cats i hope you know that like whenever i move my cats against their will i just go unbelievable again that's what i picked up on eliana against their will you have a will too um have you met a cat oh my god you know they don't want to do you have a will perry oh oh i wish can we pause and talk about how cute amir wilson is by the way oh my god he's so adorable that boy he's a handsome young lad isn't he and he is those kids you know a lot of people are worried about them getting older i don't really care

about that i don't i don't i'm worried about it it looks like amir ages a little throughout this series or maybe it's just he got beat up more because i was like watching the beginning re-watching some of those beginning episodes i I'm like, he looks so young and innocent here. And then in the end, he's like, I'm haggard and I watched my dad die in front of me. To me, there's definitely a difference between the way that Amir looks in Series 1

and the way he looks in Series 2. Daphne, I don't think aged quite as much as Amir did in between seasons i don't know she's she's getting older too but honestly i don't think it's a big deal because they already exactly 12 and 13 right like that's a period and yeah i think like honestly i i think that the suspension of disbelief is already a little hard and some of the things they go through, obviously, and not saying it's not possible, but they are young heroes and heroines.

I think that it'll be fine for TV. And I think also we're lucky that I mean, some shows like Doctor Who put it right in their premise, right? They're like recasting happens every couple of years when contracts are up. But for this, I think it's okay because it's about puberty so it doesn't really matter because like it also makes it like their bond will be stronger in a way like if you are perceiving them aging more and that they're going through a journey together also time moves differently maybe in the world they're going to you know how about that let me borrow your guys's opinion on this since since we've got the scholars in the room and i'm the kitchen boy when in episode six of this series when the

specter attacks uh reina the witch and lyra tells will to pull the knife out. And he knows exactly where to chase them. So he's seeing them now. Is that right? I didn't interpret it that way. Really? Because he pointed the knife at them. They scooted off to the right. He went right around to the corner, right around to the right corner, right after him.

And I don't see how, if he can't see them that he does it that he does that i i don't remember it specifically in the scene but i just kind of assumed he was maybe he was just following the witch's eyes who can see them um maybe so it it could have been clumsy directing but i think in one scene and earlier in the series they showed him almost just almost seeing a shimmer, right? I agree. Yeah. Right after they got the knife and they were headed back to the tavern. Yeah.

He saw it. I mean, Angelica does say to him, you know, like, oh, soon. You're going to see him soon. So I don't think that it's like canon that he saw them per se, but I think he's on the verge of seeing them so he could at least feel their presence probably i mean that's the thing is you could probably feel their presence also he does this thing where he brandishes it first one direction where they aren't and then he turns around and realizes where they are by the witch is kind of how the stage directing works so

it could have been kind of awkward just stage movement because that set is kind of how the stage directing works so it could have been kind of awkward just stage movement because that set is kind of like all the rock everywhere you know and they have to stay in one line and he can only turn so much block the actresses that are behind him so much because that's the thing is he has to make sure he's not blocking the witch as she's like behind him collapsing the more convincing part of that shot was this to me was the specters darting to the right and then him going to the right specifically. I'm going to have to rewatch it. Yeah. Mm hmm.

Okay. Maybe. I just yeah, I was just gonna say like earlier, I mean, like if they age, I mean, it's believable regardless. And seeing the shimmers could be as well. Like it's a sign of, you know, even Lyra saying that she feels herself changing right and i think that's part of changing right you start at that age i mean you know so far from that age now um in my late days um and and uh you know you you do start to get glimpses of and start having those your thoughts like the way that you think starts changing and things like that and i mean like things are wildly different

in puberty and if they even look older like kids hit growth spurts you know and like next thing you know like one kid is i have a funny story about a friend who she was like what tallest kid in her eighth grade class but now she's like the shortest amongst a lot that was me um actually i was i was i'm as tall as i am now in eighth grade five seven which is not that tall but like i went to a small school and um yeah i was like maybe the second tallest girl and then a lot of people passed me up in high school I was just done actually 5'7 is not short as a 5'7

we are technically above average right I guess we're not like supermodel tall the six feet requirement if that's still a thing it was back in the 90s they let us in at 5'11 now don't worry we know we know you're the tallest lady well holly holly i'm the same way as you i grew i grew to a whopping five eight and a half and then nothing so i'm i really got towered over by the boys by the time we were

done with high school. Anything could happen in puberty. Puberty is a time where you're between different stages in your life. In a way, you are kind of between the worlds. Let's talk about that. Nice transition.

Thank you. I need to learn segues from you elliot oh don't don't she's a bad influence oh i'm gonna do it i'm gonna talk about the theme song because i mean we got to we have to it's iconic I loved it in the first season and on every episode watch, I loved it more and more. And then I think I even mentioned that I didn't even really notice the difference in instrumentation right away, but I think I did. I just didn't realize I did because it was just,

it just felt bigger and it's that added brass. I think Matt referred to it earlier. It just feels bigger and bolder and better and fuller, like more worlds. There's more worlds inside of the theme song this time around, because as we're seeing more worlds, I don't know. But it went really hard. And I think I didn't realize it at first, because every time I heard it, I was just so excited to have it back. I think my level of excitement was matching the theme song in my ears. I don't know.

I loved it, though. I loved it. No, you're spot on. Mr. Balfe said several times this season that he reworked the brass parts. I mean, the first season, basically, the only time you really heard the brass was during that low part. That's where it really stuck out. And there were other parts in there, but they were buried way down in the mix, and I'm not sure if he had had those being played at pianissimo or whatever

while the strings were carrying the bulk of the weight and other instruments were carrying the bulk of the weight. But he definitely reworked some of those brass bits for the main theme this time around so good ears holly excellent ears learn from the best i paid her to say that he pays beautiful really good she's hourly you guys she's hourly pays me with very kind editing maybe maybe by the end of the episode depending on where we are in our lives maybe this will be the episode where we suddenly do a beautiful acapella version all of us of the theme song

which set of let's see how we're feeling which set of lyrics are we going to use the season one lyrics or the season two lyrics you're're the Latin expert, not me. Dude, neither of us took Latin. Listen, the lyrics are... You know the lyrics. You do it every single week. I don't know why I'm telling you the lyrics, okay?

See? Those are the words. Lorem Ipsum. Oh my god, did you say Lorem Ipsum? I love you so much. I did, yes. I got so got this season. You know, I have that knack for looking at details too closely. They got me on the Lorem Ipsum a couple times, you guys. They got me a couple times i was

like oh this is fake latin and it means nothing yeah damn it painting practice one of the things that i love about balfe is that uh when he puts new versions out that have latin lyrics he will post what they are and their translation which i i don't know latin so he could be totally fooling me and i wouldn't know the difference. But nonetheless, I appreciate it when he does that stuff. Yeah, him doing that, the series has been so helpful, actually, because I remember last year at the beginning of the series, he ended up posting about halfway or a couple episodes into the series because there's a bunch of us at Reddit that were trying to figure out each word and what it meant. So he finally hooked us all up. So we don't have to do that anymore and it's kind of nice it is nice it is

nice of him to do especially for somebody who's you know again a kitchen boy like me speaking of kitchen boys let's talk about roger who oh you like that one better thanks eliana oh rude oh you're right sorry i like it equally as well i like it equally i taught her everything i know no you didn't if you had i would be better at this oh well i was doing a good sad listen to where is ro, which is beautiful, right? It's swooping. It has the Lyra theme and Oxford theme within it. And that against I Had a Best Friend, which Matt, I know you're going to regale me with everything that's within I Had a Best Friend soon, but I Had a Best Friend has a lot of the slower Oxford and Lyra themes in the strings at the beginning. of the slower oxford and lyra themes and the strings at the beginning and the contrast of the middle end of the songs really stands out the end of i had a best friend is really heavy

heavy music very emotional but the end of where's roger is light and feels hopeful and open i found that juxtaposed really really interestingly yeah those that stuff is beautiful. He goes through so many themes in that particular cut that it's hard to keep up with all of them, but he's got the... That's the reference to the prophecy theme. He's got the Mrs. Coulter melody, which ends up going down here.

And then it's got the main theme in it as well. And it's also got the Mrs. Coulter chords. It shifts keys and goes to here. And then it's also got the specter part in it. And then... Not only that, but then the specter chords, which are just really bizarre. They like go...

I don't even know what the last one is. Let's see. It all goes around this kind of diminished chord is the way that that's all built around. And then finally, it's got the Ruta Scotti theme at the end of it as well. So it just goes through so many different things that it's hard for me to place it in the episode, actually. Oh, it's the bench, right?

Yeah, I think it is the bench. It's the bench. Oh, that fucking bench. God damn it. God damn it, another bench. It's the bench. Oh, that fucking bench. God damn it. God damn it, another bench. Also rude. I think it's really interesting that Ruta Scotti's theme gets worked into that, right? Another song that has all of those big motifs kind of hanging out together is Tortured Witch.

You started off with Coulter torturing her and the music is very different. But as you get to that very end it becomes an opera piece right the the the very end is the the strings going as ruda just murders them all oh it's so good god it was so good so emotional she's flying there she's like i hear you i'm gonna come save you girl i got you it's me ruda scotty she flies there she shows up and then she does the murder stuff and then she's all bah, duh, duh, bah, bah you know. Right. That was my melodica, thank you it was my voice. So but that was another song that has

like all these themes at the beginning it has that prophecy kind of theme going that melody playing and then it gets emotional and then it becomes all of a sudden a huge switch and I really like how much he was able to fit in and layer with that kind of two layer switcher switch-in, switch-out, fade-in, fade-out system he's doing this series. A lot to work in together is the other thing.

He has a lot of characters to make happen together. And he did it really well. Yeah, and one of the biggest challenges for composers absolutely is if you have montage montage scenes if you have scenes where you're switching perspectives a lot a way to be narrative with that can be really challenging to work themes together as well so again excellent job by Mr. Balfe. There are a couple really good themes as we talk about some of these characters that have been drawn together through the world. And yes, we got a glimpse at Andrew Scott's Joppery, whatever that pronunciation is that I now am using. It does sound like Joppery, and that's kind of how I keep it in my head.

Oh, yeah, I get it. Like, I literally get it. But it also is problematic. it's problematic it makes me think of how oh that must be what the tribe could say when they said his name of people that he then became the shaman of whatever anyways i digress i get it i hate it i'm gonna do it anyway so joppery yes john perry we met him in series one albeit briefly from some youtube videos and now he's back full time in this series, Sexy Priest. Hot Priest. Hot Priest.

I'm sorry. Oh, my God. Sorry. Don't crucify me there. We call him Hot Shaman in our podcast. Yeah, that's true. We do. Hot Shaman.

Well, Hot Shaman. Matt started Fleabag finally. Did you get to season two yet, buddy? I finished it all. It was beautiful. Did you cry? It was beautiful did you cry it was beautiful though it was yeah it was it was amazing i uh there's some very moving moments in that absolutely yeah it was a lot speaking of you know sympathetic potentially female villains i don't know but coming back to the shaman yeah the shaman theme i think it it's called in the anthology track the shaman but the melodic shape of that

again very related to lee scoresby's theme also very related to Lee Scoresby's theme. Also very related to the Children of the Prophecy theme. If I play the Children of the Prophecy theme in that key... All of the exact same notes, which musically connects the lineage between John Perry and Will, which I love that they do that. But again, I'm a sucker for copeland and one of the most beautiful treatments of that particular theme for me uh was him and lee in the balloon and uh there was this very wonderfully copeland-esque kind of version of that

typically chloe i had seen that you had made a note that you like the way that the trumpet sounds in some of this stuff. And I think that probably 90% of the time that this theme was played, we did hear a trumpet play it. But my favorite version is actually the second half on the official soundtrack of The Female Scholar. It then plays that Copland-esque version. It's kind of like the second half of the track. You have Mary's theme in one part and then the Shaman's theme in the other part. But that's done with a slightly lower brass, which I love.

It's got a French horn or trombone which i've yet to decide it's either a really really beautifully played trombone and mr balfe is a huge trombone fan uh he specifically wrote that line so that he could hear bass trombones play that it's what he told me he said i love I love the fact that I can get that splat out of them. So he loves brass. And we've talked a lot about how he's used a lot more brass this series than he did last series. And I can't decide whether it's a beautifully done French horn or a beautifully done trombone, but that's the version of it that i truly love i love that and i will say for those listening at home that uh the lyrics in latin to that part of the song are

just so you know is that wow amazing that's latin i know latin can you translate can you translate that for me chloe yes it means oh wow bum bum oh wow how amazing i mean i'm looking at the series in a whole new way i am well you're at the scholar table now i finally reached the scholar table uh do you guys do you guys want some crumpets can i bring you can i bring you an omelet No eggshells, please. Omelette. Omelette. Omelette. Du fromage. No, I jest, but something interesting about all of this added brass, City in the Sky, a track that comes up later on. Not Spirit in the Sky, though I feel very similarly, and that probably should be on our His Dark Materials playlist now that I say that I digress that the City in the Sky track is such an like a huge combo of brass

that's where Lorne had a lot of fun with brass did he not and this song uh this this theme kind of leading up there with that kind of lower brass treatment in the female scholar. But later on with City in the Sky, there's a lot of different brass that actually comes together so well with the strings and isn't too overbearing. It's really nice. He's always used brass very well. As we talked about with the Lee's Choice, the very end of that, it's not nearly as poignant if he doesn't have that high trumpet playing that note at the very end in the swell. That's one of the things that just make that just tear into your gut at the end, because that's right as Serafina is flying off to go towards to find Lee. And or actually, I think the shot is actually on on lyra's face after she's just

flown off but the poignancy of the way that brass can be used and i love the that you pointed that out chloe because when used properly a single note from a trumpet can say worlds around what a piano can do uh playing furiously and fastly, as I often did playing in blues bands for years. So I just love saying as much as you can with as few notes as possible. To me, that makes a lot of sense that he can use that brass and balance it out with the string so well. I often wonder also, because he used the National Orchestra of Wales for the original series, for series one. This time around, he used the Vienna Orchestra, and depending on the locale and the type of recordings used, say if the National Orchestra of Wales had recorded

last season's where, at the same location, where the Vienna had recorded last season's where at the same location where the Vienna Orchestra recorded this season how might the the mixes have been a little different because you do you throw up just tons and tons of microphones around the whole orchestra and what really makes the sound of an orchestra isn't the direct instruments that the mics are picking up but the bleed through from across the room or the way that the sound bounces on the walls and that creates a whole different timbre in itself a whole different set of sonic frequencies that can really come through in a recording if you're an engineers they go through this kind of stuff all of the time. I remember one time recording a record that we spent six hours getting a tom,

a drum tom to sound right. And it was costing us a ton of money. But this engineer was very particular. And so you had to you had to go through those kinds of things because they do make a difference so i would have loved to have heard uh either the vienna orchestra recording in the national orchestra of wales uh location or vice versa just to see what differences in mixes we would have had so my musical background is not near matt's on as far as like performing in an ensemble performing with other people my problem is i'm an

only child and i don't get along with people and i've been a problem in almost every band i've been in anyways i digress i am a problem but uh i did once record an ep when i was like 17 16 years old right not to flex on everyone it was a long time ago but i recorded an ep once and this doesn't work for instruments but my voice was messed up and i had to have whiskey which smooths the vocal cords okay right right uh and musically I mean it depends on what you're playing if you have strings if you have violin you can you know wax your bow a little more you can retune your guitar but that's not something that just happens so hearing kind of an orchestra actually play all of it and have a full sound is wild it is a wild

thing to hear for every single song and I know that shows like Game of Thrones and have a full sound is wild it is a wild thing to hear for every single song and i know that shows like game of thrones and westworld have soundtracks and ramen is amazing ramen shuai is so good but like there's something about these songs something in the shaman or something even in uh we'll talk about yorick's theme in a minute but even in just the foundational songs in series one that feel like magic right like it feels like fantastical magic you know the harry potter wintry hogsmeade theme that makes you feel like you're literally in harry potter like you have a robe on and you're there like that's what i feel when i hear the shaman and when i hear all of these songs and i don't know what the magic is but lauren has captured it agreed yeah and i think um

i feel like that's captured so well also in between the worlds yeah i didn't know it had a name i was like what the shit um well something that eliana was right about in the finale or in the series in general was seeing yorick this year eliana was very gung-ho i don't know if it's because her senses were bubbling or if she just really loves yorick it could be a mix of both personally but she was right he was there and his theme was too he didn't have a speaking role so i felt i was like what about he said i know that bird's paycheck yeah he did say i know that bird oh in the finale you mean um in the finale no we just he's just looking at the glaciers falling melting yeah i mean i guess he's not in the book so we should be thankful that he appeared at all but i was just like poor joe i'm worried

about his his salary his paychecks he got one speaking line he'll be fine he'll be fine he's probably making his voice actors man they make a whole lot of money but uh the funny thing is is that you mentioned that we heard his theme i I actually didn't hear it in this season, which was very weird when Kaisa flew to him. Now, I'd have to go back. Maybe I just missed it and have to go back and rewatch the episode. But I actually didn't hear it this season because the theme that I'm used to hearing from him is this. All done with low brass, all done with trombones. You hear it prevalent in series one when he's charging to get his armor back also my favorite version is the way that it

just sneaks up out of the middle of nowhere in the sixth episode during the battle of balvanger and that's where you find it on the season one soundtrack is the battle of balvanger right at about 139 all of a sudden his music just pops up in the middle of it going along with all of the other action things that are going along it just the same way that he just kind of popped up to and Lyra saw him for the first time as he was you know throwing magisterium and and everybody around he just kind of pops in and says hi to Lyra from overhead and that's when that music shows up. And I loved that. And that theme is so powerful. It's got this really neat harmonic twist to it.

It goes to a place you don't expect. And that's one of my favorite just overall themes in general. But especially that appearance in that particular episode, the demon cages. Yeah. I thought I had heard elements of it in, think it was what kaisa kaisa reveal is that the kaisa song when kaisa has his little yeah kaisa reveal actually went underneath where seraphina showed up to save the kids from uh that's what it was i thought i'd heard elements of it in one of the songs on the album but i'm pretty sure it was mixed in if it was it wasn't anything prevalent but i swear i

thought i had heard something maybe it was during the northern posters in the university with the the exact melodical lines he played yeah yeah looking at the bears in that maybe then yeah over true not kaiser reveal but well like i said it's been several episodes since that that meeting with kaiser and yorick happened so i might just require a rewatch honestly i need a whole watch of the overarching season because i feel like there are certain things now especially like after seeing each other there were episodes where there were some lulls it doesn't mean it was bad it just means that there were a couple scenes that i was like all right i'm waiting and now watching a handful of scenes that i needed to to prepare for this for example or other things things feel better as an overarching story than they did watching

every week on a monday night several days after other countries several i mean they can't all be bangers chloe i said that before and i stand by it you gotta have some interludes every now and then on like the album all right we can't just all be lit we can't all be lauren all the time all the time well there was actually a lot less incidental music is what we call it in the biz uh in this particular series and there wasn't any television series that i've ever heard i likened it to lost actually giacchino always always using character motives and there was very little incidental music but in this particular season wow there almost everything was theme oriented which I absolutely loved for instance that Bollwanger cut that I was just talking about a second ago that's mostly not thematic that's mostly just specifically written for that action set piece with just an

appearance of themes here and there and that was not the case this particular season at all which i i personally loved because it made it easier to keep track of things interesting i have a lot of uh you'll be probably familiar with him but like thomas bergeson for example are you familiar with any of his music matt uh it's only somewhat familiar he does a lot of soundtracky fantasy super medieval kind of music that it could be filler it's probably been purchased for a handful of movies you might hear it in a couple uh and there's a handful of different osts that have songs that are like that but it's like medievally background music but there are some things that are so background and they just fit in for a battle scene etc but i mean lauren operates like a musical casting director like the second he understands who a character is and where a

character has to be throughout the story and where that character's story is going he writes for that and he writes for the actor as well he said in interviews as i know you know that like he writes for these actors and who their characters and how they play them and i just think that's really interesting because i think it is a very and we've said it that they're just being very considerate with how they handle all characters all plots uh let's not be hasty in saying i mean the witches this series they were amazing everything was fixed right i've been likening it to that uh moment from the avengers where samuel jackson is like i understand the council has said this is their decision and i've elected

that's a dumbass decision and that's what i felt like with the witches they just fixed it there were band-aids and they were like this is better now and it was and lauren is not one to just like make a song for the show every song has a meaning and he now especially in series three when he has themes that he's gonna have to write for oh melodic moments for the galavespians melodic moments for the angels there's a lot of stuff he's going to have to write. Exactly. He has to keep it tight. He has to keep it tight.

Oh my god. That's a double M. She's hired because I'm fired. Fired. Absolutely fired. You can have her. You guys can have her. No, hired. Hired. Absolutely fired. Hired. You can have her. I'm fired. You guys can have her. Hired. Hired. Matt. You can join me then if you're going to take this.

I got fired a lot less on this season. Matt used to fire me all the time. Was it season eight? You fired me every week, Matt? Well, that was just because I had to. Every once in a while, you know, you just got to, once you start something, you just can't end it. So I had to every once in a while, you know, you just gotta, once you start something, you just can't end it.

So I had to make up reasons to fire her. And then I would instantly rehire her at the end of the, I haven't been rehired ever. I think I don't know why I'm still here. And yet you keep coming back. See, that's, that's a real professional right there.

You just keep coming back. Worse. She keeps editing the episodes. You'd think if you were fired after an amount of time you just she just edits out the part where she gets fired and there you go no i keep that in so everyone knows keep coming yeah well my professional eliana i need you to tell us about the strength of strength of the Egyptians before we go into some of our honorable mentions. Yeah, so this isn't solely actually just about the song, the strength of the Egyptians. But I do want to tip my hat to some of the music for the Egyptian scenes in series one.

And especially that funeral scene for Billy Costa, where, you know, honestly, and I still stand by it. I was looking through our notes, as opposed to re-listening to our episodes but our notes for that scene last season and there was a lot that i think we were critical of and in the execution that did leave me wanting and i still uh i think those are really valid uh you know re-watching some of the scenes from series one i'm like damn the direction and the way that it the whole series is done feels just so different some of those shots like visually as well yeah it feels like a very different show in many ways not just because it's a different setting but i i thought this was like a it's different in the way that some of the music is done and that they really just incorporated it it's it's a vocal

element uh the funeral rites where the gyptians all sing to send billy off it's very haunting it's sad and i just kind of wanted to pay homage to the way that the music was interwoven into this series yeah that theme is beautifully sad um in in many ways. The theme that he uses under most of the Egyptian scenes has, it's beautiful. It has the sadness to it, but it also has this pride to it, which I feel like really exemplifies what that people are all about. And that was one of the things that I loved about it.

My favorite version of that particular theme and i you know uh john fa leading a chorus of people to sing that was extremely moving for me but more moving for me was the scene um when they first found out that Billy was missing, I believe. It was a scene that focused on Ma Costa, and I can't remember exactly the scene now because I haven't re-watched that series since Series 1 in so long. But there's one very early on in the season that just totally gutted me and uh mr balfe uses in that he uses

what we call a dorian minor as opposed to a pure minor uh and it takes a little bit of the edge off and gives it just enough of an exoticness that makes you feel the pride of those people which is fantastic yeah i don't remember that scene i haven't watched it as as closely as well either something i remember from that scene was lee and lyra watching right as the funeral rites went on and lee telling her you know like hey back down kid they've just lost their family you just want to wait and let them have it. But also I remember the zoom in on Sophanax and Hester during the singing, the very slow zoom in and Hester looking so sad and Sophanax looking so sad. And I think that's really interesting to think about just the sadness of the demons in that moment of those two specifically and of what's to come for Lee. Yeah. moment of those two specifically and of what's to come for lee yeah right in loving lyra and

losing right like in pledging to the cause not to to win not to get money but for others for lyra and quorum as well right quorum and sophinex and the things they've gone through for lyra as well and it's just sad yeah just sad thinking about it and thinking about some of those ties to the episode we just watched a little bit ago Lee's the one who comforts and as you said tells Lyra to guide her through that scene and you know what the lyrics

for this song are in English everyone so no need for any Latin expertise here Ba? Ba translates as Ba yes bah bah bah bah but the well the song itself that they sing right it's like the dear son god does never leave you yeah so i can understand that well we can't fit all of the songs of the series in this episode though matt may try if we let him long enough, right?

Can I just name a few? Just a few honorable mentions? Just a few? All right, Matt, this is your moment to shine. Give us your honorable mentions. Give us a monologue. Go for it, my friend. Okay, well, I did have 76 planned, but I'll just stick it to maybe to the danger motive we actually heard that the first time in the very first episode actually when Azrael and Stell Maria were on the cliff taking pictures and the storm was coming in and I thought oh okay there's a theme for Azrael. And then it showed up later with Mrs. Coulter. And when Lyra was trying to find out what the general ablation board was, and she found all those papers in the office, and then it showed up again, time and time again, I thought, oh, this is just about a threat. That's what this motive is about. And the best version of that ever was in episode five. During the time Lyra sets Pan loose, you know, as a Wolverine on the Golden Monkey. And from that point on for the rest of that scene, it's all variations of that little motive done rhythmically in such different ways like or same melodic shape. It is that motive. Again, Mr. Balfe, being the drummer and the rhythmologist that he is,

loves to use rhythm to disguise theme, but it's still just enough to make you think that that is, seems familiar. What is that? What is that? It's lovely the way that he does that kind of stuff. And that particular sequence was just amazing. And I broke it down on one of our podcasts. It's something that just fascinated me. It made that particular part of it outside of, you know, scrambling around trying to talk to our friends from the UK. Did they say Osmendius in the captions or not? You know, so I searched for screenshots for that forever. But that music right there made it for me that entire scene and really built the tension and did a fabulous job with that oh there's also you know we never mentioned boreal's theme we're never gonna see him again uh it's one of the most exquisite and most complicated themes harmonically uh that's ever been done for television period and i i love that one as well and i i got 74 more or does someone else what do you think about a look to the stars i really love to look to the stars that was a

beautiful series one right the end of series one there i believe am i right in that i i i find it hard to understand anything by title when it's just a cue title. Understood. It's always got to be a theme. Can you hum a... In typical piano bar fashion, can you hum a few bars for me? Let me think about this. Hold on. Hold on.

I wasn't prepared for that, but you know what? For you, Matt, let me just... Bum, bum, bum, bum. But what's the translation, Eliana? What's the translation? Bum, bum, bum, bum. But what's the translation, Eliana? What's the translation? Bum, bum, bum, bum. Oh, so we got the beginning. You start off slow. It's got

Lyra's strings and it's all boo-doo, boo-doo-doo. Boo-doo-doo-doo. Yeah, that's the main theme. Yeah, well, okay, listen. That's the main theme yeah well okay listen that's the main thing no it comes no it's it's slower though it has lots of strings i can't say that last part just for um no this comes it's in i want to say it's in episode three of series one it's a little uh it's after demons to dust it's it's right after the list in series one i don't know how else to

tell you because it's literally based on myra's theme but it's slowed down and it's about looking to the stars and it's right before gateway to the north that great mix of Lee's theme a little bit there, right before You Loved a Witch that comes up. So like when she's on the Egyptian boat with Tony looking at the stars? Yeah, I believe so. I believe that's it. Oh, yeah. Looking up at the Aurora Borealis. Yeah, that would make sense if the main theme is used there a little bit, because it is

part of the larger story, right? It's pointing towards what's happening in this particular series this time around so a city in the sky well you know speaking of uh actually that's not a phil gorfan song at all so this segue doesn't work but shit um who had the great flood i did i just took it off because i was gonna say i like it and nothing else um because i'm really i like i'm good with words talk about um okay it's the i guess the visual that goes along with it when you're watching it uh just getting to see what that flood looked like i've experienced floods in my real life, and it's not fun. I don't know, the end of that track, it kind of starts to become a little bit more of Lyra's Jordan kind of theme with it. And it's just really pretty and calming, and I enjoy it.

And the imagery. Wet. It's pretty interesting that it becomes Lyra's theme, especially, you know, when you tie it with La Belle Sauvage, the beautiful sausage. theme especially you know when you're you tie it with labelle sauvage the beautiful sausage it makes me wonder what music may have been cut or planned that was in the bottle episode especially because originally jack thorne mentioned that he had wanted to have a flashback to lyra as a baby in that episode it got cut it was cut before the episode was even really happening he just mentioned that you know his uh ladies in the writing department told him no and said it was cut before the episode was even really happening he just mentioned that you know his uh ladies in the writing department told him no and said it was too much thankfully and fixed that

but it uh i wonder if there was any music that lauren was thinking of then you know like was he thinking of any renditions of the flood in different different tone different mix. I don't know. Yeah, because that scene primarily does use a lot of Lyra-ish kind of stuff. When you look at that initial scene, after we get our little indoctrination into what this world is, you hear an awful lot of the prophecy theme and what have you, especially as Asriel and Stelmaria are wading through the water and bringing Lyra to the Master. So, awesome there. Played by the great Clark Peters. Yes, yes.

Yeah, I loved him. So good. He did a great job. I'm really excited to see him again, right? We should see him again end of season three. Gives Lyra a spot. He's a school. You mean he gives her, he offers

her sanctuary. I'm so sad. Okay. Let's get unsad for literally three minutes before we get sad one more time. we're gonna move on to a very fun portion of the episode this is the last leg right of our app and we're gonna talk about two things first we're gonna talk about filk and fan music so just a handful of songs that we've come across that are actually literally written about his dark materials.

And after that, we have a little holiday surprise, a little winter cheer for you all from the US, which is us. We've compiled a little playlist. I've compiled a handful of songs and I've had some really great help from Eliana, Holly and Matt with some other songs to add to it that are about, I don't know, just stuff that makes us think about His Dark Materials, right? Just songs that make us think about His Dark Materials. So before we get there, first, I want to talk about, did you know other people like His Dark Materials besides us?

No, really? Seems like a lot. I mean, are you sure sure i have a few others like two maybe three four four and they're all famous it looks but like by your list here are these our friends i wish oh my god if justin vernon from bony ver was my friend a lot of things would be different no I'm just kidding maybe not I don't really know what he's like but Boney Ver Boney Ver's

lead Justin Vernon he's like a really big fan of his dark materials I did not know this was a thing you might know Boney Ver from their scratchy high indie vocals against some electronic music where they're like that's kind of what they sound like but like with some acoustic but sometimes

sometimes it's a little different for example like skinny love which is like so that's kind of what they sound like usually sometimes they're better sometimes they're on taylor swift so yes uh exile featuring justin bernard of bony bear but he is his dark materials fan his song 10 death breast with lyrics that are i'll wrap you up and take it by the touch darling don't a failure fright time's the breaker I'll rack it up I'm unorphaned in our northern lights Dedecoding every demon Taken in the tall grass of the mountain cable

And I cannot seem to find I'm able That is a lyric he wrote He wrote about demons y'all That's Yeah And with northern lights Yeah That's canon Orphaned, unorphaned Unorphan yeah and with northern lights yeah that's canon orphaned unorphaned unorphaned

in the northern lights that's that's about his dark materials and there's another song Salem yeah and the lyrics for that one that are related to the series are to speak supportively big guy there's no automatic peace but I bet

you'd keep all these in-betweens that bar my youth though no anna bar dream far as i know i tried too hard to see what i thought it'd be asking constantly how's it gonna be you don't know me how's it gonna be oh that could be a his dark material song yeah i i mean the anabaric definitely that i who has written them off i mean definitely because of like the the anabaric right because i remember when i was looking up anbaric and roots in an art world turns out it's not it's just literally made up for lyra's world there's no mistake in that for sure and that's not the only thing he he's in a project the staves and why music collaboration called the way is red and stavely taylor has a sister named millie from this group

who says you wouldn't be able to tell if you didn't know but we connect elements to our music basically that go along with the witch's idea of being ageless or perspective or uh there are certain tracks that they've written on the stavely and why music's collaboration the staves of like for example take me home and the way is red they literally talk at one point about lyra how she gets those three rungs below and hits into the alethiometer, right, and hits into reading the alethiometer. And I think that's so interesting that Justin Vernon's not only in one project where he gets to write lyrics about his dark materials, but two projects where he gets to write music about his dark materials

and people just keep letting him. That's nuts. This other one links to actually someone who's in, who is in the show interestingly i don't know if either of you or any of you i don't think you have eliana have listened or watched in the heights the musical no i have not i know it exists lin-manuel mir Miranda have said that When the Sun Goes Down from In the Heights was inspired by Will and Lyra it's very emotional

if you know the musical it's very sad but the lyrics that most speak to me from this one are you know that I'll be waiting when you're gone but you're here with me right now we'll be working hard but if we should drift apart let me take this moment just to say you're gonna change the world someday i'll be thinking of home and i'll think of you every night at the same time when the sun goes down

when the sun goes down when the sun goes down yeah so it's unfair so i think that alone right there i'm like lynn manuel you're allowed to be lee scoresby that's a lee scoresby thing lee scoresby would write lyrics about will and lyra totally that was one of the things that really drew him and his wife together isn't it yes the whole history i think they read it like as a couple um yeah that's pretty cute yeah that's awesome i i have a similar story to that. Me and the guy I was dating at the time when I started reading the books, he started reading it too.

And we both got like pretty into it. And, uh, we've been broken up for like, uh, four or five years now, but we, we were texting recently about the show. So, I mean, you know, sometimes you could still talk about your favorite things with your guys all have people to share this stuff with i just sit at home waiting for somebody to send me a tweet what do you think holly is matt we do a whole podcast literally like weekly twice a week where have you been yeah but well i mean holly's always schooling me so much that i don't feel like i can properly express myself oh are we mediating matt listen

you know matt if you want this is a safe space you know we can just beat these out totally giving you guys trouble i would not be able to do this podcast without holly there's no doubt about that i kind of like her too don't tell her though yeah i'm embarrassed i'm blushing eliana i know you're not a big metal head but you have found a metal band to tell us about. We've mentioned it before in episodes. Now's your time to shine So this was actually a fascinating find. I think I found it because I was looking up the pronunciation of

Taliatea Makera which is in the maybe it's in the Amber Spyglass where that term comes up and it's called it means the last knife of all. And I don't know if I pronounced that right, because believe it or not, another one of the languages I do not speak, along with Latin, is Greek. And what came up for that search was also Isahitra. And I was like, yes, that's true. Those are both the same thing from the books.

are both the same thing from the books but turns out isahitra is in fact a metal band and tell you is one of their metal songs interesting i as soon as i saw this in the notes i went through uh their band camp page and i listened to the the album that they had up and i noticed that their cut four is called among witches and uh one of the things that they had up, and I noticed that their cut four is called Among Witches. And one of the things that I noticed was that the opening sounded like this. And then it shifts to... where you have the same top note, but all of the harmony shifts down a half step. And that's exactly, and what I find funny about this, is the fact that Loren Balfe used that exact same kind of treatment,

but for the opposite of the witches, he used it for the magisterium, where it's with New Cardinal Rises, the Macphail theme. The bottom shifts down a half step step but the top stays the same we call it side slipping or i call it side slipping i don't know what the technical term is i'm sure that if i went back through my you know volumes and volumes of music theory stuff from 30 years ago i could probably find it and tell you what the exact technical phrase is. Not in this case, but I just loved hearing that kind of same musical approach used for a similar type of idea, genre, even though they do come from different angles. I think you hear a lot of that uh metal tends to sometimes have dramatics

right is the easiest way to call it sometimes you get that build up that rise yeah well and that's the easygoing part that's before it goes into the whole you know the actual crunching stuff that's just the kind of beginning of guitar intro Loved it, though. It was fantastic. Loved that cut. Yeah, there's a couple bands like that. Have you ever listened to From Autumn to Ashes? Is that a song familiar? No. They're kind of a heavier band, but there's a song.

There are two songs, actually. There's one called Short Stories with Tragic Endings, which ironically is not short. It is like several minutes, many, many minutes. One of those long-ass like six, nine minute songs uh but it starts off with this beautiful whining violin right like this tragic sad melody and then it just goes with the violin just all and i love shit like that i love what yeah eliana's like busting her head right now. She's headbanging because I love shit like that. You get that violin leading you in

and then you're in and it's heavy on you and I don't know, not bad. So I was into that. I don't listen to a lot of heavy stuff anymore in my older age, but I used to get pretty down with that. So I could appreciate Isahitra.

I could. All right, everyone. This brings us into the most exciting the most freeing the the no rules no more the free will free will free him will someone please free him or my blanket no one knows it could be either free my blanket anyways i've made a handy dandy little playlist. You guys have added some songs that I have thrown in. There's going to be a link to Spotify with the playlist. I'm unafraid of all of you people judging my habits, the songs I listen to. So no, I will not go private. I am not afraid. You will get the playlist link. It will take you to my personal spotify but if you do not have a spotify you can check out the track listing which will be available at our patreon patreon.com

slash girls gone canon where this episode will be posted we'll also have a few significant lyrics highlighted for you and you know if you're not done being sad about his dark materials series two eliana and i have a home for you matt and holly have a home for you it's with us come get sad listen to the music with us and we're gonna jump in let's talk some of our favorite songs that remind us of his dark materials matt what do you got first i just want to say that I checked out your playlist and I loved it. Anything iron and wine will always get my attention because I played in a band a long time ago, 10 plus years ago, but we covered Naked As We Came, which is one of the cuts that you have on there. I hadn't even at that time exposed myself to anything, His Dark Materials or Philip Pullman or anything like that but now that I've listened to that song again it does remind me a lot of his dark materials and of

Philip Pullman I love that and I've I can't say that I'm an original Imogen hipster so to speak because it wasn't until like the Frufu album that I got on board with her. But the album that her song is from, the album Speak for Yourself, Hide and Seek, that record, the whole record is just an amazing record. And one of the things that I've always loved about that is that that particular song really essentially created a whole new industry for the synth industry because it repopularized the vocoder, which was an instrument that was used a lot where you blew into it and you played chords on a piano. You could only find them after the 70s. You could really only find them, maybe Moog would make one every once in a while, but you generally only found them in a studio. You only found them, and only high dollar studios,

say like in Minneapolis, like in Nashville, like in LA, like in New York. They were pretty rare to find. And then all of a sudden this song comes out, and every synth line, I had a Roland sponsorship for years. uh when roland came out with their version of it i had to try it out i was horrible at it it didn't work for me because i wasn't that great at it but roland and yamaha and moog and just everybody came out with their own version of of a vocoder the exact next year. By the next year, there were models of it anywhere, and you could get them relatively cheap. So I don't know if that killed the incentive for everybody to keep using it

or if it made it that much more accessible, and you heard hide-and-seek a lot in the clubs. But I just love those two cuts. Yeah. So that's my thoughts on that the the first time I heard that I'm a gin heap song it was 2006 and I was at a grad party or 2007 I remember the exact place the exact time some kids were playing like home laser tag they had their own laser tag stuff and i just remember kids were outside playing laser tag it was like 11 p.m uh and then of course it was popularized with garden state soundtrack which is one of the best soundtracks

of all time of any movie ever created the garden state State. 100% agree. Amazing, right? Yeah, it is. There's nothing bad or wrong with that album, and you should listen to that and go on rainymood.com while you do and just blast the rain. That's what I do when I'm sad, which is often. But I guess the Jason Derulo song is what bigly, to use a bad adjective, popularizedized it like hugely popularized the song

and of course the cultural moment that was thanksgiving in what was it series three of gossip girl uh at thanksgiving when jason derulo's much a say was played so that song has had such culture it has evolved over time it has gone many places and i feel like now the biggest moment of that song of hide and seek's life is being on this playlist so it's canon there you go i mean it's got a lot of popularity amongst teen dramas in general i believe what that same song before jason drulo was also in that that scene in the OC which I actually haven't watched but I believe they also use that same scene and then they spoofed it right in- I've seen the OC but now it's been a long time and I can't

remember. The one where everyone gets shot. Oh okay. Like a bazillion people get shot I think it's that and then I think they spoofed it on like what was it SNL or something like that and people just kept getting shot and coming back to life and shooting each other and I was like I don't understand this reference because I didn't watch the OC at that time but I'm thinking of adding it to my list it is the same

I think producer right as Gossip Girl and I think I came across Image and Heap maybe through FruFru surfing on MySpace or Zynga and someone just had it playing if anyone remembers zanga yep i had at least four zangas i remember it very well there was xxk thanks omg stfu i don't say that one lightly i'm willing to reveal it to you all i will never reveal that was it they're all gone now yeah they are thankfully holly what makes you sad about his dark materials besides you know like willow myra lee scoresby i mean musically

outside of the actual music i think the direction i kind of went with was at least for this first one just kind of the whole world and the journey itself so So I, I'm a big fan of Puss Fur. Just a big fan of Maynard James Keenan in general. I know that's controversial maybe to some people. I don't care. He's talented. And this song is one of my favorites from the Conditions of My Parole album, which I think in general, this album is kind of a

story of a person's life from birth to death but this one stood out uh called green valley just lyrically literally the lyrics are talking about strangers meeting and having to go on a journey together no direction but to follow what you know no direction but a faith in her decision no direction but to never fight her flow and no direction but to trust the final destination uh there's another line in there that says uh come the sunrise will descend through judgment valley and i'm like okay like this is like hitting really hard and all of all of his dark material things for me world of the dead stuff and there's just a lot of i think there's a lot of symbolism in that song that you can interpret in a thousand different ways that make it relate to his dark materials from uh the

river just being like the river of life or i think about like the river of dust that they can see in the sky and the malefic world near the end of the series um there's so much it's really it's a really really good song and it's very pretty it reminds reminds me of the prophecy, too, in general, around Lyra, and Lyra being the anchor in this world that everything is following, with the no direction but to never fight her flow. And especially in this series of His Dark Materials, with kind of Lyra's interesting relationship with the alethiometer, right? It wasn't quite as smooth as it was in Series 1.

Mm-hmm. Yeah yeah no direction but to trust the final destination and then just destroying destiny final destination i don't know like i've ah there's a lot there's a lot in there it's i didn't even think of that that's awesome that was very you're good at this holy shit what else you else you got? Give me next one, bartender. Throw it at me. Now, if I want to be sad about Will and Lyra, I saw your Regina songs and I had to raise you How by Regina Spector because it's the most sad, I don't know, breakup song, I guess.

It's heartbreaking. The song like will make me cry if I if I listen to it hard enough. And I haven't even really experienced a relationship or a breakup like that. But it's just I feel it in my bones. Yeah, so some lyrics are, how can I forget your love? How can I never see you again? How can I ever know why some stay, others go, when I don't? Oh, I don't want you to go. So it's pretty just kind of on the nose there, but. Yeah.

I don't think we're going to survive series three. I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. You might not. I don't know, man. There are so many Regina Spector songs that worked here in fact originally I had Samson on there I did take it off just because it's close

but it's not perfect maybe it'll go back on you don't know it could happen there's time between when you're all hearing this and when it happens you never know but I did load a bunch of Regina on there uh we need to balance it you know we need another happy regina song to balance out your sad i think because i put one sad one happy in this final mix the sad one i put is eat it reminds me of lyra losing both will and the ability to read the alethiometer, you know, all the fun stuff, you know. Oh, great. Yeah, happy stuff. And of course, the lyrics that resonate the most are, It's like forgetting the words to your favorite song. You can't believe it.

You were always singing along. It was so easy and the words so sweet. You can't remember. You try to move your feet. It was so easy and the words so sweet. You can't remember. You try to feel the beat it reminds me just of you know the negative capability that she has to enter into right

that third rung just to enter into but i did balance it with us okay i would never make that connection and i'm so glad i'm talking to you right now because you just made me leverage genus specter even more than I could have. I know, I'm like, what do we need? Fidelity? Should we just put fidelity on here? Because that could make us happier about all of this. I don't know.

Folding chair is not related, but it's just happy. So you could throw that up there. Sure ain't folding bench. We haven't had enough bench talk, you know? I feel like they were just throwing that bench at us through the whole series. They were. They said it like three different benches in three different episodes. And then they tweeted about it.

Hey, talk about some foreshadowing. And I'm assuming that we saw the bench right in episode uh what was that episode two the cave episode but uh just the fact that like okay uh every time they have an emotional connection they're sitting at a bench which is what i love about it thematically they have of course the bench in the botanical garden they have the bench just outside the window where she talks about losing the alethiometer and then they have the bench in Chittagaze where they sat right after the whole deal with Angelica and seeing Tulio where Will is all you know emotionally a mess so it's just like

it makes perfect sense that these two are going to find a bench that they have in common in their in their own worlds uh to spend time with each other even though they can't spend time with each other so oh the bench is foreshadowing oh it is we're for benching we're four benching. We're four benching. Yeah, it's brilliant. Benches have four legs. Well, not all of them. Not all benches are created equal, Aliana. It's true. There's some legs under those benches for foreshadowing.

You know, there's another song that you pointed out, Holly. I think it's from Irma Thomas. Yes. Anyone who knows what love is would understand. If you watch Black Mirror, it shows up at least once a season. But yeah, it just came on when I was in the car the other day, not long after watching the last episode. And I was like thinking about it as the monkey kind of singing it to Mrs. Coulter. And it was just a dark, kind of dark.

So sorry, but, but that's, I don't know. That song is iconic. And it just was like, this is, this weirdly works for this. I'm going to put it in the podcast, I guess. All of the suffering and he still loves her. It's an interesting concept of the monkey having a song to Mrs. Coulter. How else is he going to communicate with her? That's true.

I'm telling you, we need a musical episode of His Dark Materials. It's got to happen. Well, there are two songs I really want to hear from Matt on. And one of those songs is Chittagotse by the Portico Quartet the other one well could be a couple of songs from Jacob Collier so Chittagazze I don't know how findable that particular cut is you can find it on YouTube and Chloe maybe you'll want to put that link in if you didn't find it for the Spotify list but uh it's basically the theico Quartet, and it's a jazz instrumental. The title is, of course, will instantly remind you of His Dark Materials, but even the timbres that are used

in this particular piece do, the instruments that are used, they do give you kind of almost that tropical or Mediterranean kind of sound, which is very easily linked to the television series, if not the books, at least. And the Jacob stuff, Jacob is an amazing young musician. He's just absolutely much like a Lauren Balfe or whatever, that there's no instrument that he can't play that and play most of them world class. lyrically when he writes stuff, it's pretty general in a lot of ways. So you can interpret them in a lot of ways, but there's one particular song that he did on his first Jesse album that

really got me. And that was, uh, once you, it has just a few lines lyrically that always make me think of Will and Lyra at the end of the Amber Spyglass. And those lyrics are, time passes us by, seems like our day is gone, but I know in my heart, I'll always care for you and you'll care for me. And I'll always remember

the world we shared. The road may be long, long, long, long long but someday i'll hold you close once more and uh it's just that kind of longing that and the way this song is orchestrated very dramatically by the metropole orchestra is uh wonderfully done and uh that always makes me think of his dark materials now when i hear it sad about little myra again yeah yeah we're gonna check this out we're really good at that if you want to if you want a little bit lighter maybe chloe you can put this in your notes as well if you want to just consider his dark materials from philip pullman's perspective the bbc uh had a program where they had him on and had him select a whole bunch of tunes and i mean it's got everything from i don't know james brown through elvis through all of these different songs but if you

think about that they're phil's favorites that's double F. You know, he does have his... Double F? It's not a double F. Phil's favorites. Oh, wait. I got that wrong. Oh, it's PH. It's a double P, Matt.

It's a phonetic fail. P-H-A-V-O-R-I-T-E. Favorite with a PH. And an O-U while we're at it because the British. But yeah, there's a link to the list. It's bbc.co.uk slash programs spelled the proper British way. B09BBDLR. So check that URL out and you'll get all of Phil's favorite songs.

He does have his very good friend Kate Bush on there. He does? Yes. And funnily enough, I had cloud busting on this playlist already before you had sent me this link. So I felt pretty good. I was like, Philip and I are connected. We're very connected. And interestingly enough.

Interestingly enough when it comes to Kate Bush. You know she did a song. For the Golden Compass. The movie. You may remember it from the end of the film. I don't know how you could forget it. That's film with a PH by the way. Just in case you were worried Matt.

But I don't know how you could forget it the song was called lyra and kate bush sang the ditty it went like this eliana join with me you know when you want yes lyra lyra her soul box beside her yeah so so it wasn't it wasn't probably my favorite song it's actually grown on me it went from being ironically good to unironically good like there are days where i sing it to myself i'm at the point maybe it's quarantine maybe that's what has me is the pandemic but like i'm at the point where it might be unironically decent. Hysterically enough, it used to be called Into the Wild and was a Disney reject song. And it was reworked.

And it became this song Lyra for her very good friend, Philip Pullman, who has said that she is his very good friend so much. In fact, that if you have heard of the book, sorry, the novella, the story, The Collectors, The Collectors by Philip Pullman is based off of a story that Kate Bush told him and he decided to expand upon. Wow. Yes, he released that little nugget. I got real lucky recently in the Waterstones event where he discussed Serpentine and he answered my question. I asked him, he very, very just blasé was like, and we're going to release the collectors next year. And I was like, what? But like, there's an audio book, Bill Nighy, yada yada.

So I asked a question like, can you tell us more? like can you tell us more and boy did he and he told us all about kate bush coming to him with the story of two pieces of art that kept accidentally coming into the same collection over years and he turned it into a couple of other pieces of art and if you haven't yet read it i really recommend you do matt looking at you but uh i just thought that was so cool so she ended up reworking one of her songs into lyra for the Golden Compass and they're buddies. How cool is that? Every time.

Every time. Every time. Eliana, are you going to make me sad now? Is it your turn? Dance. Dance for me. This is like a mix of feelings. I don't know if it's sad or not, but the way I imprinted on these songs and none of these

are indicative of my musical taste at all I don't like listen to these songs but they make me think of Will and Lyra because last year when I finished my reread of His Dark Materials I was finishing it up I finished the Amber Spyglass

and I was on a plane to London and we took a red eye flight and I had the brilliant plan of you know I'm gonna sleep on this flight wake up two hours you know land two hours before my workday my meetings in London time and in British time and you know what? I didn't sleep at all during that flight. Partially because I was just so devastated again

as an adult about the ending for Will and Lyra, and then I was just delirious in the car heading to the office. And also one of my co-workers will tell you, and she interestingly might actually have access to this episode but i fell asleep in one of our meetings uh because i was just so tired but

everyone just felt so bad for me they were just like oh that poor girl and everyone was just trying not to laugh apparently but i apparently also took the best notes in the entire meeting but I apparently also took the best notes in the entire meeting. But in the car, yeah. Well, no, I would wake up periodically, and I would make eye contact with people and nod, and people were trying not to laugh because they were like, I don't understand, wasn't she asleep? But I also took the best notes.

Anyway. Amazing. I'm very talented. Anyway, so on the car ride to the office in the cab, the song If You're Not the One by Daniel Bedingfield

played, and I somehow imprinted on this song, being about Will and Lyra, this is not a great song at all. I'm sure you've all heard it somewhere on some adult contemporary station. But I decided

in my delirium that this was about Bill and Lyra. If you're not the one, then why can't we be together? But I can't take it. I can't take it I don't understand so anyway

yeah me that well that's the thing you know if I'm not made for you then why does my heart tell me that I am is there any way that I can stay in your arms and they can't they can't physically they know like this is awful and I'm about to have an emotional breakdown and about to start

crying in this cab next to my other two co-workers who also didn't sleep on this flight also in the same car ride hello from Adele played you know again adult contemporary hits all playing while I'm delirious in this cab and much of this song is not about Will and Lyra but Hello from the Other Side is and in those like moments I was very vulnerable and just imprinted onto these two songs

very strongly so it's also the Adele song oh no I don't listen to these songs in my usual life. This is not indicative of my taste in music at all. So. Since you all Adele's albums next year for Christmas.

Thank you so much. I mean, she's like a fantastic vocalist, right? She's got songs that are great to sing to. But I was just like, great. Now this is how I feel about this book now. Anyway. I mean, I don't feel like the Daniel Benningfield song is technically a negative. I think it's a bop.

I don't know. It's something. It's definitely, I guess, catchy. It gets stuck in your head for sure. a bop i don't know it's something it's it's definitely i guess catchy gets stuck in your head for sure i mean i don't know there are so many stupid pitchfork articles that just shit on pop music that are just like it's pop like fundamentally there's a very basic equation to making good music and if you have something that is catchy it's usually catchy for a reason so you know what go on with your bad self, Daniel Bedingfield. Make us sad.

And also, that feels indicative of the time, like the kind of time frame that you seem to be speaking of. Like that is completely indicative of just like popular music too. So I mean, 2019. This is summer 2019 and someone was playing old hits on their radio station. Me, who filled this playlist with old hits. Interesting. Wow.

That's good. Another old hit. Apparently this song was really, really popular in the UK. And I want to put it on here because it was canonically in the show. And I had actually never heard this song before this episode was Lighthouse Families Lifted. And I was just like, I don't know. I was like, Lord Boreal, what is happening here? Same.

Eliana, if I could just tell a story about that song. Yes. We went over this in our podcast because I broke it down. It was released three different times in the UK. And the first time it made the top 70. The second time it made the top 40 is a lot of places all around the world, not the US, I don't think. And then the third time they just put new artwork on it and released it in 1999. But I've got a friend from TV podcast industries. That's another great podcast that covers a lot of same shows that Double P does. Derek.

And he sent me this really wonderful email telling me about how anybody who is middle-aged in the 90s that was having a dinner party, that song was playing or was part of the playlist that was playing as they were entertaining. It was that much of a staple. He also said that he hated that song. And so it seemed fitting that Boreal would, of course, try to use that song to put Mrs. Coulter in the mood. Oh, my God. Yeah, I saw like it.

It's a kind of irritating song. I saw that like, it's a kind of irritating song. I saw that someone tweeted. I don't know if it was to Lorne Balfe or just in general, that they were like, damn, Lord Boreal's, like, really into Lifted. That's a villain song. And Lorne Balfe, like, quote, tweeted it. Like, isn't it perfect? Or something like that. It was like, that wasn't verbatim, but it was the same general idea.

It feels like the Dave Matthews band or something. Is that kind of how it is? I thought that's who it was that wasn't verbatim but it was the same general idea it feels like like the dave matthews band or something like is that kind of how it is i thought that's who it was it was it's like the dave matthews band of the uk that feels accurate oh excellent excellent that's a great i mean but to be fair that's not very fair because dave matthews band like the band is so talented that like i i can't it's hard to make fun of dave matthews band because the band must have sore shoulders from all that heavy lifting they're doing speaking of lifted you know yeah hey that's my dave matthews band uh yeah that's just what I saw. It's like the typical bro band, I guess.

Or like maybe a mixture of like Dave Matthews band with Incubus and like Michael Bublé. Incubus still bobs. Yeah, Incubus fucking rages. And I'm not saying maybe Lighthouse fam, they rage, you know, like you don't know. There's probably some songs they go ham on. Maybe there is. I've never seen him live before me either that's true i don't plan on finding out songs where you can go ham and this one uh was brought to my attention and and i think i'd heard it before but didn't like it's not something i really think of ever and uh our friends pete and warren brought it up of molly malone that they associate molly

malone with mary malone yes the the classic irish song yeah excellent well you know that that just leaves you chloe what are your songs i've got a lot you know i uh i was in a long distance really i was i've been in several long distance relationships actually not let i say that but uh the last long distance relationship i was in i would drive for like five to ten hours at a time depending on where i was heading to how i was going etc etc route i was taking and i had so many playlists of music right i'm a spotify girl on a spotify family i'm only on this family with people that live in my same house so don't come for me spotify that's a legal disclaimer i'm putting out there aliana don't laugh they'll know uh i have several songs that make me think of a little vibrant there are some songs on

this playlist you all will see that are like some no brainers, right? Some death cap for cuties. Some I will follow you into the dark. You can't have a you can't have a true pairing playlist without having that song on it. B, you can't have a true pairing that is going to dethrone and attack God without putting that song on there. Okay, like that's, that's easy. That's

low hanging fruit. And I'm tempted and I took it. But a couple songs that really stood out. There are two songs in particular I will tell you about the rest I am not going to tell you, you have to go click the playlist, you have to look at this track list yourself, find some stuff to get sad about or to think about. The first one is Set Fire to the Third Bar by Snow Patrol featuring vocals by Martha Wainwright. It feels like Lyra at the end of the Amber Spyglass as well as, no real spoilers, but post the Amber Spyglass. Some lyrics that I'm fond of that hurt my heart very much and remind me of Lil and Lyra are I find the map and draw a straight line over

rivers, farms, and state lines. The distance from A to where you'd be. It's only finger lengths that I see. I touch the place where I'd find your face. My fingers and creases of distant dark places. The chorus of the song is sadder. It's all like i'm miles from where you are i lay down on the cold ground and hope that something picks me up and lays me down in your warm arms it's fine so god damn it's sad yeah it's real sad it kind of reminds me of again no spoilers for the future but just a lyra in the future that live in her life going to into bars, try to just, you know, go to school, do her life, whatever. Just real sad. Real bummer. This playlist is really uplifting.

You know, it's a it's a good one. It's really, it's a positive playlist. The other songs are not happy. It's a double S. It's a double S. What? What does it mean, Matt? A sad set. Oh my fucking god. It's really fun to not be the person that does double s i was just trying to copy you i'm sorry if i'm like no you did great no you did

great like try to i'm out here like is it within my jurisdiction to fire him or do i hire him i'm just not sure what my actual job is anymore. I don't know. I'm very fireable. It's alright. Well, if Chloe fires you, I'll hire you. So, you know, who knows what'll happen. Cancel out. That's the goal. That's the goal every time. Eliana, you

would definitely be on the losing end of that trade. Trust me. I'm going back to the kitchen now. And then I have going back to the kitchen now and then and then i have to take over the music coverage and so the podcast will only be five minutes long we heard this theme it was great think of how many downloads you have though i mean if something's five minutes i'd probably download it you know what i mean like i got it i wouldn't download in seven and a half hour episode of stuff that i've done i'm glad they will though the people are the best i don't know especially when

it just makes you sad why do you listen to us if we just make you sad to feel anything yeah that's true. I just want to feel something. Well, in closing our feelings, speaking of closing feelings, the other song that I want to highlight, do any of you like Stars? The band Stars at all? Yeah. Oh, well, I'm gonna hurt you. I love Stars. I was a

big Stars fan as a teenager. Me too. So angsty, I was like, stars fan as a teenager. Me too. So angsty. I was like, I set myself on fire. Listen, I didn't put Broken Social Scene on here. Okay. Dude, that was my, I listened to that album every single day. I have never felt so old.

I listened to Broken Social Scene every single like night for like months. Yeah, I listened to broken social scene in memphis so hard oh god well stars what was dead hearts even on dead hearts was on like i don't remember it was on five ghosts i want to say so there's an album called the five ghosts that was released in 2010 a great year uh and stars released this album and there's a song on it called Dead Hearts. Now this is a song that I usually relate to another favorite pairing of mine from Doctor Who, which is Amy and Rory rip. But it works really well for Will and Lyra. So the first verse is, did you see the closing window? Did you hear the slamming door?

They moved forward and my heart died. They moved forward and my heart died. Please tell me what they looked like. Did they seem afraid of you? They were kids that I once knew. They were kids that I once knew. Yeah, so it's sad. It's a real bummer.

That is sad. It's kind of just like what if they just didn't you know what if they got to stay together what if it didn't matter what if like health wise it worked I mean it could happen you know maybe they didn't know maybe maybe the angels don't know shit

maybe they don't know shit we don't know I've been through a war i know things you know it's the angels sigh yeah well very positive sufficiently sad yep i don't know i don't have a lot of positivity because it's like we don't have the next book yet in the Companion Sandwich trilogy where I think we're going to get some closure. There's no reason to have anything there. It's not spoilers. I just think it's going to happen.

Lyra needs closure, man. Adults need closure from trauma and stuff. I mean, this kid's a pretty special kid, right? Yeah. I mean, both of them yeah dude both of them need so much help so much trauma i don't know i think music is part of that healing for us as people that have to read these books and tear our hearts open and watch this show and tear our hearts back hoping all over again, as we've been doing. I don't know.

I wonder what we'll be seeing in the future of the show. What are your hopes for the soundtrack in Series 3, Matt and Holly? What do you hope we get as far as moments from the book to sound, etc.? I mentioned it earlier, the hardest, I think the music for Leaving Pan on the Shore needs to be the saddest thing I've ever heard. It has to be. Yeah. That's kind of my moment from that book. It's really the only moment I think about. I'll be very interested to see what kind of approach Mr. Balfe takes, if any, regarding

the Malefa. Because you could theoretically just continue on with Mary's stuff and make it about that if you want to make that easier. I've never known that man to not

take a challenge though so I'm sure he's got something in mind already he's such a lover of the books but I'll be really interested to see how that works out also new cardinal rises for the magisterium let's see if we get first of all let's see if we get a father Gomez and if we do how prominent that role and theme is.

And I'm being kind of specific, but we talked about the Lee and Joppery rediscovery. So that's about all I've got for that, I guess, right now. It's just pure speculation. Can't wait to see what they come up with. It kind of makes me wonder, that's a great point regarding the magisterium if there's like going to be a you know what what's the theme going to be like when we see metatron and the authority is it going to be more magisterium-esque are they going to veer more towards the side of

the songs they've been using for dust and the angels is it going to be something different entirely you know i kind of wonder what what direction if it'll be a blend which will be weird and interesting i don't know if it's possible question metatron's theme is just the one-winged angel sephiroth theme i hope turns out we heard it all along it's I hope. Turns out we heard it all along. Yo, I bet it will be though.

I'm not even kidding. I bet that will be a very significant part of it, Matt. Oh my God. It may very well be. It may very well be. Okay. We got to remember this moment. Now I can't wait to find out that we're right. Yeah.

Holly can't wait on this moment so that she can hold it over my head and say see you've always been terrible at theories i never talk to you like that yeah that's mean what is this don't quarrel you two what is this it's three hours you know they're starting to get fussy with each other. Yeah. It's time for our naps. Set them free. I bet we're going to get a song called Closing the Windows. Closing time.

I was going there too. Oh my god. I do know that it's going to be a song that kicks in just when the angels are explaining to them. No, sorry. You got to go close the windows. Good luck.

I bet it's going to be a devastating overture. It's going to have children in the prophecy. I bet it's going to have like some of Mary's theme with the bells coming in. Maybe some of the shaman. Oh, it's going to be sad. It's going to have Lyra's theme over at the end. Real sad, real small, some strings. Lauren, it's gonna be sad. It's gonna have Lyra's theme over at the end. Real sad, real small. Some strings. Lauren,

come get it. This is yours. You can have it. Just, you know, give me a wink and a nod when you take it, you know? But there you go. Closing of the windows. Damn. Close all the windows and let no specters in the world. I don't know.

That's bad. That's bad. Series factors in the world i don't know that's bad series three eliana series three i mean i i think i'm gonna stick with what i said about metatron that's my big like wonder now yeah or what the underworld's gonna sound like in general yeah will everything have a certain like minor kind of variant to it or yeah or even diminished yeah i would think it diminished could go even further with that because that's basically just taking a minor and and making it that much more closed and the symmetry of a diminished chord will always make you uncomfortable because for every diminished chord there's three possible resolutions and we as humans just don't deal with that very well we like closure us humans is what you're

saying well we we just uh we we prefer to have a more in terms of music western music not eastern but western music we definitely prefer to have a path laid out for us that we can follow and that's why dominant chords are so troublesome for us in terms of if you just leave them at the end or which is great for a cliffhanger or what have you and why diminished chords are so troublesome for us and why augmented chords are actually troublesome for us too because they're chords are actually troublesome for us too, because they're also evenly spaced, and that's what makes them seem weird,

even though they have kind of a major sound to them. I could see that. I like that idea. I guess we'll have to hold out and find out, which we don't have a release date, obviously. We won't have that for quite some time, but we do know that series three has been confirmed. It is happening. We all kind of knew it,

you know, deep down because series two rocked. Yeah. Cause series two was kick ass. How could you not? But also still was kind of scared, right? Like still was like,

what if? So I'm really happy, really happy to hear it. Absolutely. Yay. Well, that's gotta leave some thoughts, leave some things to the future. So thank you so much, Matt and Holly, for joining us for this episode and for talking

with us for quite a while. Would you mind reminding everyone where they can find the Dust Podcast? Yeah, we're at the Dust Podcast on Twitter. I always like to let Holly give her own personal Twitter if she wishes. You can find me at HuntPants on Twitter. It's weird. You can find me at Musical Concepts. Amazing.

This episode, for now, is out for our patrons in the stranger tier and above on Patreon.com slash Girls Gone Canon. and the Stranger tier and above on patreon.com slash girlsgonecanon. However, in the future, you may see this at a public feed near you, possibly even over at the Dust podcast feed. Thank you so much for a wonderful year of podcasting, specifically His Dark Materials podcasting. We'll be returning in 2021 with much more for you, including the end of La Belle Sauvage as we get toward the middle of it now. We'll be continuing throughout the year

until we complete the novel. And of course, we are hoping to start the Amber Spyglass in 2021. Stay tuned for more information on that. Fingers crossed we can start it before series three. Yeah, fingers crossed. And you know, when we get that date, that'll help us plan a little more

yes next month we will be doing a special episode for our a song of ice and fire patrons we'll see what's coming out we have a couple of ideas throwing around and we may be returning to a faraway place or possibly something old stay tuned for more info on that as well that'll come to you on patreon.com slash girls gone canon, where you can get all of the most recent updates on what we're doing. Yes. Well, you know, we don't really need to remind you all where to find us. Because here you are on our Patreon.

So thank you everyone for joining us. And thank you once more to Matt and Holly of the Dust for joining us day, evening, time. May you find your way back soon. soon thanks and we'll talk to you soon