ALBUM REVIEW: Midnight Syndicate – Carnival Arcane

Composing the soundtrack to a movie, particularly a horror, is no mean feat. Many films rely on the moods created by their scores and sometimes this can be the difference between an effective or a boring film. Case in point: when John Carpenter screened his movie Halloween to potential distributors before he had added the music they found it boring and uneventful, yet when he resubmitted it with its complete score the reaction was far more enthusiastic. Music can be everything for a film and composers are often the unsung heroes of the movie industry. Midnight Syndicate have spent over fifteen years creating soundtracks to imaginary films, often with a central concept to help create a narrative. On occasion – such as with the low budget horror flicks The Rage and The Dead Matter – they have produced scores for real movie. These experiences have helped prepare them for arguably their strongest album to date, Carnival Arcade.

Their latest offering, as its title suggests, is set in the weird and wonderful world of sideshows and carnivals, in this instance during the early years of the twentieth century. As one may expect, this results in some playful, atmospheric and surreal moments, orchestrated by regular collaborators Edward Douglas and Gavin Goszka (read our recent interview with Midnight Syndicate here). The album opens with the sound of the Lancaster-Rigby Carnival arriving in town and helps to set up the mood for what is to follow. It is a sign of a good composer when their music alone can help create images in the mind of the listener, allowing them to direct the imaginary movie themselves. Carnival Arcade is seething with a creepy atmosphere that is more lighthearted than unnerving, giving the sense that had this been created for a real film then it would no doubt have had a sense of humour.

At this point the first of the characters is introduced; Ringmaster Montgomery Lancaster, performed by Babylon 5‘s Jason Carter. Anyone who has seen David Lynch’s The Elephant Man will be more than aware how over-the-top and unpleasant carnivals could be during this era. Where the album does benefit is from its mixture of styles and genres, with the dramatic Welcome to the Carnival followed by a soothing acoustic number, Canvas Wonderland. Douglas and Goszka (who are each credited as the writers of half the songs, never receiving co-credit) clearly understand pacing and building atmosphere and the overall flow of the album, even without occasional appearances from characters, helps to paint a picture of this strange world. Some of the supporting characters, such as Madame Zora and Alura the Snake Lady, are given their own theme tunes and one can only wonder what these people would have looked like in a horror movie.

With the way the album is structured there are no real standout tracks, as they all come together to form one narrative. That being said, among the highlights are Agent of Fortune and the simplicity of the piano-driven Revelation. Carnival Arcane, Midnight Syndicate‘s fourteenth studio album, works at its best when it takes a moment to breath by offering a calm and dreamlike tune, but on the whole it is an impressive album and one that would have worked well with a horror movie. One can only hope that a major studio will hire them at some point in the future to create the score for a major film as it would be interesting to see what kind of visuals their music would work best with.