The dystopian Seattle of The Last of Us 2 is a vision of the Pacific Northwest that is unlike anything seen in the pages of Lonely Planet. The cordyceps fungus has destroyed a city awash in exploited waterways and covered in foliage, which only serves to camouflage its diseased population. Rusty motorhomes share roads blocked with abandoned tanks and rubbish from a hopeless and dysfunctional guerrilla conflict picking you up. But amidst the chaos of this beautiful apocalypse, there are remnants of the past and links to a vanished life that help build the human core that Naughty Dog's new blockbuster runs through. Here, for example, you will find the Valiant music store. Delve beyond the corroded synths and distorted vinyl to discover an acoustic guitar, where Ellie can practice her new profession and even strum the chords to A-ha's Take On Me. In fact, for all the accompanying headlines surrounding character bloodlust, crunch culture, and LGBTQ+ themes, music plays a decisive role. It's there in the perfect devotion to Joel's Future Days Pearl Jam cover, Ellie's reprise of New Order's True Faith, with its reflection of "My morning sun is the drug that brings me closer" Since childhood I lost , replaced by fear "and also, of course, in the soundtrack by Gustavo Santaolalla. Like The Last of Us, the dominant tone of this immersive experience is given by the Argentine composer, who feels as integrated as any element in the making From the dark heart and wild soul of these degraded environments, Santaolalla, who won Oscars for his scores for Brokeback Mountain and Babel, sees clear parallels in his methods across movies and games.
A musical score inspired by the settings of Last of Us 2
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(Image credit: Naughty Dog) "I work differently than other composers," Santaolalla told TechRadar. "The industry standard in the movie world, the movie is done and they create a rough cut and start adding temp music and the composer comes to the end. I don't work like that. All the movies I did a lot of music and in some cases , all the score, for example Brokeback Mountain, I did all the score before the take. The themes, the sound, everything that was done before the shot. "Neil said that parts of the music made him write new scenes that he didn't have at first. " "Ang Lee played the music for the actors and heard it on the set and it became an intrinsic part of the film and that's how I like to work, from the story, to the characters, well more than one particular scene. I am informed of the story because that is how I connect. I am inspired by the script, the characters and the performance of the director, the writer, the visionary who invented the concept. At that point, I'm going to start composing, playing, and recording the score." As Santaolalla points out, this approach creates a contextual counterpoint that allows The Last of Us 2 writer-director Neil Druckmann's creative work and storytelling to come through. influenced by the music, rather than vice versa."The audiotapes are found over a period of two or three years," he continues. "I deliver parts in batches. Neil said that certain parts of the music prompted him to write new scenes that he didn't have at first. It's a much more artistic collaborative effort.” “I have a lot of freedom to try different things and experiment,” he explains. that is going to be presented that you cannot wait until the last moment to make the music." You really work on the basis of the story, the characters and your imagination and of course some drawings and especially after the first game you are more familiar with the visual language."
Naughty Dog presents the story of the "royal weight"
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(Image credit: Naughty Dog) Throughout her conversation with TechRadar, Santaolalla is keen to embrace the flexibility of this medium, while reflecting on the broader possibilities it offers. But did she think a different approach was needed for The Last of Us 2's music? Joking that "nobody, certainly not me, wanted a Rocky 8 or Raiders Of The Lost Ark III", he says they were keen to impose clear textual associations and elements of melodic progression, for example in the banjo introduction to the instrumentation. "I love the story. I knew it was going to be controversial and people would panic with elements of it." With a beard that "bloomed" during lockdown, he comments: "Everything for me happens on an emotional platform. This is where I work. I felt like I wanted to bring in new elements. Keep some of the themes, the melodic patterns but expanding on some of these elements. originals that have become a signature of the game." Similarly, while there's been a minor shift in focus from an audio standpoint, Santaolalla thinks it's obvious that the ominous, grating persistence of the narratives is impossible to ignore. He admits to being "captivated" by the journey Ellie takes in providing an experience that, through the collective work of Druckmann and Naughty Dog, has "real weight." "I love the story. I knew it was going to be controversial and people would panic with elements of it," he said. "It connects to deep things around the human condition. The fact that you can put yourself in the other person's shoes and see things from the other side is pretty profound. Neil says that the first game was about love and that it's hate. I think it's all about love and that hate is a perverse way of expressing love. It's not like they're both sides of the same coin."
"I'm in the game playing banjo!"
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(Image credit: Naughty Dog) Regarding the formal soundtrack, Santaolalla is responsible for creating the "emotional" elements, while fellow composer Mac Quayle delivers "action," electronic passages that accompany the more punishing and brutal gameplay. . While the music should be iconic and stateless, he agrees that South American influences and the film culture of classic westerns are essential, along with familiar atmospheric traits, such as being "economical with the use of notes and exploitation of silence." . "There's a distinctive thing that comes from my identity that I've always been interested in exploring." "There's something different that comes from my identity that I've always been interested in exploring," says Santaolalla. "The original theme for The Last Of Us was written on the ronroco, an Andean instrument in a 6/8 rhythm, which is a South American/African rhythm. It's appropriate though, because I think we live in a world now that allows us to have this mix." The banjo, which comes from Africa, has this American flavor, but I knew I wasn't going to play it like a normal banjo just because I wasn't taught to play it "the right way." I'll do it my way and see what happens. happens. I love how it was. I have tried many different styles and I have to admit that I thought for a second about what they were going to say. But Neil loved it too and they're off and of course I'm in the game playing the banjo! Although there are no major spoilers in this article, it may come as a surprise to some that Gustavo Santaolalla is sitting in a rocking chair, playing a tune alongside a mangy dog at the beginning of The Last of Us 2 in the town of Jackson.
On The Last of Us HBO TV
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(Image credit: Naughty Dog) Although not a gamer, Santaolalla's teenage son is, which posed a problem when Naughty Dog invited him to scan ahead of his animated appearance. "The hardest part is that I couldn't share this with anyone because I know I can't tell my son like he would tell his best friend and someone else. I've kept it to myself for almost a year," says Santaolalla. "Also, I didn't really know if I would be there in the final cup. When the game came out and I realized I was there, it was very gratifying. I'm almost 70 years old and sometimes when I talk to children, I think when they are much older and they talk from playing The Last Of Us, remembering the music and being there in the game. I think it's very nice." Santaolalla, who has traveled the world as a musician, playing in the group Bajofondo and winning 18 Grammy Awards in the United States and Latin America, thinks there is something unique about their relationship. built with fans of the game. Identifying it as "a deeper connection" than with other cultural forms, his involvement in this world will be further enhanced by HBO's upcoming TV show The Last of Us, which is being developed alongside Druckmann and the team behind Chernobyl. . How do you expect the tone and composition to differ? "There is an aesthetic in the music that will be present. I don't see, for example, that the series has an orchestral score," he explains. "We haven't started working on it yet, but I anticipate that the major themes will be addressed in different ways and in different forms. But new themes will emerge as well." Gustavo Santaolalla is scheduled to have a series of rescheduled live shows in 2021. For more information on dates, click here.