UPDATE 5/23:

The score has been released on Amazon.co.uk! If you don’t want to wait for the US release, here’s how to get it.

*** RESUME ORIGINAL POST ***

Leaving work at my regularly scheduled Bat-time, I went to the 4:20 showing of Kick Ass at my local theater: the historic Uptown, in not quite so lovely Cleveland Park (c’mon – you know it’s true).

I blogged a few weeks ago about how excited I was to see the movie, and how much I enjoyed the graphic novel. Millar’s other original graphic novel, Wanted, was turned into a pretty shitty movie, but the book itself was great: Adam West and What’s-His-Face get fed to a robotic super octopus by the super villains who killed all the world’s superheroes and secretly rule the world. (I mean, it was great for reasons more than that. My favorite line of the entire book belongs to the bad guy who, after a “good” bad guy tries to insult him with, “Go fuck a goat”, replies that he doesn’t fuck goats: he makes sweet, tender love to them.)

So, as for the movie, which I’ll touch on briefly: the movie stays very true to the graphic novel. There are some notable differences, particularly Katie’s reaction when Dave confesses the truth to her (I was expecting that to be a day-dream sequence, honestly). The movie is everything the book is: raw and violent. Some of the additions seem to have expanded to make the “hero” characters more sympathetic — i.e., Big Daddy’s wife really did die, as opposed to the graphic novel, where he just ran off with his daughter and the intention to kill lots of bad people. Still, the severed limbs and the swears are in the film, and that’s the most important part, right?

(I mean, unless you’re Roger Ebert).

Okay, so there’s also a pair of miniguns attached to a jet pack. But it fits so well with the implausibility of the entire movie, that it’s easy to get into the spirit of it all.

Oh, also, did Nick Cage do a perfect Adam West impersonation, or WHAT?

But my absolute favorite part of the movie? The score.

So, here’s a confession about me (if you haven’t figured this out already), I like movie scores. Those are the instrumental, orchestral tracks. You know what they are: John Williams’ scores for Indiana Jones, Star Wars, and Jaws are so legendary, people think he also composed Back to the Future — actually, Alan Silvestri did. Throw in some Hans Zimmer, James Horner, and a whole bunch of other talented folks, and you’ve pretty much got the majority of what’s on my iPod.

And the score for Kick Ass was great: it fit so well. It was haunting and wonderful and beautiful and was making me tap my feet. That’s the hallmark of a good score: that’s why when I’m walking home after a long day at work, my pace is usually a step quicker with Zimmer’s The Chase, or Steve Jablonsky’s Optimus v Megatron.

So I was pretty disappointed when I got home and could only find the soundtrack (not the score!) for Kick Ass on iTunes.

Don’t get me wrong: there are some really great songs on the soundtrack. I’m totally grabbing Make Me Want To Die. But damn, I really wanted the score.

So I turned to Twitter, and @UrbanBohemian mentioned that the score had been temp tracked.

Basically, as the director and editors are cutting the movie into its final version, they’ll put the footage to temporary tracks — classical music, or scores from other films. I remember watching the Babylon 5 pilot at a Star Trek convention (yes, yes, I know*) several months before B5 aired, and when it finally aired, all I could think was that I preferred the version I’d seen — with the wonderful James Horner’s Glory soundtrack than the music it wound up with.

With the wonderful internet researcher that I am (my secret is “Google”), I quickly found this article from Phelim O’Neill in The Guardian:

In the opening titles there’s something a little unusual. The “music composed by” credit lists four names: John Murphy, Henry Jackman, Marius De Vries and Ilan Eshkeri. Now that seemed interesting, four fairly prominent names in the soundtracking business working together on a movie. As someone who has enjoyed John Murphy’s work for Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later and Sunshine, I was looking forward to hearing his contribution in particular. Would it stand out from the others? Yes, it does, but for all the wrong reasons.

As the movie ramps up for the lengthy, action-packed finale the music is clearly Murphy’s. It’s Murphy’s music for 28 Days Later, one of the variants of In the House – In a Heartbeat. As the movie progresses there’s more from Murphy, what sounds like his music from Sunshine. Kick-Ass reuses his scores, his highly recognisable scores that have previously been heard not only in the movies for which they were written, but also achieved omnipresence on trailers, adverts and TV.

Pretty much realizing that my hopes for finding a complete score for the film impossible to acquire (no, really, some of the best tracks from the Indiana Jones flicks were JUST released within the last twelve months, even those films have been out for pushing thirty years), I surfed through iTunes listings for the Sunshine and 28 Days scores …

… and then I found this Facebook page, belonging to John Murphy, one of the composers whose work was used for the film.

AND! GUESS! WHAT! I! FOUND! OUT!

Kick-Ass: The Score, on iTunes April 26th. 40 tracks. You’d best believe one of those iTunes gift cards collecting dust in my pantry is getting used for this bad boy.

*If you argument is “Oh my god, you watched B5 at a Star Trek con, what is wrong with you?” or “Oh my god, you went to Star Trek conventions?” yes, yes, I know.

UPDATE 4/25: Via Murphy’s Facebook page, the score will be on iTunes May 3rd.

UPDATE 5/4: Yes, I know it’s not on iTunes. Yes, I am disappointed. No, I do not know when it will be on iTunes. I suggest checking Murphy’s Facebook page (linked just above).