Pay It Forward

For a reviewer, there is nothing more frustrating than receiving an album that has almost nothing going for it. While Pay it Forward isn't a failure as such, I just can't find anything terribly positive to say about it. It is a very Thomas Newman score in the sense that the mixture of bizarre instruments and percussion just couldn't have been penned by anyone else. On the other hand, like his recent Erin Brokovich it feels like yet another American Beauty knock-off. However, unlike American Beauty, it doesn't have the continuity of tone, atmosphere or the distinctive melodic fragments that made that score so popular.

Pay it Forward isn't a total loss and there are some nice moments, but many of these (such as Possibility and Tardiness) again sound like his Oscar nominated effort - same percussion sound and harmonies. I can appreciate that Thomas Newman is trying to add a different dimension to film music and pushing the mixtures of instrumental sounds he can create, but on the other hand his efforts are becoming so samey as to wish he'd return to a more familiar orchestral palette for that is an area in which he is supremely talented. I would still say that Thomas Newman is one of the finest composers around today and is rewarded with quality assignments, but I don't believe this percussive rut is doing him any good at all.