Stray Bullets
Released by Lakeshore Records, 2017
16 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 33 min.
Music by Jack Fessenden

Being a huge fan of Larry Fessenden, when I saw the name on this score, it had me immediately interested, since I assumed it was a relative of Larry’s. As it turns out, Jack is Larry’s 16-year old son, who has written, directed, co-produced, and edited his first feature film, as well as composing the music as well! Sounds to me that the father has definitely past on his creative talents to his son. I’ve only seen the trailer, but it really looks like an interesting story and the fact that it coming from a 16-year old kid, is even more amazing. But enough of that….let’s get to the score.

Overall, we have a nice blend of quiet and peaceful music, with each track running on a couple of minutes or less, giving the listener brief snippets of feelings. The score starts off with the track Ricochet that has a mysterious quality to it, with a muffled bass sound in the background, which I really liked. This feeling of mystery continues, like in Track 4, Pulse, giving the listener a feeling of someone sneaking around or something secret going on…quiet but effective. But once we get to the later part of the score, like with Track 11, Prey_v2, we get some screeching strings which breaks the peaceful tones, with the tension starting to elevate more and more.

While this score didn’t have anything that jumped out at my ears and made a huge impact, what it does give is a sense of something normal, relaxing, peaceful, that starts to unravel. It will be very interesting to see what comes next for the young Fessenden. And I look forward to it.