Vicious
Released by Lakeshore Records
32 Tracks with a Total Running Time: 46 min.
Music by Tom Schraeder

In 2020, I saw Bryan Bertino’s The Dark and the Wicked, where that title really fit the film. Very dark and brooding and doesn’t leave you all warm and fuzzy. The score was from by Tom Schraeder, which helped moved the emotions of the story along, making the visuals even more powerful and impactful. And now with Vicious, both Bertino and Schraeder have done it again.

Once again, Schraeder has created a soundscape that enhances not what we’re seeing on screen but what we’re feeling. There is a difference there. In his score for Dark, it oozes that feeling of dread and of no escape. In Vicious, what we get is sounds that increase the tension and terror that we’re feeling as we watch poor Polly and what she’s going through. Right off the bat with Track 1, Spiral, we have strings going quickly back and forth in a face pace, with a background sound getting louder and building. That really starts us in the direction we’re heading.

There are some tracks that start with an innocent piano note or two, before then moving into that tension-filled soundscape in the background, such as in Track 16, I’m Gonna Start Now. Just listening to the score on its own, which I’ve been doing for the past week, really sets the mood, and you can see how it weaves perfectly into the film. Some might think that just making background “noises” for a film would be simple, but it really needs to work with what we’re seeing on screen, as well as feeling. And I think with the score he did for Dark and this one, Schraeder has done an incredible job.