Now that I'm getting into more of the meat of the podcast, I'm enjoying it quite a lot. It doesn't hurt that he's started with Jaws, Star Wars, Super Mario Bros. (the video game, not the movie
) and Foley artists, specifically using Lord of the Rings as his examples.
He gets into the technical side of music (explaining harmonics and tritones, for example) just enough to explain why it's important and throws some history lessons in here and there, like how John Williams took cues from Erich Korngold's soundtrack for
Captain Blood for
Star Wars.
Through his explanations, I'm finding out that there are A LOT of things I've never noticed while watching movies. One example - in Star Wars, Luke has a theme song, Leia has a theme song and Obi Wan has a theme song. No surprise there. But when, spoiler (!), Obi Wan is killed by Vader, they play Leia's theme because it's more somber and fits the scene better instead of playing Obi Wan's theme. I'd have likely never noticed that.
Or that there's a bass line in the Super Mario Bros. theme.
As someone that enjoys movies, movie trivia and music, this is a fantastic combination of all of them.