‘The Social Network’ Ten Years Later ⇥ stereogum.com

Speaking of — or, at least, nodding toward — “The Social Network”, James Rettig of Stereogum wrote about the influence of its unique score composed by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross:

The general eeriness of The Social Network’s score feels prescient considering how large and chaotic a role Facebook would go on to play in disinformation politics. “When we were creating these ideas, we weren’t scene specific. We thought, ‘This could be the sound of an asteroid hitting the Earth at the end of humanity,’” Reznor half-joked back in 2011. “But I don’t know if that fits in with the tale of founding Facebook, when someone finds out someone stole their website. Is that the appropriate level of drama, or is it comically overdone?”

It was not comically overdone. The wannabe frat boy antics of the real people behind The Social Network has changed the face of the world. Reznor and Ross made a story about geeks seem grand and imbued their technological developments with a hubris that rings true. Fincher and Sorkin made a story about a character that viewers could almost empathize with; Reznor and Ross’ score seems, purposefully or not, to act in opposition to that. It constantly sounds as if the world of the film is on the precipice of disaster, which turned out to be accurate.

I cannot think of a better pairing of score to standalone film in recent memory than the soundtrack to “The Social Network”. It is also a great record, separate from the film. Speculators have pushed up its price for years, but it has just been reissued with its original cover art.