A24 Music release the soundtrack to The Iron Claw, with music by Richard Reed Parry. The LP includes the original song 'Live That Way Forever' by Little Scream and Richard Reed Parry. The movie tells the true story of the inseparable Von Erich brothers, who made history in the intensely competitive world of professional wrestling in the early 1980s. Through tragedy and triumph, under the shadow of their domineering father and coach, the brothers seek larger-than-life immortality on the biggest stage in sports...

The soundtrack to The Iron Claw is, it's safe to say on a first listen, only really going to appeal to those who enjoyed the movie. It's more an atmospheric score than it is an album of captivating themes and set pieces. That's not to say it doesn't have a heart and the occasional memorable theme. It's just that, for the most part, this is really just a collection of atmospheric cues that don't really stand out... That is until you revisit them.

Once you become familiar with the score, the themes slowly present themselves. There's emotion and melancholic vibes peppered throughout. And on an emotional level it delivers wonderfully.

Talking about the soundtrack, composer Richard Reed Parry says: "Scoring The Iron Claw was an exciting and very daunting challenge as a composer. The movie is so huge in its scope, and in its range of emotions: inspiring, tragic, tender, violent, intimate, epic, and completely down to earth all at the same time. The warmth and intensity of family bonds juxtaposed against the cold brutality of pro wrestling and the toxic masculinity embedded in its DNA, and the particular way that the story of the Von Erich family is gripped tightly by the cruel hand of fate all added up to a complicated compositional task. Finding the musical heartbeat of the film meant reaching for all the same extremes as the story itself. Sometimes explosive rock and roll, at other times austere and restrained minimalism, with The Iron Claw’s score my goal was to get inside of the emotional repression that binds the family members, maintaining a creeping sense of the ‘Von Erich Curse’ that threads through the story like an unwelcome ghost and of course capturing some of the raw, muscular athleticism on display throughout the film."

If you like scores that grow the more times you explore them, then The Iron Claw will pay dividends. If you're looking for a soundtrack that delivers on the first play through, this might disappoint. One thing is obvious, however. Reed Parry gets a wonderful opportunity to showcase the breadth of his talents, and the results are not disappointing.

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Darren Rea