Nas? Hold Steady? Or 'The Dark Knight' score?

The release: The soundtrack to "The Dark Knight."

The principles: Oscar-nominated composers Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard, who also worked on "Batman Begins," the first Bat-film to be directed by Christopher Nolan. Zimmer took home an Academy Award for his score to "The Lion King," and has been nominated for his work on "Rain Man" and "Gladiator." Howard has earned nominations for his work on "The Prince of Tides" and "The Fugitive."

This isn't just geeky fan-boy stuff? Naw. There's some high-profile releases this week, the latest from rapper Nas, as well as the return of glorified bar band the Hold Steady, but it can be safely argued that the most intense piece of music that hit stores on Tuesday was the opening cut to "The Dark Knight" soundtrack, "Why So Serious?" It's a pretty arresting composition, one that wouldn't be out of place in a horror film, or a Nine Inch Nails record.

So how does the music work in the film? "The Dark Knight" brings out the best in Zimmer and Howard. "Batman Begins" took a more subtle approach to scoring a superhero film, opting out of the sort of grand gothic overtures Danny Elfman brought to Tim Burton's two Bat-films, and instead decorated its scenes with sharp, minimalistic sketches -- fast and streamlined strings that lived in the shadows and echoed the mystery of its hero.

"The Dark Knight" score, to put it mildly, ratchets things up. This is apparent from the film's opening moments, an elaborately intense bank heist staged by Heath Ledger's Joker. It's here film-goers get introduced to the more than nine-minute epic that is "Why So Serious?" In an earlier Extended Play piece, Zimmer discussed how the Joker's theme is essentially one note, one that''s teased and manipulated and mimics the sounds of razors and rat-infested alleyways.

But it's also quite musical, driven by an edge-of-your-seat rhythm that slices its way around a deep, bellowing bass. There are other themes in "The Dark Knight," and tracks such as "I'm Not A Hero" and "A Dark Knight" more closely adhere to the sounds of "Batman Begins," with their flurry of repetitive string notes. Yet in much the same way Ledger's Joker performance takes control of the film, it's the music that follows his character that has a grip on the soundtrack.

No matter, as "Why So Serious?" and "Like A Dog Chasing Cars" are thrilling pieces of music. They're loud, they sound as if they're piercing through the speakers, and they're a bit demented in the way the music will cut out into mere nothingness one moment and suddenly pounce back to the forefront the next. And they go a long way toward making the 2.5-hour run time of the film soar, as the sheer tension in the music doesn't allow the audience to relax. And that's a good thing.

But does it work outside the film? Some better than others. The music that traces Harvey Dent/Two Face ("Harvey Two-Face," "Blood On My Hands") is a bit more traditional. And while it works in the film -- the Joker, after all, is the one who gets to run around the film's Chicago locales as if it's his own personal playground -- it slows the momentum of the soundtrack.

Yet then a cut such as "A Little Push" arrives, with its scraping atmospheres, nightmarish bass notes and teasing strings, and it knocks the traditional film score on its side. "The Dark Knight" has some of the most adventurous cinematic music released in recent memory, certainly since Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood tackled the score for "There Will Be Blood."

Even some of the shorter, less pronounced tracks, such as "Aggressive Expansion," offer some surprises. Almost everything is heavy on the rhythms, and come with drumbeats that sound as if they've been slightly tweaked -- check "Always A Catch," where the pounding is not quite organic, yet not quite electronic. It's fair to say that the sounds of "The Dark Knight" can be a bit in your face, but as the fast-moving and thematically schizophrenic "Like A Dog Chasing Cars" illustrates, can then burrow under your skin too.

Photo: Warner Bros.

Zimmer brings 'punk attitude' to Batman with 'The Dark Knight'

With the release of "Batman Begins" in 2005, director Christopher Nolan reframed the series with a true-crime grit. A stark push away from the cartoon-like "Batman & Robin," Nolan's take revisited the darker tones established by Tim Burton's 1989 film and its 1992 sequel, "Batman Returns."

Batman was again a tortured soul first and a superhero second. And with a film noir look, and an underlying theme of government corruption, "Batman Begins" had a complex approach more in line with "Batman Returns."

But Nolan's film also brought a sense of realism to the franchise. Chicago landmarks replaced fantastical soundstages, and Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne/Batman was a vigilante who was a bit clumsy at times, and still very much a work in progress at film's end.

Yet perhaps where the film took the greatest departure from previous cinematic was in its music. Before "Batman Begins," the franchise was marked by a grand overture created by composer Danny Elfman. His theme is a slow build of major and minor keys that give way to a melodic rush and was recycled multiple times throughout the first two "Batman" films and their animated brethren (a sample from "Batman Returns" is below).

"Batman Begins" instead saw a pairing of two composer heavyweights in Hans Zimmer ("Gladiator," "Rain Man") and James Newton Howard ("Michael Clayton"). The two shied away from giving "Batman Begins" a more traditional superhero theme, and instead went for a score that seemed to live in the shadows that the film set out to explore.

There were recurring notes heard when Batman was on the screen, but they were simple, and more rhythmic in nature. It was a sound that explored the tension in nighttime scenes rather than celebrated the arrival of the main character -- a brief flurry of strings that would appear and disappear just as fast as Batman (a sample is below).

Zimmer is still being questioned about the decision today. Before talking about the upcoming film "The Dark Knight," due in theaters July 18, Zimmer said, "Everyone keeps saying, 'When are you going to do the jolly 'Batman' theme, a la the Tim Burton movies.' It will never happen. We actually did it, and we threw it out."

Yet some early signs show "The Dark Knight" departing at least a little bit from the more subtle tones of "Batman Begins." Speaking at Zimmer's Santa Monica studio, an ornate complex that feels a bit like Wayne Manor might if it were housed in Germany instead of the fictional Gotham City, he and Howard offered a listen to some of the music in "The Dark Knight" -- albeit a brief one (they shared about 10 minutes of music).

But the theme Zimmer wrote for the Joker, played in the film by the late Heath Ledger, is a damning piece of music. It's an intense eight-minute piece that comes off like an orchestral interpretation of a something created by Trent Reznor's Nine Inch Nails. Zimmer says the work is only two notes, but the two notes are twisted and manipulated into mimicking the sounds of thunder, razors and all sorts of clatter heard in alleyways probably better left unexplored.

Though that description may not make it sound like music to the ears, it's still immensely listenable. It plays out like something from a horror film, with many a shift in direction and a nod to "Psycho." But all of it is tied together by a striking blow of strings that keep it from falling apart, and Zimmer said it bears a punk influence.

Zimmer and Howard again split up work for "The Dark Night." While Zimmer tackled the music for the Joker, Howard set his sights on Harvey Dent, the good-intentioned politician who eventually becomes the Batman foe Two-Face, played in the film by Aaron Eckhart.

Below, Zimmer and Howard discuss the opposing characters, and their approach to "The Dark Knight":

So let’s start in the obvious place. Why go with a fast-and-simple string pattern rather than give the film a big, easily recognizable theme?

Zimmer: I wanted to take the romance out of it -- the fake fantasy to it. One of the things I kept thinking about was just how iconic the bat symbol is, and at the same time how dark and unadorned it is. I spent forever getting rid of notes to get it down to just two notes in this ostinato pattern.... The bat symbol is so efficient at getting the idea across. I wanted to get really efficient.

Howard: At the same time, when you write a traditional, conventional superhero theme, it gives you so much information that it might be misleading about that character. Our Batman? We're still getting to know him. He's a very complicated guy. To attach a theme to him, a theme you can sort of hum, it defines him emotionally in a way that is false.... It advertises so much about who you are during the film. I think, in a way, a theme like that would have done that. This theme is about implication, and it's about menace.

And there is still a recognizable sound attached to the character.

Zimmer: But I'm letting the character finish the thought. It leaves a lot more space. I don't see Batman as a superhero. I wanted to be very clear about that. I wanted to take out anything that is super about this.

I've written enough big themes. The only really heroic theme I ever wrote -- the only one I thought I could write with a clear conscience -- was for the firemen in "Backdraft." There's purity about guys who come to your house to save you and your cat. Their agenda is strictly to help.

There's a complex agenda that goes through the Batman philosophy. He's a vigilante. He hides his face. What kind of man does that?

Earlier you said you did once consider that sort of heroic superhero theme. You said you created one and threw it out?

Howard: We created a number of them. Hans actually did write a terrific theme for this movie. It threatens to reappear, but then it just kind of goes away.

Zimmer: It appears early on. It ultimately appears twice. Without giving the story away, what it does is highlight the red herring of the Batman.

So why so secretive with the score? Are music cues really going to give away the film?

Zimmer: Look, here's the thing that happened on the last one: We all knew we had something pretty iconic and special. But before the movie was even out, someone had put it on a trailer for another movie. I phoned up Warner Bros. and told them they were ruining any possibility of having something special or having a franchise. Why would you take the Batman costume and put it on somebody else?

I think it's more that we're being private. We really started doing some pretty uncompromising experiments on this one. It's very tough to defend some of these things until you've put them all the way through the movie. You have to get through the whole paragraph to get to the point. Working in this private way lets us be a lot freer with our ideas.

Let’s talk about the "Joker Suite." This almost sounded like an orchestral interpretation of an industrial song.

Zimmer: Look, I'm German, so I come from the German tradition of Kraftwerk.... But I kept thinking I wanted to find a way to bring corrosion into Gotham -- corrosion and recklessness. The funny thing about that piece is that I knew what I wanted to do, but it took me months to actually do it. Nobody could play it.

It's all about acting and attitude, in a way. It's very much of the idea of taking one note and expressing any part of fearlessness and recklessness and surprise.... It is very industrial music. I tried to give it a punk attitude. I used to work with the Damned and bands like that.

Howard: What's great about the Joker theme to me is that it feels totally untethered. It just kind of exists. It lives somewhere in the cracks.

What else is different this time around?

Zimmer: This is what surprised me, and I think this needs a little clarifying. Everyone keeps saying that this film is darker than the last one. I always think that people think that means more violence. It's not that at all. There's much more of a precise intellectual thought that went into Christopher [Nolan] and his brother [Jonathan] while writing. The ideas are somehow more real and more grown-up. We're doing a summer blockbuster that deals with anarchy and old-fashioned values versus the modern man. That's a lot of fun to play with.

You guys split up characters a bit. James, can you talk about what you created for Harvey Dent/Two Face?

Howard: Basically, Harvey Dent is Gotham's great hope. He's going to turn things around. He starts out with the best of intentions. He's a brave, courageous, high-minded man. Over the course of this story, he becomes seduced and corrupted -- really by the Joker. The Joker kind of wins. It's just the arc of his character, which ultimately ends up in a very tragic self-destructive place. That was the musical line.

Zimmer: What makes it interesting is that there are such extremes. The music James wrote for Harvey Dent is really beautiful. On the hand, you have the Joker theme, and on the other hand you have that contrast of something really elegant and beautiful.

What makes this movie -– and this score -– interesting is the extremes. The black is a lot blacker because of the light.

Photos courtesy Warner Bros.