The Dark Knight Rises Water Tower Music****

Hans Zimmer's masterful score delivers on a grand scale for The Dark Knight Rises. Zimmer co-wrote the scores with James Newton Howard for the brooding Batman Begins and the subversiveThe Dark Knight. This new one sees the maverick composer on a gleeful solo run, revisiting his synth-rock roots and reinventing some of his signature themes with pounding beats, shrieking horns, chunky electronica and surging atavistic chants. But Zimmer the Romantic is also given full rein with mournful strings, a haunting piano and a plaintive boy soprano, which plunge and soar between melancholy and triumph to create a dynamic score of contrasting colours and moods, revealing an underlying seriousness that is as surprising as it is affecting. watertowermusic.com

Download tracks:Mind If I Cut In?, Gotham's Reckoning, Imagine the Fire, Rise