Torchlight II Soundtrack

Matt Uelmen, 2012

To call one particular work the culmination of an artist’s oeuvre can be a risky manoeuvre. It suggests linear development across multiple works and imposes an easily identifiable trajectory on a career that may not in fact possess one. But it is difficult not to hail the Torchlight II soundtrack as the fullest realisation of a specific musical approach. Here, Matt Uelmen brings together the elements that have characterised his earlier scores and refines them to an exceptional degree.

As always, his music deals in textures rather than melodies, in suggestion rather than definitive statement. At its best, that approach yields wonders like Diablo’s “Tristram”, a game music classic and an instantly striking demonstration of how fantasy settings could be scored in fresh, idiosyncratic ways. Yet applied across entire soundtracks, the same method led Diablo II and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction to veer between the scintillating and the meandering.

The Torchlight II soundtrack is a marked improvement. It combines the languid, gloomy synth layers of Diablo II, the textural refinement of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, and the increased melodicism of Torchlight, blending them into one of the finest fantasy game scores. A piece like “Enclave Morning” makes it immediately apparent that Uelmen can still evoke a faraway fantasy location like few other composers. Peaceful woodwind lines take on a soft, otherworldly cast through shimmering violin crescendi and the composition’s echoing acoustics. Its impressionistic, constantly shifting textures conjure a dazzling, majestic beauty of a very rare kind.

That textural focus is the foundation of Uelmen’s supremely accomplished work here. “Enclave Morning” does not underscore particular characters, actions, or narrative beats through an array of themes. Instead, it captures an elusive mood that feels frozen in time, yet already destined to fade away: the ephemeral beauty of a sunrise over a wondrous land, with its slowly and subtly shifting waves of gleaming colour. And “Enclave Morning” is far from the only cue on Torchlight II to revel in such exquisite tone-painting.

All of the soundtrack’s compositions proceed at a measured pace and a consistent dynamic level, rendered within an often cavernous soundscape. Thanks to the small armada of instruments Uelmen deploys, the result is not monotony but coherence. Listening to the album feels like gliding down a long river at twilight, marvelling at wonders that hazily fade in and out of view along the shoreline with dreamlike logic.

The Torchlight II soundtrack is best understood as a vast tapestry of sound, built on an expanded version of the orchestra / synth / rock ensemble Uelmen has employed across most of his major scores. Here, atmospheric instrumental lines and synth pads are layered even more densely than before. The results are subtler and more inventive than in his earlier work in this idiom, surpassing even those already formidable achievements. Such lushness does not come as a complete surprise if one traces the development of Uelmen’s music from Diablo to Diablo II: Lord of Destruction.

However, that tonal richness reaches new heights here, strengthened by the greater fondness for melody already evident in Torchlight. Indeed, while Uelmen remains chiefly concerned with the detail-obsessed, immaculate layering and balancing of textures, the Torchlight II soundtrack also contains moments of great melodic beauty. The live orchestra’s string section is especially important here, supplying injections of fantasy gravitas and sweep. Just listen to “Zeryphesh Morning” and its beautiful, pensive string chord progressions. They become even more intoxicating when merged with an exotic orchestral backdrop that incorporates the sound of the guzheng. The album’s midpoint is quite literally one of its peaks, thanks to “Echo Pass” and “Camp Evening”, whose free-flowing string melodies capture every bit of the wondrous majesty emanating from their mountainous settings.

The soundtrack’s kaleidoscopic orchestrations and melodic strengths do not prevent it from descending into the murkier depths that Uelmen explored so thoroughly in his Diablo scores. As on Diablo II, the album’s last third is devoted to more sombre material. While the score loses some of its beguiling force in these morose, more monochromatic compositions, the music remains captivating. Hollow guitars ring out over the bleak soundscapes of “Wasteland”. Feelings of despair dominate “Desolation”, driven by horn cries and piercing woodwind notes set against relentless drum patterns. “Bog”, meanwhile, sustains interest through a lone flute melody stranded amid howling deep synths.

Best of all is “Mummified”. The cue pushes its busy, disorienting string pizzicati just far enough into the background for them to become an unsettling, elusive source of motion. Uelmen then layers deceptively cheeky pizzicati over dissonant sound effects and creepy percussion. It is yet another feat of clever composition and studio engineering. Like the Torchlight II soundtrack as a whole, the track is an intriguing surprise and another facet of Uelmen’s stunningly successful world-building. It helps elevate Torchlight II to the highest echelon of Western fantasy scores, alongside works such as EverQuest II and Outcast.