Jerskin Fendrix is no stranger to composing for fantastical storylines — His work in 2024’s Kinds of Kindness is no exception. The latest Yorgos Lanthimos film is a triptych tale: three adjacent storylines with a few themes that tie the whole package together. One such element is Fendrix’s nightmarish score of piano and choir. A sometimes amorphous amalgamation of dissonant chord planing, gothic choral sequences, and impressionistic piano flourishes, there is considerable depth to be explored in these cues. In this article, we will discuss Fendrix’s audacious score and some tools we can use to explore these tones and textures in our home studios!
Where to Begin?
To break down this exploratory score requires a (spoiler-free) understanding of both the plot of Kinds of Kindness as well as Lanthimos’ particular directorial vision. Kinds of Kindness is a follow-up to Fendrix and Lanthimos’ last collaboration in 2023’s Poor Things, a coming-of-age fantasy lauded with multiple Oscar nominations, including a Best Original Score nom for Fendrix’s wild and haunting contribution. Kinds of Kindness continues in Lanthimos’ established auteuristic style of dark comedy, making light of heavy subject matter and drawing the viewer into a contemplative trance.
Yorgos Lanthimos discovered Jerskin Fendrix from his debut album Winterreise, an experimental pop project that perfectly sums up Fendrix’s playful nature. From there, the two collaborated on Poor Things. That Poor Things was Fendrix’s first feature film as a composer makes the Oscar nomination that much more momentous. Lanthimos is known for his specific, deadpan style of comedy and delivery, his absurd plot lines, and twists and turns that often send his characters on a quick descent to hell. Fendrix and his no-boundaries approach to music made him the perfect collaborator.
Lanthimos candidly instructed Fendrix to compose the score using basically just piano and choir. This is a tall ask for a composer that is traditionally inventive in his instrumentation and production. He took the challenge in stride. In an interview with Variety, Fendrix says “I was trying to think about the space between the emotions. For the piano pieces, I wanted to explore whether the spaces between the emotions were very empty and absent, and with the choir pieces, whether the spaces were very saturated and noisy and insanity-inducing. That was the main principle.”
Kinds of Kindness is told in three vignettes. The first entry in the anthology, titled “The Death of R.M.F.,” follows an emasculated office-worker (played by Jesse Plemons) who has every detail of his life dictated to him by his enigmatic boss (Willem Dafoe). An eventual rejection of his orders leads to some disastrous results. The second vignette, “R.M.F. is Flying,” follows police officer Robert (played by Plemons again) who is reconnected with his wife, Liz, who was lost at sea (played by Emma Stone). He believes the Liz that has returned is not actually his wife and subjects her to increasingly harsh tests to prove her identity. The last entry in the anthology is “R.M.F. Eats a Sandwich” which follows two cultists (Plemons and Stone) as they search for their new messiah.
“The Death of R.M.F”
This is where we are first introduced to Fendrix’s dissonant textures, almost exclusively created with piano and choir. The frightening undertones juxtapose a somewhat mundane setting, introducing a slow dread to the characters that was previously only implied. Listen below to a cue from this vignette titled “The Death of R.M.F”.
While seemingly atonal, the piece begins with a diverging chromatic line. As the piece continues, the intervals begin to open up more and explore different registers. The viewer is basically hearing Robert as his psyche begins to unravel. The underscore is a thread that is fraying at the ends. Some tonal observations are that this appears to have been played on a grand piano as opposed to an upright (note the depth of tone in the low end and the strong resonances).
The piano seems to be mostly in tune here and we can hear some room noise which adds atmosphere. There are a few great piano plug-ins for trying to recreate this style of piano tone at home. My first recommendation is for one of my most beloved plug-ins: Noir by Native Instruments. This piano was lovingly sampled from Nils Frahms’ Yamaha CFX 9′ grand piano and can be found in the Komplete 14 collection. This plug-in is highly customizable, but some particularly helpful features for recreating the Kinds of Kindness grand piano tone are the unaltered “Pure” palette, tweakable room tone and pianist tone (sampled sounds of the performers motion during playing), and vast array of microphone options and reverb settings to dial in the perfect organic quality.
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This story entry also features a cameo of Fendrix playing piano at the bar Cheval. This is considered source music, since the viewer can see it being played in the scene, as opposed to underscore. Not typical jazz piano bar fare, the cue features romantic-era styles of piano flourishes, modal progressions, and highly ambiguous rhythmic structures. This helps to keep viewers suspended in the dreamlike trance Lanthimos has worked so hard to create. The recording is meant to have a natural room sound as this scene occurs in a bar. The piano is not perfectly in tune, which adds to the organic nature of the recording. One great piano plug-in for achieving this style is the Modartt U4 Upright, a sampled upright that allows you to dial in the inharmonicity and increase imperfections found in the sound. You can also customize room size!
“R.M.F. is Flying”
A common theme in the score of the second vignette is note repetition. While this compositional technique may be simple, the slow plodding textures that Fendrix creates add to Daniel’s (Plemons’ character) descent into supposed insanity. No one believes that his wife is not the true Liz but him. His own mind is gnawing at him, like he is banging his head against a wall. This insistence is mirrored in the cue linked below. Starting with high, shrill pinging, the score soon falls to low end note clusters. Cemented in Daniel’s certainty of truth and clouded by hysteria.
Later in the second act, Daniel suggest a dreadfully impossible task of Liz to prove her loyalty to him. During this sequence we hear one of Fendrix’s choir cues titled Hymn – Matia Vlemma Stoma Psema, a horrifying gothic texture that continues the theme of repetition but ups the intensity (these choir cues feature the talented 24-Voice London Choir). We hear an undulating choir as they ping pong from low octaves to high clusters, tightly voiced and dissonant. The barren nature of the cue feels oppressive and isolating with shocking dynamic shifts that follow the emotions seen on screen.
Choir plug-ins are in less demand than piano plug-ins, but a few options that can help recreate these tones at home are one of the many choral libraries available in SampleTank 4 or the Kontakt libraries in Komplete 14. Alternatively, Arturia’s Augmented Voices library can create some lighter choral textures, but is also a very versatile and modern sound to be used in your other projects.
“R.M.F. Eats a Sandwich”
The final act of Lanthimos’ triptych tale continues to up the ridiculous antics, highlighted by Emma Stone’s infamous dance breaks, Willem Dafoe’s charismatic portrayal of a cult leader, and an intense needle-drop with COBRAH’s “BRAND NEW BITCH”.
At one point, Emma Stone’s character begins to explain a dream that she has of her new messiah saving her in a pool. As the narrative unfolds, we hear the underscore follow the arc, beginning with an A-Minor chord progression that quickly ascends to a harmonic minor texture, supported by a low, repeated pedal and an emphatic tri-tone arpeggio.
One other beautiful cue from this section is titled “The Little One” and features more of Fendrix’s impressionistic chord planing and modal progressions.
Final Notes
While this score may be simple in instrumentation, it is thoughtful and calculated in its compositional direction. These types of tones and textures are admittedly difficult to replicate at home as part of the magic is their organic and natural quality. This is not something that plug-ins can always perfectly replicate. The absolute best way to achieve these tones is to record real musicians!
Usually recording piano at home is achieved with a pair of condenser mics like the industry standard AKG C 414s. Other affordable alternatives are mics like the Lewitt LCT 440 PUREs or the Warm Audio WA-14SPs. The mics are also great options as overheads for choral recordings or capturing other ensembles!
Some additional piano tools can be found in the Arturia V Collection, like the Arturia Piano V, or in Universal Audio’s Ravel library which is a classic, natural sounding grand.
One notable element of Jerskin’s score that is not featured in the released soundtrack is his use of reverb and delay as a tool. This texture is used sparsely but he does occasionally use delay and reverb to transform sustained piano trails into pads as transitional elements. Some great tools for this type of time-based effects can be found in the FabFilter Essentials Bundle, Baby Audio’s Spaced Out plug-in, or many of UAD’s incredible effects like Lexicon 224 and Galaxy Tape Echo.
Lastly, Fendrix traditionally works in Logic Pro as his DAW of choice, but some great alternatives are FL Studio, Reason 13, or UAD LUNA, all of which come with great suites of effects and samples to get you started!
Lastly, I encourage any cinephile to see “Kinds of Kindness.” This film may not be for everyone, but it is a work of art that is hard not to appreciate!
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