Clint Mansell

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Clint Mansell

Background information
Birth name	Clinton Darryl Mansell
Born	January 7, 1963 (1963-01-07) (age 45)
Origin	Coventry, England
Genre(s)	Rock, Film score
Occupation(s)	Musician, Composer
Years active	1981–present
Associated acts	Pop Will Eat Itself
Website	clintmansell.com

Clint Mansell (born Clinton Darryl Mansell, 7 January 1963, in Coventry, England) is a Golden Globe-nominated musician and composer and former lead singer and guitarist of Pop Will Eat Itself.

1 Pop career
2 Soundtrack composer
3 Scoring credits
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Pop career

Mansell was the lead singer and guitarist of the British band Pop Will Eat Itself. After the disbanding of PWEI in 1996, Mansell broke into the world of film scoring when his friend, director Darren Aronofsky, hired him to score his debut film, π.

[edit] Soundtrack composer

Despite critical acclaim, Mansell's score went widely unnoticed by the general public. However, the soundtrack release, placing Mansell's work alongside tracks from Autechre, Aphex Twin, Orbital and Roni Size, did win many fans from the IDM and electronica communities.^{[citation needed]}

Mansell's score for π was followed up by his score for Aronofsky's next film, Requiem for a Dream (see Requiem for a Dream (soundtrack)), and the score became a cult hit. The trailer for The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers contained a rearranged version of the track "Lux Aeterna," utilizing a full orchestra and choir. The piece, named "Requiem for a Tower", was made just for the trailer. The orchestration was arranged by Simone Benyacar, Dan Nielsen, and Veigar Margeirsson.

"Lux Aeterna" has since become extremely popular, with both the original and the orchestration having appeared in a wide variety of commercials and trailers, including the trailer for the Red Sox-Yankee games in the 2007 baseball season, and trailers for the films Zathura, The Da Vinci Code, Sunshine and the TV series Lost. It is also used on Sky Sports News and as the theme for Soccer Saturday.

Other notable achievements include the theme for the film The Hole, the music for the pilot episode of CSI: NY, and the score for Aronofsky's latest film The Fountain, which was nominated for Best Original Score in the 64th Annual Golden Globe Awards.^[1] Mansell has most recently contributed the score to HBO's Voyeur. The song was also used as the base theme for the song "Throw It Up" by the hip hop artist Lil Jon.

Clint has garnered an immense cult following for his soundtrack work, so much that Smokin' Aces director Joe Carnahan admits to receiving "blatant threats" when the soundtrack was released without much of Mansell's score for the film. This led to releasing a platinum edition soundtrack which is all of Clint's music. The album included the following insert explaining the situation:

Clint Mansell likes it rough...

...no, I mean it. We engaged him on 'Smokin' the way you would a contract killer. Here's a name and a photo...now bring us back a body...that's about as much he was given to go on.

Well that and about six weeks to compose the entire score...

...and I think he prefers it that way. If you have NO times and innumerable complications, then Clint Mansell is your man. THE man. All clutch. He's that freak from the bomb squad who sits, pliers perched, waiting for the countdown clock to hit '00:01' before he starts snipping wires.

And he killed this one. Somehow managing to stitch the most wildly divergent disassociative elements of 'Smokin' Aces' into a singular theme. Bravo old boy. You've earned every last bottle of beer I piled into your fridge...and then drank before you did.

I'm most pleased and selfishly so i might add, that Lakeshore decided to give the score its own separate album. The amount of blatant threats and promises of bloodletting I received from this cultish, hardcore fan base that claim Clint as their pagan savior was enough to drive me into hiding. I hope 'Clint Crazier' are so sated by their master's latest musical offering and would only ask that they stop driving by my house in the middle of the night, playing the 'Requiem' score at full volume.

I get it, you were pissed, but now the neighbors are circulating a petition so knock it off.

His song was also featured in a trailer for the 2007 film I Am Legend.