Music of the Scream franchise

The original soundtrack for Scream was released on December 17, 1996, by TVT Records. The soundtrack features 11 songs—most of which appeared in various scenes in the film—plus a piece from the film's score, "Trouble in Woodsboro" / "Sidney's Lament", by Beltrami. The Alice Cooper version of "School's Out" appeared in the film following the closure of Woodsboro high school, but it was replaced with a cover version of the song by The Last Hard Men on the album. An acoustic cover of Blue Öyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper", performed by Gus Black, plays softly in the background while Sidney and Billy discuss their relationship. The song was also one of the few songs featured in John Carpenter's Halloween, a film to which Scream makes repeated homage. Analyst Jeff Smith describes the musical choice as:

An ironic comment on the brutality we have just seen in the opening sequence. More importantly, however, the allusion to the Blue Öyster Cult classic recasts the song's title by literalizing its meaning. While the title itself invokes the Reaper as a popular symbol for death, the film presents us with an actual person, who not only dresses as the Grim Reaper but also unleashes homicidal vengeance on the other characters of the film. The irony here, of course, is that Billy himself proves to be one of the film's dual slashers and is, in fact, the "Reaper" to be feared.[2]

The song "Red Right Hand" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, heard in the first film, is also used in Scream 2, Scream 3 and Scream (2022). Nick Cave performs a version of the track written specifically for Scream 3 in that film. An alternate version of the music video "Drop Dead Gorgeous" by Republica, featuring clips from the film, was shown on music networks such as MTV. Although the song can be heard in the film, it is only included in the European edition of the soundtrack album. The song was also used in one of the film's television commercials. AllMusic awarded the album 3 stars out of 5.[3]

The Scream score by Marco Beltrami was released by Varèse Sarabande on July 14, 1998, on a CD titled "Scream/Scream 2", which also contained tracks from the score of Scream 2.[4] The release consisted of only six tracks—"Sidney's Lament", "Altered Ego", "A Cruel World", "Trouble in Woodsboro", "Chasing Sidney", and "NC-17"[5]—with a runtime of only 12 minutes, compared to over an hour of music made for the film and the more common 30–45 minutes of music found in other original scores.[4] Some reviewers felt the restricted runtime was a result of the high cost of releasing a composer's music commercially, combined with Varèse Sarabande's unwillingness to pay.[6]

The score to Scream received generally positive reviews, with Mikael Carlsson labeling it as "some of the most intriguing horror scores composed in years".[4] Filmtracks.com claimed the scores had "cult status", awarding it 3 stars out of 5.[5] AllMusic said that the score "perfectly captured the post-modern, hip scare-ride of the Scream movies", also giving it 3 stars out of 5.[7] The track "NC-17" was named after the censorship battles over the film.[8]

The Scream 2 original score was, as in Scream, developed by Marco Beltrami and was released on July 14, 1998, by Varèse Sarabande on a CD which also contained tracks from the score of Scream entitled "Scream/Scream 2".[14] The commercially released score for both films was found to be lacking many pieces heard in either film, consisting of only nine tracks – "Stage Fright Requiem", "Love Turns Sour", "Cici Creepies", "Deputy for a Friend", "Hollow Parting", "Dewpoint/Stabbed", "Hairtrigger Lunatic", "Sundown Search" and "It's Over, Sid" – with a runtime of only 17 minutes, compared to nearly 90 minutes of score developed for the film and the more common 30–45 minutes of music found in other original scores.[14] The release was also found to be missing the track "Cassandra Aria" by Danny Elfman, described by soundtrack-review site Filmtracks as "a frenzied, choral-enhanced three minutes".[5] The length of the released score was considered disappointing with some reviews considering the track omissions the result of the high fees required to be paid to composers in order to release their music commercially.[14]

The influence of several other famous composers could be heard in the score including Hans Zimmer, Elliot Goldenthal, Ennio Morricone and Christopher Young. In particular excerpts of the Hans Zimmer's score to Broken Arrow, particularly the tracks "Brothers" and "Secure", featuring guitar work by Duane Eddy, would become a component of the theme tune of the character Dewey Riley. Filmtracks was complimentary to the score, appreciating Beltrami's evolution of his work in Scream but remarked that the most memorable music of the film would be from other composers, Elfman's contribution "Cassandra Aria" and the samples from Zimmer's score, finding the replacement of Beltrami's work for the Dewey character with Zimmer's work "effective". Ultimately, the album was called unsatisfying without Elfman's piece but better than the score for the first movie and it was awarded 3 stars out of 5.[5] The music guide AllMusic was more complimentary of Beltrami's contribution, saying the score "perfectly captured the post-modern, hip scare-ride of the Scream movies", and awarded it 3 stars out of 5.[12]

The Scream 2 original soundtrack was released December 2, 1997, by Capitol Records featuring 15 songs in the R&B, rap and rock genres by various artists, some of which are represented in the film.[15] The album spent ten weeks on the Billboard 200, rising as high as No. 50[10] but received a lower score than its predecessor from the music guide Allmusic, gaining only 2 out of 5.[6] Stephen Erlewine of Allmusic opined that the soundtrack was an attempt to compensate for the previous film's lack of a hit soundtrack, but failed to do, creating an "uneven" album of songs not "good enough to make [the artists'] own albums".[12]

The Scream 2 score was, as in Scream, developed by Marco Beltrami and was released on July 14, 1998, in a dual-pack with the score to Scream by Varèse Sarabande. The commercially released score was found to be lacking several pieces used in the film, with a runtime of only 17 minutes compared to the more common 30–45 minutes normally found in original scores.[14] Included in the missing pieces was the track "Cassandra Aria" created by Danny Elfman, described by soundtrack-review site Filmtracks as "a frenzied, choral-enhanced three minutes" that remains unreleased as of March 2011.[5] The length of the released score was considered disappointing and blamed on the fees required to be paid to musicians in order to release their music.[14] The influence of several other famous composers could be heard in the score including Hans Zimmer, Elliot Goldenthal, Ennio Morricone and Christopher Young. In particular excerpts of the Hans Zimmer's score to Broken Arrow, featuring guitar by Duane Eddy, would become a component of the theme tune of the character Dewey Riley.

The Scream (2022) soundtrack consists of 15 songs primarily of the pop, alternative, and hip-hop genres and featuring artists such as Kim Petras, DJ Khaled, and Santigold. The soundtrack received positive reviews, with Joséphine Michele of Screen Rant describing it as matching the tone of the Scream films perfectly while still feeling modern, saying "the movie itself takes heavy inspiration from the first film, but Scream (2022) ups the gore and violence, and the soundtrack brings it into the 2020s."[32]

The fifth film's score soundtrack was released on January 7, 2022, by Varèse Sarabande. The score was developed by Brian Tyler, making it the first film in the franchise with a score that was not created by Marco Beltrami.