Baltimore-based experimental artist Dan Deacon has released The Dark Wizard—Soundtrack from the Docuseries, which is out through Lakeshore Records. The Dark Wizard is four-part HBO Max documentary series that explores the extraordinary life, achievements and inner turmoil of legendary free climber, highliner, and BASE jumper Dean Potter. Deacon’s exhilarating original music captures the intensity of Potter’s life, underscoring the thrilling moments of the film, as well as the darker aspects of his psyche.
Director Nick Rosen comments: “We were initially drawn to Dan Deacon as a recording artist, having grooved out to his tracks for more than a decade. Throughout the process, it seemed like Dan was intuitively connected to Dean and his roiling emotions, as he and Chester [Gwazda] crafted an indie-inflected soundtrack of grandiose landscapes, angsty tension, intimate storytelling and the complex character at the center of it all.”
Deacon adds: “To me, The Dark Wizard tells the tragedy of obsession through someone using extreme, life-threatening risk as a form of emotional regulation. I set out to compose a score that captured Dean’s emotional turmoil as a human being, as well as the audience’s mounting anxiety, knowing that something inevitable was barreling towards them. Dean’s massive swings allowed me to take the score to equally wild extremes of texture and tone. We needed to feel the fear he felt, know the adrenaline addiction was growing, and start to sense a point of no return emerging with his obsessions. Something that stuck with me while writing the score was how Dean really embodied the ‘fuck you’ mentality Gen X had towards selling out to corporate culture, and the impact it had on him when he started playing the game.”
The Dark Wizard Soundtrack Track List
1. Act Of Beauty
2. Fuck You
3. Dopamine Junky
4. Falling Dream
5. Winky
6. Yosemite
7. Inner Demons
8. Backlash
9. Sprinting
10. Freebase
11. Conflict
12. Forced
13. Emotions
14. Ominous
15. Falling Dopamine
16. Highline Walk
17. After China
18. Anti Hero
19. Brad Breakup
20. Diary
21. Broken Man
22. Adversary
23. At Risk
24. Falling Dream
25. Fuck You Credits
Leave a Comment