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mad_tea_partyI've talked at length multiple times about how the first Power Rangers series, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, all the way through Turbo, did wonders for my self-confidence against bullying. What I have yet to touch on is the music behind it, and it's successors.
Ron Wasserman, then know both as Aaron Waters aka The Mighty Raw is an mazing composer. It was the first time, for me at least, hearing music *with* a fight scene that wasn't "incidental". No his music had words, and those words were encouraging. I wore out 3 tapes of the very first Power Rangers "soundtrack", Power Rangers: A Rock Adventure. It wasn't for the dialogue, although I had a lot of fun re-enacting the scenes in my best intimiadtions of the Rangers' voices (and Bulk and Skull and Zordon and Alpha's. Even Rita and Lord Zedd along with Squatt, Baboo, and Finster. Goldar was a hoot to play with too). It was simply because at that time, there was no alternative to hearing the songs outside of recording the episodes of the Rangers they were in, and then recording the TV on cassette tape.(Yeah, we were primitive back in the 90s, sheesh!) So, Rock Adventure it was.
Years later and i'm talking about 2012 and on, Ron Wasserman was finally able to reclaim the rights to his own music, and he did something amazing for his thousands of fans. He released a re-recorded version of every single song from Mighty Morphin, and the Turbo Movie. Oh. My. God. 13 year old me was SO happy. I have listened that particular disk on YouTube Music every day since first finding it. And I even tweeted Mr. Wasserman and thanked him for belatedly making a teen fan's dream come true. To which he replied very graciously.
Sadly, Wasserman parted ways with Saban due to some very unfair behind the scenes drama on Saban's part. (I never said the guy was a great person. In a lot of cases he really isn't, but he still brought us Power Rangers, so I *try* to ignore those things, but I'm not naive. I know they happened.) Saban refused to let Wasserman take credit for any of the music he'd written, forcing him to put Shuki LEvy and Haim Saban as the composers and Lyricist. IF you guys ever see that in the credits? Not true. I repeat, NOT TRUE. The last known series that Wasserman worked on was Power Rangers SPD.
Up until 2011, the music for Power Rangers didn't have much in the way of consistent composers. In 2011, Noam Kaniel, a former partrner of Ron Wasserman's, took the reins for a few seasons, starting with Power Rangers Samurai.
This is where I gotta talk a bit more personally. Up until Samurai, I had really liked the other composers' and their theme songs with very little exception. When I got to Samurai, I was equal parts elated and annoyed. Why? Well, first off, Samurai seemed to be a remix of the original Power Rangers anthem, "Go Go Power Rangers" from the very first season. And honestly, I was sort of okay with that. it was like a call-back to the franchise roots. What I was not okay with was Wasserman not getting any credit for the original that the song was based on. And that pet peeve has continued all the way to Dino Charge. (Which by far, has become my favorite of the franchise after the original music). This not Kaniel's fault. It was more than likely Saban not wanting to have to pay for the rights to it from Wasserman who'd left after SPD. I do wonder though, since Kaniel and Wasserman worked so close together if maybe some behind the scenes negotiating had gone down, and then shitty Saban not honoring whatever agreement was possibily made. That would not surprise me one bit. I don't know as much as much about Noam Kaniel as I do about Wasserman, but I can hope he's more honorable than Saban, and tried to get Wasserman credited.
The music for the Power Rangers franchise has very obviously changed hands and vibes. Most of the second part of that is probably changing with the times. And it's understandable. Ninja Steel, my currernt season, actually pays homage once again to the original. The music for the two "bullies" in the series is a remixed version of Bulk and Skull's theme from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. To me, though, the music doesn't feel quite as iconic as the original. In the original, I knew something was gonna happen the second I heard a specific piece of music. (ie: Bulk and Skull's theme, or putty patrollers, or, even, one of the songs I just talked about from A Rock Adventure).
Also missing from every season since the wrap up of Turbo (and probably a bit before that, but not entirely sure when it stopped, but definitely before In Space.) are the character theme songs. In Mighty Morphin and at least one other season in that era, we had three Ranger themes, and at least 1 villian theme.
Go Green Ranger was Tommy's iconic first theme after breaking free of Rita's spell. It was followed up again by White Ranger Tiger Power. meanwhile, later in the series, Jason gets his own theme, "Gold Ranger". We don't see that again after Turbo at the very least. Lord Zedd, to date, is the only bad guy with his own intro music with lyrics and subsequent "incidental" music. Rita of course had that, too, and it is iconic , but we never see that again after this series (and i"m talking Mighty Morphin to Turbo)ends.
At least for Mighty Morphin to Turbo I can say that we had a lot of great in series music that went beyond the theme songs. I attribute all of that to a man who would not get recognized for his work for many years. If I get to meet him at a Ranger Con one day, I will be very happy to tell him, in person, how exciting he made cleaning the kitchen, or my bedroom.
Noam Kaniel is a legend in his own right theme music wise. While i am still salty that Wasserman gets no credit, he took a classic theme song and managed to make it fresh for the "Now" generation. While older Ranger fans call it lazy, I call it awesome. There's not a day that goes by that I haven't rocked out to a Power Rangers theme of some sort since I was a teen, and I cannot say that about any of the other shows I have ever watched as a kid, teen, or adult. (Not counting Animaniacs. That show is a whole other level of music ingenuity.)
I hope with this new series coming out that Noam Kaniel is working on the music and theme. We're going to need a bit of familiarity here.
Ron Wasserman, then know both as Aaron Waters aka The Mighty Raw is an mazing composer. It was the first time, for me at least, hearing music *with* a fight scene that wasn't "incidental". No his music had words, and those words were encouraging. I wore out 3 tapes of the very first Power Rangers "soundtrack", Power Rangers: A Rock Adventure. It wasn't for the dialogue, although I had a lot of fun re-enacting the scenes in my best intimiadtions of the Rangers' voices (and Bulk and Skull and Zordon and Alpha's. Even Rita and Lord Zedd along with Squatt, Baboo, and Finster. Goldar was a hoot to play with too). It was simply because at that time, there was no alternative to hearing the songs outside of recording the episodes of the Rangers they were in, and then recording the TV on cassette tape.(Yeah, we were primitive back in the 90s, sheesh!) So, Rock Adventure it was.
Years later and i'm talking about 2012 and on, Ron Wasserman was finally able to reclaim the rights to his own music, and he did something amazing for his thousands of fans. He released a re-recorded version of every single song from Mighty Morphin, and the Turbo Movie. Oh. My. God. 13 year old me was SO happy. I have listened that particular disk on YouTube Music every day since first finding it. And I even tweeted Mr. Wasserman and thanked him for belatedly making a teen fan's dream come true. To which he replied very graciously.
Sadly, Wasserman parted ways with Saban due to some very unfair behind the scenes drama on Saban's part. (I never said the guy was a great person. In a lot of cases he really isn't, but he still brought us Power Rangers, so I *try* to ignore those things, but I'm not naive. I know they happened.) Saban refused to let Wasserman take credit for any of the music he'd written, forcing him to put Shuki LEvy and Haim Saban as the composers and Lyricist. IF you guys ever see that in the credits? Not true. I repeat, NOT TRUE. The last known series that Wasserman worked on was Power Rangers SPD.
Up until 2011, the music for Power Rangers didn't have much in the way of consistent composers. In 2011, Noam Kaniel, a former partrner of Ron Wasserman's, took the reins for a few seasons, starting with Power Rangers Samurai.
This is where I gotta talk a bit more personally. Up until Samurai, I had really liked the other composers' and their theme songs with very little exception. When I got to Samurai, I was equal parts elated and annoyed. Why? Well, first off, Samurai seemed to be a remix of the original Power Rangers anthem, "Go Go Power Rangers" from the very first season. And honestly, I was sort of okay with that. it was like a call-back to the franchise roots. What I was not okay with was Wasserman not getting any credit for the original that the song was based on. And that pet peeve has continued all the way to Dino Charge. (Which by far, has become my favorite of the franchise after the original music). This not Kaniel's fault. It was more than likely Saban not wanting to have to pay for the rights to it from Wasserman who'd left after SPD. I do wonder though, since Kaniel and Wasserman worked so close together if maybe some behind the scenes negotiating had gone down, and then shitty Saban not honoring whatever agreement was possibily made. That would not surprise me one bit. I don't know as much as much about Noam Kaniel as I do about Wasserman, but I can hope he's more honorable than Saban, and tried to get Wasserman credited.
The music for the Power Rangers franchise has very obviously changed hands and vibes. Most of the second part of that is probably changing with the times. And it's understandable. Ninja Steel, my currernt season, actually pays homage once again to the original. The music for the two "bullies" in the series is a remixed version of Bulk and Skull's theme from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. To me, though, the music doesn't feel quite as iconic as the original. In the original, I knew something was gonna happen the second I heard a specific piece of music. (ie: Bulk and Skull's theme, or putty patrollers, or, even, one of the songs I just talked about from A Rock Adventure).
Also missing from every season since the wrap up of Turbo (and probably a bit before that, but not entirely sure when it stopped, but definitely before In Space.) are the character theme songs. In Mighty Morphin and at least one other season in that era, we had three Ranger themes, and at least 1 villian theme.
Go Green Ranger was Tommy's iconic first theme after breaking free of Rita's spell. It was followed up again by White Ranger Tiger Power. meanwhile, later in the series, Jason gets his own theme, "Gold Ranger". We don't see that again after Turbo at the very least. Lord Zedd, to date, is the only bad guy with his own intro music with lyrics and subsequent "incidental" music. Rita of course had that, too, and it is iconic , but we never see that again after this series (and i"m talking Mighty Morphin to Turbo)ends.
At least for Mighty Morphin to Turbo I can say that we had a lot of great in series music that went beyond the theme songs. I attribute all of that to a man who would not get recognized for his work for many years. If I get to meet him at a Ranger Con one day, I will be very happy to tell him, in person, how exciting he made cleaning the kitchen, or my bedroom.
Noam Kaniel is a legend in his own right theme music wise. While i am still salty that Wasserman gets no credit, he took a classic theme song and managed to make it fresh for the "Now" generation. While older Ranger fans call it lazy, I call it awesome. There's not a day that goes by that I haven't rocked out to a Power Rangers theme of some sort since I was a teen, and I cannot say that about any of the other shows I have ever watched as a kid, teen, or adult. (Not counting Animaniacs. That show is a whole other level of music ingenuity.)
I hope with this new series coming out that Noam Kaniel is working on the music and theme. We're going to need a bit of familiarity here.
