TGL’s exclusive interview with Frank Klepacki

CommentDecember 3rd, 2009 15:00

Frank_Klepacki

Recently, Frank Klepacki sat down with TGL and spoke candidly about his time in the game industry, rumours about him being able to play the spoons and most importantly, what’s next?

TGL: Can you tell us a bit about yourself Frank?

Frank Klepacki: Sure. I grew up in a family of musicians so that was always going to be a part of my life, I started performing professionally on drums at the age of 11. I’ve always been a gamer since I discovered the first arcades and having the Atari 2600. By high school I had learned other instruments, started writing my own stuff, and gotten my first pc. Besides gaming on it, I started trying to program music with it. I enjoyed Westwood Studios games so much I wanted to be a tester there. After discovering the magic of game making, I pursued a job on the audio department, and have since made that my career. 18 years later I’m now the audio director at Petroglyph.

TGL: Your career began when you joined Westwood Studios. How has the gaming Industry changed since you became part of it?

FK: The technology of gaming changed so rapidly, that it was like new doors and possibility opened every year. Faster systems, better graphics, and of course better sound. We went from beep and blips to symphonys and cd quality music.

TGL: You are now renowned for your drumming, infectious electrical beats. One that springs to mind would be the cult classic “Hell March” from C&C. How do you go about creating such songs?

FK: Creating music comes in different and mysterious ways. For me it’s channeling energy and inspiration when it Command_Conquer_Red_Alert strikes. Sometimes it’s slow moving, othertimes, it comes all at once. Hell March was a track that came all at once. It started with waking up one morning to go to work, and I heard marching in my head, which I thought would make a cool beat foundation to a song. When I arrived, I found some samples in some sound effect libraries of marching boots, and then I picked up the guitar and the main riff to the song was literally the first thing I played without knowing what I was going to do, and it immediatly felt right. I wrote the rest of the song in a half day, and just tweaked the production after that. It was originally written with NOD in mind, but I was told that Red Alert was going to be about Soviets and Allies instead. Westwoods president liked it so much he wanted it as the title track. The rest is history.

TGL: What would be your favourite song/soundtrack that you have composed?

FK: I have several favorites, and the list changes a little bit all the time, as I keep working on new projects. Hell March of course is one of them, in all it’s various forms including the latest Hell March 3. I also love Got a Present For Ya from C&C Renegade. Others include The Zann Consortium theme from Star Wars Forces of Corruption, and Divine Intervention from Universe At War.

TGL: Not a lot of people would know about your composition for the Blade Runner soundtrack on the PC. When you were brought in to compose the soundtrack for Blade Runner, where you a fan of the movie?

FK: I was brought in about mid way through the project, and couldn’t wait to work on it. Yes I was indeed a fan of the movie so it was an honor to be a part of expanding on that.

TGL: Did you try to keep the sound of your Blade Runner music similar to that of Vangelis soundtrack for the movie? If so, was it difficult?

FK: We didn’t have the rights to use the orignal soundtrack recordings, but we did have the rights to replicate it (no pun intended) so I recomposed it entirely by ear [Vangelis' main themes of the film], and then added my own originals to to the mix. Recreating the film pieces were definitely a challenge, because not only did I have to listen for all the parts and nuances of how they were performed, I had to edit and fine tune lots of synth patches to recreate the sound of those instruments. One of the most flattering compliments I got was that a lot of the company said they enjoyed my versions a bit more only because the recording quality was cleaner than the originals.

TGL: Is there any game or game series you’d like to compose for specifically?

FK: Unreal Tournament. Always been a big fan of the series, and it’s music, especially from the first one. I think I could add some serious adrenaline into it.

TGL: Just how many instruments do you play? We have heard everything from the drums to the spoons!?

FK: Mainly, I play drums, guitar, bass, keys, and I also sing. While I can’t play other instruments such as horns or strings, I know how to write for them. For example I used to have a band that had 5 horns in it, and I wrote most of the arrangements on a regular basis.

TGL: Do you have any future projects lined up?

FK: Always. At Petroglyph we just shipped Panzer General: Allied Assault on XBLA, we’re going beta on Mytheon which is a g41684japt2 fantasy MMO PC game, and also working on an MMORTS as well. Apart from that, I’ve been touring on weekends with the Family Stone Project as their drummer for the past year and a half laying down down some funk with the legends of the genre, and aside from that, [coming up soon], I’m about to put out a special holiday package available on my official website including a new cd which is a concept album and comes with a sci-fi themed comic book I wrote, and a bunch of other goodies as well. Stay tuned for news on that very soon!

TGL: Finally Frank, when you are not working on games, what do you like to do to unwind? Are you a big gamer?

FK: I do game when I can. As you can see I’m a pretty busy guy. But I welcome that because I’d rather be accomplishing something than sitting around, even when I should be relaxing. The recording studio is like my second home. I can always spend a couple hours in there and get something done. But yes I still love to game -- most recently been playing Prototype, Magic, of course Panzer General, and just picked up Brutal Legend so I’m going to tackle that next. I also like to go out and just be social or support some of my firneds bands around town in Vegas. I fill in for some of the show bands occasionally, and most recently performed with a huge group at the HBO Emmys party.

Frank Klepacki has worked on a ferocious amount of titles. Here is just some: