Disney's penchant for quickie, video-only sequels to its animated features has earned the studio its fair share of criticism. But the soundtrack to the Mouse House's latest small screen follow-up to its classic The Lion... more » King deftly dodges the chronic sequelitis that has undermined similar efforts. Reworking the original's "That's All I Need" and "Hakuna Matata" for star Nathan Lane's turn as the antic meerkat Timon (assisted on the latter track by the stellar vocal harmonies of Ernie Gabrell, Jason Weaver and Joseph Williams) casts both in an energetic new light. Elsewhere, the emphasis is on vintage r&b covers infused with contemporary production sheen (Raven's slinky take on Ramsey Lewis' "Grazing in the Grass," The Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by Lebo M, Drew K. & French's faithful take on Kool and the Gang's "Jungle Boogie"), performances that give the project a familiar, inviting aura for kids of all ages. Composer Don Harper rounds the collection out with a selection from his original orchestral score and a remarkably faithful take on Morricone's classic theme to The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. --Jerry McCulley« less
Disney's penchant for quickie, video-only sequels to its animated features has earned the studio its fair share of criticism. But the soundtrack to the Mouse House's latest small screen follow-up to its classic The Lion King deftly dodges the chronic sequelitis that has undermined similar efforts. Reworking the original's "That's All I Need" and "Hakuna Matata" for star Nathan Lane's turn as the antic meerkat Timon (assisted on the latter track by the stellar vocal harmonies of Ernie Gabrell, Jason Weaver and Joseph Williams) casts both in an energetic new light. Elsewhere, the emphasis is on vintage r&b covers infused with contemporary production sheen (Raven's slinky take on Ramsey Lewis' "Grazing in the Grass," The Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by Lebo M, Drew K. & French's faithful take on Kool and the Gang's "Jungle Boogie"), performances that give the project a familiar, inviting aura for kids of all ages. Composer Don Harper rounds the collection out with a selection from his original orchestral score and a remarkably faithful take on Morricone's classic theme to The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. --Jerry McCulley
SuperOdie34 | Salisbury, MD United States | 02/21/2004
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Okay, so the CD is pretty short. Only eight tracks, only two music scores from the film, it must be less than 30 minutes long. But most of the stuff we get is great, although, for some dumb reason, we get the version of "Hakuna Matata" from the original "Lion King" instead of one in this movie (remember in the movie: "Hey, Timon! I've got an idea! Let's do a sing-along!"). "Grazing in the Grass" is pretty good, although I'm getting a little tired of Raven performing everything for Disney these days. "That's all I need!" is also good, and it is very nice that Disney included the reprise of the song that's played for the end credits. But the BEST song BY FAR is "Digga Tunnah". Alas, we only get the end credit version of the song, but it's so well done, you'll hardly care. This is a ingenious yet simple song, a ditty which sets up the merekats' scaredy-cat view of life in the funniest way possible. It's so catchy I still can't stop singing it. It should make the next "Disney's Greatest" album, and I'm not kidding! "Quick before the hyena Commmmmmmmee!"."
Very Short, Not Good Enough
David J. Gorman | 04/16/2006
(2 out of 5 stars)
"Since this is such a ridiculously short CD, I'll review it track by track.
1. Grazing In The Grass - I'm not too fond of Raven, so I naturally didn't really like this track. It just isn't my taste.
2. Digga Tunnah Dance - I love Digga Tunnah, but this is just the version that plays over the credits. Why weren't the superior movie version and the reprise included?
3. That's All I Need - This is probably the best track, with an extended ending.
4. Hakuna Matata - This is just the track from the original movie. I can understand including it, but why not the version in 1/2? It's brief and silly, but I still like it (although you wouldn't get the joke with Pumbaa eating the dancing grub without the visual)
5. The Lion Sleeps Tonight - This is also a nice track, but it's easy to find. It doesn't really "make" the CD or anythhing.
6. Jungle Boogie - Why was this included? It's played for five seconds in the movie! If this is here, then why not also have "Sunrise, Sunset?"
7. Timon's Traveling Theme - I like this track. It has the Hans Zimmer feel of the original movie
8. The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly - It's nice this was included, but I don't have much to say.
All in all, so much more could have been done with this CD. It's too short, and some of the choices are too silly."
Could have been better, short on music from the film
bouye | 02/25/2004
(3 out of 5 stars)
"The disc actually played without trouble on my computer's DVD drive.Music is good with the exception of the 1st track which I don't remember from the movie. The Hakuna Matata version of the Lion King 3 (international name of the Lion King 1.5) has been replaced with the one from the Lion King 1 without reason. They could have included the other two versions of Digga Tunnah Dance that occur in the movie as well."
Not too bad and a good bargain.
Ramsis Lion | Long Island, NY USA | 02/24/2004
(4 out of 5 stars)
"The soundtrack to the direct to dvd movie, isn't bad, if not short in length.While the album itself only has 8 songs, the songs they use capture the flavor the movie quite well and for the price paid, it is more then worth it. The opening song is performed by Raven, who is quite popular in the Disney fan base right now. And the song seems to fit into the theme of the rest of the LK 1 1/2 songs and ideas in the movie. The best song though that I think most will want this soundtrack for is the Digga Tunnah Dance done by Lebo M who did most of the songs in the second movie. Again he comes through with flying colors in an impressive and up beat song that expands on the actual song we see in the movie. The other original song is the Timon sung, That's All I need , which was sung in the movie as well. The other songs are not really original and have been heard before. hakuna Matata is from the first album and isn't a new version of the song and The Lion Sleeps tonight is from the Simba's Pride soundtrack, and sung by Lebo M but still is one of the best versions of the song I have heard and it does appear in this film so both work nicely. Overall its a great album for anyone who wants the complete Lion King trilogy music wise, this is a must have. Could it have had more? Absolutely. Still pretty good what we do wind up getting as 3 or 4 of the songs along on it are great and will be listened to often by anyone who enjoyed this film or the Lion King music in general. Side Note: To those who have had trouble using this on the comptuer. Press help after it loads. It won't automaticaly play as it has something to register the CD with Disney. if you press help on that screen that autoloads, it will tell you how to play it on the comptuer and that worked fine for me. It also works fine on any non computer CD rom player if you can't get it to work on the computer, but you should be able to if you follow the directions."
Actually, it's 3.5 stars in my opinion.
Any - Ren He | Nanning, Guangxi/Wuxi, Jiangsu China | 10/12/2006
(3 out of 5 stars)
"The 3 movies of The Lion King are very famous to many people who are or not Disney fans. This is one of the 3 of course. This is really a wonderful movie of stories that hadn't been told in the first movie of The Lion King. It's really filled with plenty of humor and the music in it impressed me much. So I found this soundtrack and bought it in a music shop near my college.
When I wathced the movie, the song "Digga Tunnah" is my favorite, and I'm happy that it's in this soundtrack. But I found it's a little different from the version in the movie. Then I watched the movie again and knew that this is the version in the ending. Besides, it's much longer than the version in the movie. Well, this is not so important. This song is really good, rhythmic and always makes me associate it with the tableaux in the movie, then I smile unconsciously. So is "That's All I Need", it's a little longer than the one in the movie. The last few parts of this song are a little different in the tune and lyric. However, it's a good song as well. I have listened to the song "Jungle Boogie" before but I can't remember when and where. In the movie, it appears in the plot that how Simba lives with Timon and Pumbaa. I felt this song is vivid and naughty when I was watching, and I wanted to listen to the full version. Well, I think the full version feels not so good as the one in the movie, maybe it's because of listening without the tableaux. "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" is a good song which I first listened to it in the album "Return to the Pride Rock". The same melody is repeats again and again, but it's beautiful, the lyric is good as well.
Some scores in the movie impressed me too. Take the score that appears in Simba and Timon competing with each other in eating snails as an example, it's so familiar to me when I heard it in the movie, and I think it's very dramatic in the very plot. "Timon's Traveling Theme" is really wonderful too, very glorious and dramatic.
I think the shortcoming is that it's too little for the scores, the other scores in the movie beside these ones in this soundtrack are wonderful. And I was a little disappointed that the vigorous version appears in the ending of the movie hasn't been recorded in this soundtrack. In other words, this soundtrack is not complete. However, tracks in this soundtrack are good. It can't be describe with the word "wonderful" but not too bad. So I want to rank it 3.5 stars."