Rupert Coulson on recording Alien: Romulus score: “We wanted to pay homage to the original”

In space, no one can hear you scream. But on the big screen, it needs to be quite the opposite. Engineer Rupert Coulson, who recorded the score for Alien: Romulus (the highly anticipated seventh instalment in the Alien franchise – which serves as a standalone film set between the events of 1979’s Alien and 1986’s Aliens) explains how he balanced the sci-fi score mix around the on-screen carnage in the return of the alien superstar.

“You have to have the picture,” he explains of the recording session in Abbey Road’s Studio One, “because ​​you get the dialogue, and weaving stuff in and around the dialogue is important. You can't rush over the little bits of information in the narrative that are communicated to you with the dialogue.”

And that’s not even factoring in an 80-piece orchestra and choir, although director Fede Álvarez and composer Benjamin Wallfisch were in good hands with Coulson, who has worked with some of the finest producers, composers and artists during his career so far, including Sir George Martin, The Rolling Stones, and on film scores including Rocketman, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Ex-Machina, Annihilation, MEN, and more recently, Civil War. 

That’s not to say that grappling with such a large orchestral ensemble in a huge space doesn’t come without its challenges:

“It can be tricky,” he nods, speaking to Headliner from his mix studio in Canning Town, which you can find him in almost every day – “mixing my little head off and keeping myself amused,” he says. “Ben and Fede had a lot of stuff going on all the time in Alien: Romulus because not only will there be an 80-piece orchestra, there'll be loads of synths going on, various pads, huge drum sections, percussion, more track lay and we did some choir as well. So squeezing it all in can be quite tricky. That's where you earn your money!”

Set between the events of Alien and Aliens, the most recent addition to the franchise concerns a group of young space colonists who, while scavenging a derelict space station, come face to face with the most terrifying life form in space. 

The trailer hints at a rewarding payoff for Alien fans: claustrophobic, dark scenes aboard a ship visually reminiscent of the original film’s Nostromo, a dangerous mission that is certain not to end well, face-huggers, chest-bursting, things that mostly come out at night and yes, screams in space.

The franchise's legacy is something that Álvarez and Wallfisch made sure to respect, nods Coulson: “I hadn't seen any of it until we got to Abbey Road where we recorded in Studio One, but once you started to see the look, the graphics and the production design, it was really reminiscent of Alien and Aliens. It has quite subdued lighting – it's not bright and brash. 

"I was looking at some of the shots and I thought, ‘Oh, that looks kind of familiar,’ because everyone loves the original, right? It wasn't until I was talking to the director that he said, ‘We went out of our way to pay homage to the production design of the first movie’. It puts you back in that place, which is great, and when you see it, your brain goes, ‘Oh, this looks right’. 

"It looks authentic and it’s nicely paced. It wasn't just: on your marks, get set, bloodletting! There is real suspense and an unknown young cast, which was what the original was as well, I believe. [Alien director] Ridley Scott didn't want huge stars to be bigger than the characters in the movie.”

Coulson notes the musical callbacks to Jerry Goldsmith’s iconic avant-garde score from Alien, describing the deliberate use of certain musical themes by Wallfisch: “That way of harking back to that first movie is carried on in the music as well,” he explains. 

“In the original score, Jerry Goldsmith used these woodwinds and flutes that Ben and Fede were quite eager to get in as another hark back to Alien. When you hear them, you know something bad's gonna happen. There was a flute with an oboe doubling it an octave down, and Ben was quite eager for those to be sent around the surrounds,” he adds. “He had a whole spreadsheet on the delays and where they will be panned, which is great because the flute would come from the front and then move around the room. It’s very effective.”

Recording the score for Alien: Romulus was a massive undertaking, utilising the full capabilities of Abbey Road’s Studio One. “We had a huge orchestra in there,” Coulson explains, “following the classic orchestral seating arrangement. First violins on the far left, second violins, violas, and then cellos on the far right with basses behind them. Then brass is arranged with horns on the left, and trombones, tubers and trumpets on the right, with woodwind in the middle.”

Coulson discusses the challenges of recording in such a large space: “Usually with most film scores, and especially action ones like this, there's a lot of running, chasing people getting dismembered, etc. So, that equals loud brass on most occasions, apart from the spooky discovery moments where there's the woodwind figure. 

"We screened off the woodwind to try and protect them from the avalanche of cacophony coming from the brass. I mean, they're delightful in the way they’re playing,” he insists, “and there’s lots of proud, robust moments from the brass section, but most of the time, you record the various sections separately. 

"On any given cue, you'll probably do the strings first, then the woodwinds and then the brass afterwards. But as there isn't always the time to do that on every single cue, sometimes we would do everyone together but with the woodwinds being screened off and protected a bit, so you'd still have control over them later and they didn't get completely obliterated by the louder instruments.”

To capture the intricacies of the orchestral score, a sophisticated Decca Tree mic array was used, comprising a stereo mic formation made up of three omnidirectional microphones laid out in a triangular formation to capture strings immaculately.

“The Decca Tree is over the conductor in a left-centre-right configuration,” Coulson explains. “Then in between the conductor and the back desk of strings, you'd put a mic halfway along, and the same on the other side, and halfway between the conductor and the last bass player you'd have another omni mic over the section. Ben was quite eager to have specific Atmos mics, so we spent quite a long time on that because Ben likes to create that sense of space. 

"So we would have mics that would specifically go to the side surround speakers, and the more mics you have, the more sense of space you can create. You're kind of replicating sitting in the middle of the orchestra by having specific mics go to specific speakers later on when you're mixing, which works well. Abbey Road is a brilliant old space,” he smiles.

Working on Alien: Romulus presented unique challenges, especially in mixing the contrasting elements of horror and suspense. The film's narrative demanded music that complements the onscreen tension without overshadowing it. Coulson describes his approach:

“In the more explorative moments where they are plodding through the deserted, dusty spaceship, we were trying to get the feeling of suspense where it’s not on the nose where you're saying ‘something bad is gonna happen’, but in those moments where they are discovering stuff, we create atmosphere and push it away from the speakers to make it more ethereal for the listener and make it immersive. So you are in the moment, but it's not distracting you from what's actually happening on the screen. You're being enveloped in suspenseful music, but it's not distracting you from the narrative.”

The centrepiece of Abbey Road’s Studio One control room is a 72-channel Neve 88RS console with a unique and comprehensive surround monitor section, with Neve’s SP2 scoring panel for recording and monitoring multiple stems. 

The 88RS/SP2 combination is acknowledged as the ideal film scoring solution – as well as Abbey Road, it’s found in all four of Hollywood’s top scoring stages (Fox, Skywalker, Sony and Warner) plus London’s AIR Lyndhurst – and is the setup behind the orchestral sounds in the vast majority of box office hits. The studio also boasts 48 channels of remote Neve microphone pre amplifiers and ProTools HDX – all which were essential for recording such a large ensemble.

“You'll mix all the spot mics so you monitor them on one fader – even though you've got probably 80 mics,” he explains about his use of the rare Neve console on Alien: Romulus. “You’d have one mic per desk of strings. I think we had 14 first violins, so that was seven first violin mics – one per pair of players. 

"We'll have one fader with all the first violins on. With the woodwind, we had a mic per player because of those little flourishy moments and you want to be able to manipulate and get closer in on the sound a lot of the time to really get that articulation close up.

“In a lot of film scoring, you're pushing stuff away so it doesn't get in the way of the dialogue, but it is nice to be able to bring stuff close to you when you need it, so I like to have a mic on every woodwind player,” he elaborates. 

“With the brass, I usually have a mic per brass player because it's great to be able to beef up the low end on the spot mics. I ended up winding loads of low end into the spot mics so when you marry those up with the room sound, you get the brass to sound massive, which is great for managing loads of mics. Monitoring-wise, if you cut down the number of faders it's easier for my little brain to keep up with,” he laughs.

On what makes the 88RS/SP2 combination so well suited for film score recording, Coulson explains: “It's the ability to monitor in surround, to have control over what is going to the surround and how it's going to the surround. There's four surround speakers in the control room, so you can place stuff behind you and out to the sides as well, so you get a good representation of what it's going to sound like when you're mixing as you're scoring it. 

"That's always great for the executives in the room so they get a good idea of how it's going to sound when it's been polished up. It makes them happy. And if you make them happy, everything's good!”

The combination of the 88RS and SP2 panels provided Coulson with the flexibility needed for such a complex project. “With Neve consoles, they're the last one standing,” he asserts. “Neve has stayed at the pinnacle. I know that the 88RS in Studio One is going to be updated soon, as is the one at AIR Lyndhurst – because they are of an age, those desks. 

"But luckily, Neve is still around and keeps going forward, designing newer and better ways to record film scores and for recording in general. They keep moving the bar higher to make sure that the music recording business has the tools to do what it needs to do.”

Coulson is an in-house engineer at AIR studios, which is home to a 96 channel Neve 88R with 48 channels of Neve AIR Montserrat remote mic preamps in Lyndhurst Hall and a vintage 72 Channel AIR Custom Neve a7971 in Studio 1. 

“It’s great for scoring because it’s very flexible, which is really useful if you've got people in booths, the orchestra out there, people up in the galleries, and you might have a singer in a booth or someone smashing the three shades of shit out of a drum kit,” he says of the 88R. “The flexibility of each channel being able to route various EQ and processing is really useful.”

Coulson is one of the few engineers to have experienced all three incarnations of AIR Studios, from Oxford Street studio, to AIR Montserrat and ultimately moving with them to AIR Studios Lyndhurst. Reflecting on his journey alongside AIR, Coulson shares:

“It's been a hell of a lot of fun. I had a great time. I worked hard, but I've had a stroke of luck along the way. I got the job originally because I worked with a guy who was an old friend of the manager at Oxford Street, so that was quite lucky. But once you're in, there's a lot of work to be done. 

"The studio at Montserrat needed someone to man it to be this assistant engineer, and I was asked as I'd been at the Oxford Circus location for about a year. I was flown out to do that for about a year in total. I did two stints. The second stint was doing an album with the Rolling Stones, which was hilarious on many levels,” he grins, knowingly.

Alien: Romulus will be released in UK cinemas August 16.

Alien: Romulus image credits: ©Disney

Listen to the entire interview with Coulson below, including anecdotes on working with the Rolling Stones at Montserrat island.