- “Their all-encompassing mechanical melancholia is matched by ethereal ambience and frosty synth lines that occasional open up to child-like 8-note xylophone runs that themselves build into volcanic cacophonies. Their aggressively syncopated work burrows into you, gently inviting and yet totally, tonally haunting,”
Silver Screen Riot - “The film’s aural element, combining sound design by “Gravity” Oscar winner Glenn Freemantle with a score by Geoff Barrow of Portishead and Ben Salisbury, is calculated to keep us off balance and unsettled from beginning to end.”
LA Times - “The score from Portishead’s Geoff Barrow and Dolman’s Ben Salisbury is a haunting electronic mood rollercoaster, constantly in a state of heightening the emotions we’re getting from the story.”
Film School Rejects - “Ben Salisbury and ex-Portishead shoe-gazer Geoff Barrow, gleams with soothing mechanical melodies and rhythms. “Ex Machina” is as seductive as the people in it.”
Boston Globe - “Kudos to Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury for constructing such an eerily appropriate musical accompaniment for an outside-the-box sci-fi thriller like this.”
We Got This Covered - “They have an incredibly high quality control level. I think they”re kind of amazing. What they do is they keep you honest, they are pretty fierce.”
Alex Garland (interviewed in Gigwise) - “Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury’s score throbs with menace”
The Irish Times - “The cinematography and the score are wonderful, adding to the atmosphere.”
The Upcoming - “The sleek and visually appealing imagery meshes wonderfully with its synth-driven soundtrack,”
Entertainment.ie - “Composers Ben Salisbury and Portishead frontman Geoff Barrow contribute a bristling electronic score that swarms and simmers with the characters” own emotional surges.”
Variety - “The technical aspects are all top-notch, from production designer Mark Digby’s flawless work through to an evocative score from Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury,”
Screen Daily - “Stunning visuals and thumping score, results in a fantastic intellectual science fiction film for the Google generation.”
The Hollywood News - “A great synth score”
London City Nights - “This film has a fantastic soundtrack”
4music - “The cool synth soundtrack by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury…is the perfect backdrop to a story of this kind”
We Got This Covered - “A throbbing, ominous score by newcomer Ben Salisbury and Portishead”s Geoff Barrow.”
The Playlist - “Garland pads the film out with a nerve shredding score, one which creates an impending sense of doom as the movie goes on.”
The Cult Den - “This sense of uncertainty, of boundaries being elided, is enhanced by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury’s shimmering, glissading score, slithering liquidly around quarter-tones to heighten the tension while never falling into electronic cliché.”
Sight and Sound - “The soundtrack is phenomenal. I am a sucker for goos music in films and games, and I fell in love with the music. Composed by Ben Salisbury and Geoff Barrow – who have worked together on more than one occassion – it is one of the film”s most enjoyable aspects personally.”
Fortitude Magazine - “A spine tingling score”
The Argus - “and the score, by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury, will have you in knots of anxiety”
Badass Digest - “Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury scored the film and it perfectly matches the scenes, bringing the tension into almost every scene.”
The CW69 - “The score by Ben Salisbury and Portishead”s Geoff Barrow is also a thing of ominous, pulsating beauty”
Den Of Geek - “Geoff Barrow (Portishead) and Ben Salisbury provide a score that doesn”t fall prey to an over-reliance on swelling strings or horn sections. While there are moments in which the music increases in volume during pivotal scenes that call for it, Barrow and Salisbury best deliver in their minimalist approach when creating beats of a steady pulse under a soulless red light, and in a climax that is based around their music box-esque composition. It would be lazy to compare them to the team of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, but I”ll go ahead and do that anyway. Both pairs should have continued success in creating solid scores in cinema.”
Consequence of Sound - “The spare, chilly, synth-y score, by nature-doc composer Ben Salisbury and Portishead”s Geoff Barrow, follows suit, with suggestively throbbing themes designed to unnerve viewers and imply a lurking threat.”
The Dissolve - “Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury’s score superbly pummels us psychologically as it booms eerily in the background as subjects of sexuality and identity are placed hand in hand with technology and explored with creeping delicacy.”
Culturefly - “An undercurrent of sinister suspicion perfectly complimented by the subtly unsettling score.”
The Focus Pull - “’Ex Machina’ arrives stateside, and besides being ‘the first great film of 2015,’ it’s got a great score by Portishead member Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury.”
The Playlist - “One of the film”s strongest elements is its score by Portishead’s Geoff Barrow and composer Ben Salisbury, which is a mix of electronic and more traditional compositions that help heighten the tension.”
The Film Stage - “Powered by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury’s mood-enducing score, pulses in the background, accompanying the softly cinematic work of Rob Hardy behind the camera.”
Rope Of Silicon