John Williams —The Greatest Film Composer Of All-Time — Doesn’t Like Film Music

At the risk of sounding like a hipster douche, I like to collect vinyl. I swear, I'm not annoying about it, but it's fun to dig through crates of records. 

One style of music I didn't think I'd be as into collecting as I am is film soundtracks. I've got some cool ones, like 2001: A Space Odyssey (which is great, but not really "wind-down and chill music;" if you're familiar with it, you know what I mean), and the 1967 James Garner movie Grand Prix.

But when you're talking about film music, there's no one bigger than John Williams, and, ironically, the man behind some of the most iconic scores in movie history isn't even a fan of film music.

…what?

That would be like if the late, great Ozzy Osbourne were like, "I'm just not that into metal."

"I never liked film music very much," Williams told The Guardian in an interview. "Film music, however good it can be — and it usually isn’t, other than maybe an eight-minute stretch here and there… I just think the music isn’t there. That, what we think of as this precious great film music is… we’re remembering it in some kind of nostalgic way…"

Legendary film composer John Williams isn't big on film music.  (Photo by Michael Kovac/Getty Images)

I get what he's saying… but I refuse to believe I only think the score to Jaws is good because I have a fondness for the movie.

I mean, it's pretty perfect. So are the scores for Star Wars, Jurassic Park, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Close Encounters of the Third Kind (the superior Spielberg alien movie in my opinion), Superman, and the Harry Potter films.

But I get what he's saying. Film scores are designed to accentuate the movie that they've been written for, and that doesn't necessarily mean they would stand up on their own in a vacuum.

There's plenty that wouldn't, but throw on anything by Ennio Morricone or Jerry Goldsmith (he did the score for The Planet of the Apes and a bunch of Twilight Zone episodes) and you'll enjoy it.

Still, it's wild to hear the GOAT when it comes to this line of work be like, "Meh, it was never really my thing."