The Road is Cormac McCarthy's novel about a bleak aftermath of a world-wide catastrophic event that plunges survivors into a fear-filled existence devoid of any potential recovery.  The devastation is so complete that not only are there few survivors, the survivors that remain are either banded hunters looking for the only edible thing that remains - humans - or the distrustful evading seekers, who search for that community that "carry the fire."

The film adaptation of this story of utter destruction is so perfectly formed that it draws you into its dystopian world, leaving you with a strong philosophical sense of being truly alone. It's accompanying soundtrack, scored by Rock personas, Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, musically completely captures the devastated new world so well that it becomes impossible to separate the melancholic score from the grey visual images.

As a standalone work, Cave/Ellis' 17-piece score evokes the same feelings of despair, dread, and complete removal from the human race as does the film and the original novel.  The music, while melancholic in nature, holds you captive to its sustained minimalistic collection of eerily composed notes.

Few composers can musically explore and communicate the scraped pit of emptied souls as well as Nick Cave and Warren Ellis can.  Composers that can actually touch the core of humanity are fewer than those that "carry the fire" who walk The Road. 

Cave and Ellis excel in this overwhelmingly evocative and immeasureably memorable work.