AMG Review of Back to Titanic

Stephen Thomas Erlewine
All Music Guide

#Titanic was a phenomenon in more ways than one. It was certainly unheard of for a film to break the billion-dollar barrier, but it was also unheard of for a largely instrumental soundtrack album to stay on top of the music charts for weeks on end. And it was James Horner's instrumentals that did it, too -- if it was just Celine Dion's single keeping it there, her own album would have fallen down the charts. So, Horner's Titanic was a blockbuster on par with the film, but there was one thing that distinguished it from James Cameron's movie -- there could be a sequel to the soundtrack. Both Sony Classical and Horner realized this simple fact, so they released Back to Titanic to coincide with the video release of #Titanic in late summer 1998. Since much of his original score was on the original soundtrack, he had only a little bit of unreleased music for Back to Titanic. No problem -- fill out the rest of the album with Celtic music that served as inspiration for Horner and Cameron (Enya, however, is curiously absent), and add a new version of "My Heart Will Go On" that has film dialogue layered over the original recording, à la the popular radio-play version of Springsteen's #Jerry Maguire love theme, "Secret Garden." The end result may be a little padded, but it's no less enjoyable.