For Before the Flood, a new documentary about global warming from Leonardo DiCaprio, Trent and Atticus have expanded their traditional boundaries. Before the Flood is the first time they’ve worked with “outsiders” on music, bringing in Mogwai and Gustavo Santaolalla (the composer behind Brokeback Mountain).

This lends an additional touch to the compositions. Gustavo’s horn work and textural abilities are a good match for the aesthetic qualities of Reznor and Ross. Mogwai’s tracks feel as if they come from an entirely different perspective, but rather than clashing with the other compositions, they add a variety that otherwise wouldn’t exist.

What’s most interesting about Mogwai’s tracks is how optimistic they sound, by comparison. Reznor and Ross are known for making uneasy music — or music that starts laid back and quickly decomposes — but Mogwai has a whole different feel. Check out “Ghost Nets”, a Mogwai track that’s bookended by the Reznor and Ross’s more “traditional” “And When the Sky Was Opened” and “Trembling”. “Ghost Nets” is an entirely different track, without the same elements of unease that riddle the others.

This is the variety that makes the record work as a whole. Unlike Trent and Atticus’s soundtrack for Gone Girl, which was both beautiful and exhausting, Before the Flood is easy to absorb as a whole. I firmly believe this is because of Mogwai’s contributions — the unsung heroes of the record.

You don’t need to watch Before the Flood to enjoy the music on stage here. In fact, I didn’t (and haven’t). I’m not even sure the documentary has premiered yet (I think it’s a television premiere to boot, and we don’t have cable). But even without seeing it, the level of sobriety on hand here — the hope for our planet’s future and the fear of its potential destruction — is plainly evident.

This is, in my opinion, the best work that Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross have done together since The Social Network. It’s already become a staple in my ambient music collection.

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Trent Reznor’s work here is obviously influenced by his more electronic Nine Inch Nails records, which I love. In fact, some songs — like In Motion — are remixes of work from Nine Inch Nail’s Ghosts (which is also a fantastic record).

Hand Covers Bruise is drenched in melancholy, but A Familiar Taste is dripping with angst. The Gentle Hum of Anxiety is a perfect title for one of the most anxiety-inducing bits of music from a film I’ve ever heard. But at the end of the day, the track you most need to hear from this is the cover of In the Hall of the Mountain King.

If there was ever an obvious pairing, it’s Trent Reznor and David Fincher. Both of them are fascinated by using digital techniques to improve what are traditionally analogue mediums. While both are praised by fans and critics, there’s also a left-wing conservative group of people in both mediums who say they’re going against what music and film is all about. But it doesn’t matter. With The Social Network in particular, they’ve made their piece de resistance: a piece of digital art in an analogue framework about a movement to make real relationships more digital and artificial. There’s something beautiful about that.

Film soundtracks are interesting because they rarely stand on their own. The Social Network not only stands on its own, but it’s one of my all-time favourite albums — and perhaps my favourite electronic album of all time.

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