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James Horner is a film composer, composing for films such as Avatar, Braveheart, and Titanic. Galante says to The Band Post that he's inspired by the "epic grandeur and romanticism of their music" (The Band Post, 2022). A very clear comparison I can hear is between Horner's "A Gift of a Thistle" from the Braveheart soundtrack, and Galante's "Cry of the Last Unicorn", specifically the last movement. Both movements I'm referring to are very emotional pieces of work. They both use techniques such as anticipation in the melody, anticipation of harmonies in accompaniment, swells in dynamics in accompaniment, and use of flutes to make a mystic feel.
Galante https://youtu.be/ba8tn1667V0?si=wruzz4qZOGWamw_A
Horner https://youtu.be/ELajXGKwQ34?si=yccLeaiB9fP0PHAx

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Third Eye Blind was an American rock band formed in 1993. In an interview with Harmonix Blog, Fuentes mentions that Third Eye Blind was his all-time favourite punk rock band in high school (NME, 2015). He says that he was introduced to punk rock by his brother 'blaring' it from his room. He and his brother became obsessed with 'fast beats' and 'aggressive songs'. Listening to them, I can hear many similar characteristics, such as chord progressions and guitar effects. for example, the intro of ''Queen of Daydreams'' has a similar vibe to many of PTV's songs, especially the delay guitar effect on the riff. It feels as though TEB is a more positive, more uplifting sound of PTV, almost as if Fuentes took TEB's musicality, and added his more depressing spin and lyrics to it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXVosNDjTxI

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Queen was a British rock band formed in 1970. Fuentes mentioned in an interview with Harmonix Blog (NME, 2015) that he learned the beauty of vocal layering at a young age through Queen. You can definitely hear this influence in his music, the way he layers and harmonizes his vocals. One example is during ''The New National Anthem'', where from the second half of the first verse, almost the entire song has vocal harmonies of some sort, whether it's backing the lyrical line, or just chords in the background. I think the most notable and memorable one, for me personally, is the opening of the bridge, on the line of "[don't forget] to bleed."
https://youtu.be/3qA9kA3JKV0?si=LswS62FrfxkkgheC

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The Cranberries were an Irish rock band formed in 1989. In an interview with Mixdown Magazine (Venutti, 2023), Fuentes mentions that for their latest album 'Jaws of Life', they took inspiration from artists such as The Cranberries. You can hear this in the album, with a much calmer sound than their previous music, but still holding the punk characteristics. The Cranberries' music is similar to this, not hardcore, but still having some harsher tones than standard rock music. I can compare this between The Cranberries' "Zombie" and PTV's album song "Jaws of Life". The biggest similarity I can hear is the instrumental being "harder" so to speak, using more bass, heavier drums, and gnarly guitar effects. while the verse/lyrical sections are more delicate, almost acoustic. No drums to minimal/basic rock beat, basic guitar riff.
https://youtu.be/Tez1zWBqLg4?si=wOc_Taj7xFLuVYgK

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Jerry Goldsmith is a film composer, composing music for films such as Star Trek, Mulan, and Rambo. Galante says to The Band Post that he's inspired by the "epic grandeur and romanticism of their music" (The Band Post, 2022). One comparison I can gather is between Goldsmith's "Suite from Mulan" and Galante's "Aurora Borealis". Particularly the beginning of Galante's piece has a similar grandiose to Goldsmith's piece, about 2:30 minutes in. They both have a good build-up, with the use of dynamics or harmonies. They both also have an uplifting feel. Similar to Williams', they have similar timbres, although they're written for and played by different orchestras.
Goldsmith: https://youtu.be/-pwaxuYZWZk?si=XAki93pfWXimkBr8
Galante: https://youtu.be/dTK6ns5Vy0M?si=Zwc32RhaEBqGqn5e

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Steve Reich is an American composer known for his contribution to minimalist composition. Reich particularly uses techniques such as repetitive figures, slow harmonic rhythms, and canons. These can be shown in lots of Hisaishi's work, but especially his more electronic works such as MKWAJU. As an example, the first track (0:00-6:27) is entirely repetitive figures, adding new repetitive figures to build layers. The next track (6:42) I believe features canons, although hard to tell as the melody and rhythms are exactly the same, however, the harmonies at the end of the phrases lead me to believe that they are canons.
https://youtu.be/SLqLhXqXxqs?si=dFkhPw0bZ1tMCNjn

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Terry Riley is an American composer and performer, best known for pioneering minimalist composition. His music became known for his use of tape recording techniques, delay systems, and repetition. Hisaishi says that he was 'shocked' by his "A Rainbow In Curved Air", which led him to listen to more minimalist composers. (kotakuinternational, 2020). Hisaishi uses techniques such as repetition and creates delay effects, even in live music, as shown in many of his works, and particularly in the second and third movements (6:41-15:41) of MKWAJU, making these effects with rhythms on marimbas, and notably, from  19:43-20:13, how it sounds like a delay track. Listening to this album, I'm thoroughly impressed by how much he can do with not much more than a marimba and a bass drum, plus track recording techniques, which really shows how much he took from these minimalist musicians. Even listening to his orchestral/film tracks, I never noticed how he uses the bare minimum, e.i. a melody, chords/moving parts, and basic percussion, and can still create such beautiful, meaningful music. I particularly noticed this in Hisaishi's "Howl's Moving Castle" Soundtrack.
https://youtu.be/SLqLhXqXxqs?si=dFkhPw0bZ1tMCNjn

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YMO was a band from the late 70's, well known for inspiring the Japanese techno-pop sound at the time. YMO inspired Hisaishi's electronic music, which can be heard throughout his first album ''MKWAJU'', as well as creating mystical and eerie sounds in his film soundtracks, such as 'The Levitation Crystal' from Laputa: Castle in the Sky.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlokakB1oCY

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John Williams is a film composer, writing music for many famous films, including Star Wars, Jaws, Indiana Jones, and many more. While listening to Galante's "Jaguar'', I noticed that many of the rhythms and phrasing were similar to that of Williams' work. Particularly the beginning of Galante's "Jaguar" has the same dark, brooding feel as Williams' "Imperial March". I also find this interesting as they feel as though they have the same timbre, even though they're both written for and performed by vastly different orchestral types. Galante writes primarily for concert bands, which are made of solely wind instruments and percussion, while Williams' writes for orchestras, which are mostly strings, with minimal wind instruments and percussion. As a film composer and orchestrator, I think it's only natural to take inspiration from someone such as Williams.
https://youtu.be/x-SABPTSifw?si=bKeBchSmBDkZZy6M

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Rossano Galante is a film and musical composer and/or orchestrator for 50+ studio films, including The Mummy, Fantastic 4, Avengers: Age of Ultron, and many others (The Band Post, 2022). As a concert band musician, I have performed his pieces, and they are beautiful, and fun to play. The first song of his I played was 'Cry of the Last Unicorn', and it was such a beautiful, emotional piece of music. It told the story of a baby unicorn that watched its mother die at the hands of hunters, and before being able to grieve, it had to run for its life, before being killed as was fated. Even in rehearsal or performing, the ending of this song made me tear up every time. He said to Shelby Community Band that he doesn't as much want to be the original composer, I'm trying to get an emotional reaction (Shelby Community Band, 2023). Playing his and other orchestral music inspires me to want to make my own emotion-provoking music.

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Pierce the Veil is an American pop-punk rock band who have played together since 2006. I have listened to them since I was 14, and they genuinely drive me and my passion for music. The harmonies they create, the incredible rhythms, the chord progressions, everything they make comes together so well. I especially love Vic Fuentes' lyricism. He has such a beautiful way with words and paints such gorgeous, yet devastating pictures with his words, it's truly incredible. "Hold on 'Til May" was one of the first lyrical songs that I heard that was able to give such a visceral and real image in my head without ever seeing any music video or anything visual, which was the day I absolutely fell in love with their music. I always admire how on the outside they sound like a generic pop-punk band, but when you truly listen to their songs it's so much deeper than you could imagine.

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Joe Hisaishi is a Japanese composer and music director, known most for his work in many Ghibli Studios films. His compositions have a very nostalgic, magical, and emotional feel to them. I have been watching Ghibli movies since I was young, and I have always admired how his music and the timbre he uses always made the movie twice as magical. His music always sounds so full, yet when you truly listen to it, it has the bare minimum. I recently performed his Spirited Away soundtrack and it was so fun, which made me appreciate his writing so much more. Playing his music also showed how many layers there are to his writing, which is how his themes sound so basic but so full all at once.