Bear McCreary may be the only guy in Hollywood who can put Battlestar Galactica, Outlander, God of War, Tolkien, Godzilla and a double-kick drum assault into the same concert and somehow make the whole damn thing make sense. Thursday night at the Belasco, he did exactly that.

For more than twenty years, McCreary has been sneaking some seriously strange music into our living rooms, movie theaters and game consoles. His breakthrough on Battlestar Galactica replaced the expected space-opera orchestra with tribal drums, bagpipes, voices and instruments that sounded like they had been excavated rather than purchased. It was bold, weird and instantly identifiable.

That became the blueprint. McCreary studied at USC and learned at the feet of legendary composer Elmer Bernstein, but somewhere along the way he developed a musical vocabulary entirely his own. The Walking Dead gave us those anxiety-inducing strings. Black Sails weaponized the hurdy-gurdy. Outlander went Celtic. God of War sounded appropriately enormous. Godzilla: King of the Monsters required music suitable for skyscraper-sized monsters beating the hell out of each other. Then The Rings of Power sent him into Tolkien's Middle-earth. Apparently, subtle career choices aren't really Bear's thing.

I last caught McCreary at the Fonda in 2024, when he unleashed The Singularity, an ambitious progressive-rock concept album filled with a ridiculous collection of musical firepower. That night felt like a composer escaping Hollywood for a few hours and finally getting to be the rock star. The Belasco was different. This time, Bear brought the whole damn career with him. "Apocalypse" took us back to Battlestar. The Black Sails theme came stomping out of the Caribbean. Then came God of War, The Rings of Power, more Battlestar, Outlander and eventually the wonderfully absurd collision of The Walking Dead and Godzilla. He even had time to fit in some new tracks from his second rock album, The Singularity: Ekleipsis.

Holding this musical Frankenstein together was one hell of a band. Metal legend Gene Hoglan hammered away behind the kit while Bear's brother Brendan McCreary supplied vocals and some of the rock-and-roll DNA that has always lurked beneath Bear's orchestral work. Johanna Kurkela was particularly impressive, moving between violin and vocals, including premiering some new music from God of War Laufey, and Raya Yarbrough made a surprise appearance to sing the theme to Outlander.

The entire evening was an immersive trip into the amazing world created by Bear McCreary. He has spent decades building worlds, and Thursday night, he plugged them into amps, and it was brilliant.