About the fanaticism over Thelma & Louise, Zimmer explains, "People are under the impression there is [more good music from the score]. But I go around that one 'Thunderbird' theme a couple of times, plus some little rock-n-rollish type things. I hate overstaying my welcome on these CDs, so there's just not enough. If I allowed a score-only Thelma & Louise CD, it probably would have been only 10 minutes long." On this matter, he has a perfectly valid point, because while the iconic "Thunderbird" theme, as well as the gospel-influenced finale piece, is worthy of a place in any collection of Zimmer's stylish early works, the rest of this score is a largely forgettable series of bluesy minimalism, sparse action motifs, irritating hoedown comedy, and unsatisfactory fragments of that primary theme. The underlying constructs of Thelma & Louise are quite simple. A lonely electric guitar theme with the personality of a battered rock ballad serves as the identity of "Thunderbird" and, by its adaptation throughout the film, most of the score. Zimmer was in the process of becoming quite fond of super-stylish guitar solos at the forefront of his pop-oriented film scores during the early 1990's. His collaboration with Pete Haycock for Thelma & Louise was an early representation of a partnership that continued in K2, True Romance, Calendar Girl, and Drop Zone, among others. The power behind the solo performances is neither as forceful nor memorable here as in Days of Thunder, replaced by a slightly dejected and alienating tone as required by this story. Zimmer augments Haycock's contribution with familiar keyboarding, loops, and drum pads. He makes no attempt to use his electronic samples of an orchestra to specifically emulate an organic tone for the story, instead leaving a synthetic edge in nearly every cue to reinforce the disembodied rock style. In the reunion scene ("Homecoming/Railway Station"), the score approaches the new age genre if not for the stylish guitar.

Two secondary identities are established by Zimmer in Thelma & Louise to compliment the main "Thunderbird" theme. The first is plucky Western minimalism with a harmonica and banjo, inhabiting a bluesy tone for Pitt's escaped convict. This material eventually develops into full-fledge hoedown territory, with "Bitches From Hell" (the tanker scene) previewing the more developed symphonic variant in Cool Runnings. The other secondary identity is the subtle gospel influence that very tragically but beautifully emerges in "The Decision" as the women decide to commit suicide. This music is similar to Zimmer's many other uses of soul and gospel in his scores at the time, but the duet between the guitar and voices for the "Thunderbird" theme in the first half of "The Decision" is a highlight of the score. The only other aspect of Thelma & Louise worth mentioning is the influence of Black Rain on a sort of "determination motif" that Zimmer uses to propel the protagonists to their fateful decision. Heard first in the subtly keyboarded staccato string chopping late in "Wide Awake," this idea matures in the composer's familiar action tones in "The Chase." Overall, Zimmer is correct in that there's only about ten minutes of lasting music in Thelma & Louise, but that didn't stop a First Born Records bootleg from slapping 40 minutes of it on a decent-sounding CD later in the decade. The commercial MCA album had only included the four-minute "Thunderbird" suite amongst the usual collection of songs. In 2011, the Kritzerland specialty label pressed a slightly rearranged version of the bootleg presentation on a 1,200-copy product that sold out immediately, despite the reality that the eight minutes over the final two tracks on the bootleg are the only ones definitely worth having. The same contents were re-pressed for another 1,000 copies in 2017 by the young specialty soundtrack label Notefornote Music. Given comparable sound quality on all the products, if you already own one of the prior editions of this decent but rather underwhelming score on the whole, then there's no need to seek the later editions.  ***   @Amazon.com: CD or Download