If you grew up in the ’90s, it might be difficult to imagine the 1995 film Empire Records without a soundtrack of Gin Blossoms, Toad the Wet Sprocket, and Edwyn Collins. Older millennials, fear not: The musical adaptation that opened recently at McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, New Jersey, contains perhaps the best new score in an age, a delightful blend of alt-rock pastiche and classic Broadway pizzazz. Shepherded to the stage by composer Zoe Sarnak and librettist Carol Heikkinen, this new treatment also retains every ounce of the source material’s offbeat charm.
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