How Sound Shaped a World: The Loss of Labrinth in Euphoria
Courtesy of Deadline
The TV series Euphoria began its third season last week. But the show's lead composer, Labrinth, recently publicly severed ties with the creator and HBO entirely because of alleged behind-the-scenes tension among the crew.
Euphoria premiered in 2019 with ‘emotional realism’ style cinematography, accompanied by Labrinth's synth-heavy compositions. His song All for Us won the Emmy for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics, and fans enjoyed the soundtrack's dreamy feel throughout the episodes.
Labrinth continued to score the show's second season, but he was replaced by Hans Zimmer during the third season's production. He took to Instagram in March, posting the message “I’m done with this industry. F— Columbia. Double f— Euphoria. I’m out. Thank you and good night x.” and did not publicly discuss his departure until last week, the day before the season's premiere.
In his latest Instagram story, Labrinth said he removed all his music from the new episodes, and that “people will comfortably lie in [the] industry and still call themselves honest people”. He did not specify who the message was about, although fans speculate that it was directed at the show's creator, Sam Levinson.
Sam Levinson responded to Labrinth's initial statement in March, claiming that he did not know why the musician left the show and referred to him as “the foundation of the sound of Euphoria”. He told Rolling Stone that he “wanted to lean into an old-fashioned Hollywood Western score” for the new season, which is why he brought on two-time Oscar winner Hans Zimmer as the new lead composer.
Hans Zimmer, who most famously received an Oscar for Best Score in The Lion King, was an unexpected addition to the show, considering the usual electronic soundtrack. Though the change in music is not the only major difference that sets Euphoria's third season apart.
Since the premiere of the final season, many longtime viewers have criticized the changes in style and cinematography in the first episode. It currently holds a 6.7/10 rating on IMDb, and many fans felt that it did not retain the unique style it was known for.
Dylan Paddy, an audio production major at Hampton University who has been keeping up with the show since its premiere, admitted that he “did not enjoy it any more than one of the worst episodes of the first two seasons. I feel like it's mainly missing the atmosphere of the first two seasons that drew everyone into the show, and the music was a big part of that.”
Sam Levinson did explain he wanted to do something different for Rolling Stone before the season's premiere, although most were not expecting the story to diverge from its original plot and style as much as it has, just from the first episode. Despite this, Labrinth was still very involved in the production of the last season as of 2025, and it remains unclear when he began to have tension with the other showrunners.