Best of June: New to the "Collection"

June flew by with a number of great limited editions announced from Intrada, La-La Land, BSX, and even Varese.  Funny that new score releases just feel underwhelming at a time when we should just be getting really excited.  Here then are 5 releases which stood out a bit from a fairly large crowd this month.

The first of these was a surprising romantic score by Angelo Badalementi, The Edge of Love.  The score features a nice mixture of the composer's atmospheric style coupled with noir-ish and jazzy ballad sounds.  A few original songs also standout amidst the other period songs on this disc from Universal.

A surprisingly fun score from BSX was Mike Vickers music for Hammers updated Dracula franchise, Dracula A.D. 1972.  The mix of 1970s funky sounds with some classic Hammer horror and rock sounds of the 1970s all make for a delightful listen that turns out to work very well on CD.

I finally managed to acquire Film Score Monthly's re-issue and expansion of Goldsmith's Twilight Zone-The Movie.  This is easily a "Best of the Month" recommendation at any time allowing us to hear more of the score, recast in its orignial sequences.  It also manages to repeat the original LP release (issued on a hard-to-find CD).  The sound is amazing and regardless of which part of the film you like the most, there is much to admire here.  The disc is maxed out in its playing time making it one of FSM's best releases.

Tribute Film Classics continues to astonish and amaze with its scholarship and restoration releases.  This is no less true with their latest release of Korngold's The Prince and the Pauper.  I've reviewed this earlier in the month so refer you back to that entry for more reasons why this is simply worth adding to your listening library.

Finally, another FSM release, None But the Brave, allows us to hear an early John Williams dramatic score.  This Sinatra helmed project makes for an interesting viewing these days and the score is scarcely spotted though no less effective.  Strong thematic writing hints at later martial writing by the composer and there is some additional Asian-tinged material that would have an influence in his Flute Concerto written later in the decade.  Beautiful sound and a complete release of the score material with some fun bonuses make this a must have for completists and fans of the film.

21.  None But the Brave (Williams)                                                                           FSM

Review: Sky Riders (Schifrin)

Sky Riders is a forgettable 1976 20^th Century Fox thriller starring Robert Culp and Susannah York as husband and wife.  York and the children are kidnapped and taken to a high aerie-esque crag where an ancient monastery sits seemingly impregnable.  That is until the ex-husband, played by James Coburn, arrives with a plan involving hang-gliding to the rescue.  It receives its debut here on the composer's Aleph label.

The most striking thing about Schifrin’s score for Sky Riders is its circus atmosphere and sound (scored for brass, percussion, and glockenspiel) which pervades the opening track.  “Flying Circus,” is a light, jazzy waltz reminiscent of the one for Rollercoaster.  “Climbers,” moves quickly into a typical tension-filled underscoring style for mid-1970s Schifrin, but with added Greek-flavored instrumentation mixed in amidst the eerie music.  This sense of ethnic instrumentation receives additional nods in the lighter “The Riders” with beautifully lyric string writing providing a fine contrast to the asymmetry of the Greek melody—all before we return to more tense held notes.  Schifrin does a fine job ratcheting up tension with astringent harmonies and angular thematic lines in “The Terrorists”—sounds reminiscent of his Mission Impossible scores but with more depth and a wild, accomplished abandon that often hints at continual piano ostinato lines but which come and go freely.  What helps the presentation of the score are the elongated tracks (compiled from several cues) themselves that provide an ample opportunity to experience long stretches of score.  This allows the listener to be drawn in to the music far more quickly and one gets to also hear how Schifrin must work to vary the thematic elements and orchestration to keep things moving.

While seemingly unimportant, Sky Riders holds a special transition for Schifrin from the funky styles of jazz underscores provided for a host of early 1970s films to a shifting more purely dramatic style.  Of the five other films he scored in 1976, this is the last of its kind until 1997’s Enter the Dragon.  Schifrin’s career would take a fascinating turn in his Oscar-nominated score for Voyage of the Damned (worth a re-issue itself) that would find him exploring more typical orchestral writing.  The final track is listed as the “original version” of the end credits—which begs the question why was the alternative one included, there was plenty of room.  That said, this is easily recommended for fans of good 1970s scoring and of the composer’s work when it appears towards the end of July.

Review: Twilight Zone (Goldsmith)

TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE (1983) was one of those projects that was always rumored about but which took a while to come to fruition.  When it finally made it, the classic television series creator, Rod Serling, had since died.  The project was spearheded by Steven Spielberg, recovering after a disastrous flop (1941), and John Landis.  George Miller and Joe Dante filled out the rest of the director talent.  The film was marred early on by a Hollywood-policy changing disaster when Vic Morrow and two young children were killed in a horrible on-set helicopter crash whose court case lived on far past the premiere of the film itself.  Four stories were told with a bookend sequence featuring Dan Ackroyd rounding off the film.  Three of the stories were essentially episode remakes.  The film has many highlights including a standout paranoid performance by John Lithgow (revisiting a classic episode that originally starred William Shatner), and a heartwarming story of recaptured youth featuring Scatman Crothers. 

There is of course the music by Jerry Goldsmith at the height of his career.  Goldsmith was one of the original composers who provided music for the television series, though not these particular episodes.  It gave him a chance to show off various sides of his musical personality.  Unlike the hard-to-find reissue of the original LP on CD, this new Film Score Monthly presentation allows us to hear the score as intended.  The disc is presented first in film order with the final alternates for the album edits being provided as a concluding portion of the disc (making an almost 2-for-1 release). 

Goldsmith often programmed the “Overture” from this score in concert and recorded it as well.  It turns out that this is just the tip of the iceberg.  The most noticeable addition to disc is the music composed for “Time Out” (the story featuring the extremely racist Vic Morrow character with tables turned).  The eight or nine minutes of the score are fairly minimal cast in a sort of PLANET OF THE APES atonal style with piano, percussion, and synth serving as the aural components of the score.  “Kick the Can” features the composer writing in a more romantic Americana style with beautiful intimate music and heartwrenching melodic ideas.  It is the music most prominent in the “Overture” and it turns out that it was just the tip of much wonderful music.  “It’s a Good Life” finds the composer exploring the bizarre antics of a little boy who can “do things.”  The parallel cartoon atmosphere of the story finds music by Stalling leaping of the small screen and into the main score along with plenty of scares.  The album material appears to have expanded more of the cartoonish music than what appears in the score proper.  The music here is an apt companion to the maestro’s last score, LOONEY TUNES: BACK IN ACTION.  The other highlight of the disc is the music from “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.”  Here, Goldsmith creates a wonderful ebb and flow to underscore the tension of a passenger who “sees something out there on the wing.”  The disjunct solo violin line, revisited by Goldsmith for GREMLINS (of which the theme is a very close cousin), helps to give the proper off-kilter sound needed.  It perfectly matches Lithgow’s performance without going over the top.

The sound of the score is unique in its recording of the synthesizers “live” with the regular orchestra which adds a different sonic dimension to the overall texture.  The clearer sound picture in FSM’s release allows us to appreciate the electronic layers here very well which shows Goldsmith’s perfection of integrating these sounds with orchestra so totally that they sound unbelievably full and natural in the texture.

Goldsmith’s song “Nights Are Forever”—heard on the jukebox during “Time Out”—is provided along with another song which appears to be making its CD debut, “Anesthesia” by Joseph Williams (John Williams’ son).  Jennifer Warnes performance features an arrangement by James Newton Howard.  The program notes and package are up to the regular standards and beyond for the label.  This is as close to a definitive package as one can hope for playing out to near 80 minutes.

Review: Caprica (McCreary)

La-La Land Records is releasing music for the upcoming TV Series, Caprica, featuring music by Bear McCreary.

Caprica  is set 50 years before the storyline of Battlestar Galactica where we first see two important families that will be of import to a future viewers know but the characters have yet to discover: the Graystones and the Adamas.  It is a Sci-Fi Channel pilot episode which appeared on DVD in April.  The show itself will not appear on Sci-Fi until next year.  Bear McCreary, having worked on all four years of the updated Battlestar Galactica, returns here to provide another great cinematic score. 

McCreary’s penchant for creating engaging themes is on full display as the disc opens with a delicate melody, voiced on flute, for “The Graystone Family” (which will recur throughout the score and in a sensitive and beautiful piano rendition for “Amanda Graystone” at the center of the disc).  A more plaintive idea appears in the following “Terrorism on the Lev” with electric violin cast against syncopated drum loops.  There is an implication for the sort of world instrumentation that McCreary used in Battlestar Galactica, but it flows more out of the traditional orchestral backdrop.  “Grieving” is another of a Glass-like minimalist sound with a wrenching theme that feels closer to Elfman when all is said and done, this melding of other sounds still has McCreary’s stamp on it through a wonderfully rich orchestral texture of winds and strings. 

The music works on many levels to underscore a more inner world of the characters, suggesting an inner emotional turmoil for scenes as it twists and turns from sadness to brief glimmers of hope (“Lacey and Zoe-A”).  This is in contrast to the slowly evolving electronic menace of the developing artificial intelligence threat, often scored with percussion programming, some ambient background and dissonant clusters that pile together thematic elements from which a thread of a motive or more complete theme might escape.  It is also interesting to hear how the thematic ideas move between instrumental colors, picked up almost effortlessly from one instrument to another in a natural ebb and flow which itself colors the emotional impact of the theme at that moment.  The Graystone theme has that quality of impending darkness that is reminiscent of the “Anakin’s Theme” in the Star Wars “prequels”.  With each appearance it seems to gain in tragic importance.

With its mix of semi-traditional scoring and minimalist touches, Caprica is a great listen with strong thematic content in fuller orchestral garb coupled with a balanced mix of active percussive cues.  There is enough variety of texture and development in both to make this another of McCreary’s fine scoring efforts in an increasingly long list of accomplishments.  Like any good score it makes you want to watch what it was meant to accompany.

Review: Year One (Shapiro)

Theodore Shapiro continues to be the go-to composer for comedy these days and such scoring is often quite underappreciated.  His scores for Blades of Glory and Tropic Thunder both took the material seriously even while parodying the traditional scoring of such films, always with a touch of real class.  Year One, the Jack Black/Michael Cera summer comedy, finds Harold Ramis at the helm of a film that at least looks humorous in previews.  It will hopefully have more of a brain than Meet the Spartans!  Lakeshore will release a hard copy of the score on CD and digital downloads will also be available.

The “Main Title” has an appropriately visceral ancient sound a la Stravinsky via Jurassic Park or Planet of the Apes.  It moves quickly into a percussion laden vocal chanting.  This punctuated sound will recur in the score cast along brief thematic ideas that often barely get to hint at much before receding.  “The Forbidden Fruit” has more chance to add a little more orchestral underscore between ethnic percussion and flutes that wavers between what might be mickey-mouse comedic underscore and light musical fare before getting quite serious.  Shapiro is not adverse to tossing in a little contemporary hip hop rhythm here and there (“Bazaar” is a good example with its Arabic sound and urban beats) but moves stealthily from the humorous anachronistic sound back to a faux period implication in the music.  That it even makes sense as you listen is of course part of the fun even if much of the score is laden with ethnic drumming sounds.  As is sometimes the case, the music here is cast in short tracks with just hints at thematic ideas.  The urban rhythms take up the central portion of the score presented here with klezmer clarinets, Arabic flutes, serious epic music, and ethnic guitar sounds all entering into an intriguing blend of styles that tries to create a bridge between the ancient world storyline and our own.  Some will find this interesting and it no doubt functions well in the film.  On its own, Shapiro has created enough variety to make the music somewhat engaging thematically, though one tends to want to hear the music flow into longer more coherent segments.  “The Holy of Holies” does allow for Shapiro to craft a more extensive and Prince of Egypt-like thematic sound with electric guitar cast against orchestra.  The final tracks are given more room to breathe and thus help make the final moments of the score as it is presented quite satisfying as thematic ideas finally play out longer.

Throughout the score the tendency is to feel the electronic and urban percussion sounds as anachronistic, but in reality all the music is essentially not “period” specific apart from the ethnic melodic contours, themselves not necessarily period pieces.  Shapiro’s score easily maneuvers from these urban styles to orchestral and ethnic outbursts that sometimes would feel more in place for a Bond film, therein perhaps lies some of the humor as well as music we would expect to hear in a modern story appears cast against a scene from Year One.