The score to Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho – that terrifying, string-based effort by Bernard Hermann – has entertained audiences the world over since the film’s release over 50 years ago. But it is one of the great crimes of catalogue music history that the original score as heard in the film has never been released on any format, be it LP, cassette or CD. That may change, if a U.K. report is to be believed. From Brighton’s The Argus: Psycho has one of the most iconic film scores in movie history and its…
Friday Feature: “The Graduate”
“Just one word…plastics.” With that one word, spoken to the disaffected Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) by an associate of his father’s, the audience viewing 1967’s film The Graduate, could both laugh and sneer along with Benjamin. After all, “plastics” stood for all that was superficial and fake in society. Mike Nichols, directing only his second feature film after a successful Broadway career, was anything but subtle as he masterfully threaded the film’s themes throughout every aspect of the production. To represent Benjamin’s most inner thoughts on the film soundtrack, Nichols called on…
La-La Land’s Going “Mad” Next Week
Not too long ago, La-La Land Records announced it had only one title due out March 15. Now they’ve revealed what score they’ve unearthed – but it’s something that’s been reissued before. It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) is one of the most madcap comedies ever released by Hollywood. Part road picture – groups of people working against each other to find a hidden stash of cash in California – and part Tinseltown epic (dozens of comedians and movie stars appear in the film, including Sid Caesar, Jonathan Winters, Mickey…
Intrada Premieres Scores for “Flying Machines,” “Wrongfully Accused”
Intrada’s first releases for March involve two premiere score releases from two very different eras – a roadshow flick from the ’60s and an action satire from the late ’90s. First up is Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines, a 1965 ensemble comedy from England starring luminaries including Benny Hill, Terry-Thomas and Red Skelton. Ron Goodwin’s light, poppy theme went on to have some success as a pop single, although the resultant album was an odd one, featuring music and dialogue in either mono or stereo offerings – although on either…
Friday Feature: “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”
More than 30 years ago, Dave Cameron walked through the halls of Clairemont High School in San Diego. He had a colorful collection of friends: a middle-class, business-oriented guy, his sexually naive sister, her sophisticated best friend, the jock and nerd duo that lusted after the girls and a colorful surfer dude. What none of them knew at the time was that Dave Cameron wasn’t really a high school student. He was 22, and had already graduated high school seven years prior, at the age of 15. In the time since, he…
Soundtracks Round-Up: New Releases from FSM and Perseverance
We’ve got some soundtrack news from all over the place to share with you today. Film Score Monthly has prepped its latest release, a double-premiere of dramatic scores by Lalo Schifrin (for the 1977 Charles Bronson thriller Telefon) and Leonard Rosenman (for the 1980 James Caan vehicle Hide in Plain Sight). Rosenman’s score is particularly notable on this disc, as almost none of it ended up in the final film. This set is limited to 2,000 copies. The label has also announced their next few planned titles; label head Lukas Kendall promises…
Back to the Grid: “TRON: Legacy” Remixes Coming in April
It’s not often here at The Second Disc that we get to report on a reissue project devoted to a release that’s only three months old. But that’s just the case of Daft Punk’s acclaimed score to Tron: Legacy. The novice film composers deftly paid homage to Wendy Carlos’ score to the original TRON, judiciously incorporating it into their work while carving out their own territory with a mix of ambient sounds, techno-style synthpop and traditional orchestral motifs. While the Academy Awards overlooked the duo’s hybrid electronic/orchestral score, it became the first…
La-La Land Boards “Money Train”
The newest scores to order from La-La Land are from films both old and new: Mark Mancina’s score to Money Train (1995) and Abel Korzenlowski’s soundtrack to Copernicus’ Star (2009). Money Train was an action-comedy flick starring Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson as New York City two transit cops. The film was not a success, but is known for being one of the earliest mainstream appearances of Jennifer Lopez and its killer action score by Mark Mancina, who at the time was making quite a mark on the genre (the score was…
Pino Donaggio’s Lost “Ordeal” Released at Last
Kritzerland’s restoration of Pino Donaggio’s complete score to Carrie was one of the most lauded film score releases of 2010. Today, the label announced a title that could be considered a follow-up: the premiere of Donaggio’s shelved score to the 1985 film Ordeal by Innocence. This Cannon Films adaptation of Agatha Christie’s 1958 novel was directed by Desmond Davis of 1981’s Clash of the Titans, and featured a starry ensemble including Christopher Plummer, Faye Dunaway and Ian McShane. The transition from page to screen wasn’t a simple one, however. After Donaggio turned…
“I Spy” a Set of Soundtrack Reissues from FSM
Film Score Monthly’s latest release is a nice reissue of a pair of LPs from the classic comedy I Spy. The show, riding high on a wave of ’60s spy mania thanks to the likes of James Bond, was a deft blend of action and comedy, featuring a groundbreaking pair of actors as secret agents: Robert Culp and Bill Cosby. It was the first major role for a black actor on television, and through all their jet-setting adventures, Cosby’s race was smartly never even acknowledged, let alone played for laughs. Earle Hagen,…
Michael Small’s “Audrey Rose” Arrives on CD
Despite his acclaimed scores to films such as Klute, The Parallax View, Marathon Man and The China Syndrome, Michael Small (1939-2003) remains one of the most underrated names in the film score pantheon. Too few a number of Small’s works have been made available on CD, yet his singular voice enhanced a number of great films (and even some bad ones – Ed.). This is especially true during his 1970s peak in which he collaborated with directors as celebrated as Alan J. Pakula, Bryan Forbes, Sidney Lumet, Arthur Penn and Robert Wise….
A “Cliffhanger” Coming from Intrada
Intrada knows how to make film score fans hang onto every release: their latest batch includes a long-unreleased, underrated suspense score and the long-awaited deluxe reissue of a classic early ’90s action score. Released in 1993, Cliffhanger, starring Sylvester Stallone as a mountaineer unwillingly forced into a heist led by John Lithgow was a critical and commercial success, and featured a great action score by Trevor Jones. The soundtrack called back to classic scores by luminaries like James Horner and Alan Silvestri, with a captivating theme that put it head and shoulders…
Friday Feature: “Catch Me If You Can”
It’s hard not to be skeptical over the fact that Catch Me If You Can, the amazing “true story of a real fake,” is coming to Broadway. Modern musicals based on existing properties either hew too close to their original musical source material (if they were already rooted in song, like Footloose) or not close enough; consider Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, for instance. (Or don’t!) The few songs this author’s heard from the Catch Me musical score, sent on a promotional disc, are jaunty and fun enough – score writers Marc…
La-La Land Goes Straight as an “Arrow” on New Soundtrack Batch
La-La Land’s got two soundtracks ready to order today, including their first-ever expansion of a score by Hans Zimmer. The German composer is one of a remaining few “household name” composers to even the least knowledgeable of film scores thanks to titles like the Oscar-winning The Lion King, Gladiator, Rain Man, Gladiator, the Pirates of the Caribbean series and Inception. But only last year was he treated to an expanded reissue – Perseverance’s new Rain Man CD – and it was criticized for less than stellar sound quality. The LLL team, including score…
The Gremlin May Be Out of the Bag
It was an innocent question. A Facebook friend of Screen Archives Entertainment, the online soundtrack merchant most notably associated with the Film Score Monthly label, asked if there would ever be a release of Jerry Goldsmith’s score to Gremlins. It’s not an unfair question, either: it’s one of Goldsmith’s most popular and fun scores, and with yesterday having been his birthday (he would have been 82), there’s no better time to ask. What nobody expected was SAE’s answer: “Sometime this year I believe.” Unsurprisingly, the shockwaves ran deep. Despite the popularity of…
Friday Feature: “Born Free”
Remembering his great friend John Barry upon the composer’s recent death, lyricist Don Black regaled the press with stories of the “blunt-spoken Yorkshireman” with his divine gift of music. Black relished the tales of Barry’s epic battle with Barbra Streisand which led to the mercurial composer’s departure from Streisand’s The Prince of Tides and his succinct rebuke to producer Harry Saltzman on the producer’s criticism of his theme song for Diamonds Are Forever: “What the f–k do you know about songwriting?” Yet one of John Barry’s most unhappy experiences was also one…
The Price of Box Sets: How Much is Too Much?
The revelation of The Rolling Stones’ CD singles box set is pretty cool, and living proof that the catalogue music business is still thriving. It’s a year that’s given or will give us a box set of Danny Elfman’s music for Tim Burton, all of Aretha Franklin’s Columbia-era material and an enormous run-through of The Grateful Dead’s European tour of 1972. But how much is all of this worth? The Stones set, when one converts from pounds to U.S. dollars, is nearly $300. How worth it is that for some nice packaging…
Reissue Theory: “Purple Rain”
Welcome to another installment of Reissue Theory, where we reflect on great albums and the reissues they could someday see. One of the biggest-selling albums of all time. A rock and roll classic. Soon to be inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Still un-reissued in any way, shape or form. This is Purple Rain. With the Grammy Awards on Sunday, there’s been some thought at Second Disc HQ regarding some of the Grammy Hall of Fame inductees. While there are more single recordings on the list than actual albums, one LP…
More Gerhardt LPs Coming from Masterworks in March
In October, to the delight of film score fans everywhere, Sony Masterworks reissued a portion of the Classic Film Scores series, vintage RCA LPs of great soundtracks as recorded by Charles Gerhardt and The National Philharmonic Orchestra. In March, the second installment of the reissue series is happening, covering some of the greatest composers in motion picture history, including Hermann, Waxman, Korngold and Steiner. Masterworks’ reissue campaign, announced today, covers compilations devoted to soundtracks by Max Steiner, Erich Wolfgand Korngold, Franz Waxman, Bernard Hermann, Miklós Rózsa and David Raskin (the last of which…
Frakkin’ Awesome! Intrada Releases Original “BSG” Score
It’s kind of amazing that the Sci-Fi Channel’s reboot of Battlestar Galactica which ran from 2003 to 2009 was a critical smash. This is especially true when one considers the campy nature of its original source material, the Glen A. Larson-produced ABC program which ran for one season in 1978-1979 and was considered by many to be a quick capitalization on Star Wars mania. Of course, the show was a bit more than that, with a rather captivating story and, for a modest television show, a well-received original score by Stu Phillips….
Elmer Bernstein Duo and “Gone with the Wind” Musical Coming from Kritzerland
Frankly, my dear, the Kritzerland label has given us even more reasons to give a damn. On Monday morning, the label announced its latest releases: the first-ever CD release of the Original London Cast Recording of Gone with the Wind, the 1972 musical written by composer/lyricist Harold Rome (Wish You Were Here, Fanny, Pins and Needles) and librettist Horton Foote (To Kill a Mockingbird, Tender Mercies, The Trip to Bountiful), along with a two-on-one CD presenting Elmer Bernstein’s scores to Fear Strikes Out and The Tin Star, both from 1957. Fear Strikes…
The Softer Side of Soundtracks Explored by FSM
Film Score Monthly’s newest release is ladylike – at least, the scores presented therein are from films that appeal to the ladies. Appearing for the first time anywhere are a pair of scores: Georges Delerue’s score to Rich and Famous, a 1981 film featuring Candice Bergen and Jacqueline Bisset as writers and lifelong friends and Michel Legrand’s music to One is a Lonely Number (1972), which chronicled the plight of a recently-divorced woman (Trish Van Devere, who received a Golden Globe nomination for her performance – ironically, the same year Van Devere…
The Second Disc Interview #4: Talking Soundtracks with MV Gerhard of La La Land Records
The wide berth of reissues, box sets and compilations across major and independent labels the world over, means some releases can fall through the cracks at times. At The Second Disc, it was always an early mission to make sure the labels handling catalogue soundtrack reissues did not suffer this fate. Intrada, Film Score Monthly, Kritzerland, Varese Sarabande – all are essentials for the catalogue music fan with a taste for soundtracks, and their work is hard to ignore. La La Land Records, however, may have been one of the brightest spots…
Getting “Clue” Plus Some More Exciting La La Land News!
As promised, La La Land Records put the score to Clue up for order yesterday. The soundtrack to the comedy board game adaptation, composed by John Morris, is full of bonus content and limited to 3,000 copies and is yours to order here. (The track list is of course after the jump.) But that’s not the only exciting La La Land news we have here at The Second Disc. Tomorrow afternoon, we’re running an exclusive interview with the head of the label, MV Gerhard! He’s going to talk about the great year the…
Short Takes: Legacy’s New Essentials, Concord’s New Jazz Reissues and a Catalogue Score from Perserverance
Legacy’s latest release schedule update promises three new titles in the Essential series: Paul Revere & The Raiders, Django Reinhardt and Eartha Kitt. All are going to be double disc sets, and specifically, the Raiders set (compiled by Bob Irwin of Sundazed Music) will feature some promo-only tracks and some mono single mixes. All are due on March 15. Concord has four new reissues of classic jazz titles also planned for March 15. They are Monk’s Music (1958) by Thelonious Monk, Cal Tjader/Stan Getz Sextet (1958), Ugetsu (1963) by Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers,…
