Perfect! Who better to do the soundtrack to a film about people running around in circle, than, of course, Finland's masters of repetitive hypno-rock, Circle?? Six Day Run is a short film made by Finnish documentarian Mika Taanila, all about something called "The Self-Transcendence Six Day Race", which takes place every year in the vicinity of New York City. No, we'd never heard of it either, but we'd be curious to see the movie sometime and find out more about this extreme endurance running event and the presumably equally extreme people who decide to compete in it. Sleeping as little as possible, the runners have six days to try and log the most miles around a paved one-mile loop in a park (Flushing Meadows, Queens). Apparently it's a tradition dating back to the 1870s! So it's sorta like an ultra-marathon run on a treadmill, running and running and never really getting anywhere (except maybe somewhere deep within/without yourself). You can check out the YouTube trailer for the film here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqTrJVMZnZE.
Of course, when we first heard about this, we imagined that the runners were running in, like, a ten foot diameter circle for the six days, with Circle playing in the middle the whole time, wouldn't that be cool?
The album contains six tracks, one for each day of the race. It starts off with the upbeat "Day One", with one of Circle's usual motorik rhythms in motion from the get-go, augmented with handclap/whipcrack sounds, sounding bright and jaunty, the sort of thing that in the headphones of a runner might help energize and encourage them, without making 'em burst into a sprint or anything, allowing them to pace themselves. On "Day Two", though, things get a bit darker and hazier, the music more nervous and pensive sounding, some sense of doubt creeping in: "Can I do this? Why AM I doing this?" one imagines the runners thinking as their bodies begin to grow weary. For those of us merely sitting still at home, though, it's another atmospheric and incessantly rhythmic Circle track, full of lovely floating tones and drones. And so it goes, each track/day offering moments of gauzey, gossamer beauty as well as constant, churning, endless rhythms. Definitely trance-inducing, as Circle so often is - and as the act of running in a circle for six days straight also must be, indeed HAS to be, if one were to ever hope to get through it!
Circle's music here gets at the intensity of the Six Day runners' extreme test of their own stamina physical and willpower, and yes also the transcendent quality of the experience, being at times both dense and exhausting, and also triumphantly airy and uplifting. And it's really some of the most straight-up "circular" Circle music we've heard from them in a while. Because it's a soundtrack, this album is all-instrumental, without any detours - none of the absurd, operatic vocal antics, no ironic faux-metal moves. Not that we don't love those common aspects of Circle, but this focuses pretty tightly on the repetition thing, and of course does it well. It's got a bit of an early '80s krauty/new age vibe, prominent use of synths reminding us a bit of recent works by Life Coach and Emeralds, and harking back of course to Michael Rother and Harmonia.
Good thing the filmmaker was Finnish, as Circle are certainly THEE obvious, best choice to make this soundtrack, one that is makes for a nicely trancey, energetically meditative (is that an oxymoron?) listen in the comfort of home too, for all of us armchair joggers, watching the record spin rather than running in circles ourselves. Although, one could also get up and clean the house, this would be good music for a task like that too!
The majority of folks out there are probably mostly excited about this soundtrack for the 5 new tracks from JACK WHITE OF THE WHITE STRIPES! Which is fine, but even if that's not your reason for being interested, you'll be pleased to discover that this is actually a really gorgeous compilation of new and old Appalachian folk and gospel. And while we could care less, the surprise here is indeed Jack White, and his creepy crawly blues folk. If he wasn't so intent on ruling garage-land, he'd most certainly be hot on the heels of Sixteen Horsepower, Woven Hand and Mark Lanegan in the raspy, lonely, swampish, Biblical damnation-and-salvation folk-blues stakes. He's got a sonorous but scratchy whiskey-soaked drawl, that wraps itself seductively around whatever he's singing, and the arrangements, spare and melancholy, are the perfect tattered backdrop. The rest of this soundtrack is no slouch either, with beautiful tracks from Alison Krauss, Cassie Franklin, Sacred Harp Singers, Reeltime Travellers and more.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Soundtrack to Ian Curtis biopic featuring all the greats from the era: iggy Pop, New Order, Kraftwerk, Velvet Underground, Buzzcocks, Bowie and more.
For every ecstatic high, there often needs to be a soul crushing descent, a dark, dark comedown. San Francisco electronic music pioneer Patrick Cowley is best known for his trailblazing signature sound which helped spawn a whole dance music genre (Hi-NRG), as well as his amazing production work, not to mention guest spots on many of our favorite Sylvester tracks. But we always knew there was another side to Patrick Cowley's musical genius. His life ended way too early, as one of the first victims of the AIDS epidemic (before they even understood what AIDS was), but in the short time he was on this planet he recorded hours and hours of electronic music light-years ahead of its time. Most of those recordings have never seen the light of day.
In recent years it seems a whole genre of "space-disco" has emerged out of the influence of the Sylvester track "I Need Somebody To Love", produced by Cowley, who almost single handedly created the cut's distinctive minimal spacey/sensual sound. And within the many solo Cowley releases, there were hints of this darker sonic side, a whole part of his music making beyond the greatness he created for disco divas and sweaty dance floors. Tracks like "Mutant Man" and "Sea Hunt" gave us an intoxicating glimpse into a much weirder and way more abstract world of synth-sounds, that had us hungering for more...
Enter School Daze, a Dark Entries collection of previously unreleased tracks, which showcase that warped and dark side of Cowley's music. These tracks were originally commissioned by the LA-based Fox Studios, makers of gay porn, and as we listen to this over and over, we can only imagine what kind of hazy, foggy, fucked up, beyond high, drug addled state of mind that folks must have been in to watch pornography set to these dark & dizzying sounds!
The opening track is the outlier here, a chunk of classic Cowley Hi-NRG, but it's certainly a misleading introduction, as throughout the rest of School Daze, there is hardly a trace of Cowley's typical dance floor production, instead these songs much more concerned with capturing a mood and vibe that evokes melting and dripping trippiness, seemingly designed for late, late nights long after the party has ended. Tracks like "Tides Of Man" take us on a harrowing dark voyage, the listener losing control and spiralling deeper and deeper into the empty void. "Seven Sacred Pools" displays an epic side of Cowley's sound, the track drifts drowsily from underwater warble and woozy spaciness into shimmering and tranquil soft wave shimmer, the sort of soundworld we wish could get lost in forever. The title track reveals Cowley reigning over his own majestic prog sci-fi fantasyland. Whatever the sound, Cowley somehow makes it his own! And we love it!
Traces of Tangerine Dream, Vangelis, Jean Michel Jarre, Kraftwerk, Harmonia, Cluster, The BBC Radio Workshop and even musique concrete are woven throughout School Daze. We're also reminded quite a bit of some of the proto-dark techno records that Moebius was making in the early '80s with Conny Plank and Gerd Beerbohm, on albums like Double Cut, Strange Music, Material, and Zero Set. What's even more astonishing is how so many of these sounds predate by several decades the sound of so many of our favorite contemporary electronic artists. In fact, we might go so far as to call the sound on School Daze "proto-IDM", as these tracks contain blueprints to the more spaced-out sides of artists like Aphex Twin, Boards Of Canada, The Orb, Seefeel, Bola and Isolee, as well as some of our more recent faves like Glitterbug, Actress, Reuber, Gatekeeper, Delia Gonzalez & Gavin Russom.
It's unclear exactly how many of these tracks actually made it into the films, but we can safely say this is still some of the most fucked up, avant-garde porn music we've ever heard. In fact we wonder if Matmos took inspiration from some of these Cowley tracks when they were asked to create their own soundtracks to some underground kinked out porn...
While the circumstances of these songs being commissioned for porn makes for a fascinating and intriguing story, there's certainly no shortage of lost reissues with wild stories behind them. Sadly, it's often the case, that many of those super hyped releases, are way more interesting to read about than actually listen to. But in the case of School Daze, these are truly subversive and trance inducing sounds that still hold up after all these years. In fact, some of this stuff actually sounds way more damaged and avant than almost any new left-field electronic release that comes our way. For an artist so known for taking his listeners higher, School Daze plays out like the sonic version of what happens afterwards, the wasted aftermath of staying up all night, awake for days, smiling, sweating, arms in the air, it's the sound of bodily displacement, the dreadful coming down. When you can no longer dance, or even stand, but instead are left gliding, sliding, swirling, reaching, caressing, wishing, hallucinating, and grasping for one last chance of ecstatic bliss. This is the dark, drifty, drugged out record of the year!
HUGE kudos to Dark Entries not only for releasing this amazing artifact, but for donating the proceeds to Project Open Hand and AIDS Housing Alliance, two wonderful San Francisco nonprofits who do important work helping those whose lives have been impacted by HIV and AIDS.
***Prude Alert*** The inside sleeves of this gatefold double lp contain LOTS of explicit still images from the pornos that many of these songs were featured in!! You have been warned!
This movie's theme song by DMX is so catchy and tough and mean. I (Sadie) would buy this cd for that song alone, that is if you haven't seen the commercial so many times you're sick to death of it. The second song on the cd is by Eminem, who I swear I try to give the benefit of the doubt more than anyone else, In fact, I'm even kinda obsessed with him, but Christ. This song sounds like a parody of himself: totally flat, monotonous and still women hating (issues much, Em?). So booooring. "Go to sleep bitch die mother fucker die why are you still alive, die you nameless bitch". Ha ha, so funny...I guess. And sadly the rest goes kinda goes down hill from there. Relitively dull and nondescript hip hop. But maybe worth it for that DMX track!
Recently profiled in The Wire, Skiz "Spectre" Fernando and his WordSound label have released quite a few "illbient" hip hop records that we've been into here at Aquarius. This compilation highlights several of our faves from the WordSound crew: Scotty Hard, Spectre, Prince Charming, and of course rapper Sensational, among others. It's the soundtrack to Skiz's low-budget, 'student' WordSound film Crooked, which was previously available as a double with the DVD of said film. This is the better deal though, as it's 4 bucks cheaper AND you won't end up watching the decidedly tedious movie. Great soundtrack, though. This version, by the way, has 2 extra tracks but is also about eight minutes shorter, for some reason...OH WAIT, I figured it out: this disc is ENTIRELY DIFFERENT! So, forget what we said about this being a better deal, it's in fact a different deal. That was the "soundtrack", this is the "original score". Hmm. It seems that these are the tracks that were made expressly for the film, but weren't included on the soundtrack cd that came with the dvd. Unlike that disc, there's no previously available stuff on here (which was the case with several of the Sensational cuts on that one). So you gotta get both, WordSound hedz. This one's all about incidental mostly instrumental music from a dark, dubby, hiphop perspective, which is what a lot of WordSound stuff sounds like, even when it's not meant for an actual film. Artists, aside from the above mentioned, included Mentol Nomad, the dreaded Bill Laswell, Mr. Dead, and live drum n' bassers UV Ray.
Seven Sisters is actually a soundtrack for a documentary film of the same name which follows the lives of seven sisters who grew up and moved away from their home in the Kentucky Appalachians during the 30's and 40's. The songs are all covers and traditional numbers that were popular during this time and arranged by the Crooked Jades. Among the tracks here are "Put My Little Shoes Away", Roscoe Holcomb's "I Wish I Was A Single Girl Again", "Cumberland Gap", "Mystery Train" (the very one popularized by E. Presley), "Pretty Polly" and much more.
If you saw the movie, you know how great this is. The music in 'Crouching Tiger...' was just the icing on an already 7-layered-5-different�kinds�of�icing-and�those�little-edible-hard-icing-flowers cake. Even without the visuals, Yo Yo Ma manages to evoke sadness and beauty, emotions and images. So much better than most of the soundtrack/score pap we've been conditioned to accept. And if you haven't seen it, what the hell's wrong with you!?!?!
It's been a great year for fans of Cul de Sac, the experimental/instrumental rock outfit from Boston who wowed us after a more-or-less three year absence with the brilliant Death Of The Sun back in the winter and who now give us a soundtrack album recording in the midst of the Death Of The Sun sessions. We don't know anything about the film for which this music was made, but if it's half as good as this soundtrack, it'd be worth a viewing, or two.
The music here was all composed and edited for specific scenes, or improvised in the studio as the film was being screened by the band. They got pretty creative in constructing this soundtrack, dabbling in diverse styles as befit the action in the film, from motorik krautrock-y jams to Faheyesque acoustic guitar to abstract drone-scapes to divebombing digital hardcore noise assaults! It's a myriad of moods, all expertly rendered, and despite the eclecticism it hangs together really well. It's obviously not at all a casually-tossed off endeavor -- the project was taken quite seriously by Glenn Jones, Robin Amos & co. and contains some of their finest work. Quite possibly, this will be one of those soundtracks that ends up being more significant and memorable than the film itself, though we won't know 'til we see the thing, which as we said we certainly will want to do based on the strength of its sonic component already. At turns, a haunting, propulsive, and suspenseful blend of folk, electronics, and scenic psychedelic rock.
It's kind of hard to review this objectively. As of right now, we're exactly 17 hours away from seeing a movie we've been waiting more than 20 years for, and we can barely write reviews, except for the fact that if we don't get the list done early, we won't get to go see TRON, and we know it's gonna be amazing. Some of us already have plans to see it 3 times, once in 3D, once in a normal theater, and once on the IMAX, the previews look incredible, and the music we'd heard sounded incredible. What a great idea, who better to do the music for the new Tron than a couple of guys who look like they just stepped straight out of the movie anyway. Helmeted and futuristic, makes sense that they play DJs in the movie as well. But we digress.
We'd heard nothing but complaints and gripes about Daft Punk's score for Tron Legacy, most directed at the fact that it sounded more like a soundtrack than a Daft Punk record. Which makes sense, but that's just us.
To be fair, much of the soundtrack, doesn't sound like Daft Punk at all, so for sure, folks after a Daft Punk record, you may just be disappointed. But Tron obsessives, well, shit, you either already bought this, or didn't even get this far cuz you already tossed it in your cart. For everyone else, Daft Punk have crafted a pretty excellent score, instead of Daft Punking all the music, they actually worked with a real orchestra, and tried to create a classic score, a la John Williams, or Hans Zimmer, and to these ears, it sounds pretty great, soaring and epic and lush and evocative, and there's plenty of electronics, sometimes melded to tense strings, othertimes wrapped around orchestral swells, and occasionally left alone to create John Carpenter like synthscapes. It's not until about halfway through that it gets remotely Daft Punky, "End Of Line" is a brooding, moody, bit of propulsive sci-fi synthery, "Derezzed" is THEE jam, the one that you've no doubt heard by now, and the only REAL Daft Punk sounding track, but it's killer. Can hardly wait to see what's going on in the movie during this song, and finally, the end titles, which sound like Daft Punk doing their best eighties straight to video sci-fi VHS video jam and it rules, but beyond that, it's way more soundtracky, than Daft Punky.
We've been listening to this like crazy, and digging it big time, even removed from the movie, it sounds great, but more than anything, it has us DYING a little bit more every minute to finally see the movie!
Comes in super futuristic reflective Tron style packaging!
Following the rabidly received reissue of the soundtrack for Jaromil Jires' early '70s treasure Valerie And Her Week Of Wonders, the folks at Finders Keepers keep the Czechoslovakian cinema adoration flowing. Here is the freshly reissued soundtrack to Cup's all-time favorite film -- Vera Chytilova's 1966 Czech New Wave masterpiece Daisies (aka Sedmikrasky)! It's an eye-popping work that incorporates an astoundingly broad variety of art styles Dada, absurdist, pop, cut-ups, collage, psychedelia, and so much more... all while delivering a potent commentary on the dark state of the world (which is as valid today as it ever was!). Genuinely radical and so ahead of its time, 'tis the Czech way that beneath a seemingly light-hearted, dreamy and charming exterior, lies a black wit and a mighty subversive heart.
The Daisies soundtrack commences with the insistent, pinched sound of a high-pitched horn and militant snare drum introduction, then just like the two main characters, the music tumbles and frolics and raises a giddy ruckus in a Technicolor kaleidoscope of fleeting melodic vignettes. Along with traditional instrumentation -- brass, woodwinds, strings, vocals, etc -- keep an ear out for the musique concrete scissor snips and a conversation between a typewriter and reedy woodwinds. They are definitely two particular highlights of both the film and soundtrack. Accompanied by processional/funereal march formalities, jazzy escapades, classical choral geysers, dainty minuets, Stalling-esque cartoony themes, and rambunctious surfy shimmy pop, the two female leads kick up their tipsy heels in a supper club effectively disrupting a ragtime flapper dance number, play with their food and toy with stuffily suited elder gentlemen, leave suitors hanging on the telephone, cram themselves gleefully into the tight spaces of a dumbwaiter, and... oh we don't want to give any more away. Must see! Must see! Nevertheless, taken sans the film's visuals, this soundtrack makes for a deliriously delightful, discombobulating listen all on its own! Ultra artful and fun! Feverishly wonderful, and fervently recommended!
Wes Anderson movie soundtracks are always cool. And this one's got the Bollywood angle as well. 'Nuff said.
Deadly cool, existential, and cruelly absurd, Ascenseur Pour L'Echafaud (aka Lift To The Scaffold, or Elevator To The Gallows) is one of those brilliantly black humored French noir films about an ingenious murder plan gone awry due to a random turn of events. Directed by Louis Malle and starring Jeanne Moreau, this 1958 crime thriller also featured a beautifully understated score by Miles Davis. Working with French musicians on bass, piano and tenor saxophone, along with ex-pat American drummer Kenny Clarke, Davis alternates between mostly somber processionals with a slow stalking bass and plaintive trumpet motifs, to occasionally a scurrying and frenetic bop pace depicting the seductively modern lifestyle of these carefree and careless criminals. Davis handles the noirish vibe perfectly, resonating deeply with the doom-laden mood but with a light yet foreboding touch that draws you in and entraps you long before you realize you're a goner. Very Recommended!!!!!!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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NOW ON VINYL! Terrify your turntable with this soundtrack... Dawn Of The Dead is pretty much the greatest zombie movie ever made. It definitely set the standard, and EVERY walking dead movie since has basically just been a riff off the original. And of course the Goblin score was amazing, proggy, scary and occasionally silly, but always perfect in some unlikely way. But most of the REALLY scary parts weren't scored by Goblin but instead were one of over 2000 musical cues used in the film. This comp collects some of the longer cues (many were mere seconds long, that in the context of the film were perfect, but wouldn't make for good listening here) and some of the most memorable songs that weren't included in the Goblin score. Most of this stuff is creepy and scary and totally brings back all the spine tingly feelings you had the first time you saw the movie. But there are also some super dorky bits that were as much a part of the film and its subtle (or not so subtle) humor. There's the opening track "The Gonk", a goofy, bouncy ragtime / cartoon music workout, the hippy coutry folk ditty "Cause I'm A Man" played by the Electric Banana (which just happened to feature members of the Pretty Things!!). And who can forget the scene in the mall, and the weird medley of marching band / ragtime / progressive rock organ workout that accompanied it? But outside of those whimsical moments, the rest of this collection is really really intense and spooky. From creepy, slithering orchestral drones, shimmering gongs and tinkling chimes to Bernard Hermann-ish suspenseful minor key soundtrack stuff, all tense strings and foreboding DUH DUH's to scary outerspace synth sounds, reverbed and super affected to good ol' classic Halloween / Friday The Thirteenth style horror movie suspense music. So awesome!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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Finally this all-time AQ favorite is back in print!
Dawn Of The Dead is pretty much the greatest zombie movie ever made. It definitely set the standard, and EVERY walking dead movie since has basically just been a riff off the original. And of course the Goblin score was amazing, proggy, scary and occasionally silly, but always perfect in some unlikely way. But most of the REALLY scary parts weren't scored by Goblin but instead were one of over 2000 musical cues used in the film. This comp collects some of the longer cues (many were mere seconds long, that in the context of the film were perfect, but wouldn't make for good listening here) and some of the most memorable songs that weren't included in the Goblin score. Most of this stuff is creepy and scary and totally brings back all the spine tingly feelings you had the first time you saw the movie. But there are also some super dorky bits that were as much a part of the film and its subtle (or not so subtle) humor. There's the opening track "The Gonk", a goofy, bouncy ragtime / cartoon music workout, the hippy country folk ditty "Cause I'm A Man" played by the Electric Banana (which just happened to feature members of the Pretty Things!!). And who can forget the scene in the mall, and the weird medley of marching band / ragtime / progressive rock organ workout that accompanied it? But outside of those whimsical moments, the rest of this collection is really really intense and spooky. From creepy, slithering orchestral drones, shimmering gongs and tinkling chimes to Bernard Hermann-ish suspenseful minor key soundtrack stuff, all tense strings and foreboding DUH DUH's to scary outerspace synth sounds, reverbed and super affected to good ol' classic Halloween / Friday The Thirteenth style horror movie suspense music. So awesome!
Composer John Harrison's iconic soundtrack to George Romero's legendary horror zombie classic, Day Of The Dead, is the second release on Waxwork after Re-Animator, and comes pressed on 180 gram vinyl, the first time ever the COMPLETE score has been available, including EVERY musical cue used in the film. Also of note about this release: the 1985 master tapes were restored and remixed by former White Zombie guitarist, J. Yuenger (!!).
The two lps are pressed on cream yellow marbled / 'military green' marbled vinyl, the cover is a heavy old school tip-on sleeve, with matte varnish, a full color gatefold and spot UV gloss printing, the liner notes include an essay by Romero himself, and the whole thing features all new art and design by artist Jay Shaw, PLUS, there's also an 11" x 22" replica of "THE DEAD WALK!" newspaper article from the opening credits of the film, which features notes on the music from John Harrison. So cool!!!!
The sound? Much of it is very John Carpenter sounding, check out the sample below, which is pretty indicative of Harrison's score, brooding synth shimmer, pulsing rhythms, strange percussion, haunting melodies, thick swaths of ominous bass rumble, faux strings, the whole thing darkly psychedelic and truly creepy, fans of the new wave of Carpenter / Goblin worship, will be in synth/soundtrack heaven. Old school drum machines, moody ambience, shimmery new age drift, cheesy eighties grooviness, total eighties VHS credit sequence psych-funk, synth-groove radness that is totally of its age, but informs so much of the new music today. And like all great soundtracks, has us wanting to see the movie again! We had thought they were doing Rosemary's Baby next after Re-Animator, still looking forward to that, but no complaints about this!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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"India" was a documentary produced for Italian TV in 1966, and the music on this disc was the audio interpretation composed to accompany it by composer Francesco De Masi. That's the straight forward, factual explanation of this disc. However, the music itself is not what most of us would probably expect to find accompanying such a documentary. We have to give Francesco De Masi some credit for his creative license though. After all, it was 1966 and Ravi Shankar was yet to become a household name. I imagine that the director gave Francesco a silent print for him to view and score the compositions for the film. Having never been to India and having no concept of what the music there sounded like and additionally being encouraged to come up with something as exotic and mysterious as the images on the screen, he did the best he could. The results: fucking brilliant! De Masi definitely has skills as a scorer of soundtracks. He not only has a gift for writing evocative melodic motifs, but also in arranging and rearranging the motifs with different instrumentation, tempos, and even musical genres -- something essential to all classic soundtracks. His execution in these areas is superb. And yet, when we listen to this soundtrack today and try to imagine it accompanying a documentary about India, we sense that something is not quite right. Listening to this score with no prior information about the film it supports one might more likely guess that it was for a classic Western fused with Cold War intrigue film (though there is one giddy fife & drum reel that must have slipped in from another project on the American Revolution!) I imagine Michael Caine as an English spy in America trying to infiltrate the Navajo nation and falling in love with a beautiful Native American woman along the way. Many of the arrangements here are reminiscent of the gems of paranoid cinema (think The Ipcress File, or The Parallax View, but also Mutual of Omaha's Wild World of Animals) while also sounding like the most cliched Native American war path tune ripped from a John Wayne flick. Seems like Francesco, like Christopher Columbus before him, got his Indians mixed up. This soundtrack has it all: tension, suspense, romantic instrumentals, pensive reflections and jazzy uptempo workouts. It really is an amazing soundtrack that, were it to have been attached to a feature length film, may have been a classic by now. Not only is it fully orchestrated and creatively arranged with vibes, guitars, keyboards, flutes, horns, strings and assorted percussion, but it features sitar playing by Italian guitar and whistle virtuoso (and Ennio Morricone right hand man) Alessandro Alessandroni -- who'd apparantly never played the instrument before. Beautifully recorded and excellently remastered, this is an absolute must for all soundtrack buffs!
Death Waltz strikes again. And again! Elsewhere on this week's list you'll find the Death Waltz release of the killer soundtrack for the modern documentary Room 237, a fantastic study of the crazed conspiracy theories that have surrounded Stanley Kubrick's classic The Shining, since it was first released, the soundtrack an homage to classic scores by Goblin, John Carpenter, etc. And then there's this one, the score to director Lucio Fulci's infamous 1982 Italian giallo The New York Ripper, aka Lo Squartatore Di New York, famously banned in many countries (in fact, to this day unavailable in the UK, where it is still considered a video nasty!), a story set in a pre-clean up Times Square. There's of course a serial killer, who has a weirdly Donald Duck like voice (!), a burned out police detective, a repressed psychotherapist, plenty of prostitutes, and loads of gore and seedy sex. Decried for its purportedly misogynistic tone, and often accused of pandering to the lowest common denominator, The New York Ripper does a pretty good job of conjuring up the filth and depravity of the city and its inhabitants. A classic exploitation slasher flick for sure, De Masi's score is a strange one, which much of the soundtrack being not all that scary at all, from groovy eighties funk, laced with sax and aching electric guitar, to cheesy jazzy ditties that sound like variations on the theme from the Love Boat, to wild, sweaty Latin Jazz jams, to dark slowjazz drifts, all fluttery flutes and muted trumpets, amidst all this pops up brief moments of creepy ambience, of seriously haunting John Carpenter-isms, reminiscent in places of Carpenter's They Live soundtrack for sure, but it's the way these ominous undertones creep into the otherwise UNscary soundtrack, that make it so insidious, and the perfect score for the depravity taking place on screen!
Like all the Death Waltz records, fancy pants packaging, the vinyl 180 gram and a sick greenish color, housed in a heavy casebound tip-on style jacket, includes a 4 page insert with liner notes, as well as a huge poster of the new cover art, oh, and killer new classic comic book style cover art by artist Nick Percival.
You know how a lot of soundtrack recordings are padded out with multiple versions of the same theme, reprised or otherwise repeated, when there's really only about 20 minutes of music written for the film? Well they didn't do that with this soundtrack -- it's just two cuts (the main theme, and "incidental pieces"), slightly over 20 minutes in total length.
Death Line was a British horror flick from 1972, about monsters in the London Underground or something, and the soundtrack by Will Malone is apparently a bit of a collectors' item. The main theme is more funky than it is creepy (with some great '70s bassy synth sounds), and I can totally imagine DJs salivating over the rare vinyl version. The rest of the disc is certainly eerier stuff, taking your typical horror movie soundtrack motifs (slowly bowed strings, violin stabs, spooky choral vocals) and combining 'em with some more fat, droney synth electronics. Quirkily atmospheric, likely worth the 14 bucks to soundtrack freaks.
Soundtrack to the classic metal documentary!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
In the spirit of Aquarius' long standing tradition of being on the forward thrust of aural intercourse, here's an album you should not pass up. Though the sound quality isn't the best at times (some of it really sucks, and sounds as though someone stuck their microphone up the tv set) there are some gems on here that are really hard to pass up. Even if you can't quite swallow more seventies scores, the penetrating dialog from the film more than makes up for any disappointment you may have. It's hard to play this cd in the store without having someone blush (usually it's Allan.) But really, this album not only features some truly weird and wonderful '70s porno-groove-pop (by anonymous musicians of course) but is even funnier than this review. Really.
We had a reissue some years back of this soundtrack but the audio was terrible (sounded like somebody had taken the soundtrack straight off the speaker of their Zenith television set). Now it comes remastered, apparently from the master tapes by the sound of it, and err.. expanded. If you've only seen or heard of one porn film it's most likely going to be Deep Throat. It was for a long time (and may still be) the highest grossing independent film ever. It's even made it into US political history in the form of the informant so named by Woodward and Bernstein during the Watergate brouhaha. Fitting then that, according to the liner notes, Richard Nixon was said to posses his own personal copy at the Whitehouse (Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. apparently also had copies). Deep Throat brought porn kicking and screaming into the mainstream. While much of the music is typical of your standard porn soundtrack: raunchy funk with loads of wah-wah guitar and peppy hammond organ, there are also plenty of atypical numbers including a laid back, let it all hang out cover of Mickey & Sylvia's "Love Is Strange". But the best track, or worst depending how you look at it, has to be the ballad "Deep Throat To You All" with breathy male vocals singing "deep throat, deeper than deep, your throat... don't row the boat, don't get your goat, that's all she wrote". It's truly truly inspired in that special way, like a classic song poem. Like those Deep Note compilations, Light In the Attic has included some of the finer parts of the movie's dialog for your enjoyment. Also included as a bonus is the soundtrack to Deep Throat's incredibly unsuccessful sequel. The music here is a pallid imitation of the original film's score, but you can take it or leave it at this price. Included is a full color booklet with a personal account on the film's impact by one viewer and an interview with Ron Jeremy on the film and its legacy.
OK folks, here it is, the soundtrack to the indie flick all the kids are talkin' 'bout. The film score was written by Tim Delaughter and performed by The Polyphonic Spree (who are sounding more and more like a children's choir with each passing day) which is a treat unto itself, but scattered throughout are three songs by the late Elliott Smith which only make the proceedings that much more heartbreaking (two previously unreleased covers of Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens' "Trouble" as well as the track "Let's Get Lost" from Smith's last album From A Basement On A Hill). Somehow none of us have seen the film yet, but we can confirm that the soundtrack on its own swings you from carefree'n'feelgood to to dreamily contemplative to heartaches'n'bummers and back again. It all culminates in a lengthy (30-minute long) pastoral instrumental and finally a joyous reprise of Polyphonic's "Move Away And Shine".
We all went a little gaga for those BBC Radiophonic Workshop cds, amazing collections of freaky and far out music for movies and radio and television, crafted in mad scientist like labs packed to the gills with strange sound making devices, primitive analog synths, tape machines and all manner of random electronic bric a brac. Delia Derbyshire was one of the Workshop elite, having been responsible for the Dr. Who theme as well as the Tomorrow People theme and loads of other legendary BBC songs and sounds.
This super limited lp, is a repress of a rare and long out of print disc of library mood music released on KPM in 1972. Derbyshire and her sonic cohorts recorded the record as Electrosonic, using pseudonyms as well, to avoid any sort of complications due to their positions at the BBC. The results were of course fantastic. Moody and mysterious, wild and playful, spacey and haunting. From Goblin-esque creepy haunted house synthscapes, to freaky fuzzy funky seventies sci-fi grooves, to far out bloops and bleeps. Analog synths, jazzy upright bass, tons of primitive and not so primitive effects, all whipped into impossibly catchy and fantastical sounds and songs.
This was SUPER SUPER LIMITED. It's already out of print. We have about 10 copies and once those are gone this is gone FOR GOOD. Gorgeous super stylish sleeve with amazing artwork, extensive liner notes, and pressed on super thick milky green vinyl!
Another disc of horrifying progressive creepiness from Italian underground masters of the bizarre and the frightening, Devil Doll. Never was a band more suited to scoring horror films (since Goblin), but Devil Doll don't, they just weave epic and haunting
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Still even more haunting and lush frightscapes from this Italian troupe of musical miscreants. Orchestral and progressive and heavy and occasionally carnivalesque. Super distorted creep-out piano abruptly shifts to a melancholy soundscape underpinning mad
Another Devil Doll record that we finally managed to get our hands on. This is apparently a fan club only re-release and the sleeve warns that "this music can alter your mental health". It sure is strange enough that it might make you wonder what the hell
More Devil Doll insanity. It seems unfair to always compare Devil Doll to Goblin, but it's sort of unavoidable as they both traffic in the same creepy proggy nightmarescapes and they are both so good. To be fair though, Devil Doll have more room to play
Plenty of folks hated the movie House Of 1000 Corpses. We weren't among 'em. Sure it was a bit of a mess, a little confused, and borrowed HEAVILY from the classics (Last House On The Left, The Hills Have Eyes, and especially The Texas Chainsaw Massacre). But so what?!?! It was a GREAT looking movie. It was fun and gory and gross and pretty wild. One of the problems was putting it up against all the blockbusters, marketing it like a big movie, instead of letting it build momentum and exist as an art house flick, where it belonged. And part of that had to do with the celebrity status of first time director Rob Zombie, of the band White Zombie. The famous rock band, MTV, and all that, the studio probably smelled big bucks. But let's be honest, part of it had to do with the fact that it was not the greatest movie. But that said, imagine you were a total horror movie obsessive, seventies freak, wrestling fan and metal musician, and you were given $7 million dollars to make a horror movie. Doubt I could come up with anything nearly as cool and creepy and evocative as House Of 1000 Corpses. So yeah, we were predisposed to dig the sort-of-sequel The Devil's Rejects. But we had no idea just how much we'd love it. Fuck! This movie totally kicked our ass. Not only was it way more grim and violent and brutal than HO1000C, but the soundtrack was absolutely killer!! First a bit about the movie. Way darker and SO VIOLENT. So violent in fact it's a bit hard to believe they got away with just an R rating. A bit less over the top and outrageous than HO1000C, but definitely more confident, none of those debut feature mis-steps, and a much tighter story arc, and lots of cool cult movie legends (Pee Wee Herman's girlfriend Dottie as a hooker! The Hills Have Eyes' Michael Berryman as the pimp's sidekick / janitor! Sid Haig again as the creepy Captain Spaulding) as well as an amazing bit when the sheriff calls in a very fey Gene Shalit like movie expert to discuss the Marx Brothers films! So funny! The crazy part is how blurry the line is between good and evil. The titular Devil's Rejects are definitely evil and reprehensible, but they're also sort of cool. And bad ass. Albeit in a morally repugnant way. And when the tables are turned, you actually feel sort of bad for them, and hope they'll be able to turn the tables again. And the Sheriff who hunts them down, well he's maybe just as bad. Only difference is he has a badge. Anyway, the movie is bleak and brutal, dusty and sun baked, unlike most 'horror' movies, most of the action takes place under a hot summer sun, and the film stock, the look and feel is all very seventies. So evocative of our youth, which is part of why the soundtrack is so great. Unlike the first movie, where due to budgetary restraints, Zombie was forced to write and record much of the music himself, these tracks were obviously lovingly and carefully chosen, and in the context of the film they are so so perfect. You don't really expect to hear these songs as the musical accompaniment to such utter brutality. The opening credits, a series of stills set to the Allman Brothers' "Midnight Rider", hits so hard, the lyrical refrain of "Not gonna let 'em catch me, no" and the weird moody vibe of the song, as well as the almost jaunty guitar solo, is so weirdly perfect as we watch the Rejects make their getaway. The rest of the soundtrack is packed full of seventies classics, that while being perfect in the film, also play so well as some fucked up seventies eight-track mix tape. Three Dog Night, Elvin Bishop (whose track gets discussed in the movie!), The James Gang, Joe Walsh, David Essex as well as some classic oldies from Otis Rush, Kitty Wells, Buck Owens and the mysterious (and totally kick ass) Banjo And Sullivan, a lower tier 'fictional' honky Tonk band who meet their untimely demise in the movie. The biggest surprise had to be the tracks from Terry Reid. So haunting and achingly beautiful. We knew that he was once the first choice to sing for Led Zeppelin, but the more country tracks here are fucking fantastic. So gut wrenchingly beautiful. The Reid track "Seed Of Memory" plays over the final credits and had us totally choked up. Wow. And you might wince at the inclusion of "Freebird", and you might skip it when you're listening to this disc, but in the context of the movie, and the time the stuff in the movie suppossedly took place, it's perfect! Anyway, it must mean something that with the hundreds of records we have to listen to every day, we keep throwing this one back on. And we're pretty sure we're gonna to go see The Devil's Rejects AGAIN this weekend!! Various soundbites from the film are interspersed between the tracks as well as a couple Banjo And Sullivan radio spots, and this is one of those dual discs, with a cd on one side and a DVD on the other. The DVD features a 30 minute making of The Devil's Rejects short, a bunch of trailers, and you can listen to a Dolby DVD-audio version of the soundtrack accompanied by a slide show of stills from the movies as well as behind the scenes photos.
Sountrack to the 1976 film Diamonds, composed by Roy Budd.
The latest from Dirty Beaches is not at all like past releases, which trafficked in a sort of grimy lo-fi RnB, since here there are no vocals, so that haunting Elvis-y croon is absent, and really, the whole dark twang slomo-soul thing has been replaced with a dreamy, ethereal, swirling liquid shimmer, which makes sense once you realize this is not in fact a new album, but is instead a soundtrack, for a film about an indoor waterpark in a mall in Canada, and Dirty Beaches does manage to conjure up the vibe of glimmering reflective sun dappled water, the music almost sounding as if it was recorded beneath the surface, a sort of blurred Oval like dreaminess, the instrumentation just oscillators, mellotrons, chamberlins, strings and processed electric guitar, all smeared into lovely swaths of hushed minimal drift.
The opener is almost New Agey, sounding a bit kosmische, but sunshiney and softly swirly, one can almost imagine floating on the open water, ears underwater, gazing at the blue sky above. The second track, titled appropriately "Floating Underwater Watching Waves", gets a little bit noisier, the sound gritty and low fidelity, with noisy swells swirling over murky melodies, and a sonar like high end pulse, haunting and hypnotic.
The rest of this brief soundtrack is separated into shorter sonic vignettes, lush orchestral drones, twang flecked, hazy slowcore dirges, swirling solo guitar thrum, echo drenched tangles of deep pools of reverb, chiming, cinematic melancholia, replete with faux woodwinds, and finally, a reprise of the opening track, that seems to let the listener, gradually disappear into the (not so) deep blue mystery of this tranquil pool in a strange Canadian waterpark. Lovely!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The special 20th anniversary edition of the soundtrack for this Jean-Jacques Beineix film. If you're unfamiliar with "Diva", it is an ultra stylish, darkly witty French thriller of theft, opera and murder (not to oversimplify things, mind you). Highly recommended, as is this beautiful soundtrack. Includes 8 previously unreleased tracks.
The latest from DJ Female Convict Scorpion comes in the form of this SUPER limited cassette, one that requires some work on the part of the listener to truly enjoy, or at least enjoy as the artist intended. That artist being Josh Pollock, member of psychedelic space rockers 3 Leafs and weirdo noisescapers White Pee, among others, but as DJ Female Convict Scorpion, he concocts lush landscapes of cinematic sound, purloining various bits from other songs, and movies, playing some bits himself, a lo-fi DJ Shadow of sorts, whose past outings have blown our minds and been hugely popular around here. This new one looks to be no different, the rub this time around being, that BOTH sides of the cassette are meant to be played simultaneously, a la Zaireeka or something. So you have several options, the first of course means buying two tapes, and playing them on two tape players, the second is buying just one tape, and using the link that comes with the tape to play the other side on your computer, while you play the first side on your tape player. Phew! A third option, is to attend the upcoming debut performance of Los Balls Del Norte, happening across the street at Lost Weekend, during which, both sides will be played, accompanied by a special film created just for the occasion. More info can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/events/147509788771228/?fref=ts
And finally, one last option, one that isn't mutually exclusive, which is to listen to each side of the tape on its own. We did, and both sides sound great, killer breakbeats, shifting textures, mysterious voices, movie samples, vocal snippets, dizzying sonic collages that unwind like psychedelic krautrock grooves and funky heavy soul breakdowns, dreamy lullabies sung in other languages, banging gongs, shimmering FX, woozy slowed down basslines, soft symphonic swirls, muted ambient murk, loose free jazz drum freakouts, squiggly theremin like melodies, rumbling crumbling distorted low end, new wave-y electronics, swirling cosmic synths, and more more more more more!
But what does it sound like all together? A seriously warped psychedelic sonic headtrip. Check out the sample, that's a little snippet of the two sides in perfect sync, which ultimately they never will be, which is part of the joy, every listen the sounds will shift, and interact differently, a perpetually unique recording, in fact, essentially MULTIPLE recordings, all of them super cool, one side, both sides, one side started 5 minutes in, 10 minutes, hell, play one backwards, every variation is its own special warped lysergic soundworld to get lost in, over and over and over and over...
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!!
We've featured some BBC Radiophonic Workshop collections in the past, but these two discs are especially exciting as it's all music and sound effects from the cult British television show Doctor Who! Before we get into it, Doctor Who fanatics, please go easy on us. We're new to this whole Doctor Who thing (not me! says Doctor Who fan Allan). For one we only recently learned that the Doctor was not indeed named Doctor Who, but simply 'The Doctor' which then prompts the response "Doctor Who?". We know, we know... Anyway, our pal Jay Lesser introduced us to the wonderful world of Doctor Who, by lending us a massive load of Doctor Who DVD's and now we're hooked. So hooked that we had our friend Lynda record the NEW series for us and send them over as they aired. And while we know everyone has a favorite Doctor, and for us it was Tom Baker (maybe just because he was our first!) we have been pretty smitten with the NEW Doctor, Christopher Eccleston (Shallow Grave, 28 Days Later, 24 Hour Party People). Unfortunately he only signed up for one season, and we've only gotten a brief glimpse of the new Doctor (that would be Doctor number 10!). Anyway, point is we've been all fired up about the new season, which features the same music, the same sound effects, but in a much more modern package. Still properly cheesy, but way more advanced. The important thing is all the classic sounds are there. It's part of what made the show so great. And makes the new version great too. When you hear the sound of the TARDIS landing, you get that familiar little chill. Part thrill part deja vu. And all those sounds are here on these two discs: the materialization of the TARDIS, creepy music for the Daleks, as well as loads of random sound effects and bits of incidental music, even multiple versions of the classic theme song (composed by BBC Radiophonic Workshop legend Delia Derbyshire)! So cool! Just listening to these has gotten us all excited to watch more Doctor Who. Volume One covers the early years, 1963-1969, while Volume Two is subtitled New Beginnings and covers the years 1970-1980. Doctor Who fanatics will no doubt probably already own these (or if not will buy them immediately without even reading the review), but anyone who loves weird sound effects and digs crazy sounds will love these. And even though they seem to be a bit of a hodgepodge of random sounds and snippets of music, they are a surprisingly cohesive and totally enjoyable listen! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!
We've featured some BBC Radiophonic Workshop collections in the past, but these two discs are especially exciting as it's all music and sound effects from the cult British television show Doctor Who! Before we get into it, Doctor Who fanatics, please go easy on us. We're new to this whole Doctor Who thing (not me! says Doctor Who fan Allan). For one we only recently learned that the Doctor was not indeed named Doctor Who, but simply 'The Doctor' which then prompts the response "Doctor Who?". We know, we know... Anyway, our pal Jay Lesser introduced us to the wonderful world of Doctor Who, by lending us a massive load of Doctor Who DVD's and now we're hooked. So hooked that we had our friend Lynda record the NEW series for us and send them over as they aired. And while we know everyone has a favorite Doctor, and for us it was Tom Baker (maybe just because he was our first!) we have been pretty smitten with the NEW Doctor, Christopher Eccleston (Shallow Grave, 28 Days Later, 24 Hour Party People). Unfortunately he only signed up for one season, and we've only gotten a brief glimpse of the new Doctor (that would be Doctor number 10!). Anyway, point is we've been all fired up about the new season, which features the same music, the same sound effects, but in a much more modern package. Still properly cheesy, but way more advanced. The important thing is all the classic sounds are there. It's part of what made the show so great. And makes the new version great too. When you hear the sound of the TARDIS landing, you get that familiar little chill. Part thrill part deja vu. And all those sounds are here on these two discs: the materialization of the TARDIS, creepy music for the Daleks, as well as loads of random sound effects and bits of incidental music, even multiple versions of the classic theme song (composed by BBC Radiophonic Workshop legend Delia Derbyshire)! So cool! Just listening to these has gotten us all excited to watch more Doctor Who. Volume One covers the early years, 1963-1969, while Volume Two is subtitled New Beginnings and covers the years 1970-1980. Doctor Who fanatics will no doubt probably already own these (or if not will buy them immediately without even reading the review), but anyone who loves weird sound effects and digs crazy sounds will love these. And even though they seem to be a bit of a hodgepodge of random sounds and snippets of music, they are a surprisingly cohesive and totally enjoyable listen! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!
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On this pro-duped, full color printed cd-r release Huffing Gas, one-man-home-studio-band George Draguns (a skilled skateboarder, noted wit, professional historic preservationist, and one of the many former fillers of the bass-playing position in Pennsylvania math rockers Don Caballero) has crafted a collection of instrumental tracks that are kinda post rock, even almost psych or krautrocky in spots... definitely all very moody and low-key and quite pleasurable. Not surprisingly, these were originally composed as soundtrack music for a friend's independent film project. But these need no visuals, this music is fine all by itself, although the cover art -- a strange painting entitled "Pumaseance" -- seems appropriate, somehow. The track titles, too, are jokey nonsequiturs ("Fake Drug Problem", "A New Hat", "Free Ironic Mustache Rides", "Addiction Overdose") that bear no evident relation to the sound of each piece. Some tracks have a droney groove that reminds us a bit of Circle's jazzier cousin Ektroverde, others are darker and mellower. It's hard to describe this, really. "31st Century Maximal Minimalism" is offered up by the science-fiction inspired liner notes, but that's no help is it? Whatever it is, we like it. George now has a band project happening (Thee New Zealand, a stoner rock outfit) but we hope he continues with his solo home-recorded experiments as well.
Remastered and on cd for the first time. One of the best soundtracks in Disney history. Playful, silly, beautiful and sad, from the heartbreaking "Baby Mine" to the wacky and rambunctious "When I See An Elephant Fly." Highly recommended.
Early '70s film soundtrack by a Peruvian hippie commune. Nice.
REPRESSED! (And also, FYI, the Real Gone label has also just issued vinyl versions of the soundtracks to two other Jodorowsky films, including the sought-after Holy Mountain - we have 'em in stock, but didn't have time to review yet!)
The great Chilean experimental filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky directed, starred in and composed the music for one of THEE flat out strangest cinematic experiences ever made. El Topo from 1970 was Jodorowsky's bloody surreal take on the Western genre and was the film that began the phenomenon of the Midnight Movie. Funded by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, this film is like a Sergio Leone film on a serious dose of brown acid. Visually stunning and brutally violent, El Topo shares the avant garde qualities of all of Jodorowsky's early films: the soul-baring psyche of experimental theater, the role-playing excess of costumes, props and pageantry, the ritualistic entanglements of violence and beauty as catalysts of transformation, and most importantly the notion of existence as a journey through all kinds of personal and mystical revelations both sacred and profane. The soundtrack is comprised of 18 tracks composed by Jodorowsky and John Barham inspired by both the soundtrack work of Ennio Morricone and Nino Rota. Full of flutes and droning horns, accordions and organs and twisted Mariachi styles. The music is as visceral as buzzing flies around the rotting corpse of an evil marauder. Highly Recommended!
180 grams, gatefold, remastered from original tapes, with 4 page booklet including stills from the movie.
