State of the Site

Greetings everybody. In lieu of coming up with any interesting commentary I thought I would provide an update as to the site, the magazine, film music happenings, etc.

First of all I watched Planet of the Apes this weekend, out of anticipation for the upcoming complete-score CD on Varese Sarabande this summer. (For those who don't know, Varese Sarabande has picked up the 20th Century Fox Classic Series of original soundtracks—see the relevant article in the Film Score Daily archive.) I haven't seen the film in years and it is so unbelievably great. There must be two dozen memorable lines in this movie, from "Get your stinking paw off of me you damn dirty ape" to "You know, human-see, human-do." Charlton Heston is brilliantly cast as an arrogant misanthrope now defending the mankind he left behind. Jerry Goldsmith's score is such a masterpiece—in purely musical terms I was trying to follow the construction of the material and it's just amazing, the timbres and gestures and shapes. It might sound all the same if you're listening to it for the first time, but it's not—the material is subtly developed and altered to suit the different scenes. Nowadays you might get a film score with an interesting idea or two; this one is like a hundred interesting ideas, it's nothing else. The complete score is around 50 minutes, so the upcoming CD (being mastered this week) will have 20 minutes of never before heard material—some of this coming from within cues that were previously edited down for album. Anyway, what a masterpiece of a science fiction movie and score, and I hope everybody is as psyched for the new album as I am.

Film Score Daily

This site has been up for a little over a month, and we're approaching 300 visitors a day. I was fortunate enough to get a plug from Harry Knowles at www.aint-it-cool-news.com (thanks Harry!) and as a result had a huge day on the "hit count." The idea behind "Film Score Daily" is to keep people coming back every day for a new review, news item, commentary, etc. Yes, my ploy has worked.

It has been difficult to get a new column written and loaded every day—as readers have no doubt noted, we're still taking weekends off. I must extend my gratitude to regular writers Andy Dursin, Doug Adams, and Jeff Bond, and guest writers Jason Comerford and Jason Foster, for their contributions. The idea is that no one person could write a new column about film music every day, but once a week isn't as difficult. We're going for the right mix of old stuff and new stuff, and like sitcoms and fast food, nothing is too long or unpleasant to keep you from coming back the next day!

However: we need writers. This very well could mean you. (It's not as if anyone has a degree in film score commentary.) This schedule is a monster over a long period of time, and we would welcome anybody who might want to contribute a column or two a month. This can be almost anything: a review of a new score, a helpful list of albums in a particular genre or by a particular composer, collector tips. It sure beats writing in rec.music.movies.

If you are interested, write me (lukas@filmscoremonthly.com) and pitch some topics. The columns are only around 1000 words, so they are easy to bang out. If you are feeling self-doubt, don't worry, I will decide whether or not you are too stupid. And remember, the proper study of apes is apes.

Film Score Monthly

Vol. 2, No. 4 (June 1997) ships—today! It is a wonderful issue of extraordinary magnitude, featuring a new Danny Elfman interview about his work over the last year (Mission Impossible, the Nissan ads, Mars Attacks, Men in Black); part two of our look at promotional CDs; Martin Denny and the sounds of exotica; an interview with Frank LaLoggia (Lady in White); Andy Dursin's Laserphile column (all about DVDs this time); in-depth reviews of The Fifth Element and the book Music from the House of Hammer; and a ton of news and information.

The July issue is now in preparation and will include new interviews with Mark Mancina (Speed 2, Con Air) and Elliot Goldenthal (Batman Enough Already).

Okay, for overseas subscribers who are wondering where the hell their Vol. 2 No. 3 copy is... it's like this: people at my mailing place screwed up. The appropriate people have been sacked. Your copy is indeed in the mail. I am so very sorry. It won't happen again. Furthermore, it wasn't my fault.

Film Score Monthly is still not at most bookstores across our wonderful nation. However, it is in most Tower Records, and several newstands in New York and Los Angeles. Most people get it directly from me; see the subscription information elsewhere on the site.

Some Tantalizing News

Hey, you heard it here first:

Columbia Home Video is planning a Special Edition laserdisc later this year of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and this is now slated to include an expanded John Williams score CD. It will be produced by Shawn Murphy, same as the expanded E.T. CD. Hopefully this actually will happen.

Pendulum Entertainment in New York—of the recent Cocoon CD reissue—will bring us the first CD of Clash of the Titans by Laurence Rosenthal this summer. Fans of the 1981 film will be delighted to hear about this—it's a very good symphonic score from that brief period of big-budget, non-mean-spirited fantasy films in the early 1980s.

There will finally be a CD of The Manchurian Candidate, from Premier Records, also a New York label. This is a great David Amram score to a classic conspiracy film. The album of the original soundtrack will be the first recording available—ever! It's due in November.

On the summer movie scene: I do not know of any current plans for score albums to Speed 2, or even Men in Black the last time I asked. Elliot Goldenthal told Doug Adams that there will be a Batman and Robin score album, but not until after the rock album has had its run alone. It could be a very frustrating summer in this regard for film-score fans. If it's any consolation, many of the summer movie scores which won't be released—not referring to the above, or certainly not to Men in Black—won't be very good. In fact I feel like I've heard them already.

One score I was at a recording session for the other night which is quite good is Marc Shaiman's George of the Jungle. As everyone knows, George of the Jungle has one of the greatest theme songs ever. (Personally, I love the fact how this show/movie is about nothing more than a Tarzan guy named "George," and people yell at him to watch out for that tree, after which he always hits the tree.) Marc has developed the theme quite a bit into all kinds of genres: for the bridge scene (as seen in the trailers) he mixed frenetic comedy music with a symphonic treatment of the theme with out of control big band. It could be his most elaborate score since The Addams Family. Brendan Fraser stopped by the scoring session, which was funny in that here he was on the monitor as George doing all this crazy stuff, and here he was on the couch quietly watching the orchestra.

The Coolest, Funkiest Pieces of '70s Film Music

1. Enter the Dragon main title - Lalo Schifrin

2. The Taking of Pelham One Two Three - David Shire

3. Magnum Force - Lalo Schifrin

4. Dirty Harry rooftop music - Lalo Schifrin

5. Black Belt Jones main theme - Luchi DeJesus/Dennis Coffey (one of them did the main title, one of them did the score, I forget who did what—help!)

6. Escape from the Planet of the Apes main title - Jerry Goldsmith (also to be released on Varese this summer!)

7. Theme from Shaft - Isaac Hayes

8....

Help! What are 8, 9 and 10? Superfly is awesome, but I don't know which one track stands out the most. Three Days of the Condor I love, but it's more mellow than funky. I don't want to include TV for now. Hey, a funny story: three film composers were sitting around deciding what one of them should name his boat. They had all kinds of stupid music nerd jokes like "The C Major" ("sea" major, get it?). Then finally the guy whose boat it was said, forget it, I'm burnt, I'm tired of talking shop—I don't want this name to have anything to do with music! So someone suggested, "How about the Barry De Vorzon?"

Okay, this is more than enough entertainment value for one day. Bookmark this site!