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I also wonder if the liner notes will reveal who the L.A. cymbalom player was. I'd be surprised if it was Emil Richards, who can play anything percussive. He even played with Harry Partch; not too many session players can make that claim.
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BRM and all other arguing...stop please.
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What great luck for us John Barry fans. Can’t wait to hear it all—music from that magical period in John Barry’s career when he was at the top of his craft.
Chris
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I vastly prefer the album presentation, but it is definitely interesting to hear both. It's quite a different experience.
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Gosh, no the album and the film score are two completely separate things, in this case.
The score in the film is dramatically perfect, but it is necessarily low in tone and limited in movement.
It never lifts off, musically.
It never starts to swing, twirl or dance—and that makes it dry as 'listening' music.
The album is cleverly conceived.
I love the way it takes a selection of music from the score but expands it, and inserts versions of the theme that add the movement necessarily missing in the film score.
It transforms a grim dramatic score into a nice album that contains both the drama and the swing.
To that extent, I must concur that the King Rat album is a superior listening experience to the film score.
BUT: it is fascinating to experience the score purely as it was in the film and I wouldn't pass on it ever.
Cheers
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When I first listened to the more upbeat and dramatic pieces I was puzzled. I couldn't figure out how they fit into the film unless they were for flashbacks of the characters.
Only aftweer rewatching the film did I realize Barry was doing a ' variations on a theme' LP only arrangements.
Same thing was done for IPCRESS.
It was a great concept imho.
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Just played the score portion of King Rat ("There's a Stereo In My Study") and what a wonder. One of the things I've always loved about Barry was that he always had a clear vision as to who he was and what he wanted to be. In 1965, with a #1 album on the charts, two recent scores showcasing opposite sides of 60s London (swinging The Knack and cold-war The Ipcress File), another Bond score in the works, plus a looming deal with Columbia Records coming up, Barry scores this low-key prisoner of war black and white drama and eschews the temptation to "liven it up" with either period big band swing or catchy military marches, as in The Great Escape or Bridge on the River Kwai. In 1965 Barry could have ridden his Bond reputation and scored countless spy and detective flicks, rat pack films, anything calling for a big brassy sound and turned that Columbia deal into a license to turn everything into a commercial jazz/pop/orchestral blend. He had the confidance and vision to not only score films like King Rat but score them in probably more of a downbeat fashion than anyone would have.
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) 
