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Posted: |
Feb 26, 2025 - 2:59 AM
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By: |
Hurdy Gurdy
(Member)
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I don't know why (time? place? circumstances? planetary alignment?) but this is probably my All Time Favourite score by Jerry Goldsmith.
I just absolutely love it. Always have. I never tire of it.
I saw the film, on its initial release at the cinema, at the Odeon London Road in Liverpool (I'd be around 16 years of age) and can still see that poster, with the box at the bottom, saying Soundtrack Available on MCA Records/Tapes*.
The film is a tender, melancholy slice of WWII Americana...a bit like a cinematic episode of THE WALTONS, with lovely turns by Sissy Spacek, a young Eric Roberts and the two cute kids (Pre-E.T Henry Thomas being one of them).
And the score is just perfect, underlining every beat with sweetness and tension (shades of PSYCHO II everywhere).
Anyway, while I'm happy that VS released the original album Goldsmith prepared for release back in 1981 (and I've played it to absolute death) this score could do with a nice clean-up operation being done to it.
It's got multiple cross-fades (most tracks feature 2-3 cues squished together), Mexican source music actually stapled to dramatic score cues AND is wildly out of order.
It's maybe a tad too loud too. Who knows what details someone like Mike M or Chris M could reveal with a splendid remaster?
While I don't think there's much extra missing (the session tapes, apart from various re-takes, has a very small transition piece at the end of the Main Title and there is a lengthy piece on the CD - middle section of Runaways - that wasn't used in the film), I hope Intrada (or others) can do what they've done with other MCA titles (MACARTHUR, EIGER SANCTION, THE RIVER) and give this beautiful score the definitive release it deserves, with complete and clean edits of cues in the correct order (and who knows, alternate or more unused music, should it exist).
Anyone with me?
* like HEARTBEEPS around the same time...it was cancelled due to poor box-office (until Varese Sarabande many years later).
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I'm with you! It's a wonderful score and I would love a new and improved edition. I nabbed the quickly-sold-out 2018 Encore Edition that was Robert Townson's final Goldsmith release at Varese Sarabande, but afterwards was disappointed to discover that the new mastering by Erick Labson was a step down from the original CD. I'm sure that Mike M or Chris M could do wonders with the mastering.
I for one would prefer the Mexican source music would be moved to a bonus section at the end; I never understood why it was part of the main program especially when it was a pre-existing tune and not composed by Jerry Goldsmith.
Clean beginnings/endings of cues, re-arranged into chronological order, with any previously unreleased cues (including significant alternates) included? SIGN ME UP! I even went to the trouble of trying to compare the existing album program vs. the written sketches in the holdings of the Academy's Margaret Herrick Library... here's my spreadsheet comparison; I think it's entirely possible that Goldsmith wrote and recorded some music which didn't make it into the film or onto the album:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-biUdrs5TbWb-Yv8C2zcYLecRF540nv2VuUvMKBSGjQ/
Won't know for sure until somebody digs up the original sessions tapes, I guess!
Yavar
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I'm with you! It's a wonderful score and I would love a new and improved edition. I nabbed the quickly-sold-out 2018 Encore Edition that was Robert Townson's final Goldsmith release at Varese Sarabande, but afterwards was disappointed to discover that the new mastering by Erick Labson was a step down from the original CD. I'm sure that Mike M or Chris M could do wonders with the mastering.
I for one would prefer the Mexican source music would be moved to a bonus section at the end; I never understood why it was part of the main program especially when it was a pre-existing tune and not composed by Jerry Goldsmith.
Clean beginnings/endings of cues, re-arranged into chronological order, with any previously unreleased cues (including significant alternates) included? SIGN ME UP! I even went to the trouble of trying to compare the existing album program vs. the written sketches in the holdings of the Academy's Margaret Herrick Library... here's my spreadsheet comparison; I think it's entirely possible that Goldsmith wrote and recorded some music which didn't make it into the film or onto the album:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-biUdrs5TbWb-Yv8C2zcYLecRF540nv2VuUvMKBSGjQ/
Won't know for sure until somebody digs up the original sessions tapes, I guess!
Yavar
Did the Varèse CD program reflect the planned MCA LP?
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Posted: |
Feb 27, 2025 - 2:50 AM
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By: |
Hurdy Gurdy
(Member)
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Obviously Goldsmith had crafted an LP in 1981 and tried to vary things up with the listening experience - it's a relatively short score - by incorporating the Mexican source music in and around his efforts.
But the architecture is lost as a result of the mixing and matching of his music.
The delightful Carnival Theme, which we first hear when Eric Roberts takes the two boys on a rare day out for them, gets a lovely short postlude reprise when he carries them home and straight to bed, completely spent, after their fun packed day.
On the album, Goldsmith quickly adds a dark ominous segue to the postlude, into the threatening tension music for the two locals who persecute and terrorise the Spacek character, which has never sat well with me.
Also, the Copland-like explosion towards the end of Runaways (after the unused music that sounds like LEGEND) loses its impact somewhat, due to the shortened opening bars (from the scene where Spacek quits her phone job and decides to leave town).
And the beautiful Henry & Harry cue (when Roberts has to leave town with the boys crying at his departure) is messed up as you have to listen through a minute and a half of Mexican source music to arrive at the edited opening (and it plays too early in the score programme...it's from a much later sequence in the film).
I really hope Universal have all the materials in ship-shape fashion and will allow one of our labels to deliver this score in the manner it truly deserves.
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But the architecture is lost as a result of the mixing and matching of his music.
Yeah, I get that and I've felt it very strongly about some other Goldsmith scores as presented on their original albums (whyyyy is the Ransom album so bad???)
It's clear from my Google Sheet comparison linked to above, that *either* there's a good chunk of music Goldsmith wrote (and probably recorded) that we've never heard before because it was left off the album and out of the film, *or* there was substantial re-arranging and combination of cues from various parts of the film... or some combination of both. The questions wouldn't really be answered until we get a complete & chronological presentation, and this is one of a handful of Goldsmith feature scores to not have gotten that treatment yet. IMO it's a great score and really deserves it.
I really hope Universal have all the materials in ship-shape fashion and will allow one of our labels to deliver this score in the manner it truly deserves.
Ditto!
Yavar
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Six.
That's gotta be a deal-making threshold.
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Seven.
Practically a cult now.
Let's see, Susan Atkins, Leslie Van Houten, Patricia Krenwinkel, Charles “Tex” Watson, Lynette Alice "Squeaky" Fromme, Ol' Chuck himself - 1 2 3 4 5 ...6 yeah, we were there a whole person ago.
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Would anyone be up for comparing the above spreadsheet to the film itself, and seeing what original cues make up each of the existing album tracks? I'm curious if there are any cues mentioned by the Herrick which are unaccounted-for in the film or on the album. Maybe they're all on there, and it was just a matter of choosing only a single cue title to use as the track title. I don't recall cue joins being obvious on the album but maybe comparing against the film would make them more apparent.
Yavar
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Awesome, thank you! Let us know how it goes, especially if any of the cue titles at the Herrick seem to correspond to scenes or situations which are without music in the film.
Yavar
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I thought I would bump this thread since Connor hasn't yet -- I made him an editor on my shared Google Sheet, and he has contributed his own Film Score Rundown to the bottom of it, based on carefully comparing the film against the existing album:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-biUdrs5TbWb-Yv8C2zcYLecRF540nv2VuUvMKBSGjQ/edit?gid=0#gid=0
It seems that “Watching” and the “Phone Calls” cues are both unused in the film and unreleased on album, while “The Kite” is a short unreleased cue in the film but not contained within the composite album track of the same title. Also it seems like there may potentially be one unreleased original source cue by Goldsmith. (Do I have that right, Connor? Am I overlooking anything?)
There also seem to be some alternates or inserts, and since Goldsmith apparently crafted this album so carefully it would probably be a good idea to pair a reissue of his constructed album (with unused Mexican source cue), with the music as he originally intended/composed/recorded it for the film.
Yavar
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I think the gears of Universal still move relatively slowly, but let's cross our fingers and hope. I have shared our research with Roger at Intrada, who I know is an admirer of this score.
Yavar
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