Category: 1997

Categories
1968 1997 Film P Planet Of The Apes Soundtracks

Planet Of The Apes – music by Jerry Goldsmith

Planet Of The ApesSo much has been written down through the years about the influential career milestone that was Jerry Goldsmith‘s score for Planet Of The Apes that I’ve resisted reviewing it for a long time. It’s well known that it’s an unsettling, unconventional listening experience, with or without the movie. What is there to add to that?

The funny thing, however, is in giving it a fresh listen and finding that a lot of it is actually in a familiar orchestral vein. In some ways, it’s the exact opposite of Goldsmith’s later score to 1976‘s Logan’s Run, which starts out synthetic and becomes lushly orchestral only when the characters leave their artificially constructed, computer-regulated environment. Planet Of The Apes starts out aboard a futuristic spacecraft, familiar ground for many a science fiction flick, but then both the movie and the music ditch those familiar trappings for a desperate, primitive quest for survival.

Frequently, this is accomplished with a wall of percussion that, up until this point, viewers and listeners just didn’t expect to hear next to an orchestra. But it really isn’t until “The Search Continues” that Goldsmith pushes the music into a space where it’s barely recognizable to our ears as music. Using some novel instrumental effects, he creates the disconcerting audio equivalent of chittering apes. “The Hunt” uses the call of a primitive horn to raise the tension as Taylor (Charlton Heston) tries to lead a colony of humans to freedom.

Goldsmith eschews some obvious avenues for more traditional scoring at other points too – the short cue “A New Mate” is anything but sexy; instead it’s uneasy, as the apes prod him and a primitive human woman together. “The Revelation” plays up Taylor’s horror at discovering what’s happened to his surviving shipmate.

“The Trial” again uses existing instrumentation in unconventional ways to play out the parody of the Scopes monkey trial in which Taylor is railroaded and fast-tracked for execution simply because of what he represents. After that, the score is surprisingly low-key, seeming to rumble toward what seems like either an inevitable grim fate or a daring escape… only to culminate, like the movie, in both at the same time.

Rounding things off is a 16-minute suite of music from Goldsmith’s only follow-up in the Apes film series, Escape From The Planet Of The Apes, which presents a nice “highlight reel” of that movie’s music, which was all the more surprising for not following in the footsteps of what Goldsmith created for the first movie. (Varese would later release the entire Escape score on its own as a limited edition in 2009.)

Jerry Goldsmith did accomplish some amazing sounds with Planet Of The Apes, but perhaps even more significantly, he laid the groundwork for the use of unconventional percussion in film scoring to signify the otherworldly and the uninviting. 4 out of 4The percussion lexicon he all but created here led to such things as the Sand People music in Star Wars, Bear McCreary‘s wall of eastern percussion throughout the TV remake of Battlestar Galactica, and many, many others. The shadow cast by the music of Planet Of The Apes looms large over many familiar future scores in the same genre. Jerry Goldsmith just happened to get there first.

Order this CD

  1. 20th Century Fox Fanfare (0:15)
  2. Main Title (2:12)
  3. Crash Landing (6:39)
  4. The Searchers (2:26)
  5. The Search Continues (4:57)
  6. The Clothes Snatchers (3:09)
  7. The Hunt (5:10)
  8. A New Mate (1:05)
  9. The Revelation (3:22)
  10. No Escape (5:40)
  11. The Trial (1:45)
  12. New Identity (2:26)
  13. A Bid For Freedom (2:38)
  14. The Forbidden Zone (3:23)
  15. The Intruders (1:10)
  16. The Cave (1:20)
  17. The Revelation (Part II) (3:25)
  18. Suite: Escape From The Planet Of The Apes (16:27)

Released by: Varese Sarabande / 20th Century Fox Film Scores
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 67:29

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Categories
1962 1997 Artists (by group or surname) Non-Soundtrack Music Raymond Scott S

Raymond Scott – Soothing Sounds For Baby, Volume 1

3 min read

In the formative days of electronic music, one name stands out because it wasn’t associated only with that genre. Raymond Scott, whose unorthodox jazz pieces were less improvised than they were drilled to perfection (long before they were appropriated by Carl Stalling to serve as the soundtrack to the early Bugs Bunny cartoons), was a major American innovator in electronic music. Now, keep in mind, this is far enough back that “electronic music” meant generating and tweaking sounds electrically, and it often yielded results that tended more toward musical abstraction than precision or perfection. (Which is surprising considering Scott’s don’t-deviate-from-the-program jazz days.) Raymond Scott, however, saw the potential of the studio, and purely electrical devices, as instruments in their own right. (If you need evidence of Scott’s pedigree in electronic music, he once counted Robert Moog as an employee.)

Billed as “an infant’s friend in sound,” volume one of Soothing Sounds For Baby relies heavily on mesmerizing repetition – a sort of sonic highway hypnosis. To adult ears, it might seem tinny and grating, but after a while it’s quite relaxing. And with a one-month-old child to test it out on, I can offer an answer to a question that doesn’t come up often when doing music reviews – “Does it work?” – with a resounding yes. Though I’ve already introduced him to such things as the Moody Blues Days Of Future Passed and the Katamari Damacy soundtrack, Soothing Sounds helps to get my son to sleepyland in short order, even if he’s agitated by a loud noise elsewhere in the house or some other recent disturbance. Mr. Scott’s electronic music box gets him right back to sleep, and that’s why we call him the miracle worker.

Now, in some cases, I’m not quite sure how these miracles work – the last two tracks out of five drive me nuts. “Nursery Rhyme” sounds a bit like the alarm on an ’80s digital watch going off, while “Tic-Toc” is exactly as advertised – several minutes of a two-note “tick-tock” sound, which almost seems like it was played on the electronic equivalent of cowbells. But nothing knocks the kiddo out like “Tic-Toc”, so what do I know? Soothing Sounds For Baby seems to have gained new life as a historical curiosity and an 4 out of 4early footnote in ambient music, but let’s not forget that it does exactly what it says on the box. And for that reason, I’ve gotten very well acquainted with it indeed and can recommend it to anyone whose baby needs some tunes of their own.

Order this CD

  1. Lullaby (14:05)
  2. Sleepy Time (4:19)
  3. The Music Box (6:13)
  4. Nursery Rhyme (5:48)
  5. Tic-Toc (8:03)

Released by: Basta
Release date: 1962 (CD reissue in 1997)
Total running time: 38:28

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Categories
1997 S Soundtracks Star Trek Video Game / Computer Game

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy

4 min read

This is an item that took years to track down for my soundtrack collection, and the history of Starfleet Command – and its rarity – is a story unto itself. Bearing the slightly inaccurate legend “Award-winning music from the composer of numerous TV series and Star Trek movies, Ron Jones” (Jones never scored a Trek movie, and over half of the CD’s music was composed by someone else), this CD is the soundtrack from the hit computer game Star Trek: Starfleet Academy. But what’s with the rarity? Surely anything bearing the Star Trek name would be mass-marketed to a fault, wouldn’t it?

In 1998, indie label Sonic Images (started by Christopher Franke of Tangerine Dream and at the time best known for its ongoing series of Babylon 5 “episodic” CDs, each containing the entire score to just one show), won the license to give the Starfleet Academy soundtrack a general release. And around the same time, Sony was prepping its nicely remastered and gorgeously packaged re-release on CD of the Star Trek: The Motion Picture soundtrack, which had been out of print for several years.

But there was one other thing that happened in 1998 that nixed both of those releases: Paramount wanted to give priority to marketing the then-upcoming Star Trek: Insurrection. The studio told Sony and Sonic Images to hold their releases back; Sony later released The Motion Picture 2-CD set in 1999 (which worked better anyway, as that was the film’s 20th anniversary), but Sonic Images’ license was not renewed by Paramount. The label had a warehouse full of pressed CDs, and wanted to renew the license and release that inventory. But Paramount wouldn’t budge – and so Starfleet Academy‘s soundtrack, for most, never saw the light of day.

Rumors abounded about the cause of the cancellation, including the possibility that Rick Berman, who had input into Star Trek product licensing, nixed the release to retaliate against former Star Trek: The Next Generation composer Ron Jones’ less-than-flattering comments about his time on the series. Whatever the reason, the only copies of Starfleet Academy that made it into the public’s hands came in the form of premium offers, a limited edition run of the game which included the soundtrack CD, and advance copies of the CD sent out to video game and music journalists ahead of the Sonic Images release. With its cutscenes starring William Shatner and George Takei, and its lush musical score composed and conducted by someone who had actually been connected to the franchise, Starfleet Academy was something of a big deal at the time. Thus ends the tumultuous story of the soundtrack’s premature demise.

Where the music itself is concerned, the first ten tracks will be familiar to those who fondly recall Jones’ music from the first four seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation. His signature sound is sweeping, nautical, and dramatic, paying homage equally to the Star Trek film scores of James Horner and the late, great Jerry Goldsmith and melding those sensibilities nicely. Some of the passages of Starfleet Academy’s musical score are very reminiscent of Jones’ fourth-season Next Generation episode The Nth Degree, and it’s all great stuff – the sort of adventurous bombast that became verboten on the TV series, and yet makes the soundtrack for this computer game sound like a legitimate entry in the movie series.

Jones protegè Brian Luzietti provides the remainder of the music for Starfleet Academy, and while it’s interesting to hear someone attempt to reach toward the same style, some of Luzietti’s tracks don’t quite have the “oomph” of Jones’ music. Then again, that’s probably also a side effect of hearing the music outside of its intended medium – these things would probably Rating: 4 out of 4go unnoticed buried under the layers of sound effects and pre-recorded dialogue that typically accompany a computer game from the 1990s. Luzietti is at his best when he’s doing his own thing and not trying to meet Jones halfway stylistically, and some of his tracks are quite listenable indeed – and legitimately Trekkish, with throwbacks to the Alexander Courage fanfare for the original series.

    Can't order this CD
  1. Starfleet Academy Theme (4:07)
  2. Surrounded (2:22)
  3. Evasive Maneuvers (2:22)
  4. Exploring The Unknown (1:57)
  5. On The Edge (2:49)
  6. Crew Introduction (1:50)
  7. Red Alert (2:49)
  8. On To Victory (2:22)
  9. Discovery (1:59)
  10. No Way Out (2:22)
  11. To Stop The Vanguard (3:41)
  12. Personal Problems (0:40)
  13. Romulan Suicide (1:04)
  14. Kirk’s Briefing (1:19)
  15. Venturi Suite (3:03)
  16. Sneaking Instincts (1:21)
  17. The Vanguard’s Plans (1:35)
  18. Log – Looking Grim (1:04)
  19. Log – Mission Accomplished (1:04)
  20. Log – Situation Normal (1:05)
  21. Thoughts Before The Briefing (1:38)
  22. Forester – Captain Of The Enterprise (4:00)

Released by: Interplay Productions (1998 Sonic Images release cancelled)
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 46:44

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Categories
1997 C Film Soundtracks

Contact – music by Alan Silvestri

3 min read

One of the most atypically-scored science fiction films of the 1990s, Contact is also yet another chapter in the long-running collaboration between director Robert Zemeckis and composer Alan Silvestri (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Forrest Gump). While not as epic an ongoing partnership as, say, Spielberg and John Williams, the Zemeckis/Silvestri pairing has resulting in some fine marriages between imagery and music, and Contact may well be the best of those collaborations.

Before I get much further with my rantings about how atypical a science fiction movie score this is, it’s also worth pointing out that Contact is hardly a typical science fiction movie. It does have imagination-sparking ideas and some fine action and special effects set pieces, but it’s also a character study at its heart. So given those moments of intense action, and the even greater scenes of awe and wonder, Contact gets a surprisingly subdued musical treatment; a good chunk of the almost eight-minute-long end credits is solo piano, as are some of the other cues selected for the soundtrack album.

I did like Silvestri’s equally low-key moments of menace and revelation, however: “The Primer”, which plays during one of the movie’s most pivotal moments, is one of those cues that just opens up like a flower at a certain point, introducing a slithering, arpeggiating synth motif that shows up a few other times in conjunction with the aliens’ message and technology. That sound weaves its way in and out of what is otherwise a much more acoustic, orchestral score, and while it makes for a noticeable contrast, it’s subtle enough to never quite become jarring.

When the opportunity arrives to do big action scenes, Silvestri doesn’t hold back – “Ellie’s Bogey”, “Good To Go” and “Test Run Bomber” are great examples of those moments, even if they’re not necessarily the heart of the movie or its music.

Overall, it’s probably not quite what you’d expect, but the same could be said of the movie itself. (And for all 4 out of 4those who have written me over the years to tell me that Contact the movie bears almost no resemblence to “Contact” the novel, I get the message, thanks.) If not one of the best – that’s really subjective – it’s certainly one of the most interesting SF film scores of the late 1990s, and I recommend it at least for that.

Order this CD

  1. An Awful Waste Of Space (1:43)
  2. Ellie’s Bogey (3:25)
  3. The Primer (6:21)
  4. Really Confused (1:18)
  5. Test Run Bomber (4:27)
  6. Heart Attack (1:31)
  7. Media Event (1:25)
  8. Button Me Up (1:19)
  9. Good To Go (5:11)
  10. No Words (1:42)
  11. Small Moves (5:35)
  12. I Believe Her (2:32)
  13. Contact – End Credits (7:59)

Released by: Warner Bros.
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 44:31

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Categories
1970 1997 M Moody Blues Non-Soundtrack Music

Moody Blues – To Our Children’s Children’s Children

Moody Blues - To Our Children's Children's ChildrenPossibly inspired by the moon shots of 1969, To Our Children’s Children’s Children is an interesting musical document of awe and wonder, and you can hear Hayward and Lodge turning over in their minds the implications of that decade-defining triumph of technology and determination. That rebirth of wonderment and subsequent wrestling with the realization that this triumph could be used for either good or ill is very much the theme of the album, starting with the cacophonous opening of “Higher And Higher”, evoking the sound of a rocket launch (or is that a bomb blast?) from up close and even featuring processed spoken vocals that could conceivably remind one of voices transmitted from space.

“Eyes Of A Child” furthers this theme by appearing twice on the album, in radically different forms. The first treatment is gentle and, sonically, appropriately childlike and quite relaxing. The second version is faster-paced, heavy with electric guitars, and filled with a somewhat more mature, one might even say rebellious, energy – and yet it’s the same song.. I thought that was a fascinating concept, and the Moodies did it just enough to avoid it being too repetitive. “I Never Thought I’d Live To Be A Hundred” and “I Never Thought I’d Live To Be A Million” provide another – somewhat opposite – set of matching bookends.

“Beyond” is a rousing instrumental with a dreamy, ethereal middle section, and leads directly into a quartet of some of the best material the Moodies ever put on record. “Out And In”, the churning “Gypsy”, and the wistful one-two punch of “Eternity Road” and “Candle Of Life” are a consecutive home run streak of winners. The album closes out with another winner, the gentle but eminently hummable “Watching And Waiting”.

4 out of 4Overall, To Our Children’s Children’s Children is one of the Moody Blues’ best efforts, and one of the best reflections of a lyrical style that is uniquely theirs. Their words express concerns and worries about the human condition, present and future, without taking the banal (and, for future listeners lacking the context, commercially fatal) route of making things topical. Even knowing the events that were going on when these songs were written is entirely optional – it becomes a subtext, not a context vital to understanding the songs. Beautiful stuff – there simply isn’t enough music like this around.

Order this CD

  1. Higher And Higher (4:11)
  2. Eyes Of A Child I (3:23)
  3. Floating (3:00)
  4. Eyes Of A Child II (1:22)
  5. I Never Thought I’d Live To Be A Hundred (1:05)
  6. Beyond (2:58)
  7. Out And In (3:41)
  8. Gypsy (3:33)
  9. Eternity Road (4:18)
  10. Candle Of Life (4:18)
  11. Sun Is Still Shining (3:36)
  12. I Never Thought I’d Live To Be A Million (0:33)
  13. Watching And Waiting (4:16)

Released by: Threshold / Polydor
Release date: 1970 / remastered & reissued 1997
Total running time: 40:20

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Categories
1997 Soundtracks Television X Xena: Warrior Princess

Xena: Warrior Princess Volume 2

Xena: Warrior Princess Volume 2A few tracks into the second CD of music from Xena: Warrior Princess, one gets a general feeling of “westernization” on this album. No, not meaning that suddenly everything’s gotten to be like a guitar-twanging score from a Fellini western, but that the Mediterranean elements that so characterized the early scores are starting to be phased out in favor of a more traditional western/orchestral tone.

With the second season’s exploration of slightly less serious, campier territory than the first, little musical numbers began to creep in as well, though I’m happy to hear the “Joxer The Mighty” song here – Joxer remains my favorite character in the Herc/Xenaverse, and for God’s sake, someone build some surreal sitcom around Ted Raimi in a starring role now, it’ll be gold. But I digress. There are also grander vocal outings as well, with the operatic “Xena Kicks Bacchae Butt” and more understated “At Mother’s Tomb”. Suffice to say, season two’s overall tone is accurately reflected in this collection of music from that year.

With tracks 9 and 10, I find myself thinking primarily one thought: “Wow, Joe LoDuca listened to Peter Gabriel’s Passion somewhere between the first two seasons, didn’t he?” LoDuca (well, I think it’s LoDuca – see related notes in our recent review of the first volume of Xena music) throws in some modernization on the percussive end of things, reminding me of nothing so much as some of the more interesting (if anachronistic) tracks from the aforementioned album which gathered Gabriel’s soundtrack cues for The Last Temptation Of Christ. Not that this is altogether a bad thing, mind you.

3 out of 4There’s also some seasonal fun with a healthy helping of music from A Solstice Carol, a Christmas-themed episode which made for some loving musical tips of the yuletide hat.

Overall, an interesting CD whose music is indicative of an overall shift in the “feel” of the series.

Order this CD

  1. Main Title (1:22)
  2. At Mother’s Tomb (3:00)
  3. Xena Kicks Bacchae Butt (2:03)
  4. Pop Goes Xena (1:11)
  5. Quicksand (1:25)
  6. Squeal (2:01)
  7. Sword Play (1:27)
  8. Homeland (3:29)
  9. Capoiera Fight (1:23)
  10. Many Winters Ago (2:17)
  11. Stowaway (1:53)
  12. You Really Believe That (1:05)
  13. Rrarr! (3:48)
  14. Friend (1:37)
  15. Crucifixion Of Xena / Up The Mountain (2:28)
  16. To The Rescue (1:42)
  17. Fighting Destiny (2:08)
  18. Talk With Solan (1:12)
  19. The Ballad of Joxer the Mighty (1:12)
  20. Solstice Night (2:13)
  21. The First Fate / Suspended Gabby (3:22)
  22. Where As Me / Gabby & Toys (2:20)
  23. More Fun And Games / Feather Fight (3:12)
  24. Hard Core Fishing (1:23)
  25. River Wild (1:37)
  26. Xena Is Bitten (1:33)
  27. Restoration (2:11)
  28. Caught In The Current (3:48)
  29. Callisto Becomes A God (2:04)
  30. Swamp Creatures / Imposter (2:40)

Released by: Varese Sarabande
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 67:03

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Categories
1997 L Soundtracks Television

Tales From A Parallel Universe

3 min read

Order this CDIn a weird way, Lexx shares a kind of musical heritage with Classic Star Trek – a “library” approach to its original musical score which involved certain pieces cropping up again and again in certain situations. And much like the original Star Trek, I’d begrudge that re-use more if it weren’t for the fact that the original pieces in question are so strong.

Tales From A Parallel Universe (the title of the US release; elsewhere, as with the series that spawned it, the CD is simply titled Lexx) consists of the four made-for-TV movies that comprised Lexx’s first “season”, and the universe-building pilot movie, I Worship His Shadow, is the source of the best music that the series ever had to offer. Bucking a lot of cinematic scoring sensibilities, composer Marty Simon throws everything into the stew for I Worship His Shadow: hard rock guitar licks, dance club synths, operatic vocals, silky saxophone and brooding orchestral menace. Sure, it’s probably all sampled or synthesized, but it’s done so well that pieces like “Prisoner Transport” and “Welcome To The Dark Zone” withstand repeated listening (not to mention repeated play throughout the series; the latter track is used as the end credit music for every episode from season two onward; in fact, the basic melodies of every theme song Lexx ever had can be found on this disc if you listen carefully). The synth-orchestral-choral mix and echoing guitar riffs give the series’ sound an epic but yet playful kick.

Keeping in mind that this music is from a series of movies, there’s no one consistent theme running through everything, but there is a consistent style – and in some ways, that lack of a traditional TV soundtrack structure is used to tremendous effect here music is juxtaposed with the occasional soundbyte from the 4 out of 4movies (but nothing excessive, certainly nothing on the level of the between-every-song banter from the Apollo 13 soundtrack, for example).

It’s sad that this one has gone out of print and has become a creature of the used music market. It really is very good.

  1. Cluster Anthem (0:37)
  2. Prisoner Transport (2:06)
  3. Snake Chase (3:35)
  4. Welcome To The Dark Zone (0:56)
  5. Battle Of The Universe (1:07)
  6. Planet Cruise (2:46)
  7. Poet Man (3:52)
  8. Cryochamber (4:01)
  9. Love Muscle (1:50)
  10. Gigashadow March (2:57)
  11. Yo-A-O (Fight Song of the Brunnen-G) (0:50)
  12. The Lexx Escape (2:31)
  13. Zev’s Shower (3:15)
  14. Cleric Theme (2:31)
  15. Kai Collapse (5:16)
  16. Shadows And Prophets (8:57)
  17. Feppo’s Party (3:18)
  18. Milk Fed Boys (0:54)
  19. Brunnis (2:21)
  20. Fantasy Dance (2:17)
  21. Moth Ride (2:26)

Released by: Varese Sarabande
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 58:20

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Categories
1997 John Lennon L Non-Soundtrack Music

Lennon Legend: The Very Best Of John Lennon

John Lennon - Lennon Legend: The Very Best Of John LennonIf George Harrison is my favorite Beatle, who’s number two? If I’m to be honest, I can’t choose between Paul McCartney and John Lennon. Each has his own strenghts: McCartney is unequaled when it comes to ballads and beguiling melodies, but if I want something more akin to straight-ahead rock ‘n’ roll, I’ve got to go with John. Sometime back, I traded in my copy of Double Fantasy and got Lennon Legend instead, and it was definitely a trade up, eliminating the need to skip every other track. I’m not one of these Beatles fanboys who rants endlessly about Yoko Ono breaking up the band, I just don’t like her voice or her music on their own merits. Lennon Legend alleviates the elaborate CD player programming required to skip Yoko’s stuff, since it’s all of John’s best. Still my all-time favorite Lennon tune is one of my personal theme songs from the soundtrack of my life, “Watching The Wheels”, though “Nobody Told Me” runs a close second in favorites from John’s post-Beatles repertoire. He occasionally gets a little bit out there (“#9 Dream”, anyone?), but he’s still got his rock ‘n’ roll chops with “(Just Like) Starting Over” and even gives McCartney a run for his balladeer money with “Woman”. And overplayed as it is, and as frequently misread from a lyrical standpoint as it is, I still have to admit that it’s hard to beat “Imagine” or “Jealous Guy” (I’ve always been a huge fan of the latter especially).

So is there any Lennon that I don’t like? Believe it or not, I skip “Give Peace A Chance” almost every time I put this disc in the player. Nor am I partial to “Whatever Gets You Through The Night”, but I can still listen to it; to this day I’m convinced that “Peace” is forever included in Lennon’s best-of collections more for its historical curiosity value, and its association with the man and his views, than for its musical worth. Great sentiment, perhaps a decent song…not the best performance, though.

Still, a solid collection on which you’re almost certain to find something that you liked back in the days when it was getting steady radio airplay (perhaps even before Lennon’s death, if you’re as old as I am or older), and maybe something new to like as well.

As critical as I am of Double Fantasy, by the way, it does have its value musically. Once, a couple of jobs ago, I was trying to bring something to my boss’ attention but he was busy schmoozing on a seemingly 4 out of 4endless network conference call. So, before leaving the second floor to go about my business, I calmly reversed my CD track programming to play only the Yoko Ono tracks on Double Fantasy, cranked the office stereo, and quietly walked downstairs. I can still hear the anguished shouts and screams from the second floor to this day.

Order this CD

  1. Imagine (3:04)
  2. Instant Karma! (3:21)
  3. Mother (3:56)
  4. Jealous Guy (4:16)
  5. Power To The People (3:20)
  6. Cold Turkey (5:01)
  7. Love (3:24)
  8. Mind Games (4:14)
  9. Whatever Gets You Through The Night (3:21)
  10. #9 Dream (4:48)
  11. Stand By Me (3:29)
  12. (Just Like) Starting Over (3:56)
  13. Woman (3:28)
  14. Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy) (4:02)
  15. Watching The Wheels (3:33)
  16. Nobody Told Me (3:35)
  17. Borrowed Time (4:31)
  18. Working Class Hero (3:52)
  19. Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (3:35)
  20. Give Peace A Chance (4:52)

Released by: EMI/Parlophone
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 77:38

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1997 Bill Mumy M Non-Soundtrack Music

Bill Mumy – Dying To Be Heard

Bill Mumy - Dying To Be HeardYou may know him as Lennier or Will Robinson or that creepy kid who cropped up again after 40 years in the Twilight Zone, but Bill Mumy’s also a more than capable musician, as demonstrated by this early solo effort.

It’s easy to say that Dylan is a prominent influence on Mumy’s own brand of singwriting, but think electric Dylan here. Mumy lets loose with some wailing electric guitar work in the background of his folky tunes. “Ambiguous Sky / Monte” is not only the best example of this electric-era Dylan influence, but it’s a catchy song with a very Dylanesque lyric. But Mumy isn’t just paying homage to Bob Dylan for the whole running time of the CD – at other times, he backs off of the electrics and goes for a feel-good folky sound, as with “My Sweet Seleena”. Other highlights include “Our Beautiful Life” and “Yes You In The Blue”.

And finally, you may laugh at the thought of Mumy penning a heartfelt, somber tune called “The Ballad Of William Robinson”, but don’t you dare laugh. It’s the crowning jewel of Dying To Be Heard, and actually puts a mature spin on Mumy’s adolescent Lost In Space character, updating us on what has happened to the Robinson family since their last televised adventures. The performance is outstanding, it’s some of Mumy’s best singing, and the whole song is built around a positively mesmerizing guitar lick with some equally hypnotic (and appropriately spaced-out) keyboard backing courtesy of Mumy’s son Seth. A must-listen, whether you liked the song’s inspiration or not.

3 out of 4It’s a pity that Bill Mumy isn’t the musical superstar he deserves to be. I applaud his acting talents, and I’ve always enjoyed them, but sometimes I think his screen fame has shafted him when it comes to getting his music taken seriously. Just about any Bill Mumy album will help you recover from the notion that every actor’s musical ambitions must necessarily culminate in a disaster of Golden Throats proportions. I highly recommend this one to you.

Order this CD

  1. Nero’s Fiddle (4:03)
  2. My Sweet Seleena (3:51)
  3. Ambiguous Sky / Monte (6:08)
  4. In The Grand Scheme Of Things (3:27)
  5. Dying To Be Heard (3:35)
  6. Our Beautiful Life (5:42)
  7. Yes You In The Blue (5:14)
  8. Waiting (Little Seattle Junkie) (7:48)
  9. Denver Thing (3:19)
  10. I Know We All Go (2:27)
  11. The Ballad Of William Robinson (3:35)

Released by: Renaissance Records
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 51:52

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Categories
1997 H Home Cookin' Non-Soundtrack Music

Home Cookin’ – Mmm, Mmm, Mmm

Home Cookin' - Mmm, Mmm, MmmA snapshot of Home Cookin’ at the height of its funk-with-a-live-horn-section greatness, Mmm, Mmm, Mmm may not make a big splash with those who weren’t there when this kind of music was all over the radio. For those of us who did grow up in the ’70s, this is the big, orchestrated sound of funky soul, and it was good to find someone still keeping that alive in the ’90s. Had A Feelin’ and Home Cookin’s signature single “X-Rated Superstar” may well be the best examples of that sound on here. “All Talk” soft-pedals the funk elements in favor of an almost Caribbean sound complete with steel drums, while “Golden Rule” has a nice simple message about not treating people badly – a neat little number that puts Home Cookin’s pedigree as purveyors of true ’70s-style feel-good soul on proud display.

In the wake of the band’s break-up, many of the rhythm section players have reformed as Mo’ Friction, and while I’m sure they’re at the top of their game, there was nothing quite like Home Cookin’ blasting away at full 4 out of 4volume with a real live horn section. Sure, maybe it made the band large, top-heavy and hard to keep together as a unit, but that sound – you know, the one we rarely hear these days outside of modern acts sampling the hell out of real vintage ’70s soul – has almost got to be worth the logistical headaches. And if only for that sound, I miss Home Cookin’. Maybe we need a reunion gig or two, guys?

Order this CD

  1. X-Rated Superstar (3:34)
  2. Hold Tight (3:08)
  3. Against The Grain (3:10)
  4. All Talk (2:38)
  5. Somebody (2:54)
  6. Needle’s Sting (4:15)
  7. Golden Rule (4:54)
  8. Had A Feelin’ (4:41)
  9. Soul Space Express (4:17)
  10. Words (3:27)
  11. Rock It Man (4:48)
  12. Cricket (3:40)
  13. Shine It On (4:17)
  14. Second Guess (4:56)

Released by: Fly Records
Release date: 1997
Total running time: 54:39

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