Just like seeing fire shoot out of your headphones, this music is dissident, jarring and discordant! That's not easy to do and still be listenable. Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Sun-Ra, and all the free jazz cats blowing in lofts at 3 o'clock in the morning have nothing on this short piece that rumbles along like some kind of freight train from Hell shot off like a rocket into outer space in about 47 seconds! Whew! Try and imagine the whole Miles Davis Quintet falling down a flight of stairs together, then at the bottom they just dust themselves off and go on like nothing ever happened. That's what Daniel J. White came up with for this hunt and capture scene. It's short, it's nuts! It's chaos!! It's beautiful!!!
Monday, January 21, 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
MAROONED - "Title Credits" (1969)
Never did consider the 1969 Oscar winning film "Marooned" to be a 'Monster Movie' by any means, but it is in space, okay, that's good, but it's not scary, and there's no monsters!! Still, there's a fascinating little story here. More science than science fiction, they chose to use electronic sounds instead of big orchestrated music as background. So, there is no score for this movie, I guess the sound guys, Les Fresholtz and Arthur Piantadosi get the credit since it's more sounds than music. They did get an Oscar nod for 'Best Sound' but they didn't win. Neat stuff, quite unique, and the only thing boring about it, is the feeling that a drill is boring into your cranium!! Good job guys!! By the way, Netflix is streaming this movie, so you can watch it whenever you want! Decent quality too!!
Saturday, January 19, 2008
GASU NINGEN DAI ICHIGO (The Human Vapor) - Kunio Miyauchi - "Modern Bar-Traditional Dance" (1960)
Kunio Miyauchi composed music for Ultraman and Godzilla exclusively except for this title from 1960, "The Human Vapor." Right up there with "The H-Man" as far as gaseous people and cool music is concerned, this is another one of those films you should go out of your way to try and find a copy somehow.
There are two great bar scenes where glib Detective Okamoto and his girlfriend, nosey Reporter Kyoko are discussing the case with a very witty dialogue exchange, and some swingin' with-it music In The Background.
Then, towards the end of the film, the librarian, aka the human vapor is trying to take in a beautiful show of traditional Japanese music. Of course the crowd gets in, gets ants in their pants real fast, and after one unruly guy yells out, "Bring on the strippers!" you know some body's going to pay! They really shouldn't push the librarian like that!
Fujichiyo Kasuga as the dancer.
Kishiro Katada was the supervisor for the.....Traditional Music
Friday, January 18, 2008
THE DEVIL'S MESSENGER - Alfred Gwynn - "Don Freaks Out" (1961)
After that break, seemed like a good time to do something simple, unfortunately for me this is no simple tale. In the movie "The Devil's Messenger," you have a small series of vignettes hosted by Satan himself in the guise of Lon Chaney Jr. This piece starts off with the title music composed by Alfred Gwynn. The sound quality in Hell is not that great!
This is the only film that composer Alfred Gwynn ever worked on, but the two guys in this scene have an unbelievable history! Ralph Brown (with the glasses) as Charlie, started his career playing himself as a tap dancer in a 1946 film called "Jivin' In Be-Bop", starring, for all you jazz buffs, none other than Mr. Dizzy Gillespie, with James Moody, Milt Jackson, Ray Brown, Helen Humes, and Benny Carter. John Crawford (not to get mixed up with The Rifleman's son Johnny Crawford) had a TV and movie history they should make a movie about! His way amazing career started off in 1933, in a small film called "King Kong," as a 'native dancer'. The rest of his career is like opening up a TV Guide from the 60's to the 80's. It will leave you breathless. Probably in the 70's, if this guy showed up at your house for dinner, you'd think he was part of your family because his face would be more familiar than a lot of your cousins! Hey John, Cheers!!
Thursday, January 17, 2008
ZOMBIES ( I Eat Your Skin) - Lon E. Norman - "Voodoo Love Etc" (1964)
The daily routine of this blog is a lot of work. It's starting to wear me down and I think they're going to come and take me away, ha,ha, to the looney bin here real soon unless I take a break. I do believe I hear The Islands calling my name, so let's all go back to the joyous festivities and fun of Del Tenney's "I Eat Your Skin." Okay, so this film was actually shot in Florida, but that's just going to have to do! This film is mandatory viewing for any of you tribal/zombie/mad doctor/voodoo/islands fans out there, and it's pretty easy to get your hands on a copy. Mahalo ya'll!!
The music for this love scene is the ultimate something, I can't quite put my finger on it, maybe bizarrely grandiose would describe it about right. She says "I need you" to Tom, the dude with one of the coolest widow's peaks ever, and the next thing you know the music sounds like a herd of elephants is trampling a village, and then the music gets all noodley and just fizzles out in the end with a bongo drum solo. Huh?
That was relaxing, but the time sure went by fast, it's already time to go Back to Work!!
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
FIRST MAN INTO SPACE - Buxton Orr - "Theme & Truck Death" (1959)
Scottish Doctor, Teacher, Composer Buxton Orr was responsible for the music on a fair share of cool movies including some titles like "The Haunted Strangler", "Fiend Without A Face", "Dr. Blood's Coffin", and "The Snake Woman."
It's not often you get to see the word 'Amalgamated' on the big screen, or actually almost any place, so bask in it's glory!
The soundtrack for "First Man Into Space" is highly orchestrated, but there is this one little scene where the truck driver, portrayed by Roland Brand is saying goodbye to his gal, and there's music coming from his radio. It's 1959, and the sound is swinging. They smooch and part, only for him to uh, let's just say he has an accident!
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
SANTO CONTRA BLUE DEMON EN LA ATLANTIDA (Santo vs. Blue Demon in Atlantis) - Gustavo César Carrión - "Title & Fight Scenes" (1970)
Just realized the other day that we really haven't come up with any movies from the year 1950 yet, so we figure we can throw in one or two from 1970, and it will balance everything out, besides, you really wouldn't want us to leave out this classic little jewel now, would you? Didn't think so. To look at the credits of Gustavo César Carrión, you'd think he was the only composer in all Mexico. This cat did it all, Santo, Blue Demon, Brainiac, vampires, witches, you name it, the maestro Gustavo has put music to it, and it all started in 1950!! So, here's music from the opening credits of "Santo Contra Blue Demon En La Atlántida." Great snapping snare, rumbling kettle drums, weeping horns and creepy organ!!
Santo vs. Blue Demon in Atlantis
In this wild fight scene, they manage to thrash every strategically placed lamp, vase and table in the joint before it's over!
Blue Demon drives a bitchin' convertible Red T-Bird!
Fight and Fight Some More
Here's a big smash-up of music from a couple of fight scenes. The sound isn't all that great because once again, it's taken from VHS tapes recorded off of Mexican TV in the 1980's, but it's the best we have at the moment, so enjoy it for what it's worth or "look what's going on!"
And Speaking of Mexican TV, here's an extra especial bonus for you, a mind blowing scene where Santo sits down to watch some TV in this gal's apartment, and he just sits there chilling, & watches this song by the remarkable Cuban born Olga Guillot on the tube. That's it, nothing else happens. Now that's wild!!
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