SOME NEAT ALBUM COVERS FROM MOVIES & TV SHOWS (1956 - 1987)

The original concept of this blog was to be 'music from the monster movies,' so I think it's about time I showed you some of the record soundtrack album covers to go along with some of those movies! Welcome to The Dungeon! Up first from 1956, is the wild electronic soundtrack by Louis and Bebe Barron for one of the best movies of all time, "Forbidden Planet." As cool and ahead of it's time as this music was, it's still hard for me to imagine anybody taking this record home and listening to it over and over. It was perfect for the movie, but it's just not that kind of music!

I was going to strictly do records from movies we've written about here, but I'm making the exception for these two "Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer" records, just because it's Mickey Spillane we're talking about here, not some ordinary chump!!

 "The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad" from 1958 had a magnificent score by Bernard Herrmann!

"I Married A Monster From Outer Space" came out in 1958, but this 'soundtrack' CD wasn't released until 2012. I still included it here since it's one of our favourite movies!

This LP was a 1964 release of music from the TV series "Burke's Law." The double entendre here is that the composer's name was Herschel Burke Gilbert. Tricky, right?

Piero Umiliani was a gifted composer we have featured here many times, and I'm sure this 1965 album for the movie "Operazione Poker" is a swingin' affair! Five aces in the deck, you gotta love it!

"The Satan Bug" came out in 1965, but this hard to find CD by Jerry Goldsmith wasn't released until 2007.

This fantastic record of music by Peter Thomas for the German Space Patrol, "Raumpatrouille" was released in 1966. I'm pretty sure that autographed CD's can still be purchased from BSC Music for a very reasonable price.

This seven inch 45 from 1966 by Nelson Riddle featured the "Batman Theme" written by Neal Hefti from the "Batman" TV series, and the flip side was another composer play on words, called "Nelson's Riddler!"

In 1967 "Bedazzled" came out, and this soundtrack LP came out the following year. Most of the music for the movie was composed by Dudley Moore himself. What a talented guy he was!

This is the cover for a 2016 vinyl LP they released of the 1967 film "Mad Monster Party" featuring music composed by Maury Lewis and Jules Bass, with some spoken word from Boris Karloff, and the title song sung by Ethel Ennis as can be heard right here!

This 1968 soundtrack from "Danger: Diabolik" is composed by Maestro Ennio Morricone and features the awesome song "Deep Down."

The prolific Bruno Nicolai is another Italian composer we've featured on these pages a number of times! This 1972 LP featured the music from the film "All The Colors Of The Dark!"

This CD for the 1973 film "The Satanic Rites Of Dracula" composed by John Cacavas, came back from the dead in 2011.

Sun Ra and his amazing Intergalactic Solar Arkestra came out with this movie and record called "Space Is The Place" in 1974, and is a must-see for any true fan of music!

"Suspiria" from 1977 is a Dario Argento movie we haven't got around to yet, but I wanted to include this cover just because I like the "Creepers" band called Goblin!

"The Monster Club" came out in 1981, with this very fun and listenable soundtrack featuring B.A. Robertson, The Viewers, Night, UB-40, Expressos. The Pretty Things, John Williams with the Douglas Gamely Orchestra, John Georgiadis, and Alan Hawkshaw!

Last but not least comes "Evil Dead II" from 1987, and music from Joseph Lo Duca!

Pretty Crazy, huh?

THEY CAME FROM BEYOND SPACE - James Stevens - "Opening Credits" (1967)

According to the IMDB, James Stevens was the uncredited composer for stock music for "Plan Nine From Outer Space," so what else is there to say? The man is instantly enshrined forever in the horror hall of fame, even if he hadn't done the 1955 Swedish documentary, "Among The Headhunters." The music from the opening credits of "They Came From Beyond Space," is just so smart. You think you've heard it all, & then someone throws you a curve ball from outer space, and Bam, all of a sudden, some guy's got a colander on his head! Don't forget, they didn't just come from space, they came from BEYOND space, & that's a really, really long ways out there, dude! No wonder "The Gods Hate Kansas!" Oh yeah, the extra bonus in this movie is Michael Gough as "The Master Of The Moon." 

 

Beyond Space Is Really Far Out

THE X FROM OUTER SPACE / Shôchiku Eiga - 1967

Things are finally straight in the still capture department, so, time to put The Tabonga Train back on the tracks, here at The Dungeon!.. We gots another giant rubber monster from Japan the same year I got my great 1967 Volkswagen. This is the same studio that also brought us GAPPA, THE TRIPHIBIAN MONSTER.

Eegah!! sent over a fun little sound clip from this flick for our earjoyment, sooooo, you can push the big red 'GO' button over by our atomic ? from inner space, NOW, Rufus The Gnat!.. Here's a taste of... THE X FROM OUTER SPACE!

The story starts with a trip to the Moon by a small group of Japanese Astronuts in their famous spaceship, AAB-Gamma.

There's fun to be had on the Moon, like, bouncing up and down on the surface in 1/6th gravity!

There's even more fun watching Peggy (THE TERROR BENEATH THE SEA) Neal as Lisa take a shower!

Then, it's time to dance to some Moon Music, as heard in the sound clip.

They take off in AAB-Gamma for a space expedition where they encounter a glowing UFO!

After the UFO buzzes them, they discover some residue on the exhaust shield, Lisa snags a small glowing nodule and takes it back to the ship.

Back at the Earth lab, they find that the specimen has melted through the metal floor, like in ALIEN, and, has disappeared!

Now a giant rubber monster, The X sticks its weird looking head out of a crater and is immediately attacked by tanks and missiles.

I really dig this shot as it tears the crap out of some puny power towers!

The X even has the power to turn into a big glowing heat ball, then, plows into a dam!

A radio active element is found to have a debilitating effect on The X so they feed it to the thing from another world!

Then, they just sit back and watch as the monster starts dissolving back to its original form.

Lisa recaptures the nodule, but, this time they shoot it into outer space from which it came! Tune in tomorrow as we continue our special Halloween Countdown!

FIFTIES SCI-FI MOVIE MONSTERS ON ALIEN PLANETS

Last Monday I posted FIFTIES SCI-FI MOVIE EARTH INVADERS, so, today I have the Monsters on Alien Planets that we encountered there. When I decide to do one of these posts, I have no real idea how it will turn out until I make the list. With the Earth Invaders, there were 40 movies, with this post, there are only 12 movies! We were invaded over three times more than planets we explored with Monsters! So, check it out...

First up is ROCKETSHIP X-M from 1950, the Martians were messed up primitive mutants and some were blind. Something definitely went wrong on the Red Planet years ago...

Next is CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON from 1953, there was this giant cave spider that would love to strip that tasty flesh off your bones!

I remember seeing this photo of KING DINOSAUR from 1955 in FAMOUS MONSTERS back in the day. This movie is pretty whack but fun to watch for the over the top acting!

THIS ISLAND EARTH from 1955 has one of the finest weird monsters from the Fifties. I mean, wow, what a thrill it must have been to catch this great movie when it came out!

Then we have FIRE MAIDENS OF OUTER SPACE from 1956, it had this weirdo creature I think was known as The Dark One... All he could do is throw some rocks at you and I guess choke you if you got too close to him, wow!!

My all time favorite fifties creation is The ID Monster from FORBIDDEN PLANET in 1956. What a movie, besides that, there was Robby The Robot and those amazing sound effects!!

In IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE from 1958, Paul Blaisdell came up with this mighty Martian to terrorize the crew when they return to Earth in their spaceship...

MISSILE TO THE MOON from 1958 was a remake of CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON, this time besides the giant spider, they threw in a couple of very cool Rock Monsters.

In QUEEN OF OUTER SPACE from 1958, the only monster was this giant spider reused from WORLD WITHOUT END. It looks so fakey when our hero holds on tight to the big thing to make it look like it has a hold of him!

A pile of terrific monsters appeared in THE ANGRY RED PLANET from 1959 including The Martian, the Bat Rat Spider and the giant killer Amoeba!

Also in 1959, these two bizarro monsters show up in BATTLE BEYOND THE SUN from 1959, they have to be some of the craziest creations of the Fifties!

The last movie in the post is for the Stooges' HAVE ROCKET WILL TRAVEL from 1959, it had lots of cool monsters to chase our guys around, making for a ton of laffs... Check in again on Wednesday as we keep chugging down the tracks, bringing you the goods!