Back catalogue: Soundtracks

Review: Latest in the Italian soundtrack reissues crop comes this pair of tracks from the soundtrack of Un Uomo Dalla Pelle Dura (The Boxer), a 1972 film directed by Franco Prosperi and starring Robert Blake and Catherine Spaak. Composed by Carlo Pes - who was also the guitarist of the infamous quartet I Marc 4, who probably played on this session as well - 'The Riff' and 'Bossa Party' are are light-footed, drum-led funk number and a piano-led supernova respectively. Perfect accompaniments for the subject of a disgruntled boxer fighting for his dignity.

Review: Released to acclaim in 1985, The Falcon and the Snowman recounts the extraordinary true story of Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton) and Andrew Daulton Lee (Sean Penn), childhood friends who betrayed their country by selling U.S. satellite secrets to the Soviets in the 70s. The film's score, crafted by jazz virtuoso Pat Metheny alongside pianist Lyle Mays, is a masterful blend of tension and melancholy, enriched by orchestral arrangements from the National Philharmonic Orchestra. The standout track, 'This Is Not America,' features lyrics by David Bowie and became one of his notable hits of the decade, reaching No. 14 in the UK. All in all, an exclusive collector's box set.

Review: The soundtrack to Graham Eatough's stage adaptation of David Keenan's novel, This Is Memorial Device, composed by Stephen Pastel - of Kurt Cobain faves The Pastels fame - and Gavin Thomson, offers a compelling third iteration of the book's myth. Fusing reworked home recordings from the era with expanded versions of music originally scored for the theatre production, the album captures the essence of Glasgow's post-punk scene from 1978 to 1986. Tracks like 'Introduction To Why I Did It' and 'We Have Sex' evoke a sense of youthful hope and creativity, reflecting the play's exploration of art, music, and romance in small-town Scotland. Directed by Julian House, the video for 'We Have Sex' adds a vibrant visual dimension to the DIY aesthetic of the era. This Is Memorial Device: Music from the Stage Play not only complements the book and stage adaptation but also stands on its own torch for the spirit of post-punk and the power of belief in the transformative potential of art.

Review: If its predecessor shook up the formula for what a superhero animation could be, Spiderman: Across The Spider Verse blew the game wide open in a dazzling display of shape-shifting visual style, heartfelt narrative and spellbinding action. Daniel Pemberton returned to the project to score the sequel and as he explained to Rolling Stone he followed the versatile approach to animation as a guide for how he composed the music. From archaic medieval bombast to grunge inspired squall on to the synthetic sheen of techno, the soundtrack is as wild a ride as the world-flipping action in the film.

Review: The Moving Music label continues to unearth some ridiculously odd and inspired Norwegian movie soundtracks. Their latest is taken from 1978's Operasjon Cobra, a "youth movie" with a plot that involves a group of Oslo teenagers foiling a terror plot. The soundtrack, which appears to be one of the first to be completed by obscure Norwegian composer (and former prog rocker) Pete Knutsen, flits between Blaxploitation-inspired jazz-funk, cheery, horn-and-Clavinet-heavy post-disco instrumentals, experimental jazz, creepy synthesizer soundscapes, jazz guitar-rich ambient and heavy funk-rock. Throughout, the production is admirably lo-fi, with Knutsen keeping the tracks largely free of effects or post-production trickery.

Review: Piero Piccioni's score for Ti Ho Sposato Per Allegria (1967) offers a delightful and sophisticated accompaniment to Luciano Salce's comedy, based on Natalia Ginzburg's play. The film's narrative follows a serious lawyer who marries a whimsical and scatterbrained girl with a troubled past, just a month after meeting her. The story's charm lies in its light-hearted approach to serious themes like abortion, death, separation, and marital communication issues. Piccioni's music, released on vinyl by Musica Per Immagini, perfectly complements the film's whimsical tone. His score blends moods and aesthetic elements from his earlier works while introducing the unmistakable sound of bossa nova, funk, and lounge that would come to define much of his 70s output. The Turin-born composer's ability to simplify complex harmonic structures, infused with jazz elements, results in melodies that are both memorable and classy. Key to this soundtrack are its buoyant spirit and refined elegance. Piccioni's compositions achieve a perfect balance between catchy themes and intricate musical textures. Piccioni's talent for creating music is both light-hearted and artistically rich, making this a standout in his extensive catalog.

Review: Pianist. Conductor. Composer. Impressario. Extraordinaire. We could probably leave it at that with Piero Piccioni, but for the sake of clarity let's get clear. One of Italy's most prolific film composers of the mid-late-20th Century, this monolith of big band and jazz wrote more than 300 movie scores in his career, and also lays claim to membership of 013, the first jazz outfit broadcast in his home country following the fall of Fascism in 1944. Born in Turin, one of the epicentres of Italian music, Cadaveri Eccellenti was a 1977 crime thriller about Lino Ventura, Italy's top homicide detective, who is investigating the assassination of a judge. Full of intrigue, mystery, and tension, not to mention that underlying sense of sexiness which seems to pervade European flicks of this era, by now you can probably imagine how cool the score is.

Review: Celebrates the 50th anniversary of Travolti da un insolito destino nell'azzurro mare d'agosto (which is better known in Engish as Swept Away) with the ultimate edition of this classic soundtrack from Decca. Piero Piccioni's iconic score perfectly captures the 1974 film's exotic ambience with samba, bossa nova and lounge music sounds all enriched by Nora Orlandi's wordless vocals. Fully remastered from the original archive master tape, this version comes on double vinyl and tastefully honours Piccioni's remarkable contribution to Italian cinema.

Review: If you've not seen Des Morts then buckle up and prepare for something you'll never, ever forget. The critically acclaimed documentary is one of very few films to directly deal with the unspeakable of life - death. During the course of the running time, you encounter doctors desperately trying to save a stab victim, a body melting in the heat of a crematorium chamber, the execution of a Philippine guerrilla, people who are about to be no more, and those they will leave behind.
Fear of all this is a largely Western condition, but humans have a universal obsession with death that stays with us until all questions are eventually answered when we finally die. Composer Alain Pierre does his best to convey this mystery, awe, and unknowing via a soundtrack that runs between outtakes from the film, synthesiser overtures, field recordings, religious chants and more.

Review: Fantasists, rejoice: the original score for the 1997 sci-fi action film Starship Troopers gets a reissue. Directed by Paul Verhoeven and based on the novel by acclaimed sci-fi writer Robert A. Heinlein, the film follows a group of young soldiers who enlist in the military to fight a war against a hostile alien race known as the Arachnids. Matching this timeless venturing into the unknown, composer Basil Poledouris provides a powerful and propulsive orchestral work that reflects the film's militaristic and satirical tone, making thorough use of his in-house Hollywood Studio Symphony to hammer home an expressionistic foremost brass section. Varese Sarabande now reissue the soundtrack as an expanded edition with bonus tracks, on a first time vinyl version after the initial 2016 release.

Review: John Powell could almost be seen as the Hans Zimmer of animated movies. His oeuvre to date includes Antz, The Road To Eldorado, Chicken Run, Shrek, Robots, Ice Age 2 and 4, Happy Feet, Dr Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!, the first two Kung Fu Panda films, and Mars Needs Moms, among many others. Including the entire How To Train Your Dragon trilogy.
Hugely successful, the action packed adventures of Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III - a young Viking and heir to the throne of Berk - really needs equally exciting music to accompany it. That's exactly what we get here, with a classically-inspired swashbuckling score doing more than setting the scene: some tracks hark back to the golden days of kids movie soundtracks, when the songs themselves told large chunks of the narrative.

Review: Strange Gardens, or Effroyables Jardins, tells the story of a French clown whose son is embarrassed by him, but this tomfoolery has a serious past - antics saved the street performer and his friend, Andre, both members of the French Resistance during the war, from certain death at the hands of the Nazis. It's an intimate and, at times, troubling exploration of innocence, persecution, identity, friendship, loyalty and escapism in the most harrowing circumstances. Not to mention the short memories of mankind and the prejudices we unfairly develop when truths are committed to faded sepia photographs. Zbignieuw Preisner encapsulates this thoughtful atmosphere beautifully, providing a piano and string score that's tender, poignant, emotional, and musically captivating. A record that can just as easily stand alone as it can next to its visual brethren.

Review: A Monster's Expedition + Earlier Adventures is a double disc collection of music from four different video games (namely A Monster's Expedition, Sokobond, Cosmic Express and A Good Snowman Is Hard to Build) all composed by Eli Rainsberry, Allison Walker, Nick Dymond, and Priscilla Snow. Each one is utterly unique to the game and each one comes laden with beautiful soothing atmospheres delicately coloured with ponderous and whimsical melodies that will distract you from whatever you are doing they are so gorgeous. This is music to get lost in and it comes with superbly serene artwork from Andre Rodrigues.

Review: Akira Yamaoka, Marcin Przybylowicz and PT Adamczyk's original soundtrack for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners hears original OST numbers written for the award-winning anime series set within the futuristic dystopian world of Cyberpunk 2077, which originally spawned as the offshoot of the video game of the same name. Fitting for the music's breathy progressive house and electro oeuvre, which is interspersed with more traditional expressionist orchestral climaxes and builds, the Edgerunners series centres on a crack team of cyberpunk renegades, as they traverse the beastly underbelly of Night City, located in a futuristic vision of LA, navigating a world replete with corruption, gang violence, and cybernetic addiction. A note for fans: this vinyl edition includes unused, never-before-heard tracks composed by Yamaoka for Edgerunners, but which does not appear in the series.