Wow, thanks all for the great feedback! Larry, I'll make sure to pass along your words to Doug Fake. And JRP, what you wrote means so much! I too am often a purist when it comes to preferring film recordings over later new recordings when I have the option. But there are exceptions...and many of them happen to be conducted by William Stromberg!
In my inimitable there's-no-time-like-the-past-late-to-the-party manner, I've just listened to the first part of Episode 9. Youse guys have put together a series that must have been produced for me. When Jens mentions Ross Martin with respect to "Death Ship," he only lagged 1.5 seconds behind Yours Truly. For that I knew that this was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
City Of Fear and The Four of Us Are Dying reservations at the local library have been secured. Never seen the former and it has been ages re the latter but it continues to play well in the mind's eye. You, in turn, filled the mind's ear outstandingly. Bravo. I am very impressed.
Must add that I was just thinking yesterday how Jerry, Benny and Alex may have been the greatest at picking up the pulse of narrative and shaping the score, accordingly, to enhance its substance. They are not alone in this aspect but for me the talented par excellence. For this early effort I could hear the North influence but also a touch of L. Bernstein's Waterfront. Will have to go back to the specific cue for proper citation purposes. Anyway, there is much to admire musically in what Clark refers to as a too compact production (in terms of carrying its weight of premise). I'm not sure if I agree with that assessment but the point is well made and taken.
If you found a performance of "The Thunder of Imperial Names" online by this or that band, you were likely hearing Mike Davis's arrangement of that early Jerry Goldsmith radio composition. Likewise if you've seen a suite from The Wind and the Lion so performed. Mike spent time with Goldsmith in the '70s & '80. As you may have heard in our coverage of Intrada's new Black Patch & The Man release, he even took the Goldsmith's to see The Lincoln Memorial soon after Jerry wrote music around that monument's appearance in a film for the second time, in the 1976 picture Logan's Run, and he is probably the reason we have a Generals Suite for our Goldsmith concerts.
Yavar got to speak with Mike last fall. He's one of us, a great lover of film music from his childhood, which bubbles up throughout. I've dropped in a lot of the music he mentions, and we even get to hear some of his own early film music compositions.
Mike is a really friendly presence in this conversation. I hope you enjoy it.
City Of Fear and The Four of Us Are Dying reservations at the local library have been secured. Never seen the former and it has been ages re the latter but it continues to play well in the mind's eye. You, in turn, filled the mind's ear outstandingly. Bravo. I am very impressed.
OK. As threatened, I watched the TZ ep first and now fully get Clark's point about too much territory covered in a 1/2 hour. I've always felt the same way over ST's City On the Edge of Forever except it was an hour and I wish it had been fleshed out in a two-hour TV movie. There are others. Still, there is something to be said for both and Goldsmith's and F. Steiner's scores account for much of the something.
City is one helluva B picture with the low budget and fascinating filmed-right-on-the-streets of greater LA in sizzling b&w and all. JG's early score was pulsating and indeed an aural snapshot of things to come in Nervous Man...Room and years later, LA Confidential. Having watched it now for the first time within the understanding and context of the full Goldsmith oeuvre gave it greater perspective.
Howard, I wanted to offer a belated thanks for all your kind words about the podcast. We still hope there are people discovering the podcast and starting with our early episodes decades from now, so there's no problem with you being late to the party and I always love hearing feedback even about our oldest episodes. Are you going chronologically and just recently got to our Twilight Zone coverage, or did you go to it specifically?
"Hyah! Hyah! Odyssey Ho!" says Clark, in our description.
He continues, "In our first regular episode of 2022, we join the long-running western series Wagon Train to discuss the episode "The Ah Chong Story," featuring a lively Goldsmith score that fuses eastern and western elements. In this one, your humble hosts David, Yavar, and Clark discuss the painful stereotypes that hamper the show's effectiveness, the creative ways Goldsmith finds to blend his assorted thematic and textural elements, and much more!
"Before the episode analysis begins, you'll also be treated to an exploration of an early Wagon Train soundtrack album featuring music by the likes of John Williams, Laurindo Almeida, and Roy Webb. If you've got a little time to spare, why not join the wagon train for a while?
"Our direction is westward, our pace is slow, and someday we aim to reach the land of 1962. Enjoy!"
I'm never sure how everyone's podcast programs handle the notes and links, so those are they.
Also, the Chong character looks nothing like the picture below, at least from the head down. That's our goofiness, due to the limited availability of high quality images, and because the other regular in the picture wasn't in our episode. So, you know, ho-ho.
I did mention that in the podcast, but to be perfectly frank I think it's an unlicensed bootleg. Still, until an official licensed releases comes out (if it ever does)... it'll do in a pinch for folks.
I did mention that in the podcast, but to be perfectly frank I think it's an unlicensed bootleg. Still, until an official licensed releases comes out (if it ever does)... it'll do in a pinch for folks.
Hey, folks. Our next episodes will cover two of Goldsmith's early TV scores. The shows are hard to find, so we're putting them up on our YouTube channel, in case you want to watch ahead of the podcast.
Near the end, you can hear a piece of additional, not from the Major Orlovsky program, music Leigh already mocked up that you won't (yet) hear anywhere else. As far as we know, no one's heard it since 1959! It's really nice, too, and may be, again may be able to be connected to a stretch goal. But I'm not Leigh, so this is Hell and gone from anything like an announcement or a promise. He'll do that if he likes!
Yes, the atomic podcast is terrible. But more terrible still are the effects of atomic podcast mutation. Hello, we’re your humble hosts David, Yavar, and Clark, and we want to warn you about something that could happen… something that does happen in our latest podcast. Observe the Soundtrack Spotlight: a miniature marvel of focused conversation on a single CD release. But if a Soundtrack Spotlight and a large group of guests were exposed to radiation simultaneously, the result would be terrible indeed. What began life as a simple chat about Intrada’s expanded release of Jerry Goldsmith’s charming, intuitive score for Joe Dante’s “Matinee” was shockingly transformed into a wide-ranging conversation on the entire Goldsmith-Dante oeuvre. For this very special show, we’re joined by none other than director Joe Dante himself, along with Dante’s longtime editor Marshall Harvey, liner notes writer John Takis, and Douglass Fake and Roger Feigelson of Intrada Records. Suffice it to say this is a can’t-miss production. Presented in AtomoSound: the new podcasting miracle that puts you in the action!
