Category Archives: Reviews: Soundtrack

More Horror Soundtracks!

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As a collector in general, it can be pretty tough (and expensive) to keep up with some of the amazing things coming out that you want to add to your collection. Horror soundtracks is one thing that I’m a sucker for. Ever since seeing Jaws and realizing then just how much a great score can have an effect on the viewer, soundtracks have been on my brain. They can take you on a musical journey that transport your brain to the film playing in your head, as well as triggering the memories and feelings you had during certain sequences.

Star Wars was the first soundtrack I ever bought, but more followed. Every time I am working at my computer or reading, I have a soundtrack playing in the background. There are scores that I buy because I remember the score being effective. Then there are others that I simply buy because I can’t believe someone is actually releasing it on CD! I think “who else is going to buy this release besides me?!?!”

Here are some of the titles that have been recently announced for release, most of which I have already pre-ordered!

The Golden Age of Horror Vol. 1
Released from Dragon’s Domain Records, this CD contains scores from Hammer’s 1963 film Paranoiac, and Amicus’ Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors and The Skull, both from 1965. All were composed by Elisabeth Lutyens, who was Britain’s first female feature film composer, so it’s great to see a little attention being given to her!

Retail price is only $17.95, with a total running time of 75:31. If this is anything like their Golden Age of Science Fiction releases, this will not only be a great addition to any collection, but since this is Vol. 1, one can only dream of what might be coming next!

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Soundtrack Review: Night of the Devils

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Night of the Devils
Released by Digitmovies, 2004
24 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 45 min.
Music Composed and Conducted by Giorgio Gaslini

Haunting is the main word that comes to mind when I listen to this score. From the very first track, Sdenka’s Theme – Main Title, the woman’s vocals immediately work their way into your psyche, giving you a feeling of calmness, peace, and just a relaxing melody. It does have a feel of some giallo films, how they are not always overly mysterious or tension building.

But when you get to the second track, Terrible Echoes, that is when the calmness stops, and the tension begins. When you get to the third track, the harpsicord comes in and does something I’m not used to. Usually, the instrument is loud and boisterous, but here it is played softly and just adds to the mystery. When you get to track 10, Voices in the Wood, it’s like a soundtrack from a nightmare!

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Soundtrack Review: Psycho II

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Psycho II
Released by Intrada, 2021
31 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 1:14:30 Min.
Composed and Conducted by Jerry Goldsmith

I can’t imagine being asked to take on the task of creating a sequel to the Alfred Hitchcock classic, which director Richard Franklin and screenwriter Tom Holland did, and, I feel, really knocked it out of the park. Same goes with Jerry Goldsmith, having to come up with a score to follow up Bernard Herrmann. Couldn’t have been easy to even think of doing. But Goldsmith made this score his own, and it really works.

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Soundtrack Review: Splinter

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Splinter
Released by BSK Records, 2008
17 Tracks, with a Total Running Time of 37:11 min.
Music by Elia Cmiral

When I first reviewed this soundtrack, it was before I had actually seen the film. I had originally written that it didn’t really give much in the way of scares when it came to being a horror soundtrack, leaning more towards an industrial or mechanical action-based score.

But now that I have seen the film, more than a few times as of this writing, I have to say that it works perfectly within the picture itself. It does have a very percussion-based sound to it, but what that does is build up the tension. Yes, this is a monster flick, but instead of going for that slow and moody atmospheric sounds, like the creature in the film, it is out for blood, moving fast and furious. And the soundtrack enhances that to a T.

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Soundtrack Review: The Abandoned

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The Abandoned
Released by Moviescore, 2024
14 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 46 min.
Music Composed by Alfons Conde

Nacho Cerdá’s directorial feature debut gave us something completely different than what he showed us in his short film Aftermath (1994). Instead of the disturbing and gooey subject matter of necrophilia, The Abandoned is a slow-moving ghost story, where a woman is haunted by her childhood. She returns to her birthplace in Russia in hopes of uncovering or laying to rest her dark memories.

There isn’t a lot of action here, but more of a mood piece, there are a lot of scenes of no talking, but looking. Waiting. Searching. This is where Conde’s music blends perfectly. It worms its way into your subconscious, much like the film. Sometimes you’re not even aware of the music in the background, like a prolonged note being held, or maybe a vibration. But it’s there, helping to create and enhance the emotions you are feeling by watching what is going on.

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Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein Soundtrack

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Are you a fan of the Universal Classic Monsters? Or maybe of comedic actors Bud Abbott and Lou Costello? When you combine these two, you have a film that is what I feel the best of both of those two worlds in Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948). While it is a comedy, there is plenty of monster fun within the running time, with not only Frankenstein’s creature, but we get Dracula, the Wolf Man, and even the Invisible Man is a very small “cameo” at the end. Now, the fine folks at Intrada have started a Kickstarter to help finance the creation of a CD soundtrack release of this score, and we only have a few more days to being to contribute!

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Soundtrack Review: Caveat

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Caveat (2020)
24 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 71:10 min.
Music by Richard G. Mitchell

I stumbled across this movie in 2021 on Prime one night, not knowing anything about it but since it had a creepy looking stuffed rabbit with human looking eyes in it, I figured it could be interesting. Boy was that an understatement! I counted it as in my Top Ten Viewings for the year. The movie just oozes creepiness. So much strange stuff is going on, but it really gets under your skin. One of the reasons for that, I feel, is because of the score from Richard G. Mitchell.

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Soundtrack Review: The Power

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The Power (2021)
Released by Invada Records, 2021
21 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 43 min.
Music Composed, Arranged and Performed by Gazelle Twin & Max de Wardener

The film is about a nurse having to work the night shift during the planned blackouts in the U.K. She’s young, new, and realizes quickly there is something strange going on at the hospital. And this music fits perfectly. There isn’t a typical orchestrated score, but with some melodies, but mainly strange sounds that are sometimes incorporated into a theme. But mainly it is filled with sounds. Sometimes a rumbling, sometimes some whispers, or voices that are distorted and louder. But all used to build an atmosphere for the ears.

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Soundtrack Review: Dead of Winter

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Dead of Winter (1987)
Released by Kritzerland, 2010
21 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 65 min.
Music Composed by Richard Einhorn

I first came across this little thriller back when it first came out on video, back in the late ‘80s. Being a fan of both Mary Steenburgen and Roddy McDowall, I was all in. What I wasn’t expecting was this well-crafted thriller, that I still think is highly underrated. Now being a huge fan of soundtracks, when I see one available from a film that I liked, I tend to get it. Plus, this soundtrack was done by Richard Einhorn, who also did a few of my favorite films, such as Shock Waves (1977) and The Prowler (1981), so I thought what the hell.

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Soundtrack Review: Voces aka Don’t Listen

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Voces (2020) aka Don’t Listen
26 Tracks with a Total Running Time of 70 min.
Music by Jesús Díaz

Voces, under the title Don’t Listen, was a film I stumbled upon on Netflix one night, not knowing that it was a Spanish made film, but was immediately captivated by the story, and the frightening way it was played out. One of the things that helped that was the soundtrack. This is not a score of melodies and themes, but of sounds. Sounds like you’d expect to hear in a nightmare. These could be anything from soft noises from afar that slowly build up a little louder and louder until you think you can make out what exactly the sound is, before it disappears into the distance.

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