Continuing the Goldsmith Collection Expansion Chronicles with more odds & ends. I don't think I've done one of these in a while.
...looking at when I last posted one…
FEBRUARY? Wow, it has been a while (this is what happens when you get a puppy, I suppose).
First up: The Spiral Road, part of last year’s Christmas gifts. There’s a lot of stuff going on here, with the early content strongly suggesting that Jerry had heard Herrmann’s Anna and the King a few times and the later tracks teasing the man’s turbulent psychological suspense material to come. Also, there are a few tracks with some playful “hey, look, this character is fat” tuba parts, which feel like they belong more in an Elmer Bernstein parody score than here. There’s nothing that’s bad, but for Goldsmith it’s a bit all over the place, and it’s more memorable for its collection of styles than any thematic content. Possibly for completists only.
***
Next: Thriller. Both volumes are intriguing, and undoubtedly well-performed. I love that these albums EXIST, but I feel like I ended up liking the music on these albums a lot less than other people who reviewed/raved about them at the time they came out. Like Goldsmith’s episodic Twilight Zone scores, they’re “embryonic” compositions that are intriguing warm-up acts to his later, better takes on similar concepts. Maybe there’s just a limit to how much I can enjoy haunting chamber ensembles performing anthologies.
***½ for both volumes/seasons.
Next: Shamus. Short but sweet. If you like any of Goldsmith’s crime jazz / funk scores (stuff like Warning Shot or The Detective) you’ll have a good, if not terribly distinctive time. I’d write more but I don’t want to spend more time on this post than I would if I gave the album another spin. 
Also, Intrada threw this one on Spotify, which might help with those who don’t care about physical media or don’t want to spend over $20 for an album under 30 minutes.
***
Next: Face of a Fugitive. My jaw still hasn’t left the floor from finding out that this, Goldsmith’s third film feature score, was finally getting a release, what with many of us having assumed the materials were lost to time.
AND...it’s good! Very good at times, even if it’s more Goldsmith slightly tweaking the Copland/Bernstein approach than doing the more unique-to-him Western sound that would emerge in Rio Conchos. It competes favorably with other high-end ***½ Jerry Westerns Hour of the Gun and 100 Rifles, even if it sounds nothing like either of them.
Like Shamus, this one is also on Spotify.
***½
Last: Take Her, She’s Mine, purchased only because I didn’t want to have just a single disc in my order.
And I think I speak for everyone on the planet when I say...HUH?
The Intrada album, an absurd collection of parody elements, zany comedy, ahd arrangements of popular songs, seems to only exist as a preservation tactic in case future generations want to know the origin point of the sense of humor Goldsmith exhibited in his scores for Joe Dante. If you like calliope and accordion in abundance, this one’s for you.
It’s probably fine for its play-based film (Blockers for parents in the early 60s, and written by Nora Ephron’s dad), so my rating isn’t as punitive as it could be. Still, if you’re in the wrong mood it’ll be a chore to get through standalone, even more so than Escape from the Planet of the Apes (which at least has that bizarre, catchy title track). Plus, the score exists in mono and stereo, so you get the chance to be irritated by it twice.
**½- the worst score by JG I own, though probably not his worst.
Prior entries
- Volume 1: The Don is Dead
- Volume 2: The Man from U.N.C.L.E. series
- Volume 3: Hawkins on Murder / Winter Kill / Babe
- Volume 4: The Twilight Zone series
- Volume 5: Islands in the Stream film recording and The Last Castle expanded
- Volume 6: The Detective / Von Ryan’s Express, The Challenge, and Total Recall 30th Anniversary
- Volume 7: Inchon 3CD release, Looney Tunes: Back in Action Deluxe, Studs Lonigan, Stagecoach (1966) film recording, The Loner, and Amazing Stories S1E17 ‘Boo!’
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