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•	1998 Album

•	2017 Album

•	1989 RCA Gerhardt

•	1998 Album

The government cover-up and military presence in Close Encounters of the Third Kind is provided rhythmic flurries and a slightly more coherent suspense motif before the final confrontation. The "Navy Planes" and "Lost Squadron" cues are somewhat understated (to match the surrounding material), though the material in "Roy and Gillian on the Road," the latter half of "The Mountain," and "The Escape" is a precursor to the tumultuous brass movements of Jurassic Park and, more interestingly, The Witches of Eastwick. The military motif in "Stars and Trucks" and "Who Are You People?" is a precursor to the chase music in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Two versions of "The Escape" exist, with the version not used in the film offering the better action material while the final version actually used has the aforementioned statement of the main theme with an upbeat spirit and xylophone accompaniment that reminds of the opening to The Towering Inferno. The two-note theme of wonder that precedes the main theme in "Forming the Mountain" and several other cues is the score's only other major recurring idea. The mass of the atonal material early in the score is difficult to appreciate out of context, and it's frankly why the score is often forgotten in relation to Star Wars and Superman on either side of it for Williams. The opening cue is the one exception; Williams allows the orchestra to stew with atonal noise for thirty seconds before unleashing one grand, tonal, major-key hit from the full ensemble to coincide with the title. Like the crashing start to Bernard Herrmann's Cape Fear, this smart tactic definitely gets a crowd's attention. For color in the early cues, Williams also employs the choir to produce inconsistent noise, as well as the low tuba blasts that the alien ship communicates with at the end. Parts also feature synthetic elements that mimic the sound effects that accompany the smaller alien ships that pass overhead earlier in the film. The conservative approach to the score's early sections has a surprisingly strong hold on the score well into the Devil's Tower scenes, with the actual landing of the mothership treated with musical caution. As such, the vast majority of the music for Close Encounters of the Third Kind remains turbulent and unsure.

Overall, most casual film score collectors will be best served by one of the numerous, lengthy suites that Williams has himself recorded for Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The score simply contains too much atonal, ambient material to be a full-length listening experience for the vast majority of mainstream fans and even, perhaps, for a moderate Williams collector. A notable aspect of the score's history on album is the 21 minutes available via a Charles Gerhardt re-recording with the National Philharmonic Orchestra. For years, Gerhardt and the NPO had recorded famous film scores from mostly the Golden Age of Hollywood, but as a few of their final collaborations, Gerhardt recorded the three classic Star Wars scores near the times of their release. Included with the December 1977 recording of Star Wars, five major cues from late in Close Encounters of the Third Kind were offered as well ("Barnstorming," "Arrival of the Mother Ship," "The Pilot's Return," "The Visitors," and "Final Scene"). Available on LP at the time of its initial debut, a CD version of the recording was remastered and released in 1989. The outstanding quality of this Gerhardt recording, mixed into Dolby Surround for the CD, remains among the best available sources of music from the score. In its original form, the score has seen several releases through the years. Its first CD release came from Arista in 1986 and offered 40 minutes of music that included a variety of material heard badly merged together and, in some cases, arranged specifically for the album. Four years later, Varèse Sarabande released essentially the same album but added a disco version of the theme at the end; this disgraceful variant of Williams' themes is, like others that came before and after, an insufferable reminder of the worst of 1970's pop culture. The sound quality on the two early releases is identical. A 1997 bootleg added eighteen minutes of material, but it did so at the expense of sound quality; at times, this presentation was unlistenable. In 1998, to coincide with the film's "Collector's Edition" release in video stores (and on laser disc... Remember those cumbersome beasts?), Arista returned to the score and assembled a definitive, 77-minute collection of original and additional cues, arranged them in film order, and remastered each one from the best-available source tapes.

The 1998 Arista product also has alternate, un-used cues for multiple scenes, and it featured only three tracks that were available in their entirety before on commercial releases. The original conversation between the human keyboard operator and the mothership, a keen mathematical study for oboe and tuba, is included as well, and although it's fun to listen to once, it can get on the nerves after about a minute. Use it on that pesky roommate of yours early in the morning when he or she is just entering the prime phase of a hangover. Luckily, Arista dumped the disco track. The sound quality is distinctly improved and a lengthy interview with Williams conducted at the time of the film's resurrection is transcribed for the colorful booklet. To avoid confusion, it should be mentioned that Arista did press two variants of their 1998 album; the first 50,000 copies (yes, CDs used to really sell!) of these were called a "Collector's Edition" to coincide with the film's relaunch and they feature chromium-printed packaging with the insert notes glued to the back of the front cover (which is, in reality, a bit irritating). In 2017, La-La Land Records issued a 2-CD set limited to 5,000 copies that contains the Arista product's contents and roughly the same sound quality, but the full film presentation is joined by an additional 74 minutes on the second CD with an even greater selection of alternates and unused cues. Many of the newly released cues are not dissimilar to other material in the score, but there are exceptions, including the narrative intrigue of "The Approach" and the fascinating "Inside" cue that Williams wrote in 1980 for an extended version of the film. The composer's source cues are led by the awesome Golden Age romanticism of "Eleventh Commandment," and fans will appreciate the several early renditions of the five-note greeting for the alien dialogue. Those satisfied with the 1998 Arista album may not find enough fresh material of interest on the 2017 La-La Land product to merit the latter, but the score certainly deserves such a comprehensive option, albeit one that also drops the disco mix. In the end, Close Encounters of the Third Kind may have been overshadowed by Star Wars and Superman in an incredible 18-month time span for Williams, but the score still stands on its own as one of the composer's better known. When the United States government included the five-note communication motif as one of the welcoming messages it transmits in the direction of distant worlds, the score's status was confirmed.   @Amazon.com: CD or Download

• Score as Written for Film:  ****
• Music as Heard on the 1986 Arista and 1990 Varèse Sarabande Albums:  ***
• Music as Heard on the 1997 Lacombe Bootleg:  *
• Music as Heard on the 1998 Arista and 2017 La-La Land Albums:  ****
• Overall:  ****

Bias Check:

For John Williams reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.8 (in 75 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.68 (in 351,231 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.

John Williams with Steven Spielberg, 1977.