I've never seen Short Night of Glass Dolls, but I know Ennio Morricone's atonal "Sospiri Di Morte" will give you the heebie-jeebies

It's not music. It's Ennio.

Occupy anti-Halloween conservatism with A Fistful of Soundtracks' "Buckets of Score"

Do you have a conservative neighbor or two who are part of the anti-Halloween camp and are trying to recruit people to their cause? On October 31, show those opponents of Halloween how much you feel about their hatred of fun by paying them a visit and then taking out your phone and blasting A Fistful of Soundtracks' "Buckets of Score" block in their faces.

From 5pm to 11pm on Halloween, AFOS will be streaming for the second Halloween in a row original music written for the horror, thriller and paranormal genres. The playlist--which is full of Goblin tracks, cues from Elmer Bernstein's out-of-print score to Ghostbusters and original music from either non-glittery vampire flicks (The Omega Man, From Dusk Till Dawn) or supernatural genre shows (Buffy, Angel)--will be joined this year by selections from Alan Howarth and Larry Hopkins' new re-recording of the mostly synthesized cues Ennio Morricone and John Carpenter separately composed for the 1982 version of The Thing.

Howarth, who collaborated with the filmmaker/composer on the scores to such classic Carpenter flicks as Escape from New York, Big Trouble in Little China and They Live, recreated with Hopkins the tracks from the long-out-of-print Thing soundtrack album (with some help from the Digital Orchestra Toolbox) and re-sequenced them so that they're in the chronological order of the 1982 film. The re-recording is being released by the record label wing of BuySoundtrax (a site I once had such a lousy mail-order experience with--and I'm relieved to see I'm not alone--that every time I receive an e-mail from BuySoundtrax, I angrily delete it without reading it).

(Photo source: Alex Pardee)

Also added to "Buckets of Score" this year are selections from Steven Price and Basement Jaxx's terrific, if-Carpenter-were-a-dubstepper score to the recent inner city-vs.-outer space thriller Attack the Block, a film that's now on Blu-ray (I disagree with the opinion that Attack the Block loses much of its entertainment value on the small screen and is a less interesting film if you don't watch it with an amped-up crowd in the theater--I saw Attack the Block in an empty theater and still enjoyed it).

"If you like your beats on the monstrous side, you've come to the right place," wrote Attack the Block writer/director Joe Cornish in the Attack the Block soundtrack liner notes. "We wanted the Attack the Block score to do the things that film scores used to do. To be as exciting and escapist as a John Williams adventure, and as gritty and percussive as the great John Carpenter's electronic scores."

Price and the Jaxx duo's score lives up to Cornish's intentions. As the hoodies in Attack the Block would say, believe it, bruv.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Goldfrapp, "Lovely Head"

Song: "Lovely Head" by Goldfrapp
Released: 2000
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: Trouser Press came up with a good shorthand description for "Lovely Head," the first single off the duo Goldfrapp's debut album Felt Mountain: "If Lee Van Cleef had ever romanced Shirley Bassey, 'Lovely Head,' which sounds like a score in search of a Sergio Leone film, would have been their song."

Ennio Morricone's influence on Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory, which they acknowledged in the Felt Mountain liner notes with their shout-outs to Morricone and Leone, is most evident in "Lovely Head." There's whistling, harpsichords, percussion reminiscent of Il Maestro's Sicilian Clan main title theme and a vocal effect that's as bizarre as the coyote howls in the Good, the Bad and the Ugly score, but it's more of a Goldfrapp touch than a Morricone touch. Goldfrapp, who provides the whistling during "Lovely Head," makes her voice sound remarkably like a theremin(*), with the help of a synthesizer that distorts her vocals (her theremin-like howls also turn up during another Felt Mountain cut and "Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day, "Pilots").

(*) In his intro for the TCM Essentials Jr. broadcast of the theremin-filled Thing from Another World a couple of days ago, host Bill Hader said, "Transformers would be so much better with a theremin." True that.

"Lovely Head" also channels the grandiose sound of the secondary themes John Barry composed for either 007's love interests or the foreign destinations where 007 would shag those love interests. The Bondian strings and drums of "Lovely Head" inspired a YouTuber to replace "All Time High," one of Barry's weakest Bond ballads, with "Lovely Head" in the Octopussy opening titles.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Daniele Luppi, "An Italian Story"

Song: "An Italian Story" by film composer Daniele Luppi
Released: 2004
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: The imaginary soundtrack Rome isn't the first time Luppi paid tribute to '60s and '70s Italian film scores with the help of many of the veteran musicians who performed on those scores. In 2004, Luppi released An Italian Story, which featured original music that he wrote to salute not just Ennio Morricone (whom Luppi feels doesn't get enough props for his more avant-garde material and his work with early synths), but also Nino Rota, Piero Umiliani, Piero Piccioni, Armando Trovajoli and Stelvio Cipriani. All of them are composers Luppi has admired since his childhood in Italy.

"Like the films themselves, the music of the era was shiny and exuberant, filled with unusual flourishes and surprising turns," wrote Italian Story liner notes author Dan Epstein about the '60s and '70s sound Luppi recaptured. "It was the joyous sound of 'la dolce vita'--a newly prosperous nation springing back to effervescent life after the forced dreariness of the Mussolini regime and the grim period of poverty and austerity that followed World War II."

For the album's breezy title track (and another track on the album, "Fashion Party"), Luppi recruited Alessandro Alessandroni--the whistler/guitarist/virtual one-man band who was responsible for many of the bizarre noises during Morricone's scores--to whistle, of course.

"I will always remember the smile on [Alessandroni's] face when he first heard [the title track]," recalled Luppi in the liner notes. "It was like, 'Here I am, playing with these great musicians once again!'"

That feeling of being reunited with old friends is also experienced by us while listening to "An Italian Story" (which can be streamed over at my SwiftFM site). To those of us who have dug Italian film scores since the first time we saw either Once Upon a Time in the West or maybe The Sicilian Clan, Alessandroni's whistle is like an old friend.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Mike Patton, "Deep Down"

Song: "Deep Down" by Mike Patton
Released: 2010
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: When I first learned that for his '50s and '60s Italian pop music tribute project Mondo Cane, Patton recorded a cover of "Deep Down," Ennio Morricone's wonderful theme from the 1968 Mario Bava cult favorite Danger: Diabolik, I was worried that Patton's version was going to be overly kitschy. A 2009 video of Patton and his Mondo Cane orchestra giving a soaring performance of "Deep Down" in concert put that worry to rest (see the video below).

The Faith No More and Mr. Bungle frontman is a Morricone fan who once released a compilation of his favorite atonal Morricone score cues on his Ipecac label and who, like myself, wishes that more people would notice Morricone's non-spaghetti western compositions like "Deep Down" because, as he once noted in Spin, "Many people think of him only in terms of spaghetti western music." During "Deep Down," Patton and his orchestra honor the material with a non-kitschy take that's a worthy addition to the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist. Their cover is the opposite of that occasionally amusing but otherwise terrible Mystery Science Theater 3000 series finale where Mike and the Bots wrongheadedly trashed Danger: Diabolik, one of the best comic book adaptations ever filmed, as if it were a crime against humanity like the previous--and much more deserving--MST3K target Manos: The Hands of Fate.

Double O Section, a blog that reviews films and shows from the spy genre, said "[MST3K] did a grave disservice to cinema in general" with that Diabolik episode.

"The film has been tagged unfairly in the pop-consciousness as trash/camp," said the SpyVibe blog. "As much as I enjoy their riffs on bad-but-fun flicks, Mike and the robots had no business dragging Bava's Diabolik into that campy pigeonhole."

"When it turned up on [MST3K] as a turkey to be laughed at, I thought they were missing the point, it's supposed to be fun," said Hot Fuzz and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World director Edgar Wright in his entry on Diabolik for Time Out's "50 Essential Comic-Book Movies" list. "It made me really angry!"

Mr. Wright, whenever you get angry again because you're reminded of MST3K's shabby treatment of Diabolik, do what I do. Listen to Patton's calming and respectful cover of "Deep Down." It's like all is right with the world again whenever I hear it.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: John Zorn, "Erotico (The Burglars)"

Each post in the "'Rome, Italian Style' Track of the Day" weekday series (July 1-29) provides info on a different track from A Fistful of Soundtracks' "Rome, Italian Style" playlist, which focuses on covers of '60s and '70s film and TV music and imaginary soundtracks like Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi's Rome and Adrian Younge's Venice Dawn. The mission statement of the "Rome, Italian Style" block is basically "how musicians outside the film and TV music world interpret '60s and '70s film and TV music." It airs Mondays through Thursdays at 11am on AFOS.

Song: "Erotico (The Burglars)" by avant-garde composer John Zorn
Released: 1985
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: It's a cover of Ennio Morricone's "Ma non troppo erotico," a down-and-dirty score cue (from the 1971 Jean-Paul Belmondo/Omar Sharif action flick The Burglars) that's an example of the Morricone sound at its sexiest and has been described more than once as great music to knock boots to. If you ever wondered what the Italian blues would sound like, listen to "Ma non troppo erotico," which features Morricone's excellent vocalist Edda Dell'Orso. Zorn's version of "Ma non troppo erotico" on his 1985 Morricone tribute album The Big Gundown is missing the horn stabs, pounding drums and Dell'Orso vocals that made the original such a cool track, but the cover compensates for their absence with electric guitar riffs by Bill Frisell and batshit-crazy--and of course, towards the end, erotic-sounding--howls by vocalist Laura Biscotto.

Hear Zorn, Frisell and Biscotto make a jazzy Morricone classic sound even more jazzy over at my SwiftFM site.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Adrian Younge, "1969 Organ"

Song: "1969 Organ" by Adrian Younge
Released: 2000
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: It's my favorite track off Black Dynamite editor/composer Adrian Younge's imaginary soundtrack Venice Dawn, a long-out-of-print homage to '60s and '70s Italian film music from 2000 that Younge and Wax Poetics Records reissued as a free download earlier this week.

"It is well documented that American soul expanded the thresholds of contemporary music and influenced composers around the world. Classically trained European composers, such as Ennio Morricone, loved the sound of soul and synthesized this compositional style with his music," said the self-taught musician, film editor and former hip-hop producer to Wax Poetics. "Ennio Morricone is by far one of my favorite composers."

Younge is also fond of the Italian band Goblin of Suspiria fame and similar-sounding psychedelic soul acts, and their sounds also influenced Venice Dawn (I also detect a little Jerry van Rooyen in the organ riffs in "1969 Organ"). Like Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi's Rome project, Venice Dawn is a score written for an old movie that doesn't exist. At the time of Venice Dawn's initial release, Younge pretended Venice Dawn was a real piece of Italian cinema and punked everyone.

That mischievous spirit was carried over by Younge and director Scott Sanders into Black Dynamite. The 2009 blaxploitation homage is one of the funniest and most effective comedy films of the '00s because its approach to spoofing blaxploitation flicks is refreshingly timeless (unlike the lazily written and instantly dated pop-culture references of the Epic Movie/Disaster Movie/Meet the Spartans spoof franchise) and the actors in Black Dynamite play everything straight--just like the Leslie Nielsen who was completely dead-serious and stone-faced during the brilliant and short-lived Police Squad! TV series, not the Leslie Nielsen who went completely broad and resorted to mugging to the camera in the Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! movies.

While we await both Younge's score music for Adult Swim's animated version of Black Dynamite in spring 2012 and his Wax Poetics album Something About April, which is scheduled to drop in September, he's offered us an appetizer to Something About April in the form of the newly unearthed Venice Dawn--an EP that can now be sampled during the "Rome, Italian Style" block of imaginary soundtracks and covers of '60s and '70s score music from Monday to Thursday at 11am on A Fistful of Soundtracks.

Party like it's 1969 over at my SwiftFM site.

All the other "Rome, Italian Style" Tracks of the Day from this week:
Count Basie and His Orchestra, "007"
Frank Sinatra and Count Basie, "More [Theme from Mondo Cane]"
Goldfrapp, "Utopia (New Ears Mix)"
Babe Ruth, "The Mexican"

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Goldfrapp, "Utopia (New Ears Mix)"

Song: "Utopia (New Ears Mix)" by Goldfrapp
Released: 2000
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: The original version of "Utopia" sampled one of Ennio Morricone's Sicilian Clan score cues, but even without that sample, the ethereal New Ears Mix of "Utopia" maintains the original's Morricone-esque feel. Alison Goldfrapp's mostly wordless vocals totally channel Edda Dell'Orso in this version. The New Ears Mix would make for a great opening title theme for a scripted show about parapsychologists or Dark Shadows-esque, non-wimpy vampires or something. In fact, when I wrote a brief treatment for an idea for a paranormal drama set in Amityville, New York, one of my notes said, "The opening theme should be Goldfrapp's 'Utopia (New Ears Mix),' from Café Del Mar, Vol. 8."

Go imagine this tune as a theme for a series about non-glittery vampires over at my SwiftFM site.

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Babe Ruth, "The Mexican"

Song: "The Mexican" by the British rock band Babe Ruth
Released: 1972
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: The back half of "The Mexican" is a cover of Ennio Morricone's For a Few Dollars More main title theme (the band was also fond of the Fistful of Dollars main title theme and covered that too on another album). It's a fantastic track that I was first exposed to via the 2002 Strut Records album The Official Adventures of Grandmaster Flash ("The Mexican" is one of Flash's favorite breaks).

"Rome, Italian Style" Track of the Day: Danger Mouse & Daniele Luppi, "Theme of Rome"

This is the first in a series of weekday posts about the tracks that are streamed during A Fistful of Soundtracks' "Rome, Italian Style" block. From today until July 29, each post will give some background on a different track from the block's playlist (and maybe even include a music video that the artist made for the track). "Rome, Italian Style" airs Mondays through Thursdays at 11am on AFOS.

Not to be confused with the HBO sword-and-mandals show Rome, producers Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi's new Capitol Records release Rome is a concept album inspired by swanky '60s and '70s Italian film scores that were penned by the ingenious likes of Riz Ortolani and Ennio Morricone ("Back in the early '60s, more experimental composition was looked down on, so the movies were a great vehicle to get away with doing all that," said Danger Mouse in a 2010 Guardian article about the making of Rome). The "Rome, Italian Style" playlist was built around the tracks from Rome, but because nine tracks aren't enough to fill a four-day-a-week, one-hour-per-day block, the playlist includes other songs that were influenced by the sounds of '60s and '70s Italian composers or their British and American counterparts (like John Barry and Henry Mancini), as well as covers of themes that Ortolani, Morricone, Barry, Mancini and others wrote during that era.

Song: "Theme of Rome" by Danger Mouse & Daniele Luppi featuring Edda Dell'Orso
Released: 2011
Why's it part of the "Rome, Italian Style" playlist?: During the recording of Rome, Danger Mouse and Luppi enlisted several musicians and singers who took part in many of the vintage Italian scores that influenced the project. One of these artists is singer Edda Dell'Orso, whose voice can be heard during Morricone's scores from Once Upon a Time in the West, Duck, You Sucker, Danger: Diabolik, a giallo called The Fifth Cord and Maddalena. Her wordless vocals grace "Theme of Rome," the album's opening track.

Dell'Orso's voice was like a guide through the surreal aural world of Morricone, and it acts as a guide once again as we enter the dark and melancholy Italian movie that Danger Mouse and Luppi have created with just their imaginary soundtrack and without any visuals. I have no idea what language Dell'Orso was singing in during those old Morricone cues (it's a language only she understands--Dell'Orso-ese?), but her voice during "Come Maddalena" is so reassuring and calming that I bet she was singing "And we're walking, we're walking."

Hear "Theme of Rome" now at my SwiftFM site.

Drums, please!

This week, Late Show with David Letterman is presenting its first-ever "Drum Solo Week," a series of shows in which Paul Shaffer and the CBS Orchestra will put the spotlight on legendary drummers and percussionists like Sheila E., Roy Haynes and the CBS Orchestra's own Anton Fig. Because of "Drum Solo Week," it's time to revisit a killer two-minute drum solo that opens "Come Maddalena (Like Maddalena)," a cue from Ennio Morricone's lush score to Maddalena, an obscure 1971 Italian art-house movie in which, according to IMDb, Lisa Gastoni "takes the title role in uninhibited, full frontal nudity fashion" and falls in love with "a priest in doubt over his vocation." I've never seen Maddalena--I assume it's like The Thorn Birds, but without that creepy "he first knew her when she was a little girl" thing.

Listen to "Come Maddalena" here. The soloist at the start of "Come Maddalena" is Morricone's frequent drummer during the '60s and '70s, Vincenzo Restuccia. His terrific drum work is also the highlight of "L'Ultimo," a Morricone instrumental that first appeared on the 1970 album Ideato, Scritto e Diretto da Ennio Morricone and was, according to a page about the 1970 LP, "composed for an unrealesed [sic] film whose title has been forgotten by Morricone himself." (I wonder why Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi didn't hire Restuccia as their percussionist during the recording of their Rome homage to '60s and '70s Italian film scores. Restuccia would have been perfect for that project.)

The groovetastic "L'Ultimo" sounds like something Marcello Mastroianni would have played in his convertible while driving around 1969 Rome with his 10th Victim stunna shades on.

Five killer samples that most people didn't know originated from film score music

Cee-Lo recently dropped his new single "Fuck You" on the Internet, and the delightfully profane break-up anthem, which originated from a song idea that Bruno Mars and Philip Lawrence of "Nothin' on You" fame pitched to Cee-Lo, has become a viral sensation. Before "Fuck You" (which has spawned a lame radio edit called "Forget You"), the Gnarls Barkley singer and former Goodie Mob MC's most popular track was his 2006 Gnarls hit "Crazy." Even though I got sick of hearing "Crazy" all over the place back in '06, I loved how Danger Mouse, the beatmaker half of Gnarls, sampled an obscure spaghetti western score during "Crazy." Not many people knew that the catchy bass line and strings were copped from Gianfranco Reverberi's "Nel Cimitero di Tucson," a score cue from 1968's Preparati la bara!, a.k.a. Viva Django. Here are five other killer samples that many listeners--including myself in some instances--didn't know came from film score music.


1. Jay-Z and Alicia Keys' "Empire State of Mind" drum break, 2009 (from Isaac Hayes' "Breakthrough" from Truck Turner, 1974) [WhoSampled comparison page]
The opening drum solo in "Breakthrough" is the Betty White of drum breaks: old and ubiquitous but reliable and entertaining every time. H.O.V.A.'s biggest hit of his career is the latest of many joints to sample "Breakthrough," an instrumental you can now check out during the daily "Assorted Fistful" block on A Fistful of Soundtracks.

2. Sneaker Pimps' "6 Underground" harp melody, 1996 (from John Barry's "Golden Girl" from Goldfinger, 1964) [WhoSampled comparison page]
If you were in college in the late '90s, you probably made out to "6 Underground." Did you know you were actually making out to the music from the dead-naked-chick-covered-in-gold-paint scene from Goldfinger?

3. Cibo Matto's "Sugar Water" wordless melody, 1996 (from Ennio Morricone's "Sospesi Nel Cielo" from Malamondo, 1964) [WhoSampled comparison page]
One of my favorite videos from the '90s is the Michel Gondry-directed video for "Sugar Water" (a.k.a. the song that soundtracked Buffy's sexy dance with Xander during her "Joan Collins 'tude" phase). My recent discovery that the duo sampled Morricone's Malamondo score made me love "Sugar Water" even more.

4. Ghostface Killah's "Alex (Stolen Script)" bass line and strings, 2006 (from Henry Mancini's Thief Who Came to Dinner theme, 1973) [WhoSampled comparison page]
MF Doom's sense of humor really comes through in his choice of the theme from the Ryan O'Neal/Jacqueline Bisset caper movie The Thief Who Came to Dinner (when's Warner Archives going to release that flick?) for Ghostface's How to Make It in America-esque tale of a Hollywood thief who comes to dinner--or to be more exact, a P.F. Chang's pitch meeting with the song's title hustler, who's pitching to him the script for Jamie Foxx's Ray biopic--and proceeds to steal Alex's copy of the Ray script. As music critic Jeff Weiss once wrote about this Ghostface chune, "Aspiring MC's should study this like the Rosetta Stone."

5. Wu-Tang Clan's "Rushing Elephants" brass riffs, 2007 (from Morricone's "Marche en La" from Espion, lève-toi, 1982) [WhoSampled comparison page]
My favorite film composer and my favorite experts on martial arts cinema "unite."

AFOS: "Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangster" playlist

Airing this week in the Wednesday Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series rerun time slots is the episode "Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangster" (WEB85) from February 19-25, 2007.


1. James Brown, "The Boss," Black Caesar, Polydor
2. Nino Rota, "Main Title (The Godfather Waltz)," The Godfather, MCA
3. David Schwartz, "Theme from Deadwood," Deadwood, Lost Highway/Universal
4. The Police & Henry Mancini, "Every Breath You Take/Theme from Peter Gunn (Mr. Ruggerio's Remix)," The Sopranos: Peppers & Eggs, Play-Tone/Columbia/Sony Music Soundtrax
5. Giorgio Moroder, "Tony's Theme," Scarface, MCA
6. Elmer Bernstein, "Prologue," Hoodlum: Original Score Soundtrack, RCA Victor
7. Ennio Morricone with Gheorghe Zamfir and Edda Dell'Orso, "Cockeye's Song" (from Once Upon a Time in America), The Ennio Morricone Anthology: A Fistful of Film Music, Rhino
8. Ennio Morricone, "The Die Is Cast," Bugsy, Epic Soundtrax
9. Howard Shore featuring G.E. Smith and Larry Saltzman, "Cops or Criminals," The Departed: Original Score, New Line
10. Richie Buckley, "Arcade Getaway," The General, Milan
11. Kalyanji Anandji, "Theme from Don," Bombay the Hard Way: Guns, Cars & Sitars, Motel
12. Shaan, "Main Hoon Don," Don: The Chase Begins Again, T-Series
13. Ennio Morricone, "Al Capone," The Untouchables, A&M
14. Ennio Morricone, "The Sicilian Clan--Main Titles" (from The Sicilian Clan), Ennio Morricone: The Gangster Collection, DRG
15. Ice-T, "New Jack Hustler (Nino's Theme)" (from New Jack City), A Rap Collection, Giant
16. Sammy Davis, Jr., "The Ballad of Johnny Cool," Johnny Cool, Rykodisc

Reruns of AFOS: The Series air Wednesdays at 10am and 3pm. To listen to the station during either of those time slots (or right now), press the play icon on the blue widget below the "About me" mini-bio on this blog.

AFOS: "Four-Star Playlist" tracks

Airing today at 10am and 3pm on A Fistful of Soundtracks is the Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode "Four-Star Playlist" (WEB83) from January 1-7, 2007. Each track during WEB83 received at one time or another a four-star rating or higher from Live365.com listeners. I had a bad cold when I recorded WEB83. I sounded like Peter Brady.

The instrumental bed during WEB83's opening segment is "Who Got Da Props" by Black Moon.

1. Duran Duran, "A View to a Kill," The Best of James Bond: 30th Anniversary Limited Edition, EMI
2. James Horner, "Main Title," Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, GNP/Crescendo
3. Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard, "Vespertilio," Batman Begins, Warner Sunset/Warner Home Video
4. Ennio Morricone featuring Christy, "Deep Down" (from Danger: Diabolik), Canto Morricone: The Ennio Morricone Songbook, Vol. 1, Bear Family
5. 702, "Pootie Tangin'," Pootie Tang, Hollywood
6. Jerry Goldsmith, "Old Bagdad," The 13th Warrior, Varèse Sarabande
7. Bill Conti, "Going the Distance," Rocky, EMI
8. Michael Giacchino, "'Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall,'" Mission: Impossible III, Varèse Sarabande
9. Marilyn Manson, "Resident Evil Main Title Theme," Resident Evil, Roadrunner/UMG Soundtracks
10. Bear McCreary, "Battle on the Asteroid," Battlestar Galactica: Season One, La-La Land
11. Lyle Lanley & Cast, "The Monorail Song," The Simpsons: Songs in the Key of Springfield, Rhino
12. John Barry, "Gumbold's Safe," On Her Majesty's Secret Service, EMI/Capitol
13. Ennio Morricone, "Magic and Ecstasy" (from Exorcist II: The Heretic), A Fistful of Film Music: The Ennio Morricone Anthology, Rhino
14. BC Smith featuring Ulali, "Forgive Our Fathers Suite featuring Wahjeeleh-Yihm," Smoke Signals, TVT Soundtrax

Reruns of AFOS: The Series air Wednesdays at 10am and 3pm. To listen to the station during either of those time slots (or right now), press the play icon on the blue widget below the "About me" mini-bio on this blog.

Ear candy: AFOS October 2009 segment playlists

Starting tonight at 11pm, these October '09 playlists (intro'd by yours truly, of course) will air all through the month on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel. Until November 1, they'll be repeated every Tuesday and Thursday at 4am, 10am, 3pm, 7pm and 11pm and every Saturday and Sunday at 7am, 9am, 1pm, 3pm and 5pm.


"Steven Soderbergh's Scorezopolis":
1. Marvin Hamlisch, "Golf," The Informant!, New Line
2. David Holmes, "Dice Men," Ocean's Thirteen, Warner Sunset/Warner Bros.

"Bubblegum Music Is the Naked Truth":
3. Lynn Carey & Barbara Robison, "Sweet Talkin' Candy Man," Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Soundtrack Classics
4. Danny Janssen, "Seven Days a Week," Scooby-Doo's Snack Tracks: The Ultimate Collection, Rhino

"Cardiff Rift":
5. Jacques Loussier, "Main Theme" (from Dark of the Sun), Guns for San Sebastian & Dark of the Sun, Chapter III
6. Lalo Schifrin, "Carry On," The Liquidator, Film Score Monthly

"Bollywood and the Stars":
7. Asha Bhonsle & Mohammed Rafi, "Chura Liya Hai Tum Ne" (from Yaadon Ki Baaraat), The Rough Guide to Bollywood, World Music Network
8. Lucky Ali, "Ek Pal Ka Jeena" (from Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai), The Rough Guide to Bollywood, World Music Network

"Life in La-La Land":
9. John Carpenter in association with Alan Howarth, "Tenement/White Tiger," Big Trouble in Little China, La-La Land
10. Shirley Walker, "City Street Drive/Sal Velestra/Good Samaritan," Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, La-La Land
11. Danny Elfman, "Trailer," Mars Attacks!, La-La Land

"Harmony of Dissonance":
12. Ennio Morricone, "Trafelato" (from Giornata Nera Per L'Ariete), Crime and Dissonance, Ipecac
13. Ennio Morricone and Bruno Nicolai, "Il Buio" (from L'Anticristo), Crime and Dissonance, Ipecac

"Sally (That Girl)":
14. Michael Small, "On the Roof" (from Klute), Klute/All the President's Men, Film Score Monthly
15. Lalo Schifrin, "Scorpio's View," Dirty Harry, Aleph

"Yes, I Only Hunt Blaculas":
16. J.G. Thirlwell, "Bolly," The Venture Bros.: The Music of JG Thirlwell, Williams Street
17. The Hues Corporation, "I'm Gonna Catch You" (from Blacula), MGM Soul Cinema Volume 1, Beyond/MGM Music

"...And Then James Woods Staked Edward--The End":
18. John Carpenter, "Stake and Burn," John Carpenter's Vampires, Milan
19. Texas Toad Lickers, "Padre's Wood," John Carpenter's Vampires, Milan

"In Absentia Luci, Tenebrae Vincunt":
20. Marco Beltrami, "Stand by Your Man," Hellboy, Varèse Sarabande
21. Marco Beltrami, "B.P.R.D.," Hellboy, Varèse Sarabande

"Fitted for a Suit of Flame":
22. Christopher Young, "Drag Me to Hell," Drag Me to Hell, Lakeshore
23. Christopher Young, "Lamia," Drag Me to Hell, Lakeshore

"Death Ain't No Way to Make a Living":
24. Danny Elfman, "Intro/Titles," The Frighteners, MCA Soundtracks
25. Danny Elfman, "Patty Attack," The Frighteners, MCA Soundtracks

"Loungin'":
26. Ennio Morricone, "La Cugina" (from La Cugina), More Mondo Morricone, Colosseum
27. Lalo Schifrin, "Tape Machine" (from the Mission: Impossible episode "Underground"), The Best of Mission: Impossible: Then and Now, GNP Crescendo

"R.I.P. Jerry van Rooyen":
28. Jerry van Rooyen, "The Great Bank Robbery" (from How Short Is the Time for Love), At 250 Miles Per Hour, Crippled Dick Hot Wax!
29. Jerry van Rooyen, "Sundown" (from The Vampire Happening), At 250 Miles Per Hour, Crippled Dick Hot Wax!

"That's Good Chowdah":
30. J.G. Thirlwell, "Warped Span," The Venture Bros.: The Music of JG Thirlwell, Williams Street
31. J.G. Thirlwell, "Tuff," The Venture Bros.: The Music of JG Thirlwell, Williams Street

Font memories

As part of his transition to HD last week, Craig Ferguson finally updated his show's opening title sequence, which used to be such a creaky-looking, misleading opening sequence (it made it look like The Late Late Show was all sketch comedy, when the sketches really only comprise two percent of the show--that's like if SNL opened with credits that consisted of nothing but shots of Seth Meyers reading the fake news).

The Late Late Show logo also experienced a makeover, which has been lesser-liked than the spiffy new opening ("The old logo was fun and distinctive, but the new one is somewhat bland"), while fontophiles have been more harsh towards the Ikea catalog's font switch from Futura to Verdana, according to a Gray Lady article that letterer Janice Chiang forwarded me. Branding is everything, which is why my picky self has constantly changed my radio station's textual logo over the years. I first used the Fistful of Soundtracks logo on flyers I made for AFOS the college radio program and then placed it on the AFOS sites, the covers of CD copies of episodes I burned for friends and the Microsoft Word files of the home-recorded program's episode scripts. Like what TrekMovie.com did in March with the many different Star Trek opening title fonts from 1966 to 2009, here's a brief history of AFOS fonts.


1997-1999: I wanted a dope font that both screamed "spaghetti western" and looked like something that came from poster art for a '60s or '70s European movie that was scored by Ennio Morricone, whose non-Sergio Leone '60s and '70s scores were among the scores I was discovering for the first time on CD back in 1997. I found that kind of font in Wharmby. I liked how it resembled the Morricone-scored Untouchables opening titles. Of course, after a couple of years, I get tired of the same old thing, so...


1999-2000: I chose another font that I thought screamed "spaghetti western," Wide Latin. Graphic designer Matt Hinrichs of Scrubbles.net used Wide Latin for the previous incarnation of his blog's logo. This was the first logo I featured on the program's then-new site. I forgot Wide Latin was the same font that was used in the Kung Fu opening credits. I didn't want anything to do with a font that, to me, represented an annoying show that starred yet another white guy who tried to pass himself off as Asian (I know PopeyePete loves that show, but I have issues with it), so...


2000-2001: At the time, I was crazy about the italicized opening title fonts from the Pierce Brosnan 007 flicks, the Mission: Impossible feature films and the Kyle Cooper-designed Lost in Space titles.


2001-2008: I felt like switching to a font that better conveyed speed and futurism. I stuck with this font the longest. This was the last of the logos to appear at the top of the scripts I typed for myself to record because in 2008, I switched from typing the scripts on Word to typing them on the more stripped-down Notepad, where the text is presented in only one font.


2006-2009: I was in the mood for a font that crossed Cowboy Bebop with those banjo-scored '70s Sesame Street "sand letter" interstitials.


2009-?: I wanted a return to the station name's spaghetti western roots because some people still don't understand that the name's a reference to Morricone's classic collabos with Leone.

The best result of the Morricone/Leone partnership was Once Upon a Time in the West, one of my favorite flicks since high school (I first saw it letterboxed and uncut on Bravo, back when the channel was actually watchable and wasn't a dumpster for irritating reality shows and Criminal Intent reruns). OUATITW was unique for having Morricone finish recording the score before filming began so that Leone could play it aloud on the set to help get the actors into character and to synchronize camera movements to the tempo of the music.

The 1968 epic is a still-misunderstood film (here's a reason why I don't like the city I live in and can't wait to leave it: when I rewatched OUATITW in a local theater, everyone there gradually walked out until I was the only one left because these downtown assclowns who were clearly raised on Michael Bay were expecting a shoot-'em-up, and that's not what the film is, though it contains a couple of kickass action sequences, particularly the Jason Robards shootout on the train). OUATITW is also a great union of music and image, and because the score was completed before a single frame of film was shot, it's very listenable outside the context of the movie, which is why I frequently played it on my college radio program and then on my Internet radio station.

I'm glad someone suggested A Fistful of Soundtracks as the title of my program in 1997 because Once Upon a Time in Soundtracks doesn't roll off the tongue as easily.

AFOS: "I'll Kill You and Recommend to God That He Put His Foot in Your Ass" playlist

Airing tomorrow at 10am and 3pm on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel is the Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode "I'll Kill You and Recommend to God That He Put His Foot in Your Ass" (WEB89) from June 18-24, 2007. In WEB89, I picked out my favorite score cues from obscure spaghetti westerns I've never watched like Keoma and Life Is Tough, Eh Providence? One of those tunes is the Viva Django cue "Nel Cimitero Di Tucson," which Gnarls Barkley sampled for their 2006 hit "Crazy."

The ep's title is a play on the title of the 1968 spaghetti western I'll Kill You and Recommend You to God, a.k.a. Dead for a Dollar.


1. Ennio Morricone, "Main Titles" (from Face to Face), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume Three, DRG
2. Roberto Fia, "Django" (from Django), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume Two, DRG
3. Guido and Maurizio De Angelis, "Keoma (instrumental)," Keoma, Cinedelic
4. Dandylion, "Wolf," Mannaja, Cometa
5. Stelvio Cipriani, "Un Uomo, Un Cavallo, Una Pistola," The Bounty Killer/Un Uomo, Un Cavallo, Una Pistola/Nevada, CAM
6. Stelvio Cipriani, "Faccia a Terra" (from Un Uomo, Un Cavallo, Una Pistola), The Bounty Killer/Un Uomo, Un Cavallo, Una Pistola/Nevada, CAM
7. Franco Bixio, "Just a Coward (instrumental)" (from And Now Recommend Your Soul to God), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume One, DRG
8. Gianfranco and Gian Piero Reverberi, "Nel Cimitero Di Tucson," Preparati La Bara!, RCA
9. Ennio Morricone, "The Hellbenders" (from The Hellbenders), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume Two, DRG
10. Ennio Morricone, "Main Titles" (from Life Is Tough, Eh Providence?), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume Three, DRG
11. Bruno Nicolai, "The Man Called Apocalypse Joe--Sequence 1" (from The Man Called Apocalypse Joe), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume Four, DRG
12. Augusto Martelli, "M 9 and M 15 V" (from La Collera Del Vento), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume One, DRG
13. Angelo Francisco Lavagnino, "A Gambling Man (Versione Strumentale)," 5000 Dollari sull'Asso, CAM
14. Piero Umiliani, "Suite" (from Roy Colt & Winchester Jack), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume One, DRG
15. Gianni Ferrio, "Controluce" (from Ben and Charlie), Spaghetti Westerns, Volume One, DRG

Repeats of A Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series air Wednesdays at 10am and 3pm.

AFOS: "Bad Things Come in Threes (Alright, Maybe Not Always)" playlist

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the release of one of my favorite films, Do the Right Thing, so I'm busy putting together something Do the Right Thing-related for the blog. In the meantime, airing tomorrow at 10am and 3pm on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel is the Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode "Bad Things Come in Threes (Alright, Maybe Not Always)" (WEB88) from June 18-24, 2007. Every track during WEB88 comes from a threequel like The Good, the Bad and the Ugly or Ocean's Thirteen.


1. Hans Zimmer, "Hoist the Colours," Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Walt Disney
2. Ennio Morricone, "Il Buono Il Brutto Il Cattivo (titoli)," Il Buono, Il Brutto, Il Cattivo, GDM
3. David Holmes, "Not Their Fight," Ocean's Thirteen, Warner Sunset/Warner Bros.
4. David Holmes, "11, 12 & 13," Ocean's Thirteen, Warner Sunset/Warner Bros.
5. Michael Giacchino, "Mission: Impossible Theme," Mission: Impossible III, Varèse Sarabande
6. The Four Tops, "Are You Man Enough?" (from Shaft in Africa), The Best of Shaft, Hip-O
7. Survivor, "Eye of the Tiger" (from Rocky III), Ultimate Survivor, Volcano Heritage
8. Jerry Fielding, "Prologue/Main Title," The Enforcer, Aleph
9. John Williams, "The Pit of Carkoon/Sail Barge Assault," Return of the Jedi, RCA Victor
10. Howard Shore, "The White Tree," The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Reprise/WMG Soundtracks
11. David Holmes, "Snake Eyes," Ocean's Thirteen, Warner Sunset/Warner Bros.
12. John Williams, "Scherzo for Motorcycle and Orchestra," Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Warner Bros.
13. Danny Elfman, "March of the Dead," Army of Darkness, Varèse Sarabande
14. Ennio Morricone, "Il Triello," Il Buono, Il Brutto, Il Cattivo, GDM
15. Alan Silvestri, "End Titles" (from Back to the Future Part III), Varèse Sarabande: A 25th Anniversary Celebration, Varèse Sarabande

Repeats of A Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series air Wednesdays at 10am and 3pm.

"I Need to Score" T-shirt by Shelf Life

The Deuce's PopeyePete linked in a recent tweet to a bunch of ill exploitation cinema-related T-shirts by the Cleveland-based Shelf Life Clothing. Here's the illest of them all:

These are the legendary film music composers whose faces are on the shirt:

Shelf Life's shirt design for their film music tee is way better than the shirt design I came up with for my CafePress store a long time ago:

In a hipster T-shirt market with too many racist companies and not enough Blacklavas, it's nice to see Shelf Life defy the market and be pro-Asian for a change:

Mike Patton covers the Danger: Diabolik theme

Because I'm an Ennio Morricone fan and I like Mario Bava's Morricone-scored 1968 comic book flick Danger: Diabolik, I got a kick out of Mike Patton's awesome cover of Morricone's "Deep Down" theme from Diabolik. The track, which was originally sung by a female vocalist named Christy, will be part of Patton's forthcoming Mondo Cane album of covers of '50s and '60s Italian pop songs. Also next up from the frontman of Fantômas and previously, Faith No More: the Crank: High Voltage score.



Tim Lucas, who did the Diabolik DVD's audio commentary and wrote Mario Bava: All the Colors of the Dark, said on his blog that "seeing ['Deep Down'] performed live by such an expressive vocalist, a full choir and orchestra brought tears to my eyes."

The Mike Patton's Mondo Cane version of "Deep Down" is my favorite cover by Patton since his cover of the Nestlé "Sweet Dreams You Can't Resist" jingle from his Faith No More days.

Patton and I happen to share both the same birthdate and a love for film and TV scores, especially Morricone's. I didn't come up with the name A Fistful of Soundtracks--another DJ at my college radio station did--but I chose that name for my college radio show because I thought it would be a cool way to pay tribute to Morricone and his work on the Fistful trilogy and A Fistful of Dynamite, a.k.a. Duck, You Sucker.

This post is also an excuse to show Marisa Mell in her Diabolik hot pants.