GREATEST SCIENCE FICTION HITS IV

By: Randall Larson
Date: Saturday, September 16, 2000

When I first encountered Neil Norman's GREATEST SCIENCE FICTION HITS back in 1978, I was one of those grumpy purists taken aback by his electric guitars intruding upon the pristine orchestral tonalities of STAR WARS and other icons of science fiction film music in the '70s. Even though I had grown up engulfed in the rock and roll of the '60s, I felt the chasm between rock music and orchestral film music was one that shouldn't be so simply breached. Well, attitudes change. His 3rd volume had plenty to interest my musical palette, and now, with the 4th volume, I am completely taken by Norman's interpretation of science fiction film and TV music, whether portrayed in accordance to their originals or hyped up with Norman's rock band guitars and synths.

Taken as a whole, actually, there's a lot more true-to-the-original orchestral material here than rock-and-roll, but where there's rock, the Norman and the band really cook. His rendition of Richard Band's PSYCHO-inspired music for REANIMATOR keeps up a rollicking rhythm throughout its length, with Bill Burchell's synth arrangements taking Band's orchestral licks to new vistas. Burchell appears again with the ethereal and evocative 'Universes' (a really neat textural synthesizer piece), introducing a 6:41 menagerie of 'Star Trek Encounters' that gives Norman plenty of room to flex his Trekkian guitar licks. Burchell's synth tones segue beautifully into the opening bars of Alexander Courage's 'STAR TREK Theme,' which retains a captivating feel through a synth voice. This quickly segues into Jerry Goldsmith's theme from STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE/THE NEXT GENERATION, performed here by synth and guitar over drum set, before moving into some of Gerald Fried's ethnic alien-planet festival rhythms from his original TREK TV episode 'Amok Time,' and then a heavy electric guitar rendition of Dennis McCarthy's DEEP SPACE NINE theme, hiked up several notches with Norman's brutal guitar work. The nearly 7-minute cue keeps up a seriously strident dynamic throughout.


Burchell's synths provide another neat introduction, this time to a terrific electronic adaptation of Akira Ifukube's Godzilla March from MONSTER ZERO. Burchell creates an evocative landscape of post-monster devastation with sampled Japanese flute and lute intoning Ifukube's March in plaintive and noble Japanese style, before Norman tears it all apart with a raucous and rhythmic arrangement of the theme for electric guitar and singing synths.

Jerry Goldsmith's theme from ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES (the session here produced in association with Goldsmith's son Joel, whose own film musical efforts are elsewhere presented via his themes for STARGATE SG-1) is presented straightforwardly, Norman's guitar replacing that of Tommy Tedesco on the original, giving the primitive acoustics of the first APES movie a resplendent twentieth century edge for the apes' visit to contemporary earth.

Mark Snow's X FILES Theme is given an especially compelling treatment, the main synth-wind theme backed by sonorous synth choir and a brazen, forefront synthesizer pulse. The 4-minute cue undergoes plenty of divergent textural ambiences, maintaining its cadence with that dominant synth pulse. Norman also intensifies John Carpenter (if that is possible) by giving the director-composer's theme from ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (co-written with synthesist Alan Howarth) a heavy rock rhythm and adding plenty of virtuoso synth and guitar work. Next, he provides a souped-up version of the 'James Bond Theme' that is truly perfect for Shaken, Not Stirred Air Guitars. An arrangement of Danny Elfman's cool mixture of Peter Gunn and Beetlejuice, MEN IN BLACK, includes the sultry vocal chorus from Will Smith's 'Men In Black' hit (sans the rap elements), which provides a fresh edge for Norman's listeners.

Of those cues performed faithfully to the original form, Norman includes John Williams' adventurous theme for TV's AMAZING STORIES, the first ever release of David Rose's theme from the old 1959 TV show, MEN INTO SPACE (the martial tune, all brass and timpani and very STAR WARS-ian, is a far cry from Rose's famous composition, 'The Stripper'), Richard Markowitz's catchy main theme to the original WILD, WILD WEST series (synthesized harmonica played by David Carr, who played piano on screen in several episodes of the series), Michael Boddicker's quirky synth-and-guitar theme from THE ADVENTURES OF BUCAROO BANZAI (another first recorded release entry), Joe LoDuca's brassy and adventurous theme from HERCULES: THE LEGENDARY JOURNEYS (conducted by veteran orchestrator Jack Smalley), a 4-minute suite from Elmer Bernstein's SATURN 3 (its potent rhythmic intonations of synth, strings, and fluted wind patterns also seeing the light of recorded day for the first time here), Edwin Astley's cool '60s jazz theme for THE SAINT, themes from AIRWOLF (Silvester Levay), BABYLON 5 (Christopher Franke, formerly of Tangerine Dream), and the new OUTER LIMITS (John Van Tongeran & Mark Mancina).

Norman also recreates effective renditions of Alan Silvestri's score for PREDATOR (with synth sequencing by the ubiquitous John Beal, whose take on Silvestri's quickening synthesizer pulses for this action-adventure score are very likable) and PREDATOR II, wherein the relentless rhythms of the first score are given an effective urban ethnicity with an undercurrent of bongos (performed by Alex Acuna, who also played them on the original soundtrack). Norman embellishes John Williams' symphonic JURASSIC PARK: THE LOST WORLD theme with rumbling guitars and surging cymbals, giving the motif a quite powerful denouement.

'Conquest of the Thaxton Nebula' (its title a tribute to fellow record producer and film music expert Ford Thaxton) is an original composition for this CD, a cool rhythm piece dominated by a prevalent rock bass cadence. The other original composition for this release is Jack Smalley's 'Alien Autopsy,' a spooky and suspenseful bit of orchestral ambience that draws a lot of scary power in its furtive and mysterious symphonic sonorities. Use it to create your own soundtrack for that questionable autopsy video issued a few years ago.

The CD includes notes by Norman on each cuebackground of the show and details of the selection/arrangement recordedand plenty of color photos of Norman with various composers (including dolphins), green alien girls, and band members at work and play. It's a cool CD by any means, whether or not you appreciate the guitar arrangements of hitherto orchestral music. In actuality, perhaps the CD's only drawback is that there isn't enough of Norman's guitarseemingly the main draw for his listenersthroughout. But the mix of faithful performances and rock-ized versions of selected cues makes for a varied and ultimately very likable listen.

SCIENCE FICTION'S GREATEST HITS IV: Neil Norman and his Cosmic Orchestra. GNP Crescendo Records GNPD 2258. 28 tracks: 77:16 mins. Available at www.crescendo.com.

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