Soundtracks — LPs  

A sweet early western soundtrack from Ennio Morricone – scored with a bit more drama in later years, but already showing a magical sense of space and sound! The record begins with the excellent "A Gringo Like Me" – a totally catchy English language vocal number sung by Peter Tevis, and reprised later by Daicky Jones – then rolls into an all-instrumental batch of tracks that moves between a few period pieces and some other hipper styles – including a bit of jazz at times that feels a lot more crime than western! Reissue features a total of 20 tracks in all – including two versions of "A Gringo Like Me".

The soundtrack to one of the more popular films that Morricone scored during the 70s – a successful comedy that scored big on the international market. A number of the tunes are a bit too silly for us, but there's also some nice numbers that get at the spare, dark, and lovelier side of Morricone's work – a few sweet little tunes that make the album worth having!

A really moody little record from Ennio Morricone – spare, subtle, and extremely beautiful – touched with notes of sadness and remorse, but also handled with a strong spirit of redemption! The sound here isn't as cold or atonal as that on some of Morricone's horror work – but it's also not sweet and dreamy either. Instead, there's kind of an economic use of piano, light strings, and odd sonic textures – woven into a tapestry of shorter tunes that convey a real sense of loss, but also a quietly growing beauty. There's a few wordless vocals on the set, but things are mostly instrumental overall – and titles include "La Califfa", "La Pace Interiore", "Fari Nella Notte", "La Cena", "Notturno", "Sotto La Pioggia", and "Sangue Sull'Asfalto".

Le Mani Sporche is a drama based around a story by Sartre – a bit moody, and so is the soundtrack, swirling strings and piano together in some very atonal tracks!

One of the most haunting Morricone soundtracks ever – and one of the grooviest too! The album's a perfect blend of our two favorite styles of Morricone work – that of the floating female vocal over a gentle groove, and the darker, tenser side of his music. The main "Verushka" theme is one of his most beautiful – a variation of female vocals with a gentle edge, in the tradition of classic soundtracks like La Donna Invisible or Le Photo Proibite. This theme shifts from mood to mood over the course of the LP, occasionally giving way to some more atonal passages and other more jazz-based tunes – more of which are included here than on the original release, thanks to an expanded reissue job by Right Tempo! In fact, the whole thing's bubbling over with great music – one of the best Morricone reissues we've ever stocked – done with great sound and a huge array of extra tracks! Titles include a number of takes on the "Verushka" theme, plus "Astratto", "La Bambola", "Le Fotografie", "Magia", "La Spiaggia", and "Dopo L'Intervista".

Magical mainstream Morricone – a sublime score for Sergio Leone's epic tale of gangland growth in the 20th century! Although penned for a wider audience, most of the best Morricone elements are still at play in this soundtrack – a great sense of space and timing, and some key use of spare, isolated instruments – including the pan flute of George Zamfir, an odd choice given the New York setting of the film, but one that comes off beautifully in the mix. Strings back up most of the tunes, but they're never too sleepy – just slightly sentimental, but in a really good way. Titles include "Childhood Memories", "Once Upon A Time In America", "Cockeye's Song", "Childhood Poverty", "Friends", "Photographic Memories", "Speakeasy", and "Poverty". CD also features some bonus tracks too!

A lesser-known soundtrack from Ennio Morricone – but one of his grooviest moments of the late 60s! The score is a great blend of heavy and light – and blends together that wonderful floating Morricone style with some heavier, fuzzier tunes that show the late 60s period of the film – all making for a really fleshed-out sound, of the sort that you're usually likely to hear in some of Morricone's classics! The album includes one great number that's got an extended sitar solo, and a few more with hard-edged male vocals by Patrick Samson that almost feel like late 60s French pop! Titles include "Gloria", "Sytar", "Una Voce Allo Specchio", "Tell Me Tell Me", "Sospendi Il Tempo", "In Tre Quarti", "Laila Laila", and "Dinamica Per 5 + 1".

A great score for an incredible film! Teorema is a strange and wonderful early film by Pier Paolo Pasolini – and about half of the soundtrack was written by Ennio Morricone, in a mixture of dark, edgey themes, and some more groovy tunes with a great late 60s Italy feel – an early moment of genius for the maestro, augmented by some Mozart numbers that further complicate the soundtrack! The groovier material includes the beat-heavy "Fruscio Di Foglie Verdi", the bouncing wordless vocal "L'Ultima Corrida", and the jangly guitar instrumental "Beat No 3" – and other tunes include "Teorema", "Frammenti", and the "Messa Da Requiem" by WA Mozart, which is also used in the film – to very haunting effect!

One of the hippest Italian soundtracks of the 60s – and a motherlode of tracks by the great Piero Piccioni! The soundtrack is the source of the oft-compiled "Mr Dante Fontana", a nutty groover about the mod fashion scene in Italy – and it also features the famous tracks "Richmond Bridge" and "You Never Told Me". Most of the music is by Piccioni and the wonderful vocal group I Cantori Moderni, with Edda Dell'Orso on vocals – but the CD also features some work by Lydia Mac Donald, Julie Rogers, and Ennio Morricone. Includes a few versions of the "Fontana" and "Richmond", plus "Ascot Dream", "Magic Castle", "Tango Walk", "Drag Beat", "This Is Life", "Palace Parade March", "Babylon, I'm Coming", and "His Dream Has Come True". Very groovy – with loads of excellent material, and 27 cuts in all!

A sublime second set of work from Orgasmo Sonore – even hipper than their first, and again a wonderful reworking of soundtrack modes from the Italian scene of the 70s! Compositions here are by Ennio Morricone, Stelvio Cipriani, Piero Piccioni, and others – but the group makes the music very much their own – by transforming the tunes with tighter, funkier instrumentation – almost giving the songs a small combo sort of feel, while still retaining all the majestic charm of the originals! The approach is mindblowing – easily one of the best contemporary experiments of this nature we've ever heard – and the record is pleasing both to ears that love vintage soundtracks, and to those that dig funky instrumentals too. Titles include "Too Risky A Day For A Regatta", "Incubi Ricorrenti", "Metropolis", "Summertime Bossa", "Volto Di Donna", "Pillage", "Les Dunes D'Ostende", "Un Ombra Nell'Ombra", "La Sconda Caccia", and "Pearls".

A cool contemporary combo, but one who draw heavily from the sound of Italian film scores of the 70s – all with an approach that easily makes this album a perfect partner for any giallo soundtracks you might love! Instrumentation is nice and dark – a cool mix of strings and keyboards, with some slight and subtle rhythms – all used together in ways that are never too jamming, and which really preserve a strong sense of tension throughout – but also offer up some melodic moments as a respite, too – that balance between darkness and light you'd find in the best film scores by Ennio Morricone! The overall presentation is wonderful – truly classic, and worthy of the great cover as well – and titles include "Sotto Il Sole", "Gli Occhi Della Dolcezza", "Uccelare", "Canto Del Cigno", "Agente D'Oriente", and "Senza Calore".

Life! Liberty! Vengeance! A wild and very cool soundtrack for Tarantino's dual Blacksploitation/Spaghetti Western homage Django Unchained – featuring bits from some of our favorite Italian western composers mixed up with classic and contemporary funky soul and hip hop! It's the kind of soundtrack that could only happen for Quentin Tarantino – with rare and hard-to-find compositions by Luis Bacalov, Ennio Morricone, Riz Ortolani and Jerry Goldsmith on one hand – along with a few seemingly antithetical new compositions on the other – including a track penned by star Jamie Foxx for Rick Ross, a James Brown "Payback" remix with a vocal from the 2Pac archive, plus ones by Anthony Hamilton, John Legend and others! Last but not least, it's got some great bits of film dialogue by Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson and Leonardo DiCaprio. Titles include "Django" by Luis Bacalov, "The Braying Mule" by Ennio Morricone, "Nicaragua" by Jerry Goldsmith with Pat Metheny, "Unchained (The Payback/Untouchable)" by James Brown with 2Pac, "Who Did That To You?" by John Legend, "100 Black Coffins" by Rick Ross, "Trinity (Titoli)" by Annibale E I Cantori Moderni and more.