Outside Lands vs. Lollapalooza in a fight to the death! Soundtrack by Erasure.

August 18th, 2011

I’m still decompressing from the past few weeks. I’ve had two weddings (one of which I had to be in) and a cross country trip to San Francisco that included some non-stop record shopping and a three day outdoor festival! All on damaged ribs!

Damn, I’m fucking metal.

As I’ve mentioned here before, I usually go to Lollapalooza this time of year, but that was impossible, so I made the trip to Outside Lands instead. This was not a decision I made lightly. For all of its problems (and there are many) I love going to Lollapalooza. I think that it is one of the most well-organized, affordable and fan-friendly festivals today. My only other modern festival experience has been Ultra, and that was a clusterfuck of greed, drugs and douchbaggery the likes of which I have never seen. It made me miss Lollapalooza even more.

Outside Lands was at least a positive experience, but was it really better than Lollapalooza? Let’s compare.

The Line-Up
Both Lollapalooza and Outside Lands featured many of the same bands: Big Audio Dynamite, Muse, Deadmau5, Arctic Monkeys, Beirut, Ok Go and The Vaccines to name a few. But while Lollapalooza also had Coldplay, Foo Fighters, Cold War Kids, A Perfect Circle, The Cars, Deftones and Crystal Castles, Outside Lands’ exclusive acts included bands like Phish, The Decemberists, Josh Ritter and Best Coast. Definitely much more of a chill/jam vibe that is very much NOT my thing. This led to some pretty big breaks in my schedule where I was at best not doing much and at worst actively avoiding all the stages.
Advantage: Lollapalooza

Stage Layout
Lollapalooza has seven stages (plus a kids’ stage) that are all pretty easy to see no matter what. Outside Lands is a smaller festival, with only four stages. One of them is so small it’s barely worth mentioning, and the main stage is just a clusterfuck of problems. The sound tent for it is massive, blocking the view of the stage for nearly everyone who isn’t in front of it. Furthermore, the dance dome is too close to the stage,  so unless you are close enough to the stage for the music to be loud enough, you’re going to get a constant bass thump mashed up with the music on the main stage. While I do give Outside Lands credit for not putting any of its stages on fucking cement like Lolla does, it’s much easier to actually see a band at Lollapalooza than it is Outside Lands
Advantage: Lollapalooza

Toilets
If you have to piss at Lollapalooza, no problem, there are almost never lines for all of the porta-potties, you just have to know where to look. This is not so at Outside Lands. There were never enough pissers to go around, so the lines got pretty massive. The lines were so intense, in fact, that I saw dudes and women just pissing in the woods. Classy! Making matters worse was that that porta-potty company would routinely plow their truck through the porta-potty area to empty over-used facilities. Their devotion to cleanliness should be applauded, but the cloud of dust and overall disruption the would cause every time they did this did no one any favors. This one is no contest
Advantage: Lollapalooza

Food
Outside Lands has better, more diverse food, no contest. The problem is getting to it. Just like the porta-potties, the lines to the food vendors are fucking nuts at Outside Lands. I never have to wait more than five minutes for pizza at Lollaplooza,but  a typical wait for anything aside from tofu tacos was nearly double that at Outside Lands. Still, the food is really good when you can get your hands on it, so this one is even.
Advantage: Push

Water
Price of refilling a bottle of water at Outside Lands 2011: $1
Price of refilling a bottle of water at Lollapalooza: Free
Also, finding a fucking refilling station at Outside Lands was practically impossible. Finding a beer tent, on the other hand, was incredibly easy. Funny that.
Advantage: Lollapalooza

Weather
It’s fucking HOT in Chicago in the summer. Seriously, like triple digit hot. And when it’s not fucking hot it’s fucking storming. It sucks. San Francisco on the other hand, cool and breezy, with highs in the low 70s all weekend. Can’t beat that shit.
Advantage: Outside Lands

Golden Gate Park
Holy shit this place is beautiful. Grant Park in Chicago is basically a series of baseball diamonds. GGP is actually a park, complete with scenic trails that remain open during the concert. Sure, I had a lot of downtime at the festival, but at least I could walk down to a secluded forest path and just chill. At Lollapalooza there is no such thing as a quiet spot.
Advantage: Outside Lands

Vibe
People at Lollapalooza are dicks. They push, shove and fight their way to the front of the stage, then proceed to talk and text while the music is playing. The crowd at Outside Lands was decidedly more chill and friendly. I rarely had problems with people talking over the music, and I only had one encounter with a dick shoving his way to the front of the stage. Sure, when you got further back there was more talking and more shoving, but you’re going to have that at any fest. Maybe it was that mellow California attitude I always hear about, or maybe it was all the weed…actually I’m willing to bet it was all the weed, but whatever the reason, the kindness of the crowd really made this fest one to remember for me.
Advantage: Outside Lands

The final count may be four for Lolla and three for Outside Lands, but I’m still going to call it a push, because a friendly vibe and weather that doesn’t make my balls sweat off are two factors that really go a long way.

At the end of the day, Outside Lands is a quality festival with a few problems. I saw less bands than I would have seen at Lolla, that’s for sure, but I had a lot more fun seeing those bands than I would have if I saw them at Lolla. It’s hard to say which is better. So if you’re looking for a quality festival, I’d have to say that you really can’t go wrong with either Outside Lands or Lollapalooza. Both do a pretty good job at what they’re trying to do. And while the organizers of Lollapalooza really can’t do much to solve the problems of Grant Park and Chicago heat, the problems that Outside Lands face are actually fixable, giving me hope that the festival will only get better next year.

Just don’t go the Ultra, seriously, fuck those guys. The crowd there booed Erasure. Fucking dicks.

Erasure
Always (Cappella Club Remix)
Always [Microbots Trance Dance Mix]
Always (Microbots Inside Your Brain Mix)
Always (Hey Mix)
Breathe (LMC Extended Club Mix)
Breathe (When Andy Bell Met Manhattan Clique Extended Remix)
Breathe [Acoustic]
Freedom (Motiv 8 Radio Mix)
Freedom (JC’s Freedom Of Flight Remix)
Freedom (Mark’s Guitar Vocal)
Freedom (Mark’s Jail Term Dub)
Now, I know this may come as a shock, but it turns out that San Francisco is a great place to find Erasure singles! It’s also a great place to find Madonna and Pet Shop Boys stuff, so look for them in the coming weeks as well.

As much as I love electronic music, I’d have to say that the best track of this bunch is the acoustic version of “Breathe.” Sometimes a song needs to be stripped of its production for the lyrics to really sink in, and the heartache and pain of “Breathe” really get to you when the song is taken down to nothing more than Andy Bell’s amazing voice and the soft strums of an acoustic guitar. It’s really beautiful.

That being said, the house-as-fuck seven-minute Cappella Club Remix of “Always” is pretty sweet too. All of these are from CD singles, save for the last track, which is from a 12″.

Posted in Erasure | 5 Comments »

Biggest Audio Dynamite II

August 17th, 2011

My photos from Outside Lands 2011 are up on Flickr! Enjoy!

Next post I’ll share my thoughts on the festival itself, but I’m still in pain from something stupid I did at the concert, so I don’t feel like sitting in front a computer any more than I have to. Instead, have a metric buttload of BAD II/Big Audio.

Big Audio Dynamite II/Big Audio
 The Globe (Single Edit)
The Globe (Single Remix Edit)
The Globe (12″ Mix)
The Globe (Dub Version)
The Globe (By The Orb)
The Globe (Instrumental)
Rush (12″ Mix)
Rush Dance
City Lights
Rush (Live)
Rush (Live) (Different Version)
Medicine Show (Live)
Mirror Man
Looking For A Song (The Zonka/Shapps Remix)
Looking For A Song (Zonka Shapps Early Mix)
Looking For A Song (Extended Album Mix)
Looking For A Song (Zonka’s Adventures In Space)
Okay, that’s it! That’s all the Big Audio (Dynamite) [II] that I have! I feel as if I’ve said all I can about BAD for now, except that “Looking For a Song” is one of the most underrated tracks from an underrated album that you’ll ever hear. Download it and love it.

 

Posted in Big Audio Dynamite, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Biggest Audio Dynamite

August 16th, 2011

Big Audio Dynamite is not my favorite band, but they are my favorite band that I never thought I would get a chance to see live.

When BAD first broke onto the scene I was about five years old, so I didn’t catch them the first time around.  In fact,  I didn’t discover BAD until I got into buying records and 12″ singles a few years ago. I know it’s an odd ass-backwards way of doing things, but at three bucks, a used 12″ is a great low-risk entry point for discovering artists you may not know a lot about.

I bought a few singles from the group over the course of a couple of months, but the one that really caught my attention was the 12″ single to “C’mon Every Beatbox.” Something about the track resonated with me, and I became obsessed with it and all the remixes of it that I could get my hands on. From there I bought every other BAD 12” single I could find, as well as the CD singles and the albums proper. What amazed me most about the group was how ahead of the time they sounded! You could plop any track off their first three or four albums into a Gorillaz record and no one would be the wiser. Their sound is indefinable and timeless, something you can say about very few bands from the 80s.

It bummed me out that a band I had fallen in love with had broken up, with little hope of a reunion. So when that unlikely reunion was announced, I nearly shit. When I found out they were playing America, I almost had to change my shorts.

I knew I had to see them no matter what the cost (and trust me, the cost was pretty substantial, and I’m not talking about money…it’s a long story). But all the trials and tribulations I went through in order to see them paid off, when they blew my fucking mind with an amazing performance.

They played everything I wanted to hear (save for V. Thirteen, but I’ll survive) with gusto, energy and enthusiasm. Even the people in the crowd who weren’t there for BAD (The Shins were playing next) seemed to enjoy the set. Mick Jones and the crew may all be old dudes, but they all obviously still care about getting their fans off with a polished and well-rehearsed performance. Not only that, they seemed to be having fun too, which makes it all the better for the fans watching.  I may be a little biased, but their performance was without a doubt the best performance of the entire festival, and one of the best festival performances I have ever seen.

It was totally an experience I am never going to forget (I even caught a drumstick!). I thank BAD tremendously for playing in America and apparently still caring about their fans and their own music even after all these years. Come back to America guys, I’ll travel across the country for you anytime.

In the meantime, here’s a fuckload of out-of-print BAD remixes and b-sides.

Big Audio Dynamite
C’Mon Every Beatbox (Extended Version)
Beatbox’s At Dawn
Hollywood Boulevard (Club Mix)
Hollywood Boulevard (Dub Mix)
Sightsee M.C. (Radio Cut)
Sightsee M.C. (Remix)
Sightsee – West London
Another One Rides The Bus
V Thirteen (Extended Remix)
Just Play Music (Extended Mix)
Just Play Music (Remix)
B.A.D. Overture
Other 99 (Extended Remix)
Contact (12″ Remix)
Contact (7″ Remix)
Contact (Club Mix)
Who-Beats
In Full Effect
James Brown (Remix)
James Brown (Remix Edit)
If I Were John Carpenter
Free (Club Mix)
Free (Film Version)
The Bottom Line (Film & Club Version)
What’s missing from this list? Well, not much. The only tracks I did not include were This Is Big Audio Dynamite-era stuff that you can find on the recent re-issue of that album, which you should totally buy. And I know there aren’t any BAD II or Big Audio tracks here, but just wait, I’ll get to them.

A lot of these are reposts, but I re-recorded all of them except the stuff from the “Contact” single (I couldn’t find it!) with better audio equipment, so I suggest downloading them all even if you have before.

Enjoy! Like I said, more BAD later this week. You can also look forward to some more views from me on Outside Lands 2011, as well as some reviews of San Francisco record stores.

Guess what? I bought a lot of fucking records.

Posted in Big Audio Dynamite | 11 Comments »

Where I was last week

August 15th, 2011

Front row, center under the drums. The big guy freaking the fuck out. That would be me.

New post coming very soon I promise. Take one guess as to who it will be about…

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

Sigue Sigue Something

August 4th, 2011

If you pick up on an overwhelming feeling of despair in this post, it’s because I’m writing it in Toledo. It has that effect on things.

This will be my last post for the week. Usually I’m busy during the first week of August because I’m heading to Chicago for Lollapalooza. However, I don’t get to go to Lolla this year because of reasons that I can’t even begin to get in to.

HOWEVER, I will be going to the Outside Lands Festival in San Francisco next weekend. It doesn’t look as great as Lolla (too many jam bands for my taste), but I think I’ll still enjoy it.

I also plan on doing some record shopping while in San Fran (and by “some record shopping” I mean I’m going to buy ALL THE RECORDS). Anyone want to recommend some good SF record stores? I already know about Amoeba.

Since I’ll be spending most of next week in the homeland of Rice-a-roni, only expect one post. Don’t worry. It will be Big and full of great Audio. Seriously, it’s going to by Dynamite.

Sigue Sigue Sputnik
Massive Retaliation (The Super Massive UK Remix)
Massive Retaliation (Shut Up Dub Remix)
I don’t know what to say about this song. Even for a Sigue Sigue Sputnik song, it’s freaking weird. There’s not much to it aside from a sparse beat, a simple bassline, a sample of Beethoven’s Fifth, and completely nonsensical lyrics such as “Hong Kong hit back!”

Hit back who? Who hit them first? I’m so confused!

I’m a fairly big fan of SSS’s 80s albums. Both “Success” and “Sex Bomb Boogie” have earned themselves permanent spots on my workout mix, but I’m still on the fence with these remixes. I hope you all dig them tho.

Curve
Horror Head (Remix)
Falling Free
Mission From God
Today Is Not The Day
If you’re from England then you might have a vague recollection of Curve, as they were moderately popular in the 90s. If you’re from America then you probably thought that I was typing “The Cure” for a second.

If you might recognize this song though. Although maybe you might be more familiar with this remix, as it was in this trailer.

Curve never broke through in the states, which is weird. They had a really good, radio-friendly sound that should have played over great in the Alternative Nation of the early-90s. I really can’t believe that “Horror  Head” never hit it big here. That song is beautiful. I can’t tell you how different this remix is from the original, as I am currently on my laptop, which does not have the original on it. But if I recall, they’re pretty similar. Shit this “remix” might just be the original, but the 12″ I got called it a remix, so I’m sticking with that. The other songs are great too.

 

Posted in B-sides, Curve, remixes, Sigue Sigue Sputnik | 7 Comments »

What exactly would a Mothdoom be?

August 1st, 2011

Sometimes I come up with themed-post ideas that are so easy to write that my fingers can barely keep up with my thoughts. Other times they’re like this one and are like pulling teeth while trapped underwater.

My next post is going to be as random as shit.

Torch Song
Don’t Look Now (U.K. Mix)
Can’t Find My Way Home (U.K. Mix)
Mothdoom Ecstasy
Torch Song was William Orbit’s band that he formed in the mid-80s along with one Laurie Mayer and Grant Gilbert. From what I could find online, Gilbert later left the group and was replaced by Rico Cunning Conning.

The group never had much success in either Europe nor the states though. They released a few albums, even one in the 1990s well after Orbit’s solo career was established, but none of them ever took off like Orbit’s solo stuff eventually did.

At least some of the other members of Torch Song have found a measure of success outside the group. According to Laurie Mayer’s MySpace (hey, MySpace!) page she continues to sing, and has released at least one solo album since Torch Song disbanded in the 1990s. She also works as a photographer. Rico Conning has fared even better, and has contributed remix work for artists like Depeche Mode and Erasure. As for Gilbert Grant…well your guess is as good as mine. I could not find any information on him online.

To me, William Orbit’s material with Torch Song is far superior to his solo work from the same time period. “Don’t Look Now” and “Can’t Find My Way Home” are both great, cute little pop tunes, while “Mothdoom Ecstasy” is an amazing sprawling tune with excellent guitar work and some super-sexy vocals by Mayer. It’s certainly better than anything off of Orbit’s first album or the early Strange Cargo releases, that’s for sure.

William Orbit
Feel Like Jumping (One Jump Beyond)
Blue Street (Extended Edit)
But don’t take my word for it! Compare and contrast! These songs are fine, but I started this post on Saturday, it’s Monday now and I’ve already forgotten what these songs sound like. Meanwhile, “Don’t Look Now” and “Mothdoom Ecstasy” are each stuck in my head at the same time.

Posted in remixes, Torch Song, William Orbit | 7 Comments »

Trans – Neil Young’s Magical Vocoder Adventure

July 27th, 2011

Neil Young – Trans
Little Thing Called Love
Computer Age
We R In Control
Transformer Man
Computer Cowboy (AKA Syscrusher)
Hold On To Your Love
Sample And Hold
Sample And Hold (Vinyl Version)
Mr. Soul
Like An Inca
Like An Inca (Vinyl Version)

I love this album.

That is not something often said when people are talking about Trans, Neil Young’s much-maligned 1982 electronic/New Wave effort. It bombed when it came out, most critics hated it, and it was the first of several records that eventually led to his label at the time, Geffen Records, suing Young for not sounding enough like Neil Young.

But I love it.

I find the damn thing fascinating, and I think it may be one of the bravest records ever made. At the time everyone wanted Neil Young to record another Harvest (shit, most Young fans still do), but he chose to follow his heart and try something different, critics and fans be damned.

It seemed to shock everyone  at the time, but looking back it shouldn’t have been that big a surprise. Young had toyed with some New Wave elements on his previous release Re-ac-tor, and he even made a comedic film, Human Highway, with New Wave pioneers Devo around the same time that Trans came out. It’s obvious that Young felt some sort of kinship to the New Wave movement for whatever reason, and wanted to contribute in his own little way. I respect any artist that is willing to adapt and move along with the times, artists who stick to the same schtick for decades on end just become boring as hell after a while.

There are also stories that the album was Young’s way of trying to communicate with his disabled son at the time. Supposedly his child liked the vocoder effects, so Young decided to base a whole album around the device. If that’s true then the story of Trans becomes even more touching and interesting; as it shows that Young was willing to pretty much commit career suicide if it meant he could get through to his son.

A lot of people attacked Young when Trans came out, angrily asking him to just record another “rock record.” He responded in 1983 by releasing Everybody’s Rockin’, a 25-minute collection of rockabilly tunes. If “fuck you” is a genre of music, that record is an example of it. Shockingly, that record is available on CD in America, while Trans is not. As of right now, Trans is only available in America on CD as an import. And that CD in question is a little different than the original vinyl version that came out in the states Both “Sample And Hold” and “Like An Inca” have been extended and remixed.

The CD version of “Like An Inca” is very similar to the vinyl version, clocking in at just about a minute longer. However, the CD version of “Sample And Hold,” the best track on the album in my opinion, is drastically different. It’s almost over eight minutes long, a full three minutes longer than the vinyl mix, and the pounding drum machine beat is brought to the forefront of the mix, giving the song much more of a dance feel. I think it is a much better version. Download both and judge for yourself.

Finally, even if the idea of electronic Neil Young sounds horrible to you, download “Like An Inca.” It’s the most “traditional” Young song on the album, with no noticeable electronic effects, synthesizers or vocoders. It’s a nine-minute epic about Mexican Indians, and could stand side-by-side with Young’s  “Cortez the Killer” not only thematically, but in terms of quality as well. It’s an amazing song.

Posted in Complete Albums, Neil Young | 12 Comments »

Wilburied Alive

July 25th, 2011

I planned a super-big, in-depth post tonight, but I’m in physical pain (read on for details) so instead here are some random scraps of awesomeness. Hopefully I’ll be less disabled in a few days.

The Traveling Wilburys
Handle With Care (Extended Version)
End Of The Line (Extended Version)
Not Alone Any More (Remix)
It’s weird to me that the Traveling Wilburys aren’t more fondly remembered, or remembered much at all for that matter. I mean, this was a band with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and Roy Orbison (…and Jeff Lynne) but they’re rarely mentioned when people talk about the best music of the 80s. Never mind that their first album is one of the finest examples of pop-rock to come out of the decade.

Well, maybe it’s because their music was out of print for so long. It’s hard for people to discover a band when no one can get a hold of the damn music. In 2007 both of their fantastic albums were finally re-released in a super-convenient  2CD set, and I highly recommend picking it up if you have not. There  even re-issued them in a vinyl box set which I finally picked up this weekend while I was trapped in Toledo. It’s funny, I recall that store trying to sell a used copy of the Wilburys’ first release for over $100 when it was out of print, but I scored the LP box set for a measly $45.

The LP box set sounds great, comes with a bunch of cool books, posters and other nifty stuff, and also includes an exclusive 12″ with bonus tracks and B-sides. Most of these tracks are also on the CD set, but the remixes I’m posting tonight are exclusive to the vinyl-only set.

Sadly, there was no extended dance mix of “Tweeter and the Monkey Man” as that only exists in my dreams.

The Stone Roses
Fools Gold (Rabbit In The Moon’s Message To The Majors)
Fools Gold (Rabbit In The Moon’s Straight Beat Pyrite Dub)
Fools Gold (Grooverider’s Mix)
Today I was working out, doing leg lifts, when I heard something crack in my side. That’s never a good thing. Turns out I sprained a ligament in my ribcage. This happened to me once before, during an aquarium-moving mishap, and you know what? It fucking hurts like hell. I went to the doctor today, hoping to at least get some hardcore painkillers out of the ordeal, but he denied me.

And man, these remixes of “Fools Gold” would totally sound awesome if I was on one pain meds right now, but vodka and V8 are just going to have to do I guess.

These are taken from a 12″ single. The “Grooverider’s Mix” is on a Stone Roses remix compilation, but that version isn’t the same as this version, so I’m including it here.

Posted in remixes, Traveling Wilburys | 3 Comments »

Check out my Thing…soundtrack

July 18th, 2011

Ennio Morricone – The Thing: Music From The Motion Picture
Humanity (Part 1)
Shape
Contamination
Bestiality
Solitude
Eternity
Wait
Humanity (Part 2)
Sterilization
 Despair
 The Thing remains the only horror film directed by John Carpenter that he did not also contribute the score to. But I think it’s fair to say that he found a good replacement in Ennio Morricone.

Morricone is a god of film scores, having written approximately 800 billion in his 82 years (Okay, so it’s more like 500. Still, that’s fucking insane). Even if you don’t know the name Morricone, you are familar with his work. He did this. And this. Also this and this. Some notable Hollywood films he did the scores for include Brian DePalma’s The Untouchables and…Exorcist II: The Heretic.

Hey, they can’t all be bangers.

Morricone’s score to The Thing perfectly captures the claustrophobic feel of the film, although it doesn’t work that well as an independent piece of music. Most of it is so quiet that it is barely audible, and just when your ears have become accustomed to the muted music, it explodes in a menagerie of plucking strings and bombastic horns.

After a while, the soundtrack itself becomes kind of scary, as you wait for it to jolt your system with another sonic blast. While it’s not easy listening, I imagine it would be a great way to liven up your day-to-day activities. Work in a cubicle? Play this on headphones and you’ll have the most intense numbers-crunching session of all time. Clean your home while listening to it, and be prepared for your humdrum dusting to turn into a terrifying battle against microscopic dust aliens.  Listen to it at the bus stop and you’ll slowly start to suspect that everyone around you is really an alien shapeshifter – well, that might happen at the bus stop no matter what you’re listening to, but you get my point.

A word on the technical aspect of this rip. Like I said before, this is a QUIET soundtrack. One limitation of vinyl is that quiet music can be overcome with surface noise, and that was the case with my original recording.

To make it a little more listenable, I cleaned it up using Audacity’s noise removal tool. While the quiet parts are crystal clear now, some of the loudest parts of the score have some very slight distortion. I still think it’s more than a fair trade-off though, considering the ration of quiet-to-loud parts. And besides, I wasn’t about to chuck out 40-plus bucks for a used CD copy.

Posted in Ennio Morricone, soundtrack, Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

Rick Wakeman’s Burning Sensation

July 12th, 2011

Okay, so I wrote this huge post and THEN I found out that the album is finally available on CD in the states. I don’t like to post in-print music, so I’m putting up one track from the soundtrack as a teaser. If you like it, go buy the rest.

 

Rick Wakeman – The Burning Soundtrack
Variations on the Fire

If you’ve never heard of The Burning, don’t be surprised. Although the plot has some curve balls, it’s still your typical, forgettable 80s slasher flick, complete with horny teens in the woods and special effects by fake blood guru Tom Savini. It’s pretty much remembered today for two things; This scene (WARNING: incredibly graphic violence) and the people who were involved in the production.

The Burning was produced by Harvey Weinstein and co-written by his brother Bob. That’s right, The Burning is the very first Miramax Film – the studio that later brought you Pulp Fiction, Shakespeare in Love and Clerks.

You think that’s nuts? Just wait, it gets even odder. Bob Weinstein didn’t write the script to The Burning by himself. Oh no, a flick of this high quality requires some serious collaboration. For help he turned to a man named Peter Lawrence, who later went on to write for such classics of 80s animation as Thundercats and Silverhawks. So we’re just one degree of separation between Cropsy (the killer of The Burning) and Lionel.

It’s a small world.

But that’s not even the most whacked out bit. A dude by the name of Brad Grey also worked on the story of The Burning. He later went on to serve as an executive producer for The Sopranos as well as The Departed. Now he’s the Chairman and CEO of Paramount Pictures!

So if you’re ever at a horrorcon, be nice to the guys who wrote the piece of shit indie slasher flick playing at 4PM on a Sunday, because you never know.

The talent in front of the camera is pretty forgettable, except for a supporting role by Jason Alexander and a super-quick bit part by Holly Hunter (seriously, if you blink you will miss her).

About the only person who worked on The Burning who didn’t go on to fame and fortune was the director and co-writer, Tony Maylam. He was primarily a documentary filmmaker before the release of The Burning, and he returned to that shortly thereafter. One notable exception being Split Second, a great/awful piece of 90s sci-fi/horror shit with Rutger Hauer and Kim Cattrall.

But give Maylam some credit, it is because of him that we have this stellar soundtrack by Rick Wakeman from Yes. The two previously worked together on White Rock, a 1977 film about the Winter Olympics. It was that relationship that led to Wakeman coming in to do the score for The Burning. 

I would have loved to sit in on the phone call Maylam made to Wakeman that convinced him to do the score to The Burning:

Maylam: Hey Rick, I might have some more soundtrack work for you if you’re interested.
Rick: Oh yeah? You doing a documentary on the summer Olympics?
Maylam: Not exactly, it’s a slasher film called The Burning. It’s about horribly burned camp groundskeeper who murders teenagers with a pair of hilariously large garden shears.
Wakeman: …can I work in some “shear terror/sheer terror” puns into the track listing?
Maylam: Sure thing!
Wakeman: I’m in! I’ll plug in 50 synthesizers and get to work immediately!

The first side of the LP is labeled as “The Wakeman Variations,” so I don’t think it’s a straight-up recording of the actual score. That half works better as a standalone recording, while the second, with its diversions into instrumental pop-rock and even some banjo-country jamming, are probably only of interest to fans of the film.

As I said before, the full soundtrack is now available in America for a pretty fair price. If you like Rick Wakeman or keyboard-fueled scores ala Tangerine Dream or John Carpenter, I suggest checking it out.

Posted in Rick Wakeman, soundtrack | 3 Comments »

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