I had a nice long post written about how awesome Queen are and how this movie was one of those that I always ended up watching when I was kid after taping it off TV. But I decided against all that because its obvious Queen are awesome isn't it? Its obvious Flash Gordon is a sweet movie? So those two elements combined would be awesome? Case in point below.....
So while I was left reeling by the announcement that Busta Rhymes wouldn't be playing Shonuff in the upcoming remake of Berry Gordy's, 1985, cinematic milestone The Last Dragon ( the part is taken by Samuel L Jackson! Why? Of all people?), I got listening to his albums for the first time in years as a way to console myself over this blow. Busta always had a different angle to most of the other turkeys in the mainstream rap game. Up until the early 2000's you could always rely on him for something odd and slightly left of the game. The album below, When Disaster Strikes.... and its follow up Extinction Level Event were the soundtrack to a full year of my misspent college adventures when I was younger. The version below is the repress that removes the slightly lumpen Survival Hungry track and replaces it with the Knightrider sampling, floor filler Fire It Up. In turn, a reworking of the album track Turn It Up.
A brief but beautiful little burst of noise. Post-Hammerhead, Paul S knocked out this 7" with fellow noise traveller Matt Entsminger. The four tracks contained revel in their stripped down. clanging, noise rock glory. Its basically a given that if you like any of the guys previous bands ( once again I don't trust anyone who doesn't like Hammerhead or Janitor Joe) you will dig this long lost treat.
Perfect for sound tracking a rain swept, smoke filled, neon blasted drive through a future city sometime in the 1980's or fighting vampires/zombies in the club from Terminator while attack helicopters strafe your ass.
The Australian duo responsible for this ( who may or may not be lawyers from the future) have this EP and the second one available for free download online. They also had the track "Hunters" remixed by another electro duo, Lazerhawke, and included in the movie Hobo With A Shotgun. The scene when the Plague rampage through the hospital, that's Power Glove ( not to be confused with 8-bit covering metal band Powerglove).
A fine piece of original scoring for you today. The full soundtrack to the second ( and my personal favourite) film version of Richard Matheson's I Am Legend, the Charlton Heston starring The Omega Man.
Grainer worked on a lot of TV and film music, even helping compose the famous theme to Doctor Who, and was very progressive in the use of strange sounds and electronic musical instruments. The Omega Man uses these odd effects but also balances them with uptempo, almost psychedelic rock, glimmers of folk and some very stirring orchestration to soundtrack Chuck Heston's running fight with "The Family". I won't recap the film as its been adapted four times for the big screen, my favourite posted here, the 1964 The Last Man On Earth, 2007's I Am Legend and those cheeky devils at Asylum Films knocked out their own adaptation in the same year, I Am Omega. So here you have it, one of my favourite 70's scores, a very hard to find one at that. It never got a proper release until a 3000 copy pressing in 2002 and then a general release in 2008.
Another RIP post. Sad news when it reached me. Kevin Mahony passed on recently. Kevin, along with his band mates in Siege basically defined the parameters and direction of hardcore punk back in the 80's.
If it wasn't for Kevin and Siege I wouldn't be doing what I do now. Here is the only release they ever managed. Drop Dead compromises the 6 track demo recorded back in '84 and 3 more tracks that came to light on Pushead's Cleanse The Bacteria compilation in 1985.
Basically the foundations of any band, musically and lyrically, that parades under the banner of fastcore/grindcore/power violence/hardcore whether your aware of it or not.
RIP David Alexander Hess 1942 - 2011, a very dark and intense actor responsible for many villanous roles, his most important and commonly recognised one was for the 1972, Wes Craven classic, The Last House On The Left. Not only did he turn in a suitably nasty turn as the psychopathic Krug Stillo but he also composed and recorded the psychedelic, folk inspired soundtrack. Which is here......
For further David Hess viewings I would highly recommend Hitch Hike (1977), House on The Edge of The Park (1980) and despite its patchwork editing and plot, Swamp Thing (1982) for Hess pulling, a pretty much spot on comic book villain, out the bag.
