Graham Reid | | 1 min read
The late Ennio Morricone's work was so diverse – orchestral scores to oddball sonic vignettes – that listeners almost invariably default to their favourite style: the quirky spaghetti Western soundtracks, the more heroic and expansive works like the music for The Mission and so on.
Elsewhere's favourite spaghetti Western soundtrack is that for The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (an Essential Elsewhere album, and our favourite Western also) but we've also thrown the spotlight on some of Morricone's more experimental and seldom heard music (Crime and Dissonance, another Essential Elsewhere album).
On what would have been the composer's 92ndbirthday in November came this 27-track, 69 minute collection of soundtrack miniatures, incidental music with strange sound effects, synths, psychedelic pop and more.
Here too are seven previously unreleased pieces, but let's be clear: very little of this – unless you are an aficionado of the byways of Italian film music – will be familiar.
From the quirky opening piece Vie-Ne (from Quando l'amore e sensualita) through the Middle Eastern sound of Jukebox Psychedelique (Peur sur la ville) and the abstract sounds of the dark pop instrumental Eat It (with groans and strangling vocals interpolations) to the noir Sinfonia di una citta (from Copkiller) and the quiet piano, flute and strings piece Macchie solari at the end, this can be quite a strange, revealing journey for the inquisitive prepared to step away from their favoured Ennio Morricone music.
It is subtitled, “the hidden, dark-tinged and psychedelic side of the maestro” for a good reason.
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You can hear this music on Spotify here
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