Bopping along on a popping beat between the drums and bass, the A-side of this single (pulled from the ‘74 album Reality) features James Brown giving general upbeat encouragement about perseverance. Horns and guitar touch-ups add further flair, bringing it all together for a memorably hooky piece. The B-side, taken from Brown’s other 1974 album, Hell, rides a shuffling guitar riff through warnings against taking too many risks. A slick bridge ups the intensity before sliding back into the horn flourishes, a repeat of the earlier lyrics, and woodblock punctuation. A cool pair, with the sampling of both of Brown’s ‘74 albums as a bonus.
With numerous layers of synthesizers droning, sweeping, and warbling over each other, the six-part suite of Oxygène flows along on gentle energies and light playfulness. Adapting largely the same instrumentation and synth voices to various moods, tempos, and densities of activity, the album proceeds along its course with smooth transitions. Hints of early techno crop up from time to time, usually when the bass-lines are allowed to take hold, while the slips into slow particle washes foreshadow the emergence of dark ambient. Though the conclusion is a bit lacking, with no firm completion of the themes, it’s still an interesting set of compositions, and its anticipation of further developments in electronic music adds some extra spice.
Early electrodisco marks the debut album from Chilly, which opens with an expansive ~12-minute adaptation of The Yardbirds’ “For Your Love”, rolling out sharp guitar twitching, punchy percussion, and syrupy synth dressing with lush vocal accompaniment. The grooves are given lots of life, as in the songs that follows, and while all seven tracks together come in at just over half an hour, the lavish production-work and high energy of the performances make the album feel bigger than it really is.
Also helping are the swings through uncommon atmospheres for the style, like the slightly cold and plaintive intro to “Dance With Me”, and the switch-offs between the multiple singers. Though things accelerate towards the end, with the last two songs falling under the three-minute mark, there’s still plenty to savor, and the fun ride through the full album does a lot to off-set its brevity.
Collecting portions of the scoring provided by Trevor Jones and Randy Edelman (though at least four other composers also contributed to the film), the soundtrack album for The Last of the Mohicans splits the cues from the two into discrete sections, with Jones’ (including “Main Title” and its heavily revisited motif) opening, Edelman’s (covering most of the softer material) following, and a track of quiet bass-pulses and airy vocals by Irish group Clannad capping off the set.
For his part, Jones does an excellent job of combining folk (often of a Gaelic bent) with strong electronic textures (the under-surging bass synths of “The Glade, Part II” being a prime example). And while the progression established in “Main Title” does get run a bit thin over the course of his nine included arrangements, its adaptation through the various energies of the film’s scenes provides a distinctive through-line, matching the fervor of “Fort Battle”, the yearning of “Promentory”, and the swelling grandeur of “Top of the World” without any major lapses in comparable capability.
Edelman’s portion also follows the blending of folk instruments with electronic touch-ups, and while he doesn’t establish any themes as powerful as Jones’ main go-to, his melodies do manage a greater sense of organic growth to their shaping. That may be largely due to Edelman’s coverage of the softer scenes, but his handling of near-incidental moments (e.g., the twangs at the end of a bar in the opening of “River Walk and Discovery”) put him in good light for what arguably boils down to a patch job.
Despite the disparity of its contributors (Edelman was allegedly brought in to score scenes as the film’s editing ran overtime and began conflicting with Jones’ schedule) and the trimness of the soundtrack’s selections in comparison to the full score, the album achieves a richness of emotion and engaging flavor that firmly overcomes its troubled production, making for a rare score as enjoyable on its own as it is in the context of the film.
Scrambled Brains 