ALIEN INVASION: SPACE AND BEYOND II

VARIOUS

Rating:

Original Review: How long can Silva Screen keep this up for? They're five for five now - after Cinema Century, Swashbucklers, Warriors and Space and Beyond, Alien Invasion is yet another high quality, highly enjoyable double CD compilation from those master musicians in the Czech Republic. Whereas Space and Beyond concentrated mainly on the most famous sci-fi themes from recent times, Alien Invasion steps back in time a little by combining classic scores from the 1950s such as Leith Stevens' The War of the Worlds and Bernard Herrmann's The Day The Earth Stood Still with 1990s blockbusters such as Independence Day, Starship Troopers and Contact. On an album chock full of excellent music, there are a number of standouts: Danny Elfman's 'Mars Attacks' opens the proceedings with a wonderfully wacky tune, using the Russian theramin and unusual sound effects to great effect in a perfect homage to all those cheesy sci-fi movies of the 1950s; 'Dune' impressed me immensely, with David Paich's orchestral arrangement of rock group Toto's electronic score adding a touch of unexpected grace and depth to the proceedings; Stu Phillips' militaristic theme for 'Battlestar Galactica' regressed me back to my childhood, bringing back memories of me and my friend Leon Kay pretending to be Apollo and Starbuck in the playground of my junior school (I was always Starbuck 'cos he always got the chicks!); Christopher Young's surprisingly tender theme from 'Invaders From Mars' is great, and the symphonic version of Jack Nitzsche's theme from 'Starman' is actually better than the synthesised original - the strings and female choir employed here really bring out the true beauty of the score. The one and only disappointment on the whole album is the one which will have most film music fans drooling - James Horner's 'Battle Beyond The Stars'. As an extremely proud owner of the rare original, I am sad to say that Nic Raine and The City of Prague Philharmonic have really screwed this one up - the lead trumpets are too shrill, the brass underscore is far too soft, the synthesisers sound different, the tempo is too fast and the ending is wrong (although the undulating strings in the middle section are actually pretty accurate). It's a real shame, because the music itself is excellent and it was only the original orchestra's incredibly poor performance that marred the original recording. Obviously, those who have never heard the original would not know that anything was wrong, but I'm advising you now: the version presented here is quite different from the original. Other than that, though, I find it quite difficult to say anything else negative about Alien Invasion. Go buy it. Simple as that.

Track Listing:

DISK ONE DISK TWO Running Time: 149 minutes 56 seconds

Silva Screen FILMXCD-190 (1998)

Music conducted by Nic Raine, Paul Bateman and Nicholas Dodd. Performed by The City of Prague Philharmonic and The Crouch End Festival Chorus. Orchestrations by Steve Bartek, Bernard Herrmann, David Paich, Allyn Ferguson, Frank Bennett, Brad Dechter, Arthur Morton, Dennis McCarthy, Alexander Courage, George Parrish, Nic Raine, Patrick Russ, Stu Phillips, Nicholas Dodd, Mary Ayres, Gustav Holst, Alan Silvestri, Steven Scott Smalley, Steve Bramson, Greig McRitchie, Mark McGurty, Herbert W. Spencer, Christopher Young, Shirley Walker and Joe Harnell. Chorus Master David Temple. Recorded and mixed by John L. Timperley. Album produced by James Fitzpatrick.


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