Red Bull Music Academy Tokyo Discussion - Harold Faltermeyer

A very interesting video from the Red Bull Music Academy in Tokyo has popped up, featuring a nice long discussion by Harold Faltermeyer about his music and film scoring career, touching on his most famous work such as Beverly Hills Cop, Fletch and Top Gun.

Faltermeyer discusses his early beginnings, and there is even a very rare video of him with his family performing and singing. A very rare video indeed.

A key highlight of this video is the discussions around his method of film scoring, and how some of his iconic scores were simply done by virtue of him being left alone to complete them.

The Running Man and Tango & Cash are scores which Harold completed when left alone to his creative freedom. The results are simply astounding, in particular his score for The Running Man, a true dystopian vision of the future which is more relevant now than ever.

Additional discussion is placed on his production work for popular artists such as Laura Branigan, and The Pet Shop Boys.

All in all, Faltermeyer says he is back in Hollywood and available to score movies and video games.
Let's hope the upcoming Beverly Hills Cop 4 movie producers have the guts to hire Faltermeyer and bring some much needed funky synth back to the movie world.

Days Of Thunder Score Release - La La Land Records Limited Edition - Hans Zimmer

If any of you can remember the Hans Zimmer of the late 80s, early 90s, then you will surely recognise his score for the Tony Scott racing action masterpiece from 1990.

Starring Tom Cruise, and from the Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson team, this was a great movie with those distinctive visuals that only Tony Scott could deliver.

Apparently, Days Of Thunder was most likely going to be a third team up between Tony Scott and Harold Faltermeyer (having already done Top Gun and Beverly Hills Cop 2), but by this time, Faltermeyer was moving out of Hollywood and back to Germany.

It would have been interesting to have seen what Faltermeyer would have done with the score, with most likely a similar type to the Top Gun music he created, along with some memorable theme songs.

Nevertheless, Hans Zimmer, fresh from Rain Main and Black Rain was the man given the task of scoring the visuals on this movie, and he delivered everything perfectly.

Frenetic, energetic, and plenty of action cues, this is a worthy score from the early Zimmer period of scoring.
This was when Zimmer was at his best, pulsating synthesizers, orchestra hits, wild guitars and the kitchen sink thrown in for good measure.

This score is one of the blueprints for the next decade or so of scores during the 1990s, although some may argue Mark Mancina is the one who did just as much (Bad Boys, Speed).

The title track "Last Note Of Freedom" is a great song, written by Hans Zimmer and Billy Idol of all people and performed by David Coverdale (Whitesnaker lead singer).  This is a great track, starting off slow, and eventually ending in a fast guitar driven finish, much like the movie itself, mirroring the frenetic action of the Daytona racing.

The entire score has been available as an unreleased bootleg for a number of years now, but La La Land have finally released it in official format which is better late than never.

Most of the score is present apart from maybe 1 or 2 cues which if I recall correctly are during the racing scenes. The bootleg score usually has 24 or 26 tracks if I recall correctly.

http://www.hans-zimmer.com/index.php?rub=disco&id=22

This release does include however, some alternate takes and some extra tracks which fill up the CD.

Here is the full release information from La La Land Records.

La-La Land Records and Paramount Pictures present the world premiere release of acclaimed composer Hans Zimmer's (BLACK RAIN, THELMA & LOUISE, THE DARK KNIGHT, MAN OF STEEL) full-throttle original score to the 1990 racing drama feature DAYS OF THUNDER, starring Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman and Robert Duvall, and directed by Tony Scott. After waiting decades, film music enthusiasts have finally been rewarded with a worthy release of this Zimmer classic. Clocking in at over 70 minutes, this CD absolutely roars with the kind of blistering dramatic action scoring that vividly demonstrates how Zimmer became one of filmdom's most important contemporary composers. Rounding out the music presentation are some notable bonus tracks and the song "The Last Note of Freedom," performed by David Cloverdale. Produced by Dan Goldwasser and mastered by Doug Schwartz, this special limited release of 3000 Units was supervised by the film's producer, Jerry Bruckheimer and star Tom Cruise. The sleek art design is by Dan Goldwasser, with exclusive, in-depth liner notes by film music writer Tim Greiving, which include feature comments from Bruckheimer and Cruise. This release is dedicated to the late Tony Scott.

TRACK LISTING:

1. Days of Thunder (Main Title) 3:08
2. Rowdy Drives/Who Is This Driver? 2:06
3. Let Me Drive/Cole Drives Rowdy's Car 2:26
4. Car Building 2:05
5. Darlington - Cole Wins 4:47
6. You're Home/Daytona Race/The Crash 3:29
7. The Hospital 2:20
8. Wheelchair Race 0:37
9. Rental Car Race* 3:50
10. Claire Arrives at Her Apartment 1:55
11. Physical Kiss 1:05
12. Cole Blows His Engine 1:10
13. Wheeler/Cole Smashes 2:25
14. Cole at the Laundry/Cole Agrees to Drive Rowdy's Car 2:11
15. Cole and Harry Fight/Harry Talks to Car 2:52
16. Cole in Truck/Pre-Race 3:52
17. The Last Race 10:20
18. "The Last Note of Freedom" 4:57 performed by David Coverdale 
    
    BONUS TRACKS
19. The Hospital (alternate) 2:21
20. Wheelchair Race (alternate) 0:38
21. Claire Arrives at Her Apartment (alternate ending) 1:53
22. Cole Blows His Engine (alternate) 1:12
23. Pre-Race (alternate mix) 2:25
24. Days of Thunder (Main Title) (rock arrangement) 4:59 
    
    TOTAL ALBUM TIME 71:14 

This release is limited to 3000, and you can get your copy direct here:

http://lalalandrecords.com/DaysOfThunder.html

You can also get this release from a number of other online stores also.

Beverly Hills Cop Returns, but now on TV and without Harold Faltermeyer

After almost 19 Years, there is another installment of Beverly Hills Cop, except this time it will be on TV, rather than the big screen.

This is expected to be a continuation of the movie series with Brandon T Jackson as Aaron Foley, the obligatory son of Axel Foley.

Unfortunately, there is no Harold Faltermeyer involved with this, so nobody knows what type of music we will get with this pilot episode.

What people don't realise is that without Harold Faltermeyer's music, Beverly Hills Cop loses a great deal of its success.

Faltermeyer's electro synth work is catchy, memorable and simply evokes a fever of action and comedy like no other.

There seems to be no music for tv shows as in the days of Miami Vice with Jan Hammer and movies like Harold Faltermeyer, so it remains to be seen whether this new continuation will be a flop or simply another nail in the coffin of a vastly underused character.

Axel Foley should have had many more adventures, it seems like this next one may bring more, but who knows what will happen.

Lost Classics - Keta Bill - Hold On (1987) - Beverly Hills Cop 2 - Hef Loves It

Another lost classic, it beggars belief how this one has never been released, given the fact it features during the infamous Playboy mansion scene in Beverly Hills Cop 2.  This is the original version of "Hold On" by Keta Bill which is a million times better than the Corey Hart version.

You can picture the funny guy in the tuxedo pulling off his hilarious dance moves with the playboy bunnies while Axel tells his pals to follow their dicks and find the bad guys.  Even the dirty old Hef makes a cameo in this classic piece of cinematic extravagance.

Both versions are featured in the movie, you can even hear Corey Hart's version very faintly during one of the scenes with the 3 main characters.

As to why this legendary classic has never been released remains a mystery.  The best song from the movie and its not even on the soundtrack.  Worse than that, none of Harold Faltermeyer's scores have been released for either the first or second movie which is unnacceptable.

Anyway, enjoy this lost classic, its not perfect quality, but Keta Bill herself gave this out a few years back, so the fact we even have this is a miracle in itself.

https://www.box.com/shared/lzih2271kt

Harold Faltermeyer - The Discovery - 2011 Style! - Syntesen

I came across this quite funky remake of Harold Faltermeyer's The Discovery score track.

Awesome just doesn't justify how cool this is!
I could imagine the next Beverly Hills cop sequel with this along with updated versions of the original score themes.

Tango and Cash 2 - Time For Some Wild Action Synths!

Here is the classic opening to the 1989 masterpiece starring Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell.  Two legends team up in a wild action movie with some vintage one liners and some cracking synths for the soundtrack.

Harold Faltermeyer provided the TR808 drums and the state of the art Synclavier produced score.  Sonically, its a full tour de force of vintage synthesizers conveying the action comedy on screen.  You can literally rewatch this movie again and again and you can never got bored!  It also features Mr Maniac Cop himself, Robert Z'Dar, the guy with the biggest chin on this planet!

Now that Stallone has brought back Rocky, Rambo, its time for more Tango & Cash. Rumours have been circulating of his attempt to bring back Ray Tango once more.  I say why not? Most buddy cop movies made today are complete and utter rubbish give or take a few.  Give us some proper buddy cop action movie's again please, not the rubbish we have had to watch for the past ten years!  And while they are it, put in some synthesizers again, we need some groove back in these sorry excuses for "action" movies!

If you like vintage synth soundtracks, then you get a copy of the Tango and Cash soundtrack from LaLaLand Records.

http://www.lalalandrecords.com/

Harold Faltermeyer - Beverly Hills Cop Soundtrack Score (1984)

A classic score for a classic movie. Harold Faltermeyer created an iconic score for this 1984 action comedy starring Eddie Murphy. The funky electro synth instrumentals were featured throughout this movie and inspired countless other imitators throughout the 80s.

The highlights of this unreleased score (as of 2011) are "The Discovery", and the amazing end shootout score, which goes from serious to funky to comedy and back again, all in the space of 10 action packed minutes. Its mind boggling how this score has never been released. Even Serge is probably unimpressed with that!

A youtube user named "msupplies1" has however managed to extract large chunks of the scores for both Beverly Hills Cop and Beverly Hills Cop 2 which is quite amazing and will tide you over until the actual scores are released.  

A true synth master, Faltermeyer made a return in 2010 with "Cop Out", but it remains to be seen whether it is permanent. Let's hope so, because these days, many soundtrack scores are complete and utter rubbish and more synths are required!