| For those of BLOOD SPATTERED BLOG readers that aren't yet savvy to my mental agenda, let it be here and forever noted that I am an unapologetic, tried and true, deep-red-dyed in the wool, black glove lovin' devotee of The Italian Horror Film. That's right…capitalized…and bold.
There are a multitude of reasons as to why I so fervently adore this slick, sexy, gaudy and often gory offshoot of European exploitation film. Whether it be the erotic, color drenched murder set pieces in the early Hitchcockian giallo's of Argento, Bido and Martino, the metaphysical zombie meltdowns of Lucio Fulci or the trend setting fever dreams of Mario Bava, Italian horror takes everything that's good about the genre, cross breeds it with vintage high fashion and classic, violent and melodramatic opera and ultimately creates a kind of heavily stylized cinema that I eat for bloody breakfast.
But I think the deal sealing element that has always endeared me to The Italian Horror Film, the pulse that pushes all that glossy tension and delicious artificial shock along, has been the incredible (and incredibly diverse) music that seethes underneath every frame. As a musician and film composer myself, I've always been acutely aware at just how important sound is to the horror movie and nowhere is that more evident than in these fabulous art/trash pictures: imagine the eye spinning tracking shot from Argento's TENEBRE without that initially jarring but ultimately brilliant Goblin electro/disco them? You can't. Or that sweet n’ sickening eyeball puncturing sequence in Fulci's ZOMBI 2 without that pounding, guitar wailing and unnerving escalating Fabio Frizzi noise attack? Wouldn't work. How about the native woman impaled on the pole bit in Deodato's CANNIBAL HOLCAUST without Riz Ortalani's beautiful, melancholy acoustic guitar and string lullaby? Okay, it would still work…but it would be a lot different.
These dark, romantic scores aren't like the interchangeable dime a dozen, charisma free sonic backdrops that burble in the back of even the finest American genre fodder, but rather the works of serious visionary artists; classically trained jazz and pop musicians whose groove lounge sounds became essential to the sleazy strains of cinema they supported – as vital an ingredient as the shapely, nude, mascara soaked female leads, the black leather clad killers, the red velvet walls, the intestine spillings, the throat openings, the serpentine mysteries and international casts. Music was and is a character in these flicks; a melodic, often experimental aural messenger that helps burn gothic, decadent, quintessentially rococo imagery deeply into our cinema scarred psyche. Viva Italia….
So, it is with a reverence usually reserved for Sunday worship that I get on my knees and thank GOD for BEAT RECORDS, the Rome based label responsible for amassing the biggest and baddest collection of Italian exploitation, horror, western, thriller and cult soundtracks in the history of Italian exploitation, horror, western, thriller and cult soundtracks. So dense, so jaw dropping, so magnificent is their catalogue that I have to STOP writing for a moment and just direct you their site. So click below, have a look, come back and I'll get to the point of my mad musical ravings:
www.beatrecords.it
See? What did I tell you? Them BEAT muthafucka's got it ALL!
Alright then. Let me breathe in. Breathe out. Okay. Better….
One of the latest releases from BEAT is actually the fourth in their delicious CINECOCKTAIL series. Titled CINECOCKTAIL 4: THE ITALIAN HORROR SHOW, this brilliant disc sports themes and cues from some of Europe’s biggest film composers this gorgeously packaged disc is a bloody valentine for both Euro soundtrack newbies and those who, like me, have a borderline unhealthy fixation with the subject. Don’t believe my hype? Let's walk through a few of the masterfully macabre tracks that drip from this platter like spaghetti sauce from Umberto Lenzi’s chin…
LA LUCERTOLA
(Ennio Morricone)
Fans of Lucio Fulci's psychedelic thriller A LIZARD IN A WOMAN'S SKIN will no doubt acknowledge the debt that it owes to Maestro Ennio Morricone, the bar raising composer who changed genre film history with his Western and Giallo scores. This cue from that stylish film combines strings, percussion and female voice to heart pumping effect; outrageously gorgeous stuff from the undisputed overlord of the Italian cinema sound.
BABY SEQUENZA 2
(Fabio Frizzi)
Though the quasi sci-fi film it supports isn't one of director Lucio Fulci's finest, Frizzi's operatic cues for MANHATTAN BABY are just as throbbing, thick, dark and doom laden as his work in L'ALDILA (THE BEYOND), ZOMBI 2 or CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD. Really big, slinky, sad and epic.
STAIRWAY TO HELL
(Simon Boswell)
One of the greatest post 70's Euroslashers is, without a doubt, Michelle Soavi's 1987 psuedo-giallo STAGE FRIGHT (aka DELIRIA) and Boswell's tough, sexy score is just as godamn cool. This particularly jazzy track sports the same funky drummer James Brown loop sampled in many a 90's hip hop tune…but twists the tar out of it, milking the hypnotic creep factor. Guaranteed to make you shake your homicidal, owl mask wearing ass off while stabbing stuff.
ZOMBIE PARADE
(Nico Fidenco)
For those fans of DOCTOR BUTCHER MD who hated the obnoxious moog score, let it be known that the original Italian cut (known as ZOMBI HOLOCAUST) sported none of that sonic nonsense. In fact, Fidenco's original cues are better than the ho hum picture deserves! Sumptuous, languid orchestral mad scientist/cannibal/living corpse island musings that will lull you into a state of self-surgery.
NEW YORK…ONE MORE DAY
(Francesco De Masi)
THE NEW YORK RIPPER is Fulci's most controversial and depraved film and De Masi's sleazy and tacky 70's cop show funk is downright greasy. With this 'wokka wokka' guitar and slimy bass cue, you can actually smell the skunky peep shows and skeezy back alleys that course through the flick. Great, dirty, sensational junk.
VENI SANCTE SPIRITUS
(Ennio Morricone and Bruno Nicolai)
Morricone goes the distance scoring Damiano Damiani 's ultra rare and elegantly depraved theological shocker THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN, freely ladling screeching blaspheming chants with scraping violins and various orchestral maneuvers in the dark. Nicolai conducts the madness with the hand of a master. Over 8 minutes of kinky religious hyperbole.
These gems plus 17 more tracks of shuddery, sexy, deeply groovy ambient lounge, rock, orchestral and experimental music, exemplify the best that The Italian Horror Film has to offer. Even cooler, as a special bonus, CINECOCKTAIL 4: THE ITALIAN HORROR SHOW features a second disc, a DVD featuring filmmaker Paolo Fazzini's intelligent and in depth documentary HANGING SHADOWS, a examination into the who's who of Italian horror featuring Argento, Dardano Sarchetti, Luigi Cozzi, Gianetto de Rossi and virtually every other creative force from the vintage era. If you're a fan, you KNOW you want this.
Now be a good BLOOD SPATTERED miscreant and scroll back up on this column and click on the BEAT RECORDS site link, get your credit card ready and get your Eurotrash soundtrack mail order groove on. You'll thank me later.
Stay tuned for more obscenely over modulating Italian soundtrack love, starting with a look at the great Allessandro Allessandroni’s beyond brilliant score for one of my all time favorite Italian/German sleazies THE DEVIL'S NIGHTMARE.
Alexander out, baby…out.
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