Tomorrow's World - Pt.1

"Tomorrow's World", sigh, now there was a science program. Thursday nights on BBC1, best TV night of the week...Tomorrow's World then Top of the Pops...TV bliss for a young Mark Morb.
Plenty has been written about this science program and watching a few clips from the 70's and early 80's on Youtube it definitely had a naive amateurish charm to it, far more endearing than the "Kids TV" slightly patronising style that current BBC science programs go for (I'm looking at you "Bang goes the theory!").
During the main years I watched the program (mid 70's to mid 80's) there were two theme tunes, the jazzy Johnny Dankworth composed original from 1966 and the synthy version by Martin Cook and Richard Denton from 1980.
This post is a new rip I've done of the Dankworth theme (credited to "The Brass Chorale") along with the B-Side, the theme from "The Late Show", which is also excellent. Taken from the original vinyl (I also own an original 7" Demo version but it's an identical recording) and ripped at high res (96/24) although the usual 320 MP3 version is available also (links in comments), let me know your thoughts.

I will post up the Cook/Denton version at some point over the next few weeks as well so keep an eye out for that.

If you go down to the Woods today... #2

This has to be my favourite Photograph by Photographer Elspeth Diederix, it has a really creepy, eerie atmosphere and the colour contrast works great (she has used this "Red" contrasting colour in several other images but this is the one that stands out for me).

2005 / z.t. (costa rica) / 150 x 120 cm

Do "The Wriggler"...

Back in 1985 I was 15 and heavily into my ZX Spectrum and Electronic Music (as well as in the throes of my burgeoning "Smiths" obsession!).
One particular item from that time satisfied my needs in both departments...it was "Wriggler"
"Wriggler" was a game released in 1985 by Romantic Robot (more info here) and basically consisted of manoeuvring a worm (the eponymous Wriggler) around a variety of environments avoiding various beasties.
The graphics were good (for the time) and I remember being particularly impressed with the animation of the spiders...
So all in all not a bad little game....but....turn the cassette over (that's right games used to come on compact cassette back then!) and there was a musical track called "Moons of Jupiter'. This was a great little electronic piece, bouncy, with some nice FX and interesting sounds going on throughout and even a little electronic drum solo in the middle...and it suited the game perfectly.
I soon wore my tape out rewinding the track time after time and ended up having to buy the game three times in order to maintain a working copy!
Anyway, time moved on and I forgot all about this game and it's musical partner until I spotted a copy of Wriggler at a Car Boot sale a few years back...I snapped it up took it home and shoved it in the tape deck, pressed play and the memories came flooding back....sitting in my bedroom, "Empire Strikes Back" Wallpaper on the walls, tapping machine code into my ZX Spectrum and listening to this track...
The music still sounded good (if a bit dated) so I started to dig a bit...the track was written by Alexander Goldscheider who also owned and managed Romantic Robot.
There's lots more about Mr Goldscheider in his Wikipedia entry and across the Web in general, but he's a very interesting and accomplished Czech Musician credited with pioneering the use of the Synthesiser in that country. He also had a stint working for the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.
He released a couple of library LP's on the "Red Bus" label in the early 80's and it's on one of those, "Themes for a One Man Band - Vol.1 (1983 Red Bus Music Library RBML 103)" that the track "Moons of Jupiter" originally appears.
I managed to track down a copy (along with Vol.2) and it's really rather good...very much of its time but if you were ever a fan of Jarre, Vangelis, Mark Shreeve, Koto, Tomita, Tangerine Dream, etc. then there is plenty here to like. In my opinion Side A has the advantage, Side B seems a bit uninspired in comparison (with the exception of the last track "The Star Gate" which has a nice Tangerine Dream feel to it).

I've made the usual High Def Vinyl rip (24/96 FLAC) and also a 320MP3 version, links in comments and please leave thoughts and ruminations...

Nostromo Disco!!

I recently worked my way through the Blu-Ray box set of all the Alien movies (which I can highly recommend and seems to be fairly cheap at the moment). Not only did I enjoy revisiting these films in higher quality than I had ever seen but I fell in love with Jerry Goldsmith's Score all over again (sounding better than ever on these Blu-Rays).
It's a great score and just one of many that Mr Goldsmith has produced over the years (The Omen anyone?) so I dug out my Vinyl copy of the original score and enjoyed listening to it...then I remembered that I had a 12" "Disco" version of the main theme somewhere. I couldn't remember if it was any good or not and wasn't expecting a lot when I stuck it on the turntable but I was pleasantly surprised...it aint a half bad slice of Space Disco and the B-Side is a nice little Disco Funk number as well.
The 12" is on Bronze Records (12 BRO 80) a label I always associate with "Uriah Heep"! and was released in 1980. The track is credited to "Nostromo" (The name of the cargo ship in "Alien") but appears to be the work of Kenny Denton, a prolific producer over the years including a stint producing Gary Numan/Tubeway Army. "Nostromo" also released disco versions of music from "The Black Hole" and the "Imperial March" from The Empire Strikes Back...

Anyway, it's not going to change your world but it's definitely worth a listen as it's better then could be expected....

As usual I've ripped the Vinyl in High Res (96KHz 24Bit) and did a new scan of the cover, and that's the version I recommend you download but for the bandwidth challenged I've also included a link to a 320 MP3 version...links in comments and as always I welcome your thoughts and ruminations...