‘The Sounds Of Star Wars’ – The Sonic All-Stars (1977)

“Mission control calling all eathlings. Pickwick International have broken through the inter-cosmic barriers with a new and hitherto unidentified sound.”

Many of the first albums I owned as a kid were soundtracks. In those days (otherwise known as the 70s), there were only two ways to see films: at the cinema or broadcast on telly (three years later). So soundtracks and novelisations were the closest you could get to re-living your favourite films.

I’m quite certain my grandparents bought me this record, as I saw ‘Star Wars’ with them countless times when it came out. And as a 6-year-old, I really wasn’t that worried that instead of the original John Williams score, I was listening to The Sonic All-Stars conducted by Bruce Baxter. As a 39-year-old listening back to it now, I think Pickwick International pretty much nailed it with their description at the top there: there is indeed very little you can identify on here. “Why bother with an orchestra when you can use one of these new synthesizer things?”

The album does immediately take me back though to those days of playing with my Star Wars figures in my room, reading Star Wars comics in the woods, and drawing more Star Wars adventures with my Star Wars pencils from my Star Wars pencil case, before falling asleep on my Star Wars pillow in my Star Wars pyjamas. Of course, at my age, I shouldn’t still be doing those things, but hey.

My Star Wars memories could fill a blog of their own … Watching it at the free cinema at Butlins with the sound two seconds out of synch. Watching ‘Return Of The Jedi’ and the film melting just as the Death Star explodes (oops – spoiler). Watching the original trilogy as an all-dayer with my cousins – and having the cinema almost to ourselves for nine hours. Popping over to Boston to see ‘The Phantom Menace’ the day it came out (three months ahead of the UK). And so on. Have you given up reading yet?

“So today’s song pick was simply an excuse to write about Star Wars?” Yes, it was. May the Force be with you. Always.

Spotify linky (rest easy: Spotify doesn't have the Pickwick version):
London Symphony Orchestra;John Williams – Main Title/Rebel Blockade Runner - Medley

'Heroes' - David Bowie (1977)

“I …

I wish I could swim.
Like the dolphins.

Like dolphins can swim.”

Bowie popped up in my life a number of times before he really caught my attention. Not literally, obviously. It wasn’t like I’d be staring out the window in Geography class and he’d be waving furiously at me from the playing fields. Though that would have been cool.

No, the reality was more the odd song on the radio here, the odd Top Of The Pops performance there. But none of them made me want to dip into his music any further. I think this was because my Bowie was 80s Bowie. I’d just missed the real good stuff.

The first time I clearly remember hearing one of his songs was at a disco (yes, kids, a disco) on another dreaded school trip. My first and last disco. The song was ‘Let’s Dance’ which was number one at the time. It stood out because it wasn’t Duran Duran, which was about the only thing the DJ (or Mr Abbott the PE teacher, as he was otherwise known) had been playing all evening.

My second encounter of the Bowie kind was in ‘Labyrinth’. At some point, this film appears to have achieved cult status and everyone in their late 20s seems to love the Goblin King. But at the time I just remember thinking, “Who’s this guy getting in the way of all the ace muppets?”

And then, in 1990, EMI began reissuing all Bowie’s albums as he went on tour to play all his big songs (except ‘The Laughing Gnome’) one final time. (And then one final time again a few years later. And then again a few years after that, etc.) At this time, Chris Roberts (my favourite music journalist then and now) wrote a review of the ‘Sound And Vision’ greatest hits collection in Melody Maker that I can still picture to this day. I’ll thank him now for it. The way he wrote about ‘Heroes’ made me want to immediately hear early Bowie. And he even brought new depths to later songs I’d already heard, such as ‘Blue Jean’. I went out that lunchtime at college and began building my Bowie collection. Yep, even the 'Labyrinth' soundtrack is in there. But that’s another post.

Spotify linky (the full length album version):

David Bowie – Heroes