THE BIG SCREEN SPIES
"Our Man Flint" (1966) and "In Like Flint" (1967) both had sountrack LPs by Jerry Goldsmith released in the 60's. Varese put out a cassette of both scores in the 80s, but no CD.
Then in the 90's they put out a CD with both scores, but wait! This wasn't the same as the albums, it was the actual music cues from the film. (Soundtrack albums are often re-recordings of music from the film, but you knew that, right?) More music for us, but what of the highly collectible and hard to find record albums?......
Look for this CD on the Tsunami label. Both Flint albums and a suite from Von Ryan's Express to boot!
Mr. Goldsmith also gave us the scores to"Sebastian" (1968) on LP and Harkit CD. A nice little film about an intelligence agency code expert falling in love (Sounding a little like the missing Flint tapes.) and...
"The Chairman " (1969) starring Gregory Peck as a scientist with a bomb in his head stealing secret formulas from China. Also on LP and CD
Michael Caine starred in three films as Len Deighton's Harry Palmer, each with great scores by different composers. "The Ipcress File" (1965) by John Barry, "Funeral In Berlin" (1966) by Konrad Elfers, and "Billion Dollar Brain" (1967) by Richard Rodney Bennet. All three scores have been re-released on CD. (O.K. there were actually five films. Two others, "Bullet To Beijing" scored by Rick Wakeman and "Midnight in St. Petersburg" were both made in 1995 for the cable market. No music available as far as I know.)
Dean Martin made four films as Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm. The first was "The Silencers" (1966) with a score by Elmer Bernstein and a couple of good vocals by Vicci Carr (who did the singing for Cyd Charisse in the film). Two versions of the vocal theme were released. A slower version can be found on "Spy Magazine Presents Spy Music" on the Rhino label.
There is a second LP for the Silencers, but it's mostly Dean Martin singing. There are a couple of instrumentals (alledgedly from the film) and a nice version of the theme.
The second in the series was "Murderers' Row" (1966). This time Lalo Schifrin provided a knock-out spy score that's just begging for a CD release. The next two flicks,"The Ambushers" (1967) and "The Wrecking Crew" (1969) were scored by Hugo Montenegro, but nothing was released as far as I know except for a 45 of The Ambushers theme by Boyce and Hart. It can also be found of volume 1 of "The Mad, Mad World Of Soundtracks".
"Charade" (1963) and "Arabesque" (1966) were both directed by Stanley Donen, both had big stars like Cary Grant and Gregory Peck, but more importantly had great Henry Mancini scores (and can both be found on CD).
"Otley" (1968) stars Tom Courtenay as a pickpocket who inadvertently gets mixed up with some spies. Sort of an anti-007 type of flick with a mixed bag soundtrack by Stanley Meyers.
One of John Barry's non-Bond spy scores was "The Quiller Memorandum" (1966) with the title theme, "Wednesday's Child" sung by Matt Monro.
"The Liquidator" (1965) Not only had a top notch score by Lalo Schifrin, but a theme sung by Shirley Bassey. It doesn't get much better than that. Film Score Monthly has released a CD with the original LP tracks as well as extra music from the film.
"Hammerhead" (1968) is a little known film with a really good score by David Whitaker and a great theme song performed by Madeline Bell. Well worth seeking out.
"The Last of the Secret Agents?" (1966) with Marty Allen (Hello Dere!) and Steve Rossi isn't nearly as bad as you'd think and the score by Pete King really delivers! It runs the gamut from the sublime to the ridiculous. The theme song performed by Nancy Sinatra isn't on the album, but can be found on several collections.
Steve Allen took a shot at scoring "A Man Called Dagger" (1967). His sense of humor is evident and while you'll probably need yours to watch this movie, the score isn't too bad.
"The Spy with a Cold Nose" (1966) was a fun litle film with a score to match. Not a lot of twangy guitar, but what you'd expect from a light 60's romp.
"What's Up Tiger Lilly? (1966) is an amazing film where Woody Allen took a Japanese spy film, dubbed in other voices and got The Lovin' Spoonful to do the score. It has the girls from "You Only Live Twice" in it and is on CD.
"Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs" (1966) is actually a sequel to "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine" (1965) with Vincent Price once again in the title roll. It's another teen romp with a soundtrack of pop tunes by some lesser known performers. Several instrumental tracks are attributed to "The Mad Doctors" and they back "The Sloopys" on the title theme which is worth getting just because it's so goofy. (The theme to "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine" can be found on a collection by the Supremes)
"Out of Sight" (1966) was one of the beach party crowd's contributions to the spy genre. Mostly pop tracks by Gary Lewis And The Playboys, Freddie And The Dreamers, The Turtles, and the like with one or two pretty good spy instrumentals (More Batman than Bond) by the Nick Venet Orchestra.
Paul Newman starred in "The Prize" (1963), an attempt at a Hitchcock type thriller with an early Goldsmith score on the Film Score Monthly label.
In "Torn Curtain" (1966) Paul Newman and Julie Andrews are scientists defecting from East to West Germany in an actual Hitchcock thriller with a score by Bernard Hermann...
And of course (not quite the sixties) Cary Grant starred in Hitchcock's "North By Northwest" (1959) with a fantastic Hermann score.
David Amram's jazz score for"The Manchurian Candidate" (1962) can be found on CD.
Richard Burton is a disillusioned spy in John Le Carre's "The Spy Who Came In From The Cold" (1965) with a sort of "spy noir" score by Sol Kaplan.
Another Le Carre story, "The Deadly Affair" (1967) has a beautiful bossa nova score by Quincy Jones and is available on CD paired with his score to "The Pawnbroker".
O.K... Austin Powers was technically a 60's secret agent frozen in the 60's and thawed out in the 90's, right? So that's why he's included here. That and George S. Clinton's music for "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery" (1997), "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me" (1999), and "Goldmember" (2002) were so incredibly right on target! With the first film we got a nice, well thought out CD with 60's pop tunes, covers of the Austin Powers themes, Soul Bossa Nova by Quincy Jones (used as the title theme) and score medley.
With "The Spy Sho Shagged Me we got two pop soundtracks, another short medley, and pretty much ripped off. (The good stuff could have all fit on one CD.)
But low and Behold, when nobody expected it, a CD of both scores was released. Really just cues edited together, but good enough.
If you were lucky you came across this oddball bootleg titled Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (although it was made up of cues from the first movie). It has music not found on any of the other releases including a vocal of the love theme, orchestral versions of Mas Que Nada, and a lot of musical stings and other cues from the film.
There was no score released for "Goldmember" (2002), but the pop tune CD (above) is available.
WHO IS NUMBER TWO?: The TV Spies