2016 Record Store Day Black Friday release - limited to 2,500 copies on gold wax and includes a 18 x 24" poster.
Light In The Attic's soundtrack imprint Cinewax Recordings is honored to announce an official re-release of Jerry Goldsmith's 1974 epic score to Roman Polanski's masterpiece Chinatown. The Academy Award nominated soundtrack ranks ninth on the American Film Institute's Top 25 film scores of all time and remains a monumental classic for music fans around the globe. This exclusive Black Friday title is newly re-mastered and features new artwork by renowned painter and illustrator Sterling Hundley with layout by Jay Shaw (Mondo/Death Waltz).
Sometimes, it doesn’t take very long to create something brilliant. When producer Robert Evans rejected Phillip Lambro’s original score for Chinatown, Jerry Goldsmith was hired to create another, from scratch, in just 10 days.
To say he rose to the challenge is an understatement. Goldsmith, a 20 year veteran of the TV and movie industry with credits including Dr Kildare, Planet Of The Apes and even The Waltons theme, turned in a work that was both a career peak for him and the saviour of Roman Polanski’s masterpiece of neo-noir.
What was clever about it? It wasn’t quite straight jazz, it wasn’t quite classical. It was identifiably a movie soundtrack, but an unusual one at that, leaning heavily on Uan Rasey’s mournful trumpet solos, sparingly using pianos, harps, strings and percussion, and employing sounds and crashes as overtures. It doesn’t try to speak to the film’s 1930s setting so much as to the mood and feel of the movie, a piece about political and moral corruption in a water-starved LA featuring Jack Nicholson at the absolute top of his game.
“I remember [Evans] speaking about the music having a contemporary feel, contemporary meaning the ‘30s,” Goldsmith said in an interview before his 2004 death. “I said, ‘Bob, I don’t think so – you see that on the screen, why should I do that in the underscore? … Emotions are timeless.’”
Originally released as a soundtrack in 1974, and long out of print, Cinewax’s reissue is remastered from the original tapes and is presented with brand new artwork by acclaimed illustrator and painter Sterling Hundley, with layout by Jay Shaw. Drop the needle and hear why Chinatown is, reportedly, David Lynch’s favorite soundtrack. Goldsmith was right about emotions…
| A1 | Love Theme From Chinatown (Main Title) | 1:59 |
| A2 | Noah Cross | 2:27 |
| A3 | Easy Living | 1:49 |
| A4 | Jake And Evelyn | 2:41 |
| A5 | I Can't Get Started | 3:35 |
| A6 | The Last Of Ida | 2:59 |
| B1 | The Captive | 3:05 |
| B2 | The Boy On A Horse | 2:05 |
| B3 | The Way You Look Tonight | 2:16 |
| B4 | The Wrong Clue | 2:32 |
| B5 | J. J. Gittis | 3:05 |
| B6 | Love Theme From Chinatown (End Title) | 2:03 |
