Rob Price
Gutbrain Records
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2025 September 29 • Monday

The 876th Soundtrack of the Week is G.T. Moore & Shusha's music for the documentary People of the Wind.

A cheery mixture of acoustic guitars, percussion, reeds and flutes start off the record with "Baroun-Barouneh (The Rain)". The melody swirls around and the track is a joyful and hopeful feel to it.

This is followed by another lovely track, "Stars in Heaven", harmonically similar to "Baroun-Barouneh" but more delicate and spacious, with the melody played on what could be xylophone or similar instrument with sensitive acoustic guitar support.

A bit of spiky rock energy comes sneaking in with the staccato punctuations of "Departure", which has an airy melody with hand percussion groove and sharp, angular, hide-and-seek lines from stringed instruments while piano rumbles in the background. Then drum kit comes in and we're in instrumental prog/acid rock country all of a sudden!

A beautiful vocal version of "Stars in Heaven" is next up but this isn't just slapping a vocal track on the previous take, this is a different arrangement, different instruments as well as having lyrics and a female vocalist.

The same singer then gets a solo track, "Aziz Joun", a beautiful and soulful melody given a silky smooth performance.

"The Lions Graves" brings back the rock band for a mellow instrumental that's very nice and lilting and features some kind of analog synthesizer.

Then there's another vocal, a brisker number with vocals and what sounds like a traditional dance feel similar to some Greek music I've heard.

A similar swirling energy continues in the next cue, "Conquest of the Basuft" but the one-note throbbing bass line, pounding drums and aggressively plucked strings create a sense of tension and urgency and even menace.

A gorgeous guitar duet, "Thanksgiving", comes next, a huge shift in tone and mood. This is peace and relaxation.

The album concludes with another solo vocal piece, "Silver Gun (Tofang-E-Noqreh)" and then a reprise of "Baroun-Barouneh (The Rain)" but this time with vocals.

2025 September 26 • Friday

Here's another great coffee table, a gift from a dear friend: Jeff Bond's The Fantasy Worlds of Irwin Allen.

This is a huge book with tons of information as well as a multitude of photos and illustrations.

There's even a signed menu from Allen's dinner at Chasen's with The Posiedon Adventure investors.

2025 September 24 • Wednesday

Actual movie theatres have been becoming less relevant for a long time now. Which is sad. The movie palace is basically an anachronism now and those that still exist serve a nostalgic, museum-like function.

Perhaps today's multi-plex will be fascinating years from now and far away. This is a notion encouraged by this book, Angolan Cinemas by Walter Fernandes and Miguel Hurst.

This is a coffee table book that documents what remains of movie theatres constructed in Angola in the 1960s and '70s when the country was still under Portuguese rule.

The photographs are beautiful. The one on the cover is, I think, the Cine Estúdio in Province Namibe.

But check out the Cine-Teatro Imperium in Province Benguela:

It's a gorgeous book. As of this writing it's out of print and available at a significant discount.

2025 September 22 • Monday

Well, here it is, the first day of autumn. This one is more autumnal than most at Gutbrain Headquarters. And so the 875th Soundtrack of the Week is It Was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown by the great Vince Guaraldi.

By this point, you know the drill with these records. Guaraldi is a sublime pianist, near the Ahmad Jamal end of the spectrum. Both of them have a startling gift for combining deep and intense lyricism and love of melody with a nimble lightness of touch.

The Charlie Brown theme is famous but in this particular reading it sounds heavier than usual, with more shadowy tones.

And the familiar trio has been enhanced with Herb Ellis on guitar, who blends seamlessly with Guaraldi's piano, so much so that it sounds like a separated at birth scenario. Also on hand are the Candoli brothers on trumpet and Victor Feldman on vibes. Frank Rosolino is on trombone, Peter Christlieb and William Hood on reeds, Monty Budwig (Shelly Manne's first call) on bass and Jack Sperling on drums.

The theme for this particular outing is swinging and swirling and also has a tinge of melancholy—or perhaps I'm just projecting. It's a brilliant piece and over in less than a minute but should leave you thinking that Guaraldi is under-rated.

Most of the cues are quite short. "You're in Love, Charlie Brown" is a delightful waltz but only 23 seconds long. "Bus Blues" is a little over a minute, in 6/8, and has some unusually edgy piano flourishes from Guaraldi.

The "Peppermint Patty" cue has a rock feel to it, with some tough saxophone playing, Feldman featured on vibes and Ellis letting a bit of grit into his tone.

"Love Will Come (Nova Bossa)" is definitely a piece with a line of sadness running through it. It's also quite beautiful, with unison saxophone lines and a perfect feel from the rest of the band.

The famous Charlie Brown theme gets as bit on an inversion in "Pebble Beach", which features a flute solo, while "Air Music" is almost like a pre-bebop jazz tune.

There are alternate takes of many of these tunes on the album. It's all wonderful.

2025 September 19 • Friday

While Mr. Hobbs' Vacation was made into something greater by its transformation into the movie Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation, its adaptation for the stage had a reductive effect.

The children and a few other characters are cut, as are most scenes that take place the characters out of the house. But the main problem is that the comedy in the original book comes from Streeter's tone and writing style and these just aren't in the play.

But this actual edition is a fascinating artifact of a time sixty years or so ago when people actually licensed this and put it on in their community.

Reading it didn't give me the impression that it would be a satisfying show to watch but who knows?

2025 September 17 • Wednesday

Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation is one of my favorite movies. So of course I had to read the source novel. It's by Edward Streeter, who also wrote Father of the Bride, and it's called Mr. Hobbs' Vacation.

Obviously that apostrophe without an "s" after it is a problem. No wonder they changed the title for the movie.

Speaking of which, this is the movie tie-in edition, as you can see. And if you forgot that the captain's portrait from The Ghost and Mrs. Muir was in the movie, you can be reminded by this edition's back cover.

The book and the movie share a premise and many of the same characters but are quite different. The book is basically plotless, a collection of of vignettes that all share a theme of expectations gone awry, and the title character's heroic struggles simply to endure what's meant to be a pleasurable and relaxing time in a summer vacation town.

You can see how bits of the book crept into very different scenes in the movie—getting lost in the fog in a boat, the bird-watching guests—but the movie version intensifies and amplifies the people and events, always effectively and humorously.

The book is quite funny as well, though it's a quieter, more whimsical, stealth sort of wittiness. James Thurber was very popular at this time and I think it's fair to say that the tone is meant to be very similar to his. Certainly the original hardcover edition's many original drawings, by Dorothea Warren Fox, are meant to remind readers of Thurber's own illustrations for his writings.

Streeter's writing is very smooth, confident and relaxed. He doesn't go for big effects but gets genuine laughs from readers simply by going with the current and letting the inexorable logic of Mr. Hobbs's streak of small failures play out.

This is alternated with precise and beautiful descriptive writing, never too much of it but so perfectly distilled that the setting is extremely vivid. Streeter knew his stuff.

The first line is "The incoming tide nosed its way inquiringly into dozens of rock-rimmed coves and tiny inlets".

2025 September 15 • Monday

Those of you who've been agitated by the lack of Jimmy Buffett content here can breath a little more easily today. The Rancho Deluxe soundtrack album by Mr. Buffett is the 874th Soundtrack of the Week.

Mostly this is a collection of Buffett songs that are presumably in the movie, with occasional snippets of dialogue from the film. I never care for that practice and it seems especially pointless here. I haven't seen the movie and the selections aren't interesting on their own.

There isn't much that sounds like "score" though there are some instrumental tracks like "The Wrangler" that might be source music.

The instrumentals "Gothic Ranch Action", with synth strings and walking electric bass as well as jazzy electric guitar and vibes solos and "Fifteen Gears", with acoustic guitar and features for harmonica and fiddle as well as country-rock electric guitar, are probably used as score.

The Western swing of "Cattle Truckin'", with its steel guitar solo, is probably also used as score rather than source.

The rest of it is Jimmy Buffett songs and I think they're all really good, well written and well performed country songs with great vocal harmonies and excellent playing from all of the musicians, the guitarist in particular.

Maybe this movie is worth seeing. The music is definitely worth listening to.

2025 September 12 • Friday

Apparently people were not screwing around when it came to making home movies in the 1950s. Is there anything today like Peter Gowland's How To Take Better Home Movies (1956)?

Pretty much everything is covered, even underwater photography and on-screen titles.

And just as the cover promises, some real Hollywood heavyweights chime in.

That's a very thoughtful reponse from James Wong Howe, one of the greatest cinematographers of all time!

Hitchcock is less helpful, which isn't particularly surprising.

But this magazine/book has lots of good advice and guidelines and most of it probably translates pretty well to the capabilities of your cell phone. Maybe we'll try some!

2025 September 10 • Wednesday

It's still summer so it's still shark season. (It's always shark season around here.) Here's a documentary about shark movies, aptly titled Sharksploitation.

In the world of sharksploitation there's before Jaws and there's after Jaws. Jaws is celebrating its fiftieth birthday this year and it's still an admirable movie in just about every way, certainly a highlight of Steven Spielberg's career.

In the before-Jaws era, one of the most notorious movies was Samuel Fuller's Shark! a.k.a. Man-Eater. The studio re-cut the movie and Fuller hated what they did enough to ask them to take his name off it, which they refused to do.

In Sharksploitation it's asserted that this movie contains footage of a real shark attacking and killing a stuntman, that this really happened and can be seen in the moviem, the producers deciding to leave it in for ballyhoo value.

This has apparently been debunked as a hoax but it's presented as fact in Sharksploitation, so watch out for that.

Other than that, all the interviewees in the movie, whether writers or filmmakers or marine biologists or horror-film experts, are engaging and knowledgable and a pleasure to listen to.

The terrifying as well as the goofy are covered, from the ridiculous rubber shark in the 1966 Batman to the world of Sharknado and its rather extensive family tree.

When you see footage of the real thing, though, the beauty of the creatures and their environment is just awesome.

It would be interesting to see what Jaws would have been like if the young Spielberg had been able to work with the CGI technology available now, or even Jurassic Park-era. A very different movie, most likely. It's hard to imagine.

2025 September 08 • Monday

The 873rd Soundtrack of the Week is another collection of film theme interpretations. This one is Screen Mood '62 by The Sharps and Flats Orchestra.

It's a fairly dizzying selection of titles, all from the years 1961 or 1962.

That's Suzanne Pleshette on the cover because one of the numbers is "Al Di La" from the movie Lovers Must Learn.

The small screen is represented as well as the large, silver screen, by the themes from Ben Casey and Surfside 6.

No surprise to find "Moon River" or "Tonight" here. Sequencing this record could have been a challenge, I suppose, having to connect El Cid and Blue Hawaii, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Parent Trap.

The arrangements and the sound of the orchestra smooth everything over. The general feel is like Glenn Miller's orchestra playing different material and throwing in a twist once in a while.

2025 September 05 • Friday

Vinegar Syndrome releases keep arriving in the mail. They pile up on the guitar amp next to the rocking chair and I try to get to them. Among the highlights this summer was the Nick Millard Action Collection.

This set contains five low-budget, independent movies from the 1970s and '80s, presented here on two Blu-ray discs. Nick Millard was quite a character, a second-generation exploitation filmmaker whose father could be a bit of a con man at times.

Millard started out in porn and made a couple of horror films before turning his attention toward the action genre. Shooting on location is always a matter of necessity for those working with his constraints but he gets some remarkable places in there, the Millard family vacations always including some time set aside for shooting.

And before you get to the actual features, there's this promising message: "The Action Films of Nick Millard were all stored in extremely sub-standard conditions, resulting in extensive physical damage, including moisture damage. Additionally, due to Nick Millard's frequent re-cutting of his camera originals, all film elements contain extreme amounts of dirt and handling damage. Although extensive image restoration was performed, substantial dirt and damage remain. Furthermore, due to Nick Millard's unorthodox approach to filmmaking, he edited each of these title 'Single Strand,' rather than AB rolling, resulting in visible splice marks on most cuts".

First up is .357 Magnum, a loosely plotted hitman-versus-hitman story.

Assassin John Hightower is tasked with taking down a hired killer named Clay who's been on a killing spree from Angola to Hong Kong. Hightower tries to get his old teacher Steve to come with him on the job but Steve demurs, opting instead to hone Hightower's skills.

Steve changes his mind when he learns who Hightower's target is, as Steve also trained Clay.

There's a bit of a setback after that, as well as an incident that might be a reference to The Man from Laramie but also of course might not.

Certainly this is not a production with a lot of money or seasoned technicians going for it, but it's pretty fun to watch and a movie like this will at least be different from usual fare.

The score is also low-budget and efficient, getting a lot of mileage out of solo piano and also the koto.

This is the only one I've watched so far but I'm looking forward to exploring the other titles in the box!

2025 September 03 • Wednesday

W. K. Stratton's The Wild Bunch: Sam Peckinpah, a Revolution in Hollywood, and the Making of a Legendary Film is a thorough, well written and very enjoyable read.

Of course you probably have to be a fan of the movie to enjoy it, or even to pick it up in the first place. I found a remaindered copy at a grocery store in Cape Cod. I stashed it at my parents' place out there and finally read it a few years later.

The book is divided into many short chapters, making it perfect for putting down and picking up again. Generally each person involved in the production gets a chapter that goes over biographical information before covering their role in the film.

They're all really interesting, with cinematographer Lucien Ballard being one of the most so. One of the greatest of all time took a very unusual path to the camera.

It's also fascinating to read about the great Warren Oates and everyone else in the cast. I learned some startling things about William Holden that changed the way I watch him in the movie. (Naturally you have to watch the movie again right after reading this book.)

Lee Marvin is a presence in this book, starting with the author's life-changing experience watching The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and continuing with Marvin's friendship with Peckinpah and original casting choice for Pike.

Stratton also does a great job placing The Wild Bunch in relevant contexts, with the Vietnam War and assassinations creating an atmosphere of violence and fear in the United States and Hollywood itself getting shaken up by the unexpected international success of the Sergio Leone/Clint Eastwood movies.

I wish there were more books like this, as long as they could be written this well.

The first line is "The butchery occurred in the Quảng Ngãi Province village of Sơn Mỹ on March 16, 1968".

2025 September 01 • Monday

Stewart Copeland is famous but underrated as a composer. His music for Rumble Fish is the 872nd Soundtrack of the Week.

It starts with a song called "Don't Box Me In", which Copeland co-wrote with Stanard Ridgway, who sings the lyrics. It has a nice sort of reggae groove.

Next is "Tulsa Tango", which has a peppy energy, jangly electric guitar and a bass line that's similar to Henry Mancini's classic A Shot in the Dark theme.

"Our Mother Is Alive" starts with a solo piano part but then various other instruments start swooping and whilring in. The tempo is a brisk 3/4 and Copeland plays a cool drum part with the great Buell Neidlinger on bass.

The next cue, "Party at Someone Else's Place" alternates between kind of a slinky reggae-ish groove and a more insistent, straight up and down piano-led figure.

After this comes "Biff Gets Stomped by Rusty James", which has long and ominous synth tones as well as a trumpet feature.

The first side of the record concluces with another kind of reggae number, "Brothers on Wheels", which is really pleasant, with a hypnotic, swirling energy to it.

The second side stasrts with "West Tulsa Story", which is a driving and upbeat number with a great groove and some nice changes. It's immediately restated in a different arrangement for "Tulsa Rags". Neidlinger's bass is crucial for these two.

"Father on the Stairs" is short, sharp, percussive hits with trumpet and some other sounds, creating a spare melody and atmosphere.

A short synth reggae track, "Hostile Bridge to Benny's", follows that, after which we hear a swinging and moody piece, "Your Mother is Not Crazy". This is one of the most satisfying pieces on the record, with Copeland layering different instruments with different time feels.

Then it's back to a cheery reggae thing but again, for "Personal Midget/Cain's Ballroom", which gradually builds in energy before a grounded conclusion. Then the record ends with the sober, trumpet-driven "Motorboy's Fate".