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SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE - 3CD Set from La-La Land Records


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SUPERMAN THE MOVIE & NAKED GUN TRILOGY (3-CD SETS)
are BACK IN STOCK!



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Our acclaimed SUPERMAN THE MOVIE 40TH ANNIV (3-CD set) by John Williams and THE NAKED GUN TRILOGY (3-CD set) by Ira Newborn are back in stock now at www.lalalandrecords.com !

Thank you for supporting our label! We are excited to bring you our new limited edition CD releases of SLIVER by Howard Shore and a 4-CD SET of music from the classic TV series VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA on June 23 at 12noon (pst)!

Stay well and safe everyone!

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  • 1 month later...
  • 1 month later...

Query: Since I couldn't completely piece this together from the information available to me at this moment, are these tracks  from the 2000 Rhino release included on the LLL release (either in their entirety or as edits and alternates):

 

R 1-1: Prelude and Main Title March / LLL 1-1 Prelude and Main Title

R 1-17: Main Title March (alternate) / LLL 2-12: Prelude and Main Title (alternate)

R 2-1: Superman March (alternate) / LLL ???

R 2-13: Finale and End Title March / LLL 2-10: The Prison Yard and End Title

R 2-18: Theme from Superman (Concert Version) / LLL 3-1: Theme from Superman (Main Title)

 

R ??? / LLL 2-17: Prelude and Main Title (film version)

 

Thanks! :)

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It’s all there.

 

Jay’s spreadsheet is pretty comprehensive:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1SkAOjZN-WOO03rsafaw4nOo2rFALx7E0DVj5-ky7Zmw/htmlview

The two your missing:

R 2-1: Superman March (alternate) / LLL 2-12 Prelude and Main Title (Alternate)
R 1-1: Prelude and Main Title March / LLL 2-17: Prelude and Main Title (film version)
 

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The only thing the Rhino album gave us that the FSM or LLL did not was the End Title cue by itself in its own track

 

That cue is always combined with the old Prelude, new Prelude, or Prison Yard cue in every other released version of it.

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1 hour ago, Kühni said:

Thanks for pointing me in the direction of Jay's spreadsheet

His very helpful threads collecting his spreadsheets used to be pinned to be visible - that was the whole point of collecting them in one thread, easy to find. Is there any specific reason they aren't pinned anymore, @Jay?

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20 hours ago, Jay said:

The film itself

  • The start of the film features the new Prelude (New 1M1), seguing into End Title, which has its speed altered from its original recorded speed
  • The end of the film features The Prison Yard (New 14M4/15M1) seguing into the new Main Titles (New 1M1 Part 2), which has its speed altered from its original recorded speed

The 1978 OST album

  • Track #1, "Theme From Superman (Main Title)" is actually the start of the old Prelude/Main Titles (1M1) seguing into the End Title
  • Track #16 "End Titles" is an edited down version of The Prison Yard (New 14M4/15M1) seguing into the End Title (again)

That's fucked up shit that caused special labels big trouble, not to piss any fan off.

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Even if soundtrack albums weren't even a thing that ever happened, it would have been better for the film itself if he has asked for a re-score of the main titles instead of tracking in a pitch-shifted end credits recording.  The main title cue Williams intended is not even terribly different from the end title one so I have no idea why Donner didn't like it, I'm just speculating about his reasons

 

 

Here's a video on youtube of Williams' intended Main Title synced to picture

 

 

 

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Could be, I have no idea.  The reason for the swap is just as unknown whoever it was that made the call

 

Heck, we don't even know if Williams put the End Title in the first track of the OST because he knew they were swapped in the film, or if that is just a coincidence

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23 hours ago, Jay said:

The only thing the Rhino album gave us the FSM or LLL never did was the clean opening to the revised Main Title march, since the FSM and LLL only present that cue with the revised Prelude cue (or the Prison Yard cue) overlapping the beginning of it


Yeah, but that was easy enough to separate with an edit. There’s no overlapping music, if I’m not mistaken.

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I mistyped before; That final track on Rhino disc 1 is the End Title cue in its own track, likely included because that cue is edited a bit in its disc 1, track 1 appearance, like it is in the film.

 

The FSM and LLL had no reason to release the End Title cue in its own track, because it is already presented without any edits at the end of their main score programs where it comes directly after The Prison Yard.

 

And yea, you can already get that opening pretty much clean in the Prison Yard / End Title track on the FSM or LLL, it's just never been in its own track by itself on any other release than the Rhino.

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On 9/13/2020 at 1:04 PM, Jay said:

The 1978 OST album

  1. Track #1, "Theme From Superman (Main Title)" is actually the start of the old Prelude/Main Titles (1M1) seguing into the End Title


Wouldn’t the very end would be taken from the revised main title (New 1M1 Part 2)? Isn’t that the only version with that added long chord into a stinger?

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You're absolutely right!  FSM Blue Box page 29 confirms this, and pages 58-59 go into more detail. 

 

In fact, these pages explain that the Film Version of the opening actually uses 16 seconds of the revised Main Title in between the Prelude recording and the End Title recording.  Sheesh!

 

Updated the post above.

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I wonder if Donner or whoever preferred the more immediate ending of the end title. Maybe they were looking for an edit point that worked..... They couldn't cut to it after the Puzo credit because one of them has that brief key change.... so they just thought "ah well, replace the whole thing." Maybe I'm thinking too hard, trying to rationalise the irrational!

 

The speed up is just so weird though. One of the biggest head scratchers. 

 

Thanks for all that info on the edits Jay. Fascinating stuff. 

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On 9/14/2020 at 7:22 PM, Jay said:

Even if soundtrack albums weren't even a thing that ever happened, it would have been better for the film itself if he has asked for a re-score of the main titles instead of tracking in a pitch-shifted end credits recording.  The main title cue Williams intended is not even terribly different from the end title one so I have no idea why Donner didn't like it, I'm just speculating about his reasons

 

 

Here's a video on youtube of Williams' intended Main Title synced to picture

 

 

 

I never really understood what is supposed to be better synced here?

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5 hours ago, bigjimwilson said:

I wonder if Donner or whoever preferred the more immediate ending of the end title. Maybe they were looking for an edit point that worked..... They couldn't cut to it after the Puzo credit because one of them has that brief key change.... so they just thought "ah well, replace the whole thing." Maybe I'm thinking too hard, trying to rationalise the irrational!

 

That could very well be it, yea!

 

 

4 hours ago, rough cut said:

I never really understood what is supposed to be better synced here?

 

Williams provides little flourishes sometimes for the things going on in outer space

 

Check out 3:25 for example

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On 9/14/2020 at 8:56 PM, Jay said:

And yea, you can already get that opening pretty much clean in the Prison Yard / End Title track on the FSM or LLL, it's just never been in its own track by itself on any other release than the Rhino.

 

Ah, OK, so I can switch and ditch that one track from the Rhino release and switch everything else with their LLL counterparts without "losing" any music. Cool, thanks again, Jay! :up:

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Hey!

 

I was the one pointing out that there was no problem with the LLL (if you’re up to a little editing).

 

On the other hand, I don’t seem to know how to sync up the original main theme to the opening credits so that the outer space syncs up to the orchestral flourishes.

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21 hours ago, Kühni said:

Ah, OK, so I can switch and ditch that one track from the Rhino release and switch everything else with their LLL counterparts without "losing" any music. Cool, thanks again, Jay! :up:

 

I don't understand what this sentence means at all, but if the ultimate question is "is there music heard on the Rhino that is not heard on the LLL" than the answer is "no, there is not."

 

If you're deciding between keeping or selling the physical Rhino album, that depends only on your personal nostalgia for that releases / your personal collector mentality.

 

if you're deciding which tracks from the Rhino release to keep in iTunes or your music program of choice, the only track to consider keeping is the final track on disc 1, and the only reason to keep it is if you ever feel like listening to the End Titles cue without listening to The Prison Yard or the Prelude first

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 I worked in a movie theater where this played.

I still get a thrill.

I love how JW builds the theme until it crescendos at 1:30.

The main SUPERMAN theme doesn't even appear until three minutes in!

Awesomeness.

Nuff said!

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The LLL organizes the music in the best possible way. Still, I'm not sure whether it was necessary to include the film versions of the Main and the End Title that merely swap out the march after the prelude.

 

There is just an Superman March overload on disc two.

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28 minutes ago, Brundlefly said:

The LLL organizes the music in the best possible way. Still, I'm not sure whether it was necessary to include the film versions of the Main and the End Title that merely swap out the march after the prelude.

 

I think there were 3 reasons. 

  1. that's what the film itself did (and some fans might prefer things that way, purely based on their nostalgia for seeing the film that way)
  2. the Rhino and FSM editions included those edits. 
  3. there was room

 

 

17 minutes ago, bollemanneke said:

Yup, more space for the source music.

 

JW would probably not have approved all the source music to be included on this release, based on recent history with him nixing source music for Jaws, Jaws 2, Dracula, and Stanley & Iris, so I think it was EXTREMELY smart to release all his Supes source music on the II / III set instead.

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I don't understand. JW is not okay with it being on this set, but is powerless/happy to stop his music from being included in the other one?

 

Also, I don't get this source music issue: it's part of this film score, why is it so problematic to include it?

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3 minutes ago, bollemanneke said:

I don't understand. JW is not okay with it being on this set, but is powerless/happy to stop his music from being included in the other one?

 

It's entirely possible he doesn't even know that there exists new editions of Superman 2, 3, and 4

 

Quote

Also, I don't get this source music issue: it's part of this film score, why is it so problematic to include it?

 

I don't think anybody on this forum can tell us JW's reasons for not liking certain music he wrote in the past.  You'd have to ask him yourself

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On 9/14/2020 at 1:22 PM, Jay said:

Even if soundtrack albums weren't even a thing that ever happened, it would have been better for the film itself if he has asked for a re-score of the main titles instead of tracking in a pitch-shifted end credits recording.  The main title cue Williams intended is not even terribly different from the end title one so I have no idea why Donner didn't like it, I'm just speculating about his reasons

 

 

Here's a video on youtube of Williams' intended Main Title synced to picture

 

 

 

I think that this is a case of comparing apples to oranges.

 

In that video, the person used a digital audio workstation with a 'stretch/shrink' function that changes the duration of an audio file without changing the pitch in order to sync the intended 'main-title' cue with this main title sequence.  Heck, the free software, Audacity, has that function (go to Effect-->Change Tempo).  In the sound-mix for the film, the music editor used analogue technically to make the music fit the said sequence.  Those techniques included trimming-off bits of music and changing the speed of a portion of music that resulted in that high-pitch sound.

 

Also, during the post-production process, Warner Bros was paying for the completion of the film.  My conjecture is that since so much money was spent on this film already, their thinking is that spending even more money on having JW and his crew come in and fix one sequence would not be necessary.  Also, not many average mover-goers would notice a pitch-change.

 

I do agree that this version sounds good over the main titles.  That video was made 12 years ago, so I hope that Mike M. and 'Film Concert Live' use that version for the L2P concert version for the flying-credits, instead of duplicating the edit in the film-version.

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You never knew that Donner swapped the Main Title music and the End Title music in the 1978 film?

 

Don't feel too bad, the public didn't know either, until the Blue Box came out 30 years later in 2008

 

But that was 12 years ago now, so I dunno how you spent the last 12 years not knowing that.

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There’s actually yet another variant of the main title, but it wasn’t recorded, or even orchestrated.

 

The original 1M1 was sketched with a different opening fanfare. This was replaced prior to orchestration by the familiar “Theme from Superman” opening fanfare, labeled “1M1 Main Title (B)” on the sketch.

 

Here’s a mockup of the original opening:

 

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1 hour ago, Jay said:

You never knew that Donner swapped the Main Title music and the End Title music in the 1978 film?

 

Don't feel too bad, the public didn't know either, until the Blue Box came out 30 years later in 2008

 

But that was 12 years ago now, so I dunno how you spent the last 12 years not knowing that.

 

Screenshot_2020-09-16-14-46-09.png

You'll hafta forgive me but after seeing the film fifty times,  ( in state-of-the-art Dolby six track)listening to the OST and the RHINO set, I wasnt exactly starving for any more stuff.

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2 hours ago, BrotherSound said:

There’s actually yet another variant of the main title, but it wasn’t recorded, or even orchestrated.

 

The original 1M1 was sketched with a different opening fanfare. This was replaced prior to orchestration by the familiar “Theme from Superman” opening fanfare, labeled “1M1 Main Title (B)” on the sketch.

 

Here’s a mockup of the original opening:

 

I actually had a mockup made of this, but I wasn't able to include it in my restores due to us not knowing what the early cut for the opening was.

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3 hours ago, Jay said:

You never knew that Donner swapped the Main Title music and the End Title music in the 1978 film?

Me neither. But then again, that particular score and film never really were of much interest to me.

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8 hours ago, Jay said:

It's entirely possible he doesn't even know that there exists new editions of Superman 2, 3, and 4

 

Pretty sure Mike said he discussed the source music with Williams' management and they specifically didn't want the source music included with S:TM.

 

But when Mike asked if they could include it with 2/3 instead, they had no issue? I'll have to get an exact quote from the podcast.

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