Intrada Soundtrack Forum

INTRADA Announces:



SHAMUS
Music Composed and Conducted by JERRY GOLDSMITH
INTRADA ISC 469

Intrada announces another rare find – the complete score to Jerry Goldsmith's much-sought score to the 1973 Burt Reynolds film Shamus. Long thought lost, what was once lost is now found! Goldsmith took a funky approach, using Reynolds’ relaxed performance as his touchstone, infusing the score with a '70s vibe. Goldsmith's main theme is a droll, jazzy melody, first heard on the piano, that is the ideal musical match for Reynolds’ refreshingly off-hand performance. But the sparse score has moments that burst into action in true Goldsmith fashion.

The score was praised in the press, catching the attention of at least two critics hailing his hip, contemporary score, as well as how it added to the entertainment value of the film. Fans would argue that is the case for all of Goldsmith's works. Fans will also relish the crisp, detailed sound of this recording, allowing all the instruments to shine in this long, long overdue soundtrack release.

In the film, The “shamus” of the title is McCoy, a low-rent private eye who lives in a barely furnished Brooklyn apartment and hustles pool to help make ends meet. After a jewel heist leads to the thief’s brutal murder, millionaire E.J. Hume hires McCoy to track down the stolen diamonds, though the client admits that McCoy was his “fifty-third choice” for the assignment. The trail of the gems leads to Felix Montaigne, a former football star with a shady shipping business and a beautiful sister who strikes McCoy’s fancy. After an investigation full of double crosses, violent confrontations and narrow escapes, McCoy finds himself without a client but with a new love in his life.

INTRADA ISC 469
Barcode: 720258546906
Retail Price: $21.99
Available Now
For track listing and sound samples, please visit http://store.intrada.com/s.nl/it.A/id.12187/.f

At 25 minutes,
This is like Goldsmith’s original albums from PROJECT 3 records.
PLANET OF THE APES & BANDOLERO which also had roughly 25 minute programs each.

Definitely ordered!!!

As I've said at the FSM board, I would take whatever I could get from SHAMUS but the clips sound just great, apparently in stereo. As to it's relatively short length, Spenser Tracy's quote about Katherine Hepburn applies--"Not much meat on her, but what's there is cherce (choice)."

Just to hear my favorite cue, "Surprise Visit", unencumbered by sfx, in clean stereo is worth the price to me. Thanks again Intrada.

The relatively short running time of SHAMUS isn't its most important factor; neither is its having been legendarily unavailable before now. This is first a terrific score. Then for listeners who already appreciate Jerry Goldsmith and today probably don't know this particular film, SHAMUS demonstrates now some of the reasons why the composer's work was becoming so popular within Hollywood back then.

Star Burt Reynolds was still very new to the wide audience by 1973, with top billing in rather few small-to-midrange pictures. His specific blend of offhand charm and self-deprecating humor were hardly as familiar as those qualities would soon become. But Goldsmith's breezy theme and underscore beautifully complement those aspects of Reynolds' performance -- just as the the excellent action cues spread throughout enhance the danger and toughness of the movie's rough underside.

Some are complaining about the limited 26-minute running time, as if filling a CD were a valid requirement for evaluating a film score. I say you have to be too tied to the blaring, wall-to-wall overkill of modern, bloated movies if you couldn't appreciate a score like SHAMUS. There was a wonderful era when deliberate, effective spotting could heighten a narrative's danger and tension while also conveying lightness and humor... and needing no more than 26 minutes to do the job and wrap it up.

Thanks so much, Intrada, for all the time and steps that were needed to bring this release to reality. I would have loved for the booklet notes to have included details on how these long-elusive recordings finally emerged -- and in such beautiful condition and quality. (Any coincidence that this one turned up so closely in time after the same studio's FACE OF A FUGITIVE appeared so unexpectedly?) But I don't feel cheated by not being served the backstory; I'm too grateful for now having both scores on disc.

But especially SHAMUS -- which still impresses me as much now as it did when I was a teenage Goldsmith fan!

Don't sleep on this one, folks. Short but so very sweet.

I can understand the argument of wanting more music for the cost. After all, we were told that the less music on an album the less expensive it is to produce. But then again, we have also been told that there are fewer people buying these albums than ever.

Some short albums are among my favorites. See No Evil is one such album, which is helped by having among the best sound quality I've ever heard from a film score recording.

Many of Jerry Goldsmith's best scores are relatively short, like PATTON or CHINATOWN. It was something I noticed watching old Goldsmith movies on TV when I was starting out with film music: they were excellently spotted and didn't have music all the time. COMA practically had none in the movie's first half, and then almost non-stop.

I've never seen SHAMUS, but a new Goldsmith score is always welcome, I will definitely get that one. I sampled some of the score on YouTube and it sounds really "cool". So if the score is short, that's what it is... music is not bought by the pound, and the overall cost and amount of labor and paperwork etc. to be done for such an album release is probably not less just because the running time is short.