Women In Lounge (Cinedelic - 2002)

You lucky people: as Christmas gift, I have just decided to post the first volume of Women In Lounge, a compilation that just becomes pretty hard to find these days. You'll find here 20 rare vocal gems, composed by Italian brightest soundtracks composers and made for movies now largely forgotten, except if you're into late 60's/early 70's Italian bis cinema: Alessandroni, Pisano, Piccioni, Morricone, Trovaioli, Orlandi, Ortolani, Bongusto, Nascimbene. A brilliant collection.

Download => Women In Lounge

Raymond Lefèvre - Jo (1971)/Les Grandes Vacances (1967) (Play-Time/FGL - 2011)

Raymond Lefèvre is probably not the best known of French soundtracks composers but when you consider the work he did for this two comedies, Jo and Les Grandes Vacances, he clearly deserves his place among the greatest composers, the Lai, Goraguer, Jarre, Magne, or de Roubaix. We can clearly thank Play-Time/FGL for this excellent reedition. Jo and Les Grandes Vacances soundtracks never got a proper release even if both movies have often been played on French television channels. Jo is a dark comedy but the music could have easily been made by Lalo Schiffrin for a thriller. Les Grandes Vacances music is largely influenced by British Invasion pop music of the time and each track is a reorchestration of the same melody in various styles, between Burt Bacharach and Henri Mancini. As bonus track, you can find the themes of two other movies made by Raymond Lefèvre for the same director, Jean Girault, La Maison De Campagne and Un Drôle De Colonel.

Download => Raymond Lefèvre - Jo/Les Grandes Vacances

Quincy Jones - In The Heat Of The Night/They Call Me Mister Tibbs! (MGM - 1997)

This long CD allows you to possess Quincy Jones two best soundtracks both featuring the character of detective Virgil Tibbs played by Sidney Poitier. Composed in respectively 1967 and 1970, In The Heat Of The Night and They Me Mister Tibbs! are heavy on jazz, blues and soul and don't have all the nervous tic of later blaxploitation soundtracks. Purists will certainly disdain this CD, because tracks are melted with dialogue snippets that are not on both original records. But what the hell, purists certainly already have those records on vinyl.

Download =>Quincy Jones - In The Heat Of The Night/They Call Me Mister Tibbs!

François Valéry - Joy (Instrumental) b/w Joy (Vocal) (WEA - 1983)

When producers saw the money Just Jaeckin racked with Emmanuelle and Histoire d'O, they started to produce erotic movies that could be distributed in theaters without being rated X. Joy is the cinematographic adaptation of the novel of the same name and made the rich hours of French late night TV programs in the 90's. At that time, there was no You Porn and those late night diffusions were the closest thing you could get your eyes on explicit sex scenes. This time, the music was not made by Pierre Bachelet but by François Valéry, who is as well an awfull French singer but succeded to make a nice little erotic soundtrack. The Joy instrumental title theme is a synthetic ballad with heavy drums and strings. The vocal version tries its best to sound erotic. Defintely not a masterpiece but a good try.

Download => François Valéry - Joy (Instrumental) b/w Joy (Vocal)

Michel Bernholc - Les Bronzés (Trinacra - 1978)/Pierre Bachelet - Les Bronzés Font Du Ski (Trinacra - 1979)

This double CD holds the soundtrack to two of the most popular French comedies of the 70's. Every French people you will meet anywhere in the world knows by heart the text of those two really funny films. Making fun of French people in vacations (in Africa in the first movie and in the Alps in the second ones), spectators found they represented them very well and the characters featured are now part of French popular culture. The music of Les Bronzés was composed by Michel Bernholc and is  mixing exotica, folk, disco funk and melancolic electronica. The theme music, Sea, Sex And Sun was allegedly composed in five minutes by French master Serge Gaisnbourg himself. Pierre Bachelet was trying to make a living with erotic soundtracks (Emmanuelle, Histoire D'O) when he was called to make the music of the second adventures of Les Bronzés, Les Bronzés Font Du Ski. You will go for track number 5, a nice little piece of electronic funk clearly inspired by Moroder.

Download => Michel Bernholc - Les Bronzés 
Download => Pierre Bachelet - Les Bronzés Font Du Ski

Women In Lounge - Volume 2 (Cinedelic - 2005)

Don't run away with disgust: this compilation has nothing to do with an awful lounge restaurant compilation. Instead it gathers 20 vocal gems issued from various Italian soundtracks of the 60's and 70's. All the usual suspects are here (Morricone, Bacalov, Cipriani, Nicolai, Umiliani) but other less known composers are also featured. If specialists won't find anything new here, the casual listener will find everything he needs: dreamy, jazzy, catchy and brilliant music. If the movies featured are only half good than their brilliant soundracks then they are definitely must see.

Download => Women In Lounge - Volume 2

Janko Nilovic - Soul Impressions (Editions Montparnasse 2000 - 1975)

Soul Impressions is a very good library funk record made by library maestro Janko Nilovic who proves that French could funk as well. Janko Nilovic add just his personnal touch, mixing what you can expect from a funk library record (plenty of wah-wah riffs, flutes, nices breaks) with easy-listening or jazz. We can be thankful to Vadim Music for having reeissued this year this hidden gem. It was just impossible to buy it on vinyl without saling an eye or a kidney to Chinese if you were lucky enough to find an original version in good conditions. Soul Impressions has probably been posted already on a lot of blogs but it's just the kind of record difficult to keep for yourself.

Download => Janko Nilovic - Soul Impressions

Viva La Muerte OST - Ekkoleg b/w Siesta (Barclay - 1970)

Viva La Muerte (Long Live Death in English) is a movie made by Spanish director Fernando Arrabal. Then exiled in France, fleeing dictator Franco’s fascist regime. Arrabal tried to exorcice his demons and its bad memories of the Spanish Civil War, counting the story of a young kid, Fando, that discovers that his missing father has been turned down by his mother to the fascists. Fando then tries to find his father. I never saw this movie but he is quite famous for being disturbing and closed to the surrealist movement with the graphic representation of the dark fantasies of the young boy.

This 7” is apparently the only soundtrack to this film and sums it up very well. Side A, Ekkolag, is  an innocuous singalong song made by a child until you realize that the song is in fact (supposedly) in Danish and sang by adult singer, Grethe Agatz. Side B, Siesta, sounds like an insane Henri Mancini song. It was composed by Edouard Ruault (the real name of now deceased French music mogul and stunner Eddie Barclay)and Raymond Le Sénéchal. Curiously neither sides has been apparently sampled but Ekkoleg was featured in a French advertising a few years ago. For you, fanatic digger, this record can be find easily in France for a modic price but the inflation quickly increases when you cross the French border or try buy it on the internet. A good record worth having anyway.

01 Ekkoleg
  02 Siesta
Download =>Viva La Muerte OST - Ekkoleg b/w Siesta