Soylent Green (1973) was the last and arguably the finest of Charlton Heston’s trilogy of early-’70s sci-fi films, beginning with 1970’s Beneath the Planet of the Apes and continuing with 1971’s The Omega Man. (All three soundtracks are now immortalized as FSM CDs.) Heston plays a detective in this dystopian, overcrowded future, where the death of a prominent executive leads to a discovery of the shocking truth behind the society’s precious foodstuff.
The music to Soylent Green was composed by Fred Myrow (1939-1999), an eclectic musician who worked in film, theater and the concert hall. Myrow provided an imaginative, pop-based main title (for a montage of still photographs), futuristic-sounding source cues (featuring electric violin and synthesizers), and strange, atmospheric moods for the underscore. The CD includes his original, unused classical-styled music for Edward G. Robinson’s death sequence, as well as the actual classical works (by Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Grieg) conducted by Gerald Fried for the finished film. The Soylent Green portion of the CD is entirely in stereo.
Demon Seed (1977) was directed by Donald Cammell (Performance) and stars Julie Christie as the wife of a scientist (Fritz Weaver) who has invented the Proteus IV supercomputer. However, Proteus soon develops the need to procreate—and uses Christie as the means to that end, trapping her in her house and terrorizing her. Jerry Fielding’s avant garde score was a high-water mark in the composer’s experimentation, featuring eerie suspense and violence as Proteus and Christie engage in a battle of wills.
Fielding conceived and recorded several pieces electronically, using the musique concrete sound world of Karlheinz Stockhausen; some of this music he later reworked symphonically. FSM’s premiere release of the Demon Seed score features the entire orchestral score in stereo, as well as the unused electronic experiments in mono and stereo
Track Listing
Soylent Green
Music Composed and Conducted by Fred Myrow
Prologue/Opening City Music 4:20
Can I Do Something for You? 1:47
Out for a Walk/Nothing Like This/Assassin Approaches/Necessary to God/New Tenant 5:29
Stalking the Pad 1:41
Tab’s Pad/Furniture Party 3:43
Shirl and Thorn 2:08
Home Lobby Source 2:58
Sol’s Music 6:29
Symphony Music (Tchaikovsky/Beethoven/Grieg, cond. Gerald Fried) 6:17
Infernal Machine/Thorn in Danger/Are You With Us?/Alternate City Opening/End Credits 5:13
Total Time: 40:21
Demon Seed
Music Composed and Conducted by Jerry Fielding
Birth Scene/Speaking Room/Elk Herd 3:17
Proteus Requests/Light On/Your Phone Is Out 8:24
Visiting Hours/Probed and Put to Bed 3:24
The Gaz Chamber/Rape of the Earth/How?/Hypnosis/Chimes 8:23
Pre-Trip/Big Wind/Sperm/Spirograph/Tetra Waltz 7:18
Last Voyage 2:35
Closing Crawl 2:03
End Credits 3:59
Total Time: 39:28
Total Disc Time: 79:49
