:: theLogBook.com Music Reviews ::

More or less an album songs performed by or inspired by the Intellivision video game console, Intellivision In Hi-Fi is an affectionate throwback to the days when video game music was anything but hi-fi. To come even close to approximating a popular piece of music was a feat, and achieving true polyphony, even in just a flat, synthesizer-esque tone, was pure luxury. Intellivision was the first home game console to manage this level of musical sophistication, and even so, it only did so on the most primitive of levels - no attack or decay or anything as fancy as sounds intended to emulate acoustical instruments. But even with that extreme return to the basics of making music, Intellivision game designers pulled off some real winners - the jazzy chase music heard when Snafu drops from a four-player game to a two-player death match, the catchy theme (coined by a then-unknown musician named George “The Fat Man” Sanger) from Thin Ice, and the sticks-in-your-head-and-stays-there music from Shark! Shark!. All of these and more appear on Intellivision In Hi-Fi.

There are also numerous Intellivision-generated ditties from never-before-heard programmers’ concept tests and a few aborted works in progress. These include classical pieces such as “Also Sprach Zarathustra” (better known to many as the theme from 2001), and more decidedly modern works along the lines of the James Bond theme and a McDonald’s jingle, among others. (It’s interesting to note that a James Bond video game was later made, but not for the Intellivision, and not by Mattel Electronics, the company that originated the console in 1979.)

To round things out, there are a few more tracks which are either songs about the Intellivision, or are reinterpretations of classic Intellivision musical themes on actual instruments. This along brings us to George Sanger’s surf-rockin’ “Surfing On Thin Ice”, which is in itself a good reason to buy this CD. Jazzy interpretations of music from Snafu and Shark! Shark! also prove to be entertaining. Confusium provides two tracks featuring copious samples of Intellivision sound effects and vintage TV ads starring George Plimpton; the first of these opens the CD to great effect, while the latter is simply too bloody long and wears out its welcome. (At nearly 15 minutes, I find it hard to sit through the whole thing without skipping to the next track.) Best of all, however, is Michael Schwartz’s “My Intellivision”, an appropriately new wave-flavored pop tribute to the machine, sung from the perspective of someone who pines for his long-lost Intellivision.

Naturally, this CD is really for those who are already enthusiasts of the game machine in question; Intellivision In Hi-Fi doesn’t feature gobs of stuff remixed into a more modern form, opting instead to give you the actual beeps-and-boops sound of the original hardware. I’m a fan of both approaches, but this album’s diverse sampling of original sounds and reinterpretations should have something to please just about everyone.

1. Compare This! - Confusium (5:03)
2. Snafu (1:33)
3. Shark! Shark! (0:29)
4. Buzz Bombers (0:29)
5. Mind Strike (0:24)
6. The Jetsons’ Way With Words (0:21)
7. Melody Blasters (Blasters Blues) (0:31)
8. Thin Ice (Carnival Of The Penguins) (0:43)
9. Billiards Blues (1:34)
10. Surfin’ On Thin Ice - The Fat Man (3:06)
11. Also Sprach Zarathustra (0:47)
12. Scooby Doo’s Maze Craze (0:32)
13. Thunder Castle Songs (1:29)
14. Lounge Shark! Lounge Shark! - The Tilton-Tate Orchestra (3:21)
15. Maple Leaf Rag (1:21)
16. My Intellivision (1982 Mix) - Michael Schwartz (4:38)
17. James Bond Theme (0:37)
18. You Deserve A Break Today (0:36)
19. Linus & Lucy (1:14)
20. Blow Out (0:58)
21. Yogi’s Frustration (0:23)
22. Rocky & His Friends (0:16)
23. The Bullwinkle Show (0:19)
24. Snafu City - The Buddy O Trio (3:12)
25. The Closest Thing To The Real Thing - Confusium (13:58)
26. Tron 1.1 - Tom Kahelin (7.49)

Released by: Intellivision Productions / Retrotopia.com
Release date: 2002
Total running time: 55:42

The last hurrah for Silva Screen’s license to release Doctor Who music on CD in the 1990s, Worlds Of Doctor Who largely consists of music you’ve heard before if you’ve heard the same label’s other Doctor Who output, give or take a surprise or two.

The album opens and closes with two new versions of the famous theme music, the “Lightning Version” at the beginning and the lively “Spoons Version” at the end. As you might’ve guessed, the latter rendition of the theme is practically built around a guest performance on the spoons by Sylvester McCoy himself; it’s an interesting novelty, right up there with Jon Pertwee’s “I Am The Doctor”, but not much more than that. Both of these new arrangements wouldn’t have been out of place on the Variations On A Theme EP.

After the “Lightning Version”, things proceed very much along the lines of Silva’s original Earthshock compilation CD, providing classic clips arranged more or less chronologically, starting with the original BBC 45 version of the 1960s theme tune and then going straight into the Dudley Simpson single “The World Of Doctor Who” (built around music from the 1971 Pertwee adventure The Mind Of Evil). Selections from The Sea Devils and several Tom Baker adventures follow, the latter material coming from Heathcliff Blair’s Pyramids Of Mars re-recordings of classic Simpson scores from that era. At least some canny choices were made here to present the most listenable and accessible material.

After the 1980 Doctor Who theme arranged by Peter Howell, we segue into the more modern, synth-heavy sound of the Davison era; again, the material heard here has been heard before (not just on previous Silva Doctor Who soundtrack compilations, but on the 1980s BBC LP releases that those compilations drew from). To vary things up a bit, material that isn’t necessarily strictly from Doctor Who begins sneaking into the playlist during the 80s section, including Mark Ayres’ theme for the Myth Makers interview videos. This material, too, has been presented before by Silva, on Ayres’ Myths And Other Legends solo release.

Things get a bit more interesting with the suites of Ayres’ music from the last two seasons of the original series. The material has been heard before, but here it’s edited into three eight-minute-or-longer suites (one each for The Greatest Show In The Galaxy, Ghost Light and The Curse Of Fenric) where, again, the best material is brought to the fore. Those three episode scores have also been released in their entirety by Silva, but Ayres picked out his own best material (and it has to be said that I agree with him just about 100% on the selections he made for the suites) and put it all into a single track per episode. No new interstitial material tries to introduce cohesion to the suites; there are stops, starts and pauses between individual cues, but nothing too jarring.

Things are capped off with the first CD release of Ayres’ “Return To Devils’ End” suite, composed for a documentary video of the same name which reunited the cast and crew of the Pertwee-era classic story The Daemons at the original shooting locations. A true Dudley Simpson afficionado, Ayres creates an even better homage to “the Simpson sound” here than Heathcliff Blair managed with the original Simpson sheet music. The “Spoons Version” of the theme music wraps things up.

If you’re wondering about the music from Shakedown: Return Of The Sontarans and Downtime, two of the better fan-produced video drama spinoffs of the 90s, both of those projects’ scores were released in their entirety on Silva CDs as well, but not until after this CD’s release.

It’s a nice sampler CD of Doctor Who soundtrack cues, with a smidgeon of new (but hardly canonical) material, so there are worse ways for Silva Screen to have closed out their Who catalog.

1. Doctor Who (Lightning Version) (5:17)
2. TARDIS - Doctor Who (2:37)
3. The World Of Doctor Who (2:39)
4. The Sea Devils (3:19)
5. The Ark In Space (0:50)
6. Pyramids Of Mars (3:59)
7. The Brain Of Morbius (3:11)
8. Doctor Who Theme: 1980-85 (2:37)
9. Meglos (1:32)
10. The Five Doctors (5:24)
11. The Caves Of Androzani (6:07)
12. Myth Makers Theme (2:11)
13. Doctor Who (Terror Version) (4:16)
14. Terror In Totters Lane (1:55)
15. The Greatest Show In The Galaxy (8:31)
16. Ghost Light (8:05)
17. The Curse Of Fenric (8:57)
18. Return To Devils’ End (2:51)
19. Doctor Who (Spoon Version) (4:27)

Released by: Silva Screen
Release date: 1994
Total running time: 78:45