SUPERMAN II (1981)

The second soundtrack album I received was SUPERMAN II, given to me for Christmas in 1981.  Strange that I didn't receive the original SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE?  Granted, but it must have been easier for my parents to find a copy of the sequel's soundtrack, since it had just been released that Summer.   I loved both of those first two SUPERMAN films and still do, but admittedly my sisters and I wound up watching the action-packed follow-up more often (eventually recorded on Betamax video from HBO).  On another note, I have a soft spot for SUPERMAN III - come on, the junkyard fight scene between Clark and Superman, that's gotta be a highlight!

We were living in Odessa, TX from 1981 until mid 1983.  My sisters and I  became friends with kids in the neighborhood this time around, one of whom had the double LP soundtrack for STAR WARS, meaning I could at last drink it in and savor that music apart from the movie.  These brief years in Odessa, living on Dunbar Street, included two full glorious weeks of snow one winter, which finally allowed me to introduce my Han Solo and Luke Skywalker action figures into a live Hoth-like environment.  My parents gifted us with an Atari 2600 and "Space Invaders" competitions began in earnest.  Weirdly, I also recall using bits of wood from a nearby construction site to construct my own broadsword, influenced by the violently bloody, nudity-lined, amazing movie EXCALIBUR in '81.  Lastly, my first kiss awkwardly occurred in '82 when I was 9, thanks to a dare, with my friend Corey's sister, Carmen.  She was 11 and I recall feeling paralyzed in the moment, frozen inside, trying to figure out what I was supposed to do, exactly.  Sadly, I can't imagine it was much of a stellar experience for Carmen due to my brain gears working overtime.  Sorry, Carmen.

At that age, I don't imagine I would have called myself a film music fan.  I listened to Top 40 Radio with my sisters, Casey Kasem countdowns and absorbed MTV when it ramped up that year.  I loved Duran Duran, Toto, the song "Mr. Roboto" and bought pop songs on 45's.  Still, I now owned two soundtrack albums, yet it hadn't dawned on me that I could seek these out from other movies.  Instead, I began placing my portable cassette recorder beside the television, right up against its single, oval speaker with glorious mono sound, all in order to garner my own copies of FLASH GORDON, CLASH OF THE TITANS, the television series BATTLESTAR: GALACTICA and even the Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor comedy SILVER STREAK. What can I say, that smooth, laid-back main title helped me appreciate Henry Mancini.

Those custom cassette copies I could listen to at will, soon memorizing and replaying sequences for my favorite bits of music.  From the classic, arresting opening song by Queen and the bracing, orchestral score cues composed by Howard Blake for the aforementioned FLASH GORDON to the unabashed rhapsodic nature of Laurence Rosenthal's music for CLASH OF THE TITANS, I was swiftly becoming enamored of this music accompanying all sorts of movies and TV series.  Indeed, on several occasions I played hookie from school simply to catch one last airing of these movies on HBO.  I still don't know if my parents were ever wise to this... I mean, my mom had been a teacher so for sure she knew all the tricks kids play, right?  Thanks E.T., for the trick of heating up the thermometer with my desk lamp.

The album for SUPERMAN II was only one LP, not double like THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, so I soon realized it didn't include all the music I really liked hearing in the movie.  I enjoyed what was embedded in the grooves nevertheless yet didn't realize then how much of this score was adapted from the first film's cues.  If only I had a copy of that album then I wouldn't have been left pining!  John Williams's music for 1978's SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE had been adapted for the sequel by another composer, Ken Thorne, and done so with such skill that it seems completely organic to that second film.  It's very impressive work, once you dive fully into both scores and fathom how the first's had been broken apart, reconfigured and re-purposed so smartly for the second.

The full score for SUPERMAN II eventually found its way to disc in the form of a wonderful box set, from the Film Score Monthly label, which actually represents all that was composed for the four Christopher Reeve-led installments.  In other news, my custom-made wooden broadsword provided far too many splinters for its good and I never received another kiss from Corey's sister again.