Music Composed by David Spear
Rating: ***

About a month back, BSX Records posted promotional material for a new limited release that hinted toward one of the great science fiction fanboy favorites. Then they released The Creature Wasn’t Nice, an obscure score by an obscure composer for an obscure early ‘80s sci-fi comedy. It was pretty goddamned funny. In fact, the only thing funnier was the massive indignation that erupted across the message boards from people who apparently took out second mortgages on their houses to prepare for this release. But while David Spear’s actual score isn’t quite the giant space-bound epic that was “promised”, it’s still a charming piece of tongue-in-cheekery that is certainly a great deal better than massive nerd indignation would lead you to believe.

David Spear was Elmer Bernstein’s orchestrator in the 1980s, so it shouldn’t come as any surprise that this score is both extremely similar to Bernstein’s comedy scores and also features terrific orchestration. I don’t hold much salt in the notion that Bernstein created the technique of scoring comedies with a straight face – look John Morris in the eye and make a claim like that. But he did invent a certain method of straight-faced scoring that pretty much dominated comedies of the 1980s, and it’s that method that Spear maintains throughout The Creature Wasn’t Nice. Spear’s music is far too self-consciously serious to ever actually register as being truly serious, which is why it works so well as comedy. It also makes for great good-natured fun as a listening experience.

The score opens with Spear’s main theme, a sharp parody of the countless Holst-inspired space marches. It actually greatly resembles Henry Mancini’s celebrated main title from Lifeforce, another score for a cheesy 1980s sci-fi film released by BSX Records. Think of it as Lifeforce-light. Spear works an impressively varied number of renditions of this theme throughout the score, often to great wit. There’s a good deal of mock-suspense music, but Spear’s intimate orchestration is precise enough that the suspense music never becomes a chore. His mystical faux-Herrmann references in the suspense music also lend the score a fair share of charm (particularly the eerie minimalism that opens “Let’s Eat Here,” a loving homage to The Day the Earth Stood Still). The score also has a fair share of action outbursts, a charmingly old-fashioned love theme (“Annie and John Meet the Creature”), an even more pompously goof march (“Captain Jameson’s Dramatic Reading From the Ship’s Log”), and at least one raising rendition of the main theme with a light ‘80s pop beat (“The Creature Eats Jameson and Rodzinski”). That last feature is strikingly similar to Bernstein’s pop renditions of his “Ghostbusters” theme in, um, Ghostbusters, released the same year – so it might be worth puzzling over when we try to decide who influenced whom.

The album also has a handful of lounge songs written by the film’s director, Bruce Kimmel. I’m not crazy about this genre and Kimmel doesn’t do much to sway me, but it is hard not to get a kick out of The Creature’s rendition of “I Want to Eat Your Face” (from the sounds of it, the creature appears to have been voiced by one of the Muppets). The disc is long, but much of that is due to the multiple song renditions/alternates/karaoke tracks – the score itself is just about long enough to not outstay its welcome.

Overall, this is a charming release, with a score that probably gets a little extra credit for being far better than it needed to be. The numerous inside jokes and token mementos will also be a treat for anyone who actually saw the film (we’ll apparently have a new chance to see it with an upcoming DVD release, restored to Kimmel’s original intentions). It’s not, truth be told, the sort of thing you’ll be playing on any regular basis, but it’s intelligent, witty, and all in good fun. Anyone fond of Bernstein’s many comedy scores from the ‘80s would do well to add this to the collection.

Music Composed and Conducted by David Spear; Songs: Music and Lyrics by Bruce Kimmel; Album Produced by Bruce Kimmel and Ford A. Thaxton; Label: Buysoundtrax, (8825); Availability: 1,000 copies; U.S. Release Date: March, 2007.

01. Let’s Eat Here / Main Title (2:46)
02. Annie Is Surprised (0:32)
03. An Unknown And Undiscovered Planet (0:22)
04. Captain Jameson’s Dramatic Reading From The Ship’s Log (1:42)
05. Cooking With John (0:17)
06. Hold Me, Touch Me, Thrill Me (2:52)
07. The “Stark” Planet (0:39)
08. The Sample Vault (0:36)
09. Growing Pains (0:23)
10. Still Growing (0:52)
11. Science Is My Pie (0:55)
12. The Creature Is Loose (0:45)
13. Trying To Find The Creature (0:35)
14. The Long Corridor (1:19)
15. Don’t Move (0:59)
16. All Right, I’ll Go (0:46)
17. All Right, I’m Back (0:47)
18. The Solarium And A Visitor (1:23)
19. The Solarium And Another Visitor (1:36)
20. Drawing Lots / John Finds The Creature (4:04)
21. Translating The Creature (1:27)
22. I Want To Eat Your Face (3:39)
23. This Creature Means No Harm (0:44)
24. It Seems To Have Eaten Dr. Stark (0:39)
25. Two Teams Searching (2:36)
26. The Creature Eats Jameson And Rodzinski (1:28)
27. The Creature Lurks (0:25)
28. Annie And John Meet The Creature (2:34)
29. Annie Has A Plan (1:02)
30. Bachelor Bills (1:29)
31. Farewell To The Creature / It’s Just You And Me Now (1:58)
32. End Credits (3:29)
33. I Want To Eat Your Face (Alt. “Creature” Vocal W/ Orchestra) (3:39)
34. It’s Just You And Me Now (Version Not Used In Film) (0:29)
35. Hold Me, Touch Me, Thrill Me (Demo Version - Vocal: Lisa Cutler) (2:46)
36. Bachelor Bills (Demo Version) (1:32)
37. Hold Me, Touch Me, Thrill Me (Karaoke Sing-A-Long Version) (2:52)
38. I Want To Eat Your Face (Karaoke Sing-A-Long Version) (3:39)
39. Bachelor Bills (Karaoke Sing-A-Long Version) (1:30)
40. Broderick Crawford As Max (5:06)

Total Playing Time: 67:13