Review by Paul Cote

Rating: *****

I’m not really in the “know” when it comes to these cult sci-fi trends. I’ve seen maybe an episode or two of Twilight Zone and Star Trek, I’m aware of Lost in Space and Doctor Who, and I understand that they’re extremely well liked within a certain group of people. The Outer Limits, however, is one that completely passed under my radar. Not my generation, and not really my thing to be honest. So when La-La Land announced their mammoth 3-CD set of the series Dominic Frontiere scores, I wasn’t quite as ecstatic as everyone else seemed to be. Great for people who grew up with the show, I imagined, but I doubted it would be of much appeal to anyone not looking for a big lump of nostalgia.

Well I was, not for the first time, extraordinarily wrong. The music that Frontiere managed to create for this anthology series is some of the wildest, most brazenly experimental and complex music that anyone’s ever gotten away with in television. I know that 1960s had people like Goldsmith and Rosenthal making crazy avant-garde music close to the norm for the genre, so I guess it shouldn’t come as too much of a shock the trend seeps into television as well. Still, I’m pretty floored. I still know very little about The Outer Limits as a television show, but I can say that the CD release contains hours’ worth of thoroughly entertaining, uncompromising, and intelligent music.

Dominic Frontiere

Now how best to describe it? I’d say that there’s plenty of dissonance, but also plenty of melody, oft times even (gasp) at the same time! It occasionally takes us on exotic journeys to Latin America, the far East, the future, and distant outer space, but it never veers too far from its intense and unsettling core. We get plenty of harsh brass for the bombastic thrills, but also plenty of delicate woodwind passages for the more lyrical moments and lush strings for the emotional climaxes. And harp. Lots and lots of harp. Possibly even the most extensive use of harp that I’ve ever heard in a film or television score. At times it reminds me of Herrmann’s transfixing harp work in key cues from Journey to the Center of the Earth and Fahrenheit 451, but Frontiere pushes the instrument even further. At times he uses harp for abrasive atonal effects, but he just as frequently lets it pursue hypnotic and melodically unpredictable dreamscapes (particularly mesmerizing in the conclusion to the “Nightmare” episode, “The Truth Revealed and Epilogue”). It all adds up to captivating material and it benefits immeasurably from the time Frontiere gives it to develop.

Which is actually one of the greatest assets of this music – that it actually takes the time to develop and complete itself. One of the worst liabilities for TV music tends to be the limited opportunity to create sustained musical ideas, and even the best composers struggle to do their best work when forced to squeeze their ideas into fleeting 10-second statements. The Outer Limits, miraculously, rarely encounters this problem. Oh, there are few mammoth tracks and quite a few have several shorter cues strung together, but very few cues run for less than a minute. It doesn’t sound like much, but being able to hear Frontiere start an idea and carry it to its natural (or its unsettlingly unnatural) conclusion really makes the music stand out against even the best music from the medium.

And the reason for this isn’t too much of a mystery. According to the box set’s excellent liner notes, Frontiere was a producer on the show as well as the composer, with the first and last word on just about every spotting and music decision. So if he wanted to explore an idea for longer than 10 seconds or take the music in a brazenly unorthodox direction, nobody was there to tell him otherwise. I have a hard time envisioning a situation like that repeating itself in the foreseeable future, so savor it here. It’s by no means easy listening, but it’s thrilling, challenging, and really just extraordinary music.

Music Composed, Conducted and Produced by Dominic Frontiere; Additional Music by Robert Van Eps; Recording Engineer: Artie Becker; Album produced by Ford A. Thaxton and James Nelson; Label: La-La Land Records; Availability: Limited to 3000 units; U.S. Release Date: June 10, 2008.

Disc One
1. The Control Voice – Long Version (1:08)
2. The Outer Limits – Main Title – Version #1 (0:24)
3. Teaser: Nuclear War / “To Be Turned Into That” (0:51)
4. The Lottery / Alan Leighton / The Point Of No Return / Baby Talk (4:39)
5. Scarecrows (Alan And Yvette Love Theme) (2:42)
6. Alan’s Departure / The Telegram / Maturity Cloths (2:04)
7. Double Vision / Madness / Aborted Phone Call/ Sadness (3:36)
8. The Spaceship / Alien On The Loose / Alan Returns To The Lab / The Truth Revealed (2:54)
9. Requiem For A Scarecrow (2:30)
10. Spaceship / The City / The Pawn Shop / TheCustomer / Coffee And Cigarettes / Act Out (3:10)
11. The City #2 / The Hotel / Time Loops / TheShooting / “Put It Back The Way It Was!” (6:01)
12. Marriage Proposal #1 / Marriage Proposal #2/ A Happy Ending (2:32)
13. The Republic Of San Blaz (0:59)
14. Creature On TV / First Dive (1:39)
15. Drive To The Party (0:23)
16. Party Source Cue #1 (2:15)
17. Party Source Cue #2 (4:09)
18. The Old Gods (1:19)
19. Dive #2 / Capturing The Creature (3:49)
20. Photo Op (0:50)
21. The Creature Wakes** (2:09)
22. To The Rescue / Nets (1:11)
23. Love Scene (2:04)
24. Finale – Act Out (0:24)
Tracks 13-24 Music by Robert Van Eps
**Composed by Dominic Frontiere
25. The Outer Limits End Credits – Long Version (Stereo) (1:01)
Disc One Total Time 55:26

Disc Two
1. The Control Voice – Short Version (0:46)
2. The Outer Limits Main Title – Version #2 (0:21)
3. Prologue (1:53)
4. Ebonite POW Camp (1:53)
5. Tortures Of The Mind (3:11)
6. Turning On One Another (2:02)
7. The Verdict And Sentence (3:20)
8. The Truth Revealed And Epilogue (3:32)
9. Wedding Party Source (2:46)*
10. The Years Pass / Phone Call (2:01)
11. Dark Corridor (1:36)
12. Crazy Lady Source Cue (2:28)*
13. Unopened Box / Scared (1:42)
14. Groom Be Gone (0:55)
15. Bride Be Gone / Box Creature (2:54)
16. Crazy Lady Room / Back To Room (1:44)
17. A Father’s Search / Upstairs / Zapped intoBox (3:46)
18. The Price Of Freedom / Double Cross /The House Is Destroyed (3:29)
19. Teaser / Enter Andro / The Library / Return to the Past (3:01)
20. Andro & Noelle Theme /“Moments, Men & Places” (6:16)
21. Andro Breaks Mirror / Andro Revealed (1:57)
22. Time Crossed Lovers / The Big Chase / Take Off (8:15)
23. “I Was Never Born!” / A Better World (2:16)
24. The Outer Limits End Credits – Version #2 (0:56)
Disc Two Total Time 63:40

Disc Three
1. The Outer Limits – Main Title Version #3 (0:24)
2. The Slumbering Giant (1:21)
3. Malleable Flesh / Transformation (4:57)
4. Assassination / I Didn’t Know You Had A Gun / Election / Voting And Swearing In (5:12)
5. Washington D.C. / Bad Guys Meet In Oval Office / Unmasked! (3:10)
6. What Planet / Planet Chromo / 3 O’Clock / Chromoite Beams In / Attempted Escape (4:40)
7. Alien Pond Scum / Alien Overhears Plan / Kill Jong / Escape and Recaptured (4:01)
8. Chromoite Dinner / Transmat Attempt / Chromoite Breaks In / Act Out (2:13)
9. Jelly Morton / Chromoite Lurking / Chromoite Kills Guard / Battle With Chromoite /Big Finish (7:22)
10. Epilogue With A Jelly Doughnut (0:52)
11. It’s Here / Monster Appears (1:22)
12. Love Revealed / You Don’t Need Me / Major Arrives And Talks / I’m The Doctor /
Monster #2 / Getting The Gun (8:02)
13. Building Terror (1:23)
14. Phone Call / Look Into My Eyes / The Key /Escape / Struggle And Gunshot (5:17)
15. Love Theme Reprise (2:16)
16. Teaser (5:17)
17. Buzzing About (2:16)
18. The Big Finish (4:30)
19. Closing Narration Music (1:02)
20. Control Voice Sign Off (0:14)
21. The Outer Limits End Credits – Version #3 (0:48)
Disc Three Total Time 62:31