In 1967 I was 13 years old. The year brought the complete Sergio Leone "Dollar's Trilogy" to American screens. Not only did I love the movies, I thought that the music scores were fantastic, but at 13 I didn't pursue who wrote that music, since I was grounded in The British Rock Wave and the growing psychedelic movement. Years later my friends got into the New Wave band Wall of Voodoo and convinced me to go to one of their shows. I loved them and became a fan. Their late guitarist Marc Mooreland was not only inventive, but he loved that twangy western electric guitar sound. They played an instrumental set which included the theme from The Good, The Bad & The Ugly, Hang 'Em High and The Ecstacy of Gold, also from TGTB&TU score. One of those old friends brought a live vinyl EP of WOV called The Morricone Themes. It included the first two of the previous mentioned themes, but not Ecstacy. Later we learned that Hang 'Em High was written by Dominic Frontieri. We now learned That it was Ennio Morricone who wrote those great scores. Those Leone movie scores were available easily in the U.S., but that was about it. Then one of my friends recorded on his VHS machine Sergio Sollima's The Big Gundown from TV. He was convinced that Morricone wrote the music for that score too. So we rolled back to the credits, and low and behold, yes, it was Morricone. We both loved this western music and we said, "There has to be more!" Then began a pursuit for information on the music of Morricone. Remember this was before the internet, so it was not easy obtaining info. Several phone calls led me to the late Don Trunick, who was the undisputed biggest collector of Morricone's scores in the world, and not just his western scores. He was very friendly and invited my friend and I to his home, which was only 20 miles away. We were amazed at what we saw, and learned that Morricone wrote over 20 scores for westerns. From the early 1980's to the early 1990's we visited him frequently. We not only leaned about Morricone, but also of many other Italian composers that we writing for westerns. Fast forward: I now own the music for every Morricone western score, and others by similar composers.
With the now legendary status of the westerns by Morricone and others, many tribute and cover bands have put out homages to this music. Some are excellent, some so so. Many do strictly covers, while others base their original music on the music genre. I now am pursuing these type of artists for new music compilations based the Spaghetti sound. I will always love these scores. Sorry for the long story, but I know there are lots of Morricone fans at this web site who may be able to point me to some other artists. I will list some of the artists that I think are great in this field. But I appreciate any feedback from those out there who can possibly enlighten me to more! Gracias amigo's!
Federale (Portland Oregon. Writes their own music. IMO these guys are the best!)
Mondo Sangue (Italy. Writes their own music)
Red Dead Redemption (Score to video game)
The Hellbenders (U.S. Surf band who changed their name for this one tribute. Covers and originals)
Spindrift (American folk/country band who music has a big Spaghetti influence)
Boot Hill Heroes (Score to video game)
Secret Ponchos (Score to video game)
Outlaws (Score to video game)
Lindi Ortega-Liberty (American folk/country artist who started to listen to Morricone westerns that highly influenced this album)
For A Few Guitars More (Compilation of various surf bands doing the Spaghetti thing. Some good, some bad and ugly!)
Happy Trails...
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by philsunset
Bookmarks