Conan the Barbarian: The Definitive Orgy Battle Music

Greetings! I'll start by thanking the hard working creators for this fantastic site - I'm ecstatic that I happened to stumble upon it!

I'm as big a Conan the Barbarian fan as they come - having grown up watching the first film on a recorded Beta tape every morning and being completely mesmerized and awestruck at how flippin' cool and bad-ass the film really was. It's certainly not a film for everyone but we who appreciate this film for all that it is are a special breed. In this day and age of CGI'd blood and video game effects littered in every film, "Conan the Barbarian" is truly a breath of fresh air and the showpiece of the fantasy/action genre.

Being an avid fan of the film I, like many of you, also appreciate the films brilliant soundtrack by the late, great, Basil Poledouris. Now when word spread out about the release of a 2 CD expanded score I was in tears! It was long overdue. I recently ordered this CD and gave it a good listen and while I think it's 98% incredible - it is missing the feel of the original recording. So I attempted through much trial and error to combine both the new recording and the original score by Basil Poledouris to create what I feel to be a pretty solid rendition of what is heard in the actual film.

Personally, I was always disappointed that The Kitchen/The Orgy was cut short of the battle sequence on the original soundtrack (also cut from the rerecording!) with the exception of the Anvil of Crom reprise. So I did my best to mimic the full sequence (from the pre-battle preperations to The Kitchen to The Orgy and to the Orgy Battle) as heard in the film.

Peace & Longevity! Enjoy.

Greetings and welcome. Good job, Beacham! I think that the 2 CD set is fantastic too, but it suffers from certain mistakes/ bad choices that I really don´t understand. One of them is the one you´ve already mentioned. Why the hell if this is supposed to be complete did n´t they include the part of the fight right after The Orgy and right before the reprise of Anvil of Crom?? And why did they leave out the drums before The Kitchen?? (that part shoud have opened the second CD. and fade into The Kitchen... like in your great editing here!)




Instead, Battle Preparations (track 4 on disc 2) starts with those drums?? In the movie as soon as Funeral Pyre ends the next piece of music heard is that which starts starts at 1:04 on track 4. I mean, what are those 64 seconds of drums doing here and not where they belong???


Also, I can understand why they put together the two tavern themes, but... why did they have to change the order in which they are heard in the movie??


Another thing that baffles me: James Fitzpatrick says in the booklet notes that because Basil had lost the original Latin texts some "oohs" and "aahss" had to be inserted

But... the lyrics for Riders of Doom can be found easily on the Internet! Ok, maybe they are not accurate but at least the words resemble what the choir voices are singing! Ohhs and aaahs? Why, WTF??

The rest is absolutely fantastic (leaving aside the fact that the backcover art sucks big time and that there´s not a single picture from the movie), but ... I´d really like to understand the above mentioned flaws

BTW, Do you know if Chamber of Mirrors in this edition is taken directly from the Conan the Destroyer soundtrack or was it also recorded again by the Prague Philharmonic? (I don´t have here the CTD soundtrack to compare both, only a expanded bootleg in which that track sounds great, but different)

Soyfriki, the 'chamber of mirrors' piece is interpreted in the new CD by the Prague philarmonic.
I really don't like this one, the first recording was far better. Just listen how flat some instruments sound. Compare with the version directed by Poledouris himself.
All this new material business is overhyped in my opinion, it's easy to spit on the first OST just because they weren't recorded in dolby super-duper-extra-mega-zega surround bull.
The first OST directed by Poledouris remain the best for me, dot.

Notice also how the rythm is all dead slow and just sounds wrong in the new chamber of mirrors.
The flute+harpsichord combo has become plain LIFELESS, what a shame, compared to the spiritful version recorded by Poledouris.
Nic Raine isn't Poledouris, that's for sure.

I would have agreed that the work orchestral work of Nic Raine and company was slower in tempo until a couple of years ago when they released the work for EL CID by Miklos Rosza. This also seemed to be slow compared to the old music and Nic was getting the blame.

However, the EL CID disc had copious notes and one related that Rosza provided metronone beat notation to ensure his tempo because the studio interfered so much with his original score, so it is quite likely the music produced by the studios was at fault and to fast.

It being human nature we tend to believe the version we hear first is correct. This might not be the case. Music can be altered to fit the film, whether for speed or content, or to fit an old vinyl LP - not such a problem now!

For me it is a bonus to have different interpretations. it breaths new enjoyment into much loved music.

Regards

Peter

I too was disappointed that the music for the orgy battle wasn't on the expanded Varese disc. So late last year I finally decided to make it myself using the first 2 tracks from the OST and Audacity. Turned out well too.