For those who admit (to themselves, if not others) to admiring the song "Moonlight Shadow" - here is a similar but perhaps slightly better song which is much less well-known. This one has a male vocalist and, like "Moonlight Shadow", features a good guitar solo from Oldfield. Not an album track, nor one which appears on most of Oldfield compilations.

Yet another track modelled on "Moonlight Shadow" appears on Oldfield's album "Tubular Bells 3" of 1999. This one is called "Man in the Rain" and again sounds very, very similar, as though time had stood still for 16 years. Never let it be said that Oldfield is short of ideas!

Most of the soundtrack to this comedy-caper flick is pretty standard '60s soundtrack material. This track, however, is moody, top-notch crime jazz... The arrangement is chaotic but stirring with some really heavy bass-piano, wailing brass, and organ (used more as an atmospheric sound effect than to deliver any melody). Special thanks to Darrell Brogdon for playing this on his Retro Cocktail Hour.

This is one of these sensationally sensual, wonderful instrumental tracks only the italians could pull off in late sixties/early seventies. This is the title theme to "La morte cammina con i tacchi alti/Death walks on High Heels", one of the numerous gialli (thriller movies with that special italian touch) to come out of italy in heavy doses from the late sixties up to the mid seventies. Wonderful scores have been one of the constitutive elements of these films and while the scores that Ennio Morricone did for these movies (e.g. "L'ucello dalle piume di cristallo/Bird with the crystal plumage, "Cosa avete fatto a Solange/What have they done to Solange", Una lucertola con la pelle di donna/Lizard on a womans skin" or "Le foto proibite di una signora per bene/ Forbidden fotos of a lady above suspicion") have been long released, a lot of excellent music is still locked up in the vaults of CAM, Cinevox and other italian soundtrack labels. Thanks to the hard work of the guys at DigitMovies a lot of these scores now successively get a proper, remastered release (often for the first time ever), music otherwise would have been lost in oblivion forever. Stelvio Cipriani may not be remotely as well known as Morricone (who, naturally, overshines just every other italian composer), but he was very prolific in the heyday of italian cinema, scoring an equally wide range of different genres from westerns to gialli and from romantic movies to italain police (so called "poliziotteschi") and crime movies. This title track of "La morte cammina con i tacchi alti" doesn't have to hide behind the best of themes Morricone did, in fact the orchestration does sound very Morricone itself with an uptempo-ish bossa nova beat, lush strings, wonderful harpsicord and a female voice carrying the main melody with a bitterweet tone. The voice is delivered by Nora Orlandi, one of the very few female soundtrack composers and she could easily be mixed up with Edda Dell'Orso here. Wonderful stuff, recommended for anyone who enjoys the "Mondo Morricone" comps.

In my experience John Gregory is one of the most consistently superb British arrangers of the 60s and 70s. I've never really heard anything I didn't like by him, although I understand that he was very prolific and that I've barely scratched the surface so far.

His arrangements have simultaneously a bite and a beauty that few others were able to match. Although not much of his work is available on CD, there's one excellent disc, 'Mission Impossible and other themes', that compiles most of his 'big band crime jazz' work, dating from the early 1960s to the mid 1970s. The disc isn't very excitingly packaged and can be had very cheaply, but it's full of outstanding tracks.

'Fire and Rain' is from a 70s album (I have it on a Philips sampler from the early 70s), and is a sumptuously arranged instrumental in the vein of some of the work of other British arrangers of the era, such as Johnny Harris and John Schroeder.

Of course, the song was written and originally recorded by James Taylor. His track is quite nice, but maybe it helped that I came to this version 'fresh', without having heard the original. This happens to me a lot, and Gregory's full arrangement and jazzy touches definitely elevate the track for me.

The melody is carried by a beautifully played trumpet, and later by the strings. There's a strong beat throughout, and a particularly groovy break towards the end with some great brass.

The Crimea are the current guise of 90's Welsh indie band The Crocketts, who were pretty rubbish and best forgotten. However, this song, which I think was their first single as the Crimea, is fantastic. It has a great summery feel thanks to some steel drums, goood weird lyrics, and thanks to Davey Crocketts always ammusing fake American singing voice sounds like its come straight from 60s California. This is the only song I've heard by the band since they became the Crimea so not sure whether it's a one-off or they really have improved since the days of the Crocketts (Aberystwyths most famous band!).

I love John Barry's work, he always seam to be able to score anything with excellent results. This song is no exception, taken from the movie 'Seance on a Wet Afternoon' from 1964. Haven't seen the movie my self so I can't really say what the premise of it is, but IMDB says it's a crime-drama about a self-styled psychic in London. Groovy eh?

This song is however great, Barry relies heavily on haunting flutes and trombones to create a some what eeire feeling, and it really works. Just listening to this song makes me think of a rainy gloomy dark afternoon in London. Now if I only could get a hold of a copy of the movie...

Another "detective themed" song that sounds like the backside of the theme from 'The Streets of San Fransisco'. Heavy basses, powerful percussion, trumpets and a cool melody to top it off. Run before they catch you!

Of the thriller/cop/detective/crime soundtracks, this is maybe my tops. Slow, plodding, and sparse, with beautiful and short dalliances of sound.

Amazing song from the 1960's blending powerful luscious strings with a fast paced catchy melody. One might think that you have landed in the middle of a international crime affair in the French Riviera. Would work amazingly good as a theme-song for a TV-series (maybe it has been used that way already?)

Here's another early Burt Bacharach composition, this one from (or just a promotional piece for?) the William Wyler film "The Desperate Hours." I haven't seen the movie, but this song makes me want to. This song is steeped in a heavy film noir atmosphere -- with vibes and wailing sax -- that I love. Needless to say, this has a very different sound from the stuff Bacharach would become famous for a few years down the road.

A very neatly-executed bluesy number of considerable sophistication. I prefer it to anything on "Crime of the Century" and to many of their more famous songs. Please note that the heavily-tattooed breasts that adorn the front cover of the album have never held any great personal appeal for me. Your mileage may differ.

A colorful "crime jazz" soundtrack piece that is considerably different from the "Schoolgirl Report" scores for which Wilden is better known. Wilden makes great use of the Harpsichord here pitting against electric guitar.

Lulu has inflicted on the world many crimes against music, politics and fashion but gets into the pearly gates of musical heaven on the basis of this track. One of her early Decca sides, it's raw and heartfelt, and (despite her tender age at the time) a mature, original view of love.