Where the Pop disc failed in cohesion, the Incidental/Lounge disc succeeds. There’s a unified sensibility throughout this disc as it perks up and trances out. Quite frankly I’m not sure that a lot of this qualifies as incidental or lounge (some of the grand orchestral bits I wouldn’t say are either, some feel more like jazz than lounge), but in any case it’s fitting space-age bachelor pad music for your hi-fi.
As noted in “anew 34″, this disc of the compilation hits its height with Holst’s “Mars, Bringer of War”, but that’s not to say it’s the only high point. The jazzy instrumental version of Lunar Rhapsody (the vocal version featured on Disc 3) is included here, followed the plundering “Man From Mars” by Ferrante & Teicher which actually reminds me of a space-age version of the Sandbaggers theme.
It would seem the “incidental” aspect overpowers the “lounge” side of this collection, but there are some pretty interesting compositions here, what sound like extract from many a 50’s and 60’s sci-fi film soundtracks.
“Space Reflex” and “Moon Gas” by Dick Hyman (hehe) are probably the loungiest things get (though Sun Ra’s “Space is the Place” is pretty fly too) and the “Theremin Solo” by Dr. Samuel Hoffman is about as incidental as can be. Perrey-Kingsley’s “Cosmic Ballad” sounds like the starting point for the bouncy pop of the High Llamas and Stereolab in the 90’s. Billy Mure’s space-surf “Guitars In Space” doesn’t fare much different than the Tornados’ “Telstar” from the “Pop” side of things, so after the Movie & TV Themes Disk 1 & 2 (respectively), things get a little loose in the categorization department.
Things end off with a contribution from Leonard Nimoy, “Alien”, which is about as cheeky as you’d expect, followed by the coda “On Planet X” by David Garland and John Zorn which is like Aphex Twin by way of a David Lynch film.
It’s been