Soundtracks

''Can You Dig It?' is as definitive as it gets, and treats its subject seriously, lovingly and with an attention to detail that makes it a necessary purchase. An exemplary collection that is near perfect.' WIRE MAGAZINE

‘Can You Dig It?’ charts the rise of ‘Black Action Films’ from 1970-75. It comes as a double-CD collection of the stunning music from these films. The vinyl is on two monster loud separate double albums.
The Black Action Films
of the early 1970s gave the Hollywood industry its first African-American cinema – actors, directors, cameramen, editors and writers. These films discussed aspects of the African-American experience in the form of entertainment. Storylines interwove post-civil rights revolution with action stories, many involving pimps, prostitutes, drug dealers or private detectives.

The films also featured the finest funk and soul black music of the time as stars such as James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, Willie Hutch and Roy Ayers produced some of their finest work, with film budgets allowing for the addition of huge orchestral arrangements by jazz legends such as Quincy Jones, Johnny Pate and JJ Johnson. In the early 1970s, Black Action Films exploded into the cinema with three extremely successful films – ‘Shaft’, ‘Super Fly’ and ‘Sweet Sweetback’s Badasssss Song’. The most profound statement of these films was their actual existence – black actors and black directors entering the previously closed Hollywood film industry. Black Action Films were a representation of politically everything that had gone before and stylistically of everything that was current. Civil rights, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Black Power, Black Panthers, Vietnam sit alongside the criminal worlds of policemen, private investigators, bail bondsmen and the criminals, drug dealers, pimps and hustlers that they parole. ‘Can U Dig It?’ brings you everything you always wanted to know about black action films. This is an essential Soul Jazz Records release!

VOLUME ONE OF VINYL is TRACKS 1-16
VOLUME TWO OF VINYL is TRACKS 17-34

FEATURE REVIEW

The INDEPENDENT

The 36 track 2CD album comes with 50-page book featuring text, biographies and photography. It also comes in a limited run two volume double-vinyl super-loud super-heavy gatefold sleeve editions. Compiled by Stuart Baker (Soul Jazz Records) and sleevenotes biographies by Jonny Trunk (Trunk Records).

TV Sound and Image features British composers who worked in television, film and music libraries the second half of the 20th century. 

Aside from John Barry, whose work on the James Bond films made him a household name, or Tony Hatch and Laurie Johnson, the majority of composers featured here - Simon Park, Keith Mansfield, Reg Tilsley, Syd Dale, Keith Papworth – remain relatively unknown. And yet ironically they have created some of the most recognisable songs in British popular culture, their music widely disseminated on television.

A quick role call of these would include Neil Richardson (who composed the theme tune to Mastermind) and Barry Stoller (who wrote Match of the Day). The Simon Park Orchestra’s Eye Level, theme song to the BBC series Van der Valk, reached number one in 1973. CCS’s cover of Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love was the theme tune to Top of the Pops. And so on.

This album is not however a stroll through the TV memories of the mind, but an exploration of the serious contribution that these creative musicians have on the landscape of popular music in Britain.

Here then is a guide to the amazing music of many of the composers (both well-known and obscure) responsible for some of the most widely known music ever to come out of Britain in the second-half of the 20th century.

Reviews:

Quietus

Der Spiegel: "spannende Klänge ...  die oft funky und immer lässig klingen"

"thrilling sounds.... often funky and always chilled"

New Zealand Herald: ***** "Every track is a killer... This is more than just music to mooch too."

Irish Times: **** "downright funky"

Volkskrant: "Ze leverden spanning op maat, die onbekende makers van fenomenale Britse film en tv-muziek. Door de cd TV Sound and Image opnieuw in de aandacht"

Evening Standard: "deeply funky"

Uncut Magazine "excellent 36 track set ... welcome additions to your collection"

Q Magazine: ****

A Record Store Day 2020 Exclusive - Soul Jazz Records Presents...

STUDIO ONE 007

Licensed To Ska! James Bond and Other Film Soundtracks and TV Themes

Soul Jazz Records are releasing Studio One 007 – Licenced to Ska, a limited-edition one-off pressing exclusive Record Store Day collectors seven-inch box set, featuring ten super rare killer cuts on five 7" singles.

Featuring The Skatalites, Lee Perry, Jackie Mittoo, Bob Marley & The Wailers, Roland Alphonso and The Soul Brothers, rare and classic tracks from Jamaica's no.1 record label, Studio One.

James Bond and Jamaica have very strong links and the films have always been much loved there – it was home for Bond's creator Ian Fleming and provided the setting for Dr. No, Live and Let Die, The Man With The Golden Gun and the latest instalment, 'No Time To Die', which will be released in 2020, sees Bond return to the island once more.

Also includes killer tracks from the James Bond 1969 spoof 'Our Man Flint' and the Clint Eastwood-starring Spaghetti Western 'Hang 'Em High'!

All tracks have been digitally remastered and the singles come housed in a thick, heavyweight card box.

This box set is a one-off pressing exclusively for Record Store Day.

Strictly limited and deleted on the day!

These are gonna fly faster than Oddjob's hat!

Soul Jazz Records new release Inner City Beat! Detective Themes, Spy Music and Imaginary Thrillers  is a unique CD (and 2LP) release + an exclusive limited-edition specially created 60-page graphic novel (by the mysterious cult 1960s pulp-fiction writer Mark ‘Badly’ Antringham).

The music on the album is a killer selection of funky, deep, rare, exciting and dancefloor heavyweight ‘spy themes’, ‘detective music’ and thrillers from the 1960s and 1970s. The music spans heavyweight break-beat funk, deep and heavy jazz, super-catchy mod themes, imaginary super-charged orchestral soundtracks and more.

These tracks are put together from British library music companies (DeWolfe, KPM, Conroy, Amphonic) all of whom supplied music regularly to television and films around the world during this period, often for use in detective and spy programmes, series and films.

Created as work for hire in anticipation of television or film usage, many were never broadcast and have thus remained unheard, stored in the vaults for many years. Other tracks featured were used as incidental or title music in long-forgotten 1960s detective and cult programs.

And whilst the names of the artists and composers featured on this album have remained relatively obscure (Syd Dale, Reg Tilsley, Johnny Pearson, Barry Stoller etc), the music they created is in fact some of the most well known and highly accessible music in the world - due to its widespread usage on these detective and thriller (and many other genre) television shows and films during this period.

In the 1960s and 1970s, these British music libraries used to promote these recordings to television and film productions on limited-run vinyl pressings (usually housed in generic sleeves). Mostly pressed in runs of less than 1000 copies, the best and rarest of these original records are today highly sought after items and included here is a fine selection of some of these rare, collectible and very groovy tracks.

To accompany this unique album, Soul Jazz have also commissioned the creation of a special 60-page graphic novel which features the stunning artwork of the elusive illustrator John C. Patterson in partnership with the celebrated 1960s pulp fiction cult novelist Mark ‘Badly’ Antringham. The graphic novel is set in the imaginary seedy streets of East London in the 1960s in a world full of corrupt police, political intrigue and violent sadistic criminals.

As well as the CD release this album also comes as a heavyweight deluxe gatefold super-loud double vinyl release (with free download code). The graphic novel comes free with the physical release (CD and double vinyl LP) of the album Inner City Beat.

There is also a worldwide digital download release for this Soul Jazz Records release.

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