Various Artists - Sound Gallery (24 tracks) +Album Reviews

Agreed: the best collection of its type

Mig P. | Sunnycupertoga, CA USA | 10/29/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I seek out music like this, and although I am by no means an expert-- nor do I have an exhaustive collection-- this is still the best one BY FAR. I've got some of the Easy Tempo collection; Cinematic Soul Punch; a few Italian ones; a few other British ones (e.g. Sound Gallery v2 and Sound Spectrum); a couple German ones; the "TV Dinners" album; Shake Sauvage and Beretta 70; and some more that I'm forgetting. AND THIS ONE STILL SETS THE CURVE. So check those out, but again, do not miss this one. Unlike other albums which have some hits and some misses, each song on this one is a prize waiting to be discovered. You will not be disappointed."

The best lounge/instrumental collection on the market!

Mig P. | 09/22/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This CD contains the (in my humble opinion) best instrumental ever written: The Riviera Affair/Neil Richardson. Picture David Janssen and Diana Rigg cruising in a turquoise convertible along the open highway with the wind in their hair and the glorious possibilities of the future before them. This will give you just a small idea of how glorious and transcendent this tune is!! For this alone, I would have paid for the CD. But wait... there's more! The quality of the stereo is amazingly good--in fact, wonderful. Other great instrumentals are: Oh Calcutta (corny but suave -- touches of Brian Wilson instrumentals at his best); Black Rite (cool Bond-like theme style with electric guitar and horns; Jaguar (wow--this will sweep you away!! big bass beat, organ, strings); Life of Leisure (melody a bit like "Walk on By" -- amazingly beautiful mellow horn and strings--you'll float away); The Penthouse Suite (this one does it all--really rips--get out the go-go boots and start snapping your fingers!!); Music to Drive By (theme-type tune with happy strings, xylophone, flute--transcends typical themes). The others tunes are okay to excellent--depends on your taste. Some are TV themes or game show types. Some are groovy pseudo-psychedlic (Jesus Christ Superstar). Some are funky, jazzy (Carol King's "I Feel the Earth Move"), commercial (Shout About Pepsi). Yes, there's a lot here -- something for every taste! If you own only one instrumental/lounge CD, make this the one!! (BTW, Volume Two of this series is also very good and worth owning, but not quite as sublime as this first volume.)"

Easy YES, background NO!

Stavros Zanos | Thessaloniki, Greece | 08/11/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Much props to the three compilers (Martin Green, Patrick Whitaker & Tristram Penna) for digging into the crates of Sound 2 Stereo music library, and unearthing these late 60s/early 70s orchestral gems! This album will fuel your apetite for British library music, which is somewhat under-researched in comparison to its French and Italian counterparts. You will find tracks by the likes of Alan Hawkshaw, Keith Mansfield, Alan Parker, Syd Dale, Mandingo, all excellent studio musicians that surpassed genres in their quest for catchy, quality music.Look also for these similar titles (British library tunes): Sound Gallery Vol 2, Sound Spectrum, Setting the Scene, Sound Book, Bite Hard, Morphine Mambo Jazz Club, Music for Dancefloors (KPM), Music for Dancefloors (Chapell) etc."

Orchestral Funk at its Swankiest ! ! !

Eddie Landsberg | Tokyo, Japan | 08/27/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The Liner Notes explain the album but don't really do it justice...They say, "This album is the first in a planned series that will explore the world of some of the most exciting *mood* music ever recorded." (*my emphasis.) - - Mood music... it that British slang for Groove and Funk ??? True, at the time this was marketed as ultra high fidelty quadraphonic lounge music... State of the art recordings to really test out that groovy bachelor pad stereo system on.... but in the end, what does it come down to... Orchestral Funk. 101 Strings was mood music... This is GROOVY baby !

The tracks, recorded between 1968 and 1976 mostly at Abbey Road Studio 2 featuring most of the best session men of the era features material similar to what you'd expect to find on the ULTRA LOUNGE SERIES, but with a heck of a lot more swank and groove... Yes, the strings and lush orchestra are there, but so too are mad *rse percussion, Shaft like guitars and other Jazzy, Disco, funk groove (and yes, there's some swanky Hammonds, brass and lot of ultra pumping Sergio Mendez meets Van McCoy meets spy movie type funk.)

As for the groups (or should I say "orchestras") present are The Dave Pell Singers, Mandingo, Alan Parker, Alan Hawkshaw, Neil Richardson, John Gregory, John Cameron, Keith Mansfield, Alan Morehouse and his Bond Street Brigade, Denny Wright and the Hustlers, Paddy Kingsland, Syd Dale, Brian Bennett, Allan Tew and the Joe Loss Concertium. - - Do I know half these guys ? Admittedly no... but that's what makes this CD so great... all the great discoveries...

I don't know if the folks at EMI and the DJs who picked out the tunes on this album have gotten around to Volume 2 yet, but I darn sure hope they have... or will...

Plenty of delights... musical kiche as well as some really interesting arrangemental hooks. -- Will music like this ever be made again ??? Probably not... and its a darn darn darn shame ! and listening to this wonderful music will make you want to close your eyes and dream that you're banging Claudine Longet or Cynthia Myers circa 1969 (not now, they've probably gotten quite old by now.) I guess that's what the liner notes meant by Mood Music !"

Landmark compilation of British E-Z listening

hyperbolium | Earth, USA | 04/21/1999

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The first volume of The Sound Gallery represents the headwaters of the British easy-listening scene. The curators have produced a smashing compilation of mood music from EMI's Studio Two label, rounded out with a few additions from the United Artists label and the KPM Recorded Music Library. Volume 2 of the Sound Gallery, produced 18 months after the first, features 27 more tracks from the EMI vaults. In between their two Sound Gallery outings, the producers took on the archives of Britain's Pye Records, turning up even more late-60s and early-70s gems.Both Sound Gallery volumes highlight music recorded in the best London studios and performed by the cream of England's session musicians. The sounds of the 70s (seductive saxes, funky wah-wah guitars, spunky violins) are often matched against drum-and-fife marching tempos to produce music that could put a spring in the step of anyone chasing a hood in a Quinn-Martin production. Had these tracks been produced for use in America, we might have found one accompanying a particularly melancholy episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show (Keith Mansfield's "Life of Leisure"), serving as the running theme in a made-for-TV movie starring Karen Valentine (Alan Hawkshaw's "Girl in a Sportscar"), as the soundtrack from a Starsky and Hutch episode in which Dave and Ken smoke out a pot dealer (Alan Morehouse's "Funky Fever"), as a variation on the themes for The People's Court and McCloud (Alan Tew's "The Detectives"), or simply as the soundtrack to one of your very worst nightmares (Lord Sitar's reworking of The Who's "I Can See For Miles").Though not as substantial as the first Sound Gallery volume, The Sound Spectrum does feature a few interesting British TV themes ("Get Carter" "Catweazle"), some swinging jet-set jazz (Chico Rey & the Jet Band's "Stiletto", John Schroeder's "Headband"), and a few kitschy instrumentals (The Lovin' Spoonful's "Speakin' of Spoken", Cecil Holmes Soulful Sound's funky take on Strauss's "Also Sprach Zarathustra").Both volumes of the Sound Gallery have been issued domestically on the Scamp label, the Sound Spectrum is available domestically on Sequel. Of the three, the first volume of the Sound Gallery is the pick of the litter."

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