View CD Page at FSM Site (More Details)

Finally—complete your Apes collection! In 2000 we released Leonard Rosenman's masterpiece sci-fi score to Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), complete with the LP re-recording issued at the time of the film. (Jerry Goldsmith's scores to 1968's Planet of the Apes and 1971's Escape from the Planet of the Apes are available on CD from Varese Sarabande.) Now, get the scores to the fourth and fifth films by Tom Scott and Leonard Rosenman, respectively.

Conquest for the Planet of the Apes (1972) is the darkest film in the series, set in futuristic and fascist 1991 where humans have forced apes into slavery. Cornelius' son Caesar (also played by Roddy McDowall) rallies the apes into a fighting force that takes over the society in a violent allegory of the then-recent Watts riots. Jazz musician and film composer Tom Scott—then only 24 years old—updated the Apes sound into a harsh and slightly more contemporary feel, writing a memorably rhythmic main title and aggressive brass licks for the climactic ape riots. This CD features his complete Conquest score as heard in the picture plus numerous cues which were dropped from the film and have never before been heard—including his original seven-minute finale, eliminated when a revised ending was concocted in the editing room. The Conquest tracks on this CD are a combination of stereo and mono.

Leonard Rosenman returned to the series for Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973), reprising his atonal, challenging symphonic sound from the second film but writing new themes and motifs. The main title is a long, powerful and uptempo march for gorilla general Aldo's horseback ride into the camp where apes and humans have made a tentative peace. The score also includes numerous action cues, deranged acoustic and electronic effects for the mutant human enemies, and—a rarity for the Apes series—moments of genuine melody and warmth, including the optimistic end title. The complete score is presented here, in stereo.

As a final bonus, the CD includes Lalo Schifrin's main title to the short-lived Apes TV show from 1974—an aggressive 70-second piece (in mono) firmly in the atonal Apes mold but shot through with the composer's own style.