Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Spiderman (1967-70) The Original Background Music!


Just like anybody else who has ever seen the late sixties Spiderman cartoon, I have always been a big big fan of that series' music. Over the years I discovered that there were a lot of people out there just like me who put tape recorders to their TV to capture the great music playing in the background. Well, I recently stumbled across the masters to the music from the 2nd and 3rd seasons. All the music came from the KPM Music library in England. I put together a podcast today that sets the original muddy sounds that played beneath the original Spiderman cartoon next to these recently discovered, crystal clear sounding masters. Learn all about the history of how an American comic book character was animated in New York, recorded by Canadian voice actors in Toronto and featured amazing music from a stock library in England in an essay I composed here.

Listen:
The Spiderman Background Music Podcast!





15 comments:

L'Atalante said...

For an absolutely blistering jazz blowout of the Spider-Man theme song, check out Charles Mingus rocking "Boogie Stop Shuffle" on the album "Mingus Ah Um," and then reflect that "Boogie Stop" PREDATES the theme and was actually swiped whole for the TV show!

Phillyradiogeek said...

I just heard a sample of the Mingus track on Amazon, and while his piece and the Spider-Man theme certainly share a similar bass line, I honestly don't believe Mingus's work was "swiped whole" for the theme.

Wallopin' websnappers!

M. said...

This is so great! Thanks for the research!

Unknown said...

I was looking for these tunes online for a while - finally found your podcast - Thanks.

Any chance on finding some of the first season big band tunes?

wayne said...

I've always loved Spiderman background music from season 2 and 3. A lot of this music was used in NFL Films in the late 60's and early 70's. Great stuff! this is why I love the internet.

Pale Saint said...

the Album is out there somewhere? But where? anyone know?

Thanks for posting this!

Bob Bourne said...

it is not out yet. coming in 2010 - an official release. i will make an announcement.

Steve P. said...

Hello. Came across your site while downloading Spiderman ringtones in Mp3. I really enjoyed the early Spiderman cartoons and thought that it was ahead of its time but the BGM from this cartoon series always intrigued me. It set the tone for Spidey's adventures and apparently they are quite memorable. I'd like to find the cartoon series on DVD. I feel pretty sure it's available somewhere.

Bob Bourne said...

Yes, the whole series is on DVD. Cheaper on Ebay, i think, than on Amazon. Easily accessible in Canada - less so in America.

Ian said...

Did the music ever get released?

Also a local Winnipeg band Volume, searched out one of the composers of theme, got the charts and did a small EP of Spiderman BG tunes. It's awesome. I can try and find it for you if you'd to hear it

DrKnife said...

Dude, I just started watching the Spiderman '67 collection on Netflix and I came out looking for exactly what you did. This is awesome.

Ron Lutz II said...

Has that official CD release happened?

wbhist said...

One of the KPM pieces heard on Spider-Man, "Power Drive" by Johnny Pearson, was famous in quite a few places - in Australia, as the theme of the cop series Division 4 which ran from 1969 to 1975; and in Los Angeles, on KNXT (now KCBS-TV) Channel 2, as the theme to two famous movie showcases, The Fabulous 52 (from the late 1960's up to its demise in 1974) and The Early Show (as seen well into the 1980's).

Semajin1 said...

Man! I sure would love to have copies of the original Spiderman's background music; grewup on, while a toddler! I love it; was an influence on me to playing the classical jazz tenor saxophone!

jowcol said...

I loved this capture of 11db11's. After several listens, I found the need to edit a 32 minute jazz suite out of the 68 minutes a audio. I also reduced the amount of dialog (you may notiee where I cut a couple bars or a chorus here or there>) I've also done some audio-restoration-- some multi-band compression and some EQ for a more natural sonic profile. (For my ears)

I cut a video to go with it, but the current owner is not letting clips go onto youtube without a fight, so I ended up having to use a kaleidoscope filter to make it unrecognizable.

Feel free to check it out if you are interested. No harm, no foul if you are not.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLK3b24a9NA