5.23.2009

Dark Shadows




The Robert Cobert Orchestra Dark Shadows OST LP (Philips, 1969)

I dropped my stack of the morning's haul next to my girlfriend's ottoman and sat on the couch. She starts flipping through the records, stops and exclaims "DARK SHADOWS! I used to watch that when I was a kid and it scared the Hell out of me." What was it? "A soap opera about vampires and monsters. It was pretty cool. I had a crush on Barnabas." Hmmm...I should know about this but for some reason I didn't.

Perhaps you don't either. Dark Shadows was exactly what my girlfriend said, a soap opera about vampires, monsters, and the spirit world. It aired on American TV from 1966 to 1971 and was pretty popular. Today, it has a pretty significant cult following. Important to this blog is that it also had a great soundtrack, one which in the day was considered groundbreaking.

Robert Cobert's music for the series is pretty startling once you consider that it was for a TV show. Rather than dumb down the sounds, Cobert seemed to approach Dark Shadows as if it was a film. While some of this would sound right for a late Sixties horror film - from Theramin to obligatory rock & roll instrumental - it is better than most TV soundtracks I've heard. The record was a best seller, so finding a copy should be pretty easy and cheap. I got mine for $3. If I held out for one in better condition, I would have been set back a fiver.


Comments:
That's a great album. The spoken word segments are so cheesy as to invoke milky tears. Nice post.
 
Sinister?

=/B^)

Good stuff...I may need to netflix the series to hear these in context.
 
You were right, I found one for a fiver -- and it came with a poster!
 
Love this. I was a fan as well.
One reason it was hard to fine is that the song Quentin's Theme was actually a hit song.
They did play it on the radio at the time.

Any way you could post that??
 
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