What’s up Sorry Staters? How’s the weather where you are? Unfortunately for us here in the south, just a few inches of snow, cold weather and ice can shut down the whole place. Unlike our friends in the north where it’s business as usual. As a result of the recent storm, we had to remain closed for a couple of days and stay home, but it gave us all a chance to catch up on some record listening, book reading, film watching and to get some rest. That’s at least how I spent my snow days, besides taking care of my poorly kitty cat. Oh, and I got to watch a couple of football games on TV live, which is always a bonus. Not that my team quite got the result we were looking for, but enough of that for the time being.
A big part of taking care of the cat involves sitting down on the couch with a blanket over my legs and her curled up on my lap, often trapping me there for long periods of time. Ideal for watching TV and reading, but a bit of problem when I want to listen to records and need to get up every twenty minutes or so to change the record. One of the advantages of vinyl, right? I have often had to throw on a CD or switch to streaming something from the internet. Again, not such a bad thing as I have loads of radio shows and podcasts to listen to. There simply isn’t enough time to listen to everything, watch everything and read everything in my queue. To that point, I was determined to have a good dip into a book that has been patiently waiting for me since I picked it up a while back. I have been enjoying reading it and would like to recommend it to you all for my pick this week in the newsletter. Be warned though, reading it will cause you to fall down many rabbit holes and could end up costing you a small fortune. The book is called Unusual Sounds—The Hidden History Of Library Music. It was written by David Hollander and published in 2018 by Anthology Editions.
At this stage, 2025, Library Music isn’t exactly a secret anymore. I’m sure many of you are aware of these records, but for a time they were hidden from general public consumption, only known by industry insiders and then later by progressive producers and DJs looking for new beats and samples yet to be mined. The 1990s saw a renewed interest in these records made twenty or thirty-plus years prior, as retro culture got into full swing. By the turn of the millennium, Library records were fetching good money on the collector’s scene as more and more people got turned on to them and realized how good they were. Producers looking for beats and samples other than from their parents’ James Brown records found a whole new frontier of discovery in Library music. DJs wanting to stand out and play stuff that others didn’t have would also be on the hunt for these elusive gems. There would be boutique stores opening that catered to just these types of customers. The Sound Library in New York is a good example. Although they, of course, stocked lots of cool records other than Library music, the emphasis was on servicing producers and DJs, hence the name of the store.
Fortunately, during this period of reappraisal in the late 90s and early 00s, there were a few labels reissuing some of this great music. Mostly as compilations, but occasionally whole albums. This was when I got hip to it. I gobbled up as many of them as I could find. As a DJ on a budget, I was already into collecting soundtracks as they were a great source for lesser heard tracks and unusual sounding stuff, so these compilations of cool sounding music were ideal for me. Over time, even these reissues have become valuable and collectable. I’m glad I got the ones I did and have kept hold of them. Not as cool as owning the originals, but still cooler than not having anything and not hearing the music.
So, what are Library Music records? They are records of stock music created expressly for the use in film, radio and television. Each one would have music to suit different moods and situations and were aimed at producers and productions that didn’t have the budget to hire their own composers and musicians and to pay for studio time. These recordings were ready for use off the shelf at a fraction of the cost and came pre-licensed. The heyday for these records was the mid-1960s through the 1970s. There were many different production houses, publishers and labels and several became very successful financially and produced extremely high-quality music that was above and beyond the mainstream and much more progressive. That’s why, decades later, the world is still catching up. Although North America had some Library music houses, they didn’t catch on as in Europe, due mostly to performance rights and objections from musicians’ unions. The big centers for Library music were France, Italy, Germany and the U.K., each bringing their own unique regional and cultural take on whatever musical style was being invoked.
As these records initially were not for public consumption, they mostly came in plain covered sleeves with perhaps a color scheme and/or company logo and title. On the back were the list of cues (usually with titles), their length and a brief description of style. If you were a producer looking for appropriate music for your production, you could easily listen and choose the right cues from the records, with the idea being that you then purchased those from the Library House, who would dub you a tape of your selections. The records themselves were purely a demonstration sample tool and were often returned to the library or discarded. However, as time went on, most music libraries began issuing these records with cover art of some sort. Usually something simple to obviously suggest the type of music within, but sometimes with imaginative and wonderful images that truly spark the imagination. Occasionally some of these records were made commercially available to the public, but even those are tough to find.
Obviously in the book the author gives a much better description than I am giving, and his introduction chapter is perfect. There’s a great foreword by George A. Romero, who writes about his use of library music for his classic genre defining film Night Of The Living Dead, and throughout there are incredible full color reproductions of some of the best library record cover art, along with photos of many of the key players, etc.
The author sets out the chapters with each concentrating on a particular country’s libraries. He chose British, German, French, Italian and North American libraries as being the main players, and each country chapter has a brief history of their respective labels/libraries along with some pictures of the records they produced. The artwork is so cool and often stunning on these records, and it’s great to see them reproduced in the book. There is a definite acknowledgment from the author that other countries had good music libraries too, many of the eastern European countries, for instance, and Brazil also. There’s a final chapter displaying film posters and advertising for TV shows which have famously used library music. Some are very well known and recognizable and others more obscure. Again, great color reproductions which are so fun to look at.
During his introduction chapter, the author talks about doing his best to visit many of the library houses that still exist or to contact whoever may still have ownership of now defunct ones. Many have been swallowed up by bigger companies and are owned in name only. He speaks of the still massive amounts of music that has barely seen the light of day since first being made years ago, and how a lot of it is getting saved and digitized, but that a lot isn’t and is either rotting away on magnetic tape or, in many cases, has already been dumped. He tells of arriving at a British library to discover that they had dumped master tapes just the week before. So now the only place that some of this music may exist is on those original vinyl records and, as was mentioned before, these were often thrown out too. It goes to explain how prices for many of these records are through the roof and in a league of their own when it comes to rare records and big number price tags. Again, I’m so glad to own the few I do, even if they are mostly reissues. It’s sad that music, just like film and television, hasn’t been preserved and, in some cases, has been lost forever.
Not that I have ever had the dough to buy expensive originals, but even if I did the opportunity rarely presents itself. You can trust me when I say that you hardly ever see these records. Maybe for a brief period back in the day if you knew what you were looking for and could dig in major cities around the world where they were likely to have been circulated, you might have found a few. Certainly, at record shows or stores that knew what they were doing, you wouldn’t get them cheap. However, there’s always stories of people finding them in the wild, which is cool. I recently saw that Noble Records here in North Carolina had scored complete runs of many major music libraries as part of an even larger collection they bought. So cool. I’m so happy for them and so jealous. I am not sure whether they have been put out for sale in their store yet though, and am almost afraid to know if they have. Not that I get that way often, but if you find yourself in the Charlotte area you should check out their store. They do a great job.
As I have been typing this, I’ve been spinning a cross section of my library records and trying to see whether I prefer any production house or country. The short answer is no, but I love the Italian stuff from the 1970s a lot. The UK houses like KPM, Music DeWolfe and Themes International are all ace too and supplied tons of groovy, cool music. I love a good cop show theme and there are so many cool ones throughout these libraries. I also love that lush space-age bachelor pad sound and easy listening kind of vibe and there is so much virgin timber of this ilk to be found on library records. If you like the vibe of Air’s Moon Safari or any Stereolab record, which I absolutely do, then you should start investigating these types of records. As I have been playing the few records I pulled from the shelf, there’s one thing I can say for sure: there are tons of cool sounding beats and head nodding potential samples to jam on.
One series of library and soundtrack reissues I like is called Easy Tempo. They pick from Italian library records and have released several volumes of great music. I like the Italian stuff because they are well produced and recorded and because they tackle all sorts of genres. You get cool jazz, funky cop show themes, weird electro and horror stuff, poppy easy listening and even takes on Brazilian samba and Afro-Latin sounds. At the store, John Scott often plays from a YouTube channel where a dude offers needle drops of a lot of the Easy Tempo titles, so they are available to check out. It’s cool knowing he digs them as much as I did when I first heard them years ago.
I could drone on for much longer and still not do this genre proper justice. I guess the basic point is if you have a love for film and television and always wanted to know what the music was that soundtracked the night club party scene or the trippy druggy scene or the zombie attack scene in one of your favorite cult films or shows, chances are it was music sourced from a music library. Even the famous intro music to The People’s Court is library music, shared with a 70s UK TV show called The Hanged Man and used in several other TV shows and sampled in music. That piece, called The Big One, was composed by Alan Tew and his is a name that turns up again and again on UK produced library music. Growing up, I loved the 70s UK cop show The Sweeney, and they used library music to soundtrack the action. Perhaps that’s where my interest began? One of my favorite records is a double set that came out a while ago, which collects a lot of the best cues used for the show. It’s great.
Before I sign off, a quick couple of additional library music recommendations. For more Italian grooves, check out one called Souno Libero on the Irma label. One of my faves. There’s a nice set of mostly French library recordings called Space Oddities which is great, especially volume two. That one’s put together well and concentrates more on psychedelic and progressive type stuff, but keeps it groovy at the same time. A label in Germany called Show Up did a nice series of compilations from the Themes International library, picking some of the best funky cop show type cues. That’s called Dramatic Funk Themes. I have three volumes and they’re all ace. British label BBE has a couple of volumes compiling music made for the De Wolfe library called Bite Hard and they are worth seeking out also.
Just the tip of the tip of the iceberg when it comes to library music. As I said previously, there has been so much music made. Some of it has been reissued, some of it remains on those original records still left barely heard by the greater listening public, and sadly some of it has been lost forever as the master tapes are gone, taking with them music that didn’t even make it to an actual record. But that’s the case in the regular music world too. There are countless examples of songs, tunes, takes, even whole albums that never saw release at the time for whatever reason and remained on old reels of tape for years, sometimes being discovered later and finally getting appreciation, but sometimes not. Regardless, because of the nature of its creation, covering all aspects of life, there will always be a piece of library music to suit your mood. If you enjoy instrumental music (mostly) and dig soundtracks particularly, then the world of library music awaits you. Enjoy your journey.
Before I go, a reminder that we got a ton of brilliant titles in last week. Even with snow days we (Jeff mostly) were busy behind the scenes opening boxes and getting stuff up on to our webstore and in the bins of the shop. I’m excited about the Dark Entries label new comps, especially the second volume of 80s Mexican synth-pop called Back Up Dos. I’m very excited about getting a vinyl pressing of Diamond Jubilee, the Cindy Lee album from last year. That’s one of my highlights from 2024 and it’s still growing on me, and it has been great to connect with the record in physical form. We got in a bunch of cool reissues of seminal and more obscure albums too, covering everything from country through jazz to punk. Look at the webstore or pop into the store in person, where of course you will find much more. Some titles, like the dub albums from Scientist, sold out immediately, and others may be close to selling out, but we’ll be restocking what we can as quickly as possible. The stock notification alert is your best friend if you are looking at a title that shows out of stock.
Okay, that’s enough for now. I’m out of here. Cheers everyone.
-Dom
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