SOUNDTRACK
(2) ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SCORE (2008)
© Frankie Business (ASCAP) and Season Fim Corp. Hong Kong
This record was a pre-release to the then upcoming OST (1).
Some notes by composer Frank Harris:
"Finally
after 22 years of waiting, fans of the movie “No Retreat No Surrender” and
“Karate Tiger” can enjoy the original musical score by me via digital download
that will include four versions of the main theme song “Hold on to the Vision”.
For the movie score collector, I have included the complete music underscore in
the three bonus tracks! There is about 30 minutes of original music content on
those tracks. Unfortunately for reasons that are not entirely clear to me to
this day, the version of “No Retreat No Surrender” that was released in the USA
did not include my original score. This music however, does exist in the
versions found in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Asia etc.. Fans have been
asking for this music for many years and the difficulty of getting permission
from the original film company “Seasonal Films” out of Hong Kong, has been
challenging. Fortunately, we now have a co-venture to make this possible."
I want to express my great appreciation to Kevin Chalfant for singing his heart
out on the theme as the song would not be the same without his great vocal. A
little known fact about this magical theme song is that I hired in 1985 a yet to
be discovered guitar player named Joe Satriani (yes, the now internationally
known guitar God) who came over to the studio and laced the amazing guitar solo
that has become one of the signature elements of the tune, and exemplifies the
early sound of the legendary Satriani. Because I had only a short three weeks to
complete 93 cues including 4 vocal songs and the theme song, I didn’t have time
to get some of the music exactly how I wanted it, so I’ve taken this opportunity
to re-perform and re-mix the theme song as well as a few other selected tracks.
This wasn’t easy because when I dug out the old master 2-inch analog tapes, they
were shedding (meaning they were disintegrating) so badly, they didn’t play at
all. After much effort, I then restored these tapes and successfully transferred
the original tracks to the digital domain. For the theme song, I used the
original vocal track and the Satriani guitar track but replayed many of the
keyboard tracks and of course, remixed it. Also, at the time of composing the
score, the producers asked me to deliver all of the tracks in “mono”, which is
what is embedded in the movie now. But luckily at that time I mixed the theme
and other selected cuts in stereo and archived them so I’m including the
“original version” of the theme but in stereo. I’m also including a remix that
was done by my engineer and friend Ray Pyle in 1987, at the infamous Lion Share
recording studios which was home to many hit records including “We are the
World” etc. Also, I made a special instrumental/karaoke mix as well for those
who might enjoy singing along. The bonus tracks are selected tracks and cues
from the original mono score that I re-mastered and stereo-ized to the best of
my abilities.
This has been a very long and arduous journey in getting these songs to a place
where everyone can finally hear them the way in which they are supposed to be
heard. I hope you all enjoy the music. For more information about the music and
myself please visit www.frankharrismusic.com
Playlist
1 Hold On to the Vision Remix '08
2 Hold On to the Vision Orig '85
3 Hold On Lionshare Remix '87
4 Hold On to the Vision Karaoke
5 Training Sequence Remix '08
6 Training Sequence Orig '85
7 Opening Credits Remix '08
8 Opening Credits Orig '08
9 Ask Me to Stay Remix '08
10 Ask Me to Stay Orig '85
11 Bottle and a Song Remix '08
12 Disco Scene Orig '85
13 Bonus Tracks 1
14 Bonus Tracks 2
15 Bonus Tracks 3
Listen to samples here.