Captain Scarlet

'This is the voice of the Mysterons. We know you can hear us Earthlings and we know we can kill you, take your form and have technology far in advanced of yours, yet we still haven't managed to take over the world. Bwah ha ha! No, wait, sht.' There is something strangely fascinating about a TV show based on a premise with a glaring flaw in it and Captain Scarlet is one such show. However, if you forget about the premise hole, it's a great kids entertainment and while it never reached the popularity of Thunderbirds (in fairness, nothing did), it was and remains a popular entry in the Gerry Anderson Supermarionation legacy. It's a surprisingly gruesome premise - the Mysterons commit at least one murder per episode - but as it's puppets and all carefully staged, it doesn't seem so bad and of course, Captain Scarlet and Spectrum (spectrum, as in colour, gettit?) always win in the end.

Thunderbirds had it's march, but Captain Scarlet has his timpani rhythm, which is used throughout the show to join scenes together, flicking between shots with each strike, ending up on the new scene. Genius. The main theme is one of those vocal tunes with no real words, aside from a small group intoning 'Captain Scarlet' from time to time, but the instrumental versions used in the underscore turn it into a good action motif. One clever twist is to use an eerie, theremin style version as the four note motif for the Mysterons. Much of the music is surprisingly creepy and while it doesn't really tend to be building toward anything, is pleasingly unnerving. Spectrum and Cloudbase get their own fanfare and Anderson's bit towards women's lib comes in the form of Melody, Symphony and Harmony Angel, who in Charlie's Angels (hmmm) style, do a little shooting in their petit fighter aircraft, but always retaining perfect hair. Gray gives them a suitably heavenly fanfare, surrounded by fluttering harps.

The selections here run the gamut, have doses of all the main themes, a few slices of action, plenty of Mysteron creeping around and a good dollop of lounge music, the latter being so cheesy that one wonders if it's part of the joke. The album closes with a few bonus tracks, which include regular opening sequence and a great stereo version of the end credits theme. As with the series, the music for Captain Scarlet is a lot less fun than Thunderbirds and even promisingly exciting sounding tracks - Desert Symphony or Attack on Cloudbase - are surprisingly underwhelming and fine though Gray's suspense is, it can't always maintain interest through the extensive running time. The sound is generally fine, even if it lacks the clarity and sparkle of the Thunderbirds tapes. Fans of the series shouldn't hesitate as this is not only a fine souvenir of Gray's music, but of the series, with very detailed notes on both music and show.