The Howling Soundtrack CD
The Howling
1980, Avco Embassy.
Pino Donaggio.
Lalaland, CD, 2005, LALA1037-2
Rating: 
Joe Dante (Piranha/Gremlins) made a small but not insignificant splash with this cult werewolf movie that is largely memorable for its black humour and Rob Bottin’s groundbreaking special effects. The story of a television news reporter (Dee Wallace) whose near death experience at the hands of a serial killer lead her to seek help at a remote colony populated by werewolves, is a tongue-in-cheek take on the monster movie, something tried successfully in Dante’s Jaws-alike, ‘Piranha‘. Pino Donaggio’s score is suitably melodramatic (something he does extremely well) with plenty of strings and Herrmann-esque shocks: ‘Wolf At The Door’ and ‘Run For Your Life!‘ are great examples of this; ‘The Howling’, which appears near the beginning of the film when Karen White (Wallace) comes face to face with the werewolf serial killer is also creepy and mesmerising. The drawback here is that the cues are extremely short, the briefest running to only 17 seconds, which is a bit jarring. While the longer cues, including the acoustic ‘End Titles’ go some way to resolving this, there is a disconnection here that makes the listening experience rather stop start and your engagement with it goes the same way. Curious.
The Howling Movie Soundtrack. Review: Tim Mowbray.
Track Listing:
1. Opening Titles/Phone Call/Dark Streets.
2. Sleaze/Karen’s Nightmare.
3. Eddie’s Room.
4. Doctor’s Orders.
5. The Howling.
6. Spectre/Escape from The Morgue.
7. Something Nasty In The Woods.
8. Hunting For Shadows.
9. Wolf Bites Man!
10. Terry and Karen/Delirium.
11. Animal Magnetism.
12. Wolf At The Door.
13. Run For Your Life!
14. The Big Bad Wolf.
15. Wolfing Down Terry.
16. Eddie Loves Again.
17. Transformation.
18. Welcome To The Colony.
19. Fur From The Madding Crowd.
20. Shapeshifters.
21. To Make You Believe.
22. End Title.
Bonus Tracks:
23. Flashback To Eddie.
24. “I’m Going To Light Your Whole Body Up!”
25. Karen Screams/Eddie Shot.
26. Remembering Eddie.
27. The Cabin.
28. Karen Transforms.
29. Channel 6 Update News Theme.
Electronic Stingers:
30. Synth #1.
31. Synth #2.
32. Synth #3.
33. Synth #4.
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