Soundtrack Of The Week: HIGH ANXIETY +

Inspired by comedy legend Mel Brooks’ 95th Birthday last week, I dug out the soundtrack to his 1977 Alfred Hitchcock parody, HIGH ANXIETY. I’ve had this record for around 40 years as I collected many soundtracks, and comedy albums as a kid. This album serves as both a soundtrack, and a comedy record, though the first side is closer to a conventional score.

Although the album is billed as the Original Soundtrack of HIGH ANXIETY, only Side A features music from the film. Side B is a Greatest Hits collection of tunes from Brooks’ previous films, which were written by either composer, John Morris, or Brooks or both.

The movie, HIGH ANXIETY, involves Brooks as the newly appointed Director of the Psychoneurotic Institute for the Very Very Nervous, who finds very strange occurrences seemingly everywhere he looks at the hospital. Brooks incorporates elements from such Hitchcock classics as NORTH BY NORTHWEST, NOTORIOUS, PSYCHO, THE BYRDS, REBECCA, DIAL M FOR MURDER, but mostly VERTIGO, as you can see from the album cover at the top of this post.

Now, HIGH ANXIETY didn’t reach the comic heights of Brooks’ earlier films such as THE PRODUCERS, BLAZING SADDLES, YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, but it does have a bunch of solid gags, and a great cast including Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Harvey Korman, and the mighty Dick Van Patten. Also, it should be noted that Hitchcock himself loved the film, and sent Brooks a case of wine with a note: “Splendid! I wish I had done it.”

The soundtrack starts with the Main Title, which, like a lot of movies’ main titles is an overture of the various bits of the score throughout the film. Morris does a great job of providing a homage to Hichcock’s long-time composer, Bernard Herrmann’s styles. It’s funny how the orchestral music decorating the airport-set opening is similar to Elmer Bernstein’s score for AIRPLANE!, which would follow three years later. I’m not saying anyone is ripping anyone off, it just seems that this is the way airports should sound in these satires. “What a dramatic airport!” Brooks remarks at one point.

The highlight of Side 1 has got to be Brooks’ Sinatra-style crooning to impress love interest Madeline Kahn with the title song “High Anxiety.” It’s a psychiatric condition (fear of heights) that his character suffers from so it’s amusingly convenient that he has this song handy. Brooks performance of the song is very charming most likely because he wrote it himself. His character didn’t write it – in the world of the film it appears to be a standard. Watch it below:

The rest of the score regurgitates the same melodies from the Main Title, and a reprise of Brook’s “High Anxiety” caps it off, but another track really stands out. It’s a parody of ‘70s glam rock called “If You Love Me Baby, Tell Me Loud.” It appears when Dick Van Patten’s character is locked in his car, and he’s tortured by the obnoxious song which keeps getting louder until it kills him. Surprisingly, the tune was also written by Brooks, and he and Morris are credited with performing it. If you didn’t know that Brooks can write and play rock ‘n roll, you sure know it now.

So after the five short tracks (the longest one is just over three minutes) that make up the HIGH ANXIETY side fade, it’s time to get to the real heart of the matter. In chronological order, we get two tracks from THE PRODUCERS, two tracks from THE TWELVE CHAIRS, three from BLAZING SADDLES, and two each from YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, and SILENT MOVIE.

This “hits” collection is a very funny and entertaining listen. It begins with the Busby Berkeley-style musical number “Springtime For Hitler” from THE PRODUCERS which kicks off the record with a ridiculous flourish. Such a perfect example of something that nobody could get away with these days. Other highlights include trio of songs from BLAZING SADDLES, especially the theme sung by Frankie Laine, and Madeline Kahn’s hilarious Marlene Dietrich-impression on the world weary ballad, “I’m Tired.”

Another favorite is “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” which features Gene Wilder and Peter Boyle. The event surrounding the song is the unveiling of Frankenstein’s Monster, and I’ve never been able to hear the song the same way since. As it’s written by Irving Berlin, this is the only track in this set that wasn’t written by Brooks or Morris.

Sure, some of this material is dated, but HIGH ANXIETY: Original Soundtrack paired with Mel Brooks’ Greatest Hits Featuring The Fabulous Film Scores Of John Morris is a fun album that every comedy nerd should have in their collection.

I’m not sure that I’ll seek out Brooks’ later stuff on record like TO BE OR NOT TO BE or HISTORY OF THE WORLD PART I (there was actually a single of “It’s Good To Be The King” released from the film). Not sure I’d listen to that stuff much. The soundtrack to Brooks’ 1987 STAR WARS spoof SPACEBALLS is mostly other artists like The Spinners, Van Halen, and The Pointer Sisters, so that’s a pass for me.

So that’s the first entry in my new soundtrack series. I’ll be babbling about other soundtracks in the weeks to come so please check back later.

More later...