What is the difference between the Buckaroo Banzai film
score and the bootleg soundtrack?
By Dan Berger and Sean Murphy
This article originally appeared in the March, 2019 issue of the World Watch One newsletter.
The matter of an official soundtrack to The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension has been an ongoing concern for the World Watch One newsletter for several years now. Articles on the topic appeared in our September 2018 and October 2016, issues, but fan interest in Michael Boddicker’s soundtrack stretches all the way back to 1984. So does fan disappointment in the continued lack of an official release.
For thirty-five years the best that fans could expect from a soundtrack were cover versions of the themes performed by Neil Norman and his Cosmic Orchestra and a bootleg soundtrack containing at least some music and related tracks from the film score. While we still don’t have an official release, we were recently given a unique opportunity to validate the music found on the bootleg against the film’s original score.
In February 2019 a Blue Blaze Irregular provided World Watch One with MP3 files containing the isolated film score to The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai taken from a Hi-Fi VHS copy of the film. This is an amazing discovery! The Hi-Fi VHS tape had the music on the left channel and the dialogue and sound effects split onto the right channel. This means that the audio tracks contain all of the music from the film without any dialog or sound effects on top of them, making these files a unique listening experience. For the purposes of this article, we’ll refer to the Hi-Fi VHS version as the isolated film score.
In order to validate the isolated film score as authentic, we listened to the MP3 files and compared them to the Blu-ray of the film. The two sources are, in fact, the same. We then listened to the Buckaroo Banzai Limited Edition Gold CD Bootleg Soundtrack to compare it to the isolated film score and discovered that a lot of the music on the bootleg is not actually from the film, as we’ll discuss later.
The Isolated Film Score
The isolated film score consists of thirty-six tracks worth of themes, incidental music (such as the concert music from Artie’s Artery), and music cues, presented in the same order as the music is found in the film, with a total running time of forty-five minutes.
We adopted some of the track titles from the bootleg and applied them wherever they converged with the isolated film score, in order to map out the similarities between the two sources. In all other cases we created names for the cues based on what was happening on screen when the music began in the film. The bolded tracks below appear in both sources.
1. Opening Theme 1:02*Tracks 35 and 36 above should really be combined into one track, which is the complete Banzai March and end credits music from the film. They appear as a single track on the bootleg soundtrack as Track 19 - End Credits (Long Version).
2. Flames: Stand Back 1:01
3. Buckaroo Arrives 0:47
4. Buckaroo Inspects The Jet Car 0:21
5. Goo On The Windscreen 0:09
6. Looking Under The Jet Car 0:15
7. Buckaroo Finds A Hitchhiker 0:17
8. Banzai Jam (Buckaroo Banzai
And The Hong Kong Cavaliers) 1:34
9. Since I Don’t Have You 1:15
10. Country Western Music 1:11
11. Penny In The Jail Cell 0:58
12. Red Lectroids From Planet 10 2:02
13. Thermopod from a tree 1:31
14. Escape from the hunters 0:37
15. Buckaroo Finds The Thermopod 0:45
16. Scooter Gets The Message 0:28
17. Scooter Tells His Dad 1:31
18. Buckaroo Escapes 1:23
19. New Jersey Plays Piano 0:17
20. War Of The Worlds/Lectroids Arrive 1:16
21. After John Emdall’s Message 0:39
22. Penny Learns About Peggy 0:57
23. Searching For Hikita 3:04
24. The President Reacts/
Buckaroo’s Speech On The Bus 1:23
25. Buckaroo Drives Into Yoyodyne 3:30
26. Baby Mobile For Lectroids 2:00
27. Nobody Cumz In Here 0:39
28. Secretary Finds The Overthruster 2:48
29. Ship Crashes Through Wall 1:14
30. Thermopod Flies Like A Truck 1:52
31. Buckaroo Parachutes 1:07
32. Team Banzai Theme 0:54
33. Penny Is Dead? 0:44
34. Penny Is Alive 1:14
35. End Credits - Long Version 3:05*
36. End Credits - Long Version part 2 1:06*
Some of the music cues found on the isolated film score are split over several scenes in the actual film but are combined into single tracks for a more concise listening experience. Some of the tracks are very short, just fifteen, seventeen, or twenty-one seconds long. These shorter cues are tension/mood setting/creepy background music. Examples includes the cues when Buckaroo is inspecting the jet car after going through the mountain (Buckaroo Inspects The Jet Car), or sudden musical ‘hits’ to accent something happening on screen, such as when Buckaroo discovers the creature beneath the jet car (i.e. Buckaroo Finds A Hitchhiker).
Hearing the film’s music without the dialogue or sound effects is initially a very strange experience. We hadn’t realized how much we expected to hear Artie announce the band, or Perfect Tommy saying “Let’s Rock and Roll!” as part of the musical experience until it was gone. Without these distractions we were really able to focus on the music itself, not everything else going on in the film.
We quickly discovered how often the Banzai theme music is repeated throughout the film. This included the epic sounding version of the Banzai theme when Buckaroo first appears to get in the jet car (Buckaroo Arrives); the excited driving beat when Buckaroo is saved by the helicopter (Buckaroo Escapes); or how the theme is performed slowly when New Jersey is playing the piano that helps Rawhide discover the use of the g-cypher (New Jersey Plays Piano).
The real revelation was discovering music that we hadn’t noticed before, like the country and western music that plays when New Jersey meets the band at the court house (Country Western Music). While we clearly hear this music in the film we didn’t realize that it continues to play for one minute and eleven seconds in the background. Another new discovery was the twenty-eight seconds of rocking music that plays at a low volume behind Scooter when he gets the radio message that Buckaroo needs help (Scooter Gets the Message).
It’s very easy to see why Boddicker, or any film score composer, wouldn’t just release the film score as it is found in the film. The music is sometimes cut off suddenly when a scene ends or, as noted earlier, there are short pieces of music that may not stand on their own outside of the film. It makes sense for a composer to work on the music in order to make a film score album that flows better musically, is more coherent, and contains longer music cues that were cut for the film. It is entirely possible that longer versions of some of these cues lurk in Boddicker’s archive.
The Buckaroo Banzai Limited Edition Gold CD Bootleg Soundtrack
On the first part of the Five Minutes of Banzai podcast interview with Michael Boddicker in 2018, he discussed the bootleg soundtrack and the music found on it. He said, “People took my demo cassettes that have nothing to do [with Buckaroo Banzai]. There’s Honda commercials and all this other stuff [on the bootleg]. And they’ve released it. And sold it for 25 bucks as a Buckaroo Banzai soundtrack. They’re stealing music of mine and selling it to people but it’s not the [Buckaroo Banzai] music the people think they’re buying.”
The isolated film score affords us the unique opportunity to determine which music on the bootleg is actually in the film and which of the other tracks are potentially Boddicker’s demo reel, the Honda commercials, and other stuff.
The bootleg soundtrack contains some music and dialogue from the film and runs 38 minutes. The music cues and dialogue tracks found on the bootleg soundtrack are not in the order that they are found in the actual film.
1. Opening Theme 1:21
2. Penny Is Alive 1:18
3. Red Lectroids From Planet 10 2:04
4. Penny’s Theme 0:31
5. “No Matter Where You Go...” (Dialogue) 0:13
6. “Laugh While You Can...” (Dialogue) 0:04
7. They’re Getting Away! 0:41
8. Nobudy Cumz In Here 1:30
9. You Can’t Hide That 0:32
10. Motorcycle Chase 2:24
11. Buckaroo’s Speech (Dialogue) 0:32
12. Turbo Pod On Our Tail 1:31
13. Team Banzai Theme 0:50
14. End Credits (Short Version) 2:21
15. Opening Theme Reprise 1:08
16. “Where Are We Going...” (Dialogue) 0:07
17. “It’s Not My Planet...” (Dialogue) 0:05
18. The 8th Dimension 13:31
19. End Credits (Long Version) 4:14
20. President On Line One (Dialogue) 0:20
21. Banzai Jam (Buckaroo Banzai
And The Hong Kong Cavaliers) 2:11
The first thing we did was compare the lengths of the
musically identical tracks on both the isolated film score
and the bootleg soundtrack. Although there are minor time
differences between the shared tracks, these occur because
of additional dialogue, sound effects, or dead air at the
end and beginning of some tracks on the bootleg. In
addition, track 10 - Motorcycle Chase on the bootleg
soundtrack appears to be a demo or extended cut of the
music heard while Buckaroo chases the Lectroids on
motorbike in the isolated film score track. This song also
appears several years later on the 1987 album Joyride as
track 5, Reprise, credited to Boddicker and sporting
additional guitar tracks for a little extra rock and roll
punch.
Our goal was to determine how much music found on the
Bootleg was actually in the film. We eliminated the six
tracks of dialogue from the film. These account for one
minute and twenty seconds of the 38 minute running time.
5. “No Matter Where You Go...” (Dialogue) 0:13
6. “Laugh While You Can...” (Dialogue) 0:04
11. Buckaroo’s Speech (Dialogue) 0:32
16. “Where Are We Going...” (Dialogue) 0:07
17. “It’s Not My Planet...” (Dialogue) 0:05
20. President On Line One (Dialogue) 0:20
We next discovered that the following four tracks do not
appear in the film in any readily detectable form:
4. Penny’s Theme 0:31
9. You Can’t Hide That 0:32
12. Turbo Pod On Our Tail 1:31
18. The 8th Dimension 13:31
The shorter music tracks (Penny’s Theme, You Can’t Hide
That, Turbo Pod On Our Tail) may be from the Honda
commercials or “other stuff” Boddicker mentioned on the
podcast. The track called The 8th Dimension is most likely
from his demo reel as it is a single long-form piece of
music that flows from one section to another and shows a
range of different musical themes and textures. These ten
tracks account for sixteen minutes and five seconds of the
38 minute running time.
What this tells us is that the bootleg soundtrack is only
really comprised of eleven tracks of music from the film.
1. Opening Theme 1:21
2. Penny Is Alive 1:18
3. Red Lectroids From Planet 10 2:04
7. They’re Getting Away! 0:41
8. Nobudy Cumz In Here 1:30
10. Motorcycle Chase 2:24
13 Team Banzai Theme 0:50
14. End Credits (Short Version) 2:21
15. Opening Theme Reprise 1:08
19. End Credits (Long Version) 4:14
21. Banzai Jam (Buckaroo Banzai
And The Hong Kong Cavaliers) 2:11
These eleven tracks run for 21 minutes and 55 seconds. But
hold onto your hats as this gets a little crazier. The
Opening Theme and Opening Theme Reprise are the same music
and the End Credits (Short Version) appears to be either
an alternate mix, demo version, or early version of the
“Banzai March” music found in the End Credits (Long
Version). If we remove the two shorter tracks, that’s 3
minutes and 29 seconds. That reduces the amount of actual
music from film on the bootleg soundtrack to just 18
minutes and 26 seconds.
After we apply a little bit of math we quickly discover
that there are 26 minutes and 34 seconds more music on the
isolated film score than found on the bootleg soundtrack.
Boddicker was absolutely correct when he said that the
music on the bootleg soundtrack is “not the [Buckaroo
Banzai] music the people think they’re buying.”
Ironically, the bootleg soundtrack is a much more
accessible and listenable collection of music than the
isolated film score. The commercial music and demo tracks
in the bootleg may not be from the film, but they are very
much “of a piece” with the music from the film in terms of
the textures and compositional stamp that Boddicker as an
artist brings to his body of work. We were shocked on a
couple of tracks to discover that music in the bootleg
that we thought appeared in the film did not, in fact,
surface in the isolated film score at all.
That said, the deficiencies of the bootleg’s sound quality
and questionable track inclusions are all the more reason
to release an official soundtrack to the film. After
thirty-five years, is that likely to happen?
An Official Release?
On the second part of his Five Minutes of Banzai Podcast
interview, Michael Boddicker discussed the possibility of
an official release when asked ‘What can Buckaroo Banzai
fans do to help get an official release of the soundtrack
out there?’
“I’ve actually been thinking about that,” said Boddicker,
“I could probably be motivated to do that in the next year
to year and a half...next spring would be the 35 year
anniversary [August, 2019]...I would love to do a new
Buckaroo Banzai release. I’d love to release the
soundtrack. I’d love to release the extras.”
When he mentioned the 35th anniversary time frame, he tied
it to a synth event he’d just created and was getting off
the ground at the time of the podcast. “I have an event, a
large event that’s coming up in March of next year,
2019...This would be a really great place for a bunch of
Buckaroo Banzai people. I could make that the jumping off
place for some of this music...We could very easily do a
Buckaroo Banzai showing and do some talks about
that...[The event is] called SynthPlex, by the way. Synthplex.com.”
We truly hope that there will be some kind of announcement
about an official Buckaroo Banzai film score soundtrack
release at Michael Boddicker’s SynthPlex event, which is
happening from March 28th thru 31st, 2019. [NOTE: Sadly,
nothing was announced at SynthPlex. Check out What is the latest news on an
official Buckaroo Banzai soundtrack release?]
This page was last updated on May 10th, 2020.
Maintained by Sean Murphy [figment@figmentfly.com]