A Degree Of Murder 7″ Vinyl EP featuring Brian Jones, Jimmy Page et al (OST)

Out now from http://www.1960s.london

Selected Extracts From The Original Soundtrack

All music composed and played by Brian Jones

Personnel

Brian Jones: sitar, organ,  guitar, recorder, bass, banjo, dulcimer, harmonica

Jimmy Page: guitars

Nicky Hopkins: piano

Kenney Jones: drums

Peter Gosling: keyboards, Mellotron, vocals

Mike Leander: orchestra

Glyn Johns: engineering

Recording Details

Recorded January – February 1967 @ IBC and Olympic Studios, London. Broadcast on ZDF TV 1969

Sleevenotes

In early 1967 Brian Jones found time in between Stones tours to record the soundtrack to the film Mord und Totschlag (A Touch Of Murder), starring his then- partner Anita Pallenberg as Marie. In the film Marie shoots her ex-boyfriend with his own gun after he attempts to beat her up. Instead of reporting this to the police she hires two men to help her dump the body in a construction site near an autobahn. Although the film was entered into the 1967 Cannes Film Festival it is known today chiefly for its soundtrack. The tracks on this EP provide you with the musical highlights from the soundtrack, which has never officially been released.

Talking to Rolling Stone in 2012 collaborator Jimmy Page said “Brian knew what he was doing. It was quite beautiful. Some of it was made up at the time; some of it was stuff I was augmenting with him. I was definitely playing with the violin bow. Brian had this guitar that had a volume pedal – he could get gunshots with it. There was a Mellotron there. He was moving forward with ideas.” In the film’s official press release, director Volker Schlöndorff was delighted with the results. “Brian’s music has worked so marvellously. His special music fits the film wonderfully – and I do not think anyone but he could have done it.”

William Perks

Writing in Record Collector magazine for May 2022 Ian McCann really liked this record: