The Complete 'WIld One,' Plus Reups

From top: the EP, 10-inch LP, 12-inch LP covers

Almost 10 years ago, I featured the 10-inch LP of Leith Stevens' score for The Wild One - you know, the flick where Marlon Brando and his motorcycle gang take over a small town. The movie was iconic in a number of ways - Brando as anti-hero, his leather-jacket-and-engineer-boot look, the entire biker-film genre, and - most pertinent to this discussion - Stevens' use of jazz on the soundtrack.

Jazz had appeared in films many times before, of course. At one time in the early 40s, even third-rate big bands were snaring gigs in B-movies. Stevens' sound seemed different, though - more modern. It was in fact the approach of the more hard-driving wing of the West Coast jazz scene, as embodied in trumpeter Shorty Rogers and his cohorts, who recorded the backgrounds to Brando's brooding.

That's not to say that all the music was groundbreaking. "Blues for Brando" could well have come from any dance band's catalog. "Lonely Way" is lounge music. But the title theme was influential - its aggressive motto theme paved the way for such scores as Kenyon Hopkins'The Strange One (notice the title's similarity as well).

Today's post gathers all The Wild One recordings in one place - not just the 10-inch LP, but the additional numbers recorded later for a 12-inch album, and the EP of music from the film that Rogers recorded under his own name. Doing such a compilation isn't a new idea, but since I own all three records, I thought it might be fun to put them together in one post. I've added below some remastered versions of Leith Stevens scores.

Let me start with a brief discussion of each Wild One record in order of recording date. The first was actually Rogers' four-song EP, set down in July 1953. For the date, the trumpeter led a 19-piece band featuring Bill Perkins on tenor sax. Rogers and Perkins were veterans of the Woody Herman and Stan Kenton bands, as was true of many participants on all three recording sessions.

First EP cover

Initially, RCA Victor issued the EP under the title Hot Blood, the working title of the film, which came out the following February as The Wild One. When the film was renamed, so was the EP and the movie's title tune, as well.

Rogers and eight other musicians - most of whom were on the previous date - returned to the studio in October 1953 to record a 10-inch LP for Decca. For this date, they were dubbed "Leith Stevens' All Stars." On the LP cover credits, Shorty Rogers was listed as "Roger Short" and drummer Shelley Manne became "Manny Shell" for contractual reasons. This time around, the tenor sax soloist was Bob Cooper.

By 1956, the 10-inch LP had given way to the 12-inch variety, so Decca called Rogers back to record four more numbers to fill out a Wild One reissue in the larger format. Some of the same musicians returned for this April 1956 session, including Bob Cooper on tenor.

Brando as the badly misunderstood Johnny Strabler

To summarize, my package includes: a new transfer of the EP; a remastered transfer of the 10-inch LP; a new dub of the four songs added to the 12-inch LP; and front and back scans of all three covers.

It is sometimes said (even in the comments on this blog) that Rogers, not Stevens, wrote the music for The Wild One. I haven't seen evidence for that assertion; Stevens was an accomplished musician who had a long career in Hollywood. Still, there is no question that Rogers and his hand-picked musicians had a great deal to offer when the score was recorded. IMDb lists Rogers as arranger on the soundtrack, and he surely had much to do with the sound of the score.

Leith Stevens Reups

To complement The Wild One, I've remastered two Leith Stevens soundtracks from the early days of this blog. The links below take you to the original posts.

Destination Moon. From 1950, another influential score. A decade ago, my take was that "it does have overtones of Holst and Ming the Merciless, and I know he [Stevens] cribbed one of the main motifs from somewhere I can't recall, but it is very enjoyable nonetheless." Still true!

The James Dean Story. Following Dean's 1955 death, the American exploitation machine went into overdrive. This post captures Stevens' very good score for a 1956 documentary, with a title tune by the prolific duo of Livingston and Evans. I've tossed in a Mantovani single version of the title song for good measure. Included are excellent graphics both for the LP and the Mantovani picture sleeve.