From what I’ve read online, the Italian releases of spaghetti western soundtracks tend to be superior to those released in the US and GDM specifically seems to be considered the best label when it comes to the audio quality. However, none of the soundtrack releases for They Call Me Trinity were done by GDM, thus I was uncertain if one of the releases may have been of notably superior quality to that of the other releases.
The three Italian labels that I could find which released CDs were “Vivi Musica,” “Digitmovies” & “Curci.”
Vivi Musica has two CDs (VCDS 7029) one released in 2001 and a re-release in 2011, both of which featured 13 tracks. Digitmovies also has two, one with 29 tracks (CDDM026) from 2004 and one with 25 (DPDM009) from 2013. Lastly, the Curci one (CU 006) is from 1996 and has 27 tracks and is also bundled with the soundtrack for Gunman of Ave Maria.
I’m primarily concerned with the audio quality as opposed to what release had the most tracks, hopefully someone here who is more familiar with these labels can lend me a hand.
Unrelated to the above, but is the original Django soundtrack by GDM (GDM – 4303) which was released in 2013 the best release of the soundtrack? I’m assuming that it is since it’s by GDM, but I figured I’d ask just in case.
So from my personal experience, either of the Digitmovie releases are the best, though I say that because I only have the 2013 Digitmovies Digipack version (DPDM009) . In terms of audio quality it’s stellar, no noise removal artifacts or static pops or hisses. Claudio Fuiano and his team take great personal pride in the restoration efforts, and it definitely shows in their Trinita release.
By rule of thumb, sound quality isn’t always good because of a label or team, (unless you have an amateur who’s a dumbshit and uses to much noise removal) it’s good because of how the master tapes were stored. Usually GDM has good sounding releases because their library that they pull from has been in fantastic condition (mainly because they’re mostly highly marketable Morricone recordings, so of course they wouldn’t let those go to waste). Most labels have really great sounding releases, they also have some pretty mediocre ones as well, Digitmovies isn’t immune to this. Same with Beat, Cinevox, Hillside, Hexacord, Dagored, Sugar, CAM etc. A lot of these old master tapes were stored awfully or just plain lost, or are sourced from a bad second gen tape (the score for Gentleman Jo Uccidi by Nicolai and Morricone was a dupe tape stored in a filing cabinet I think).
However I can say without a doubt that if you want the best sounding releases of anything go with anything that’s Japanese. They truly are the best of the best in sound engineering. The Verita Note, King Records, and Rambling Record releases are among the best sounding by far.
For Django. Go with the Verita Note release (VQCD-10039). Though if you want something slightly cheaper then yeah go with the GDM release. It uses the exact same restoration job Verita Note did on their 2008 release. Also if you want the true karaoke version for Django (the one that Verita Note created cuts the instrumental guitar version into the end) then this weird release has it.
Thanks a lot for your response, sounds like the 2013 release by Digitmovies might be the way to go then, it does appear to be the most recent CD release of the album, so it would make sense that it be the best one thus far. I’m curious as to why they excluded the tracks Trinity In Love & Trinity in Lounge from the previous CD release by the same label though, not sure if they were part of the rejected score or something else, but it’s not a big deal I suppose.
As for Django, is there any actual difference between VQCD-10039 & GDM – 4303? According to their discogs pages they have the same number of songs and they seem to have the same lengths as well.
In regards to GDM I often read people stating that their release for The Good, The Bad & The Ugly is the definitive one, not sure if that has changed since I read that, but I’ve generally seen people recommending them when it comes to soundtracks composed by Ennio Morricone.
Speaking of which, has there been any good CD releases for For a Few Dollars More? I’ve heard that all the releases are basically just ripped straight from the movie, which is a shame since I’d love to get a CD featuring a high quality version of “La Resa Dei Conti,” easily my favorite track from that film.
Edit: There does seem to be a Japanese release for the aforementioned soundtrack (RCA – BVCM-35316) from 2004, it’s rather pricey online, but that’s fine if the audio quality is actually good, unfortunately I have no idea if it’s actually any better or worse than other releases.
I think they excluded the Trinity In Love and Trinity In Lounge from the previous release as a sort of incentive to collect the old release. They’ve done this with a few of their other releases, like Corri Uomo Corri.
There’s no difference between the Verita note and GDM versions of Django. Same sound quality and music selections. Exact same release. GDM has done this in the past with Verita Note’s other releases, like Companeros, Il Mercenario, Faccia a Faccia and some others.
There’s no other releases of For a Few Dollars More that are worth buying right now. RCA – BVCM-35316 is literally the same rehash of the stereo album versions of the score that have been sold since the film was first released… I have this Japanese release which features the expanded score for The Good The Bad and the Ugly and the eight Stereo recordings of For a Few Dollars More. Though there is a bootleg by some guys named rarecrores that features the original mono recording sessions, which you can listen to a selection of here but unfortunately the people who release this stuff only trade bootlegs for bootlegs.
Thanks a lot for the additional info, it’s an absolute shame that there’s no particularly good releases for For a Few Dollars More’s soundtrack, to my knowledge there doesn’t even appear to be any good digital releases of it either.
Just to clarify, you’re saying that the Few Dollars More tracks featured on the Japanese release that you linked (RBCP-2814) are also the same as every other release as well correct? Even so, that album might be worth getting anyway seeing as it has a few tracks from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly which don’t seem to be on the GDM release (GDM – CD CLUB 7001) and it also appears to be the most cost efficient means of getting the For a Few Dollars More soundtrack.
Also, I had one last question if it isn’t too much trouble, do you have any idea if there’s a difference in quality between the 2004 & 2013 Digitmovies releases for They Call Me Trinity? I can’t seem to find anything online that states whether or not the first release was also restored by Claudio Fuiano and co. or not. Thus I’m uncertain as to whether the latter was just a reissue with a few tracks removed or if it was a complete restoration of the previous release with a few tracks removed. If it’s just a reissue with a few missing tracks than the first release might be worth tracking down, but if the original wasn’t a restoration like the latter one then it would make more sense to stick with getting the 2013 release.
Yeah RBCP-2814 is the exact same as GDM – CD CLUB 7001, with the exception that it includes For a Few Dollars More. I’d definitely nab it if you don’t have either of the scores yet. It’s a great release.
I’ve got no clue about the audio quality between the 2004 and 2013 releases of Trinity, but I do know that Fuiano was responsible for the restoration of both. I’m fairly certain that both releases are exactly the same, the 2013 release is just without a few tracks.