The Ipcress File – SOUNDTRACK***

Main Title Theme/Alone In Three Quarter Time/Meeting With Grantby & Fight/Jazz Along Alone/The Death Of Carswell/A Man Alone/A Man Alone/If You’re Not Clean I’ll Kill You/Alone Blues/Goodbye Harry/Goodbye Harry (Continuation)/A Man Alone

Based on the book by Len Deighton The Ipcress File starred Michael Caine as the British spy Harry Palmer. The music was scored by John Barry and the soundtrack LP was rather less successful than the composer’s James Bond albums of the time. (US:133)

“This is guaranteed to take you back to London in the 1960s. There is a loneliness about this music that perfectly matches the espionage job Harry Palmer has to do. In fact many of the tracks are called 'Alone' and Alone Blues in particular is sublime. Many of the tracks have an emotional, wistful quality in their own right and the power instantly to evoke a smoky, London seediness of another age. It positively transports you. Atmospheric is an understatement.”

"The Ipcress File is a defining soundtrack, crystallizing all the elements that would go on to become commonplace in soundtracks focusing on the dark end of the street. The ominous vibes, the bleak saxophone, the sparseness, even the Michael Caine dialogue, it's a spy thriller defined. Naturally, soundtracks tend to milk their main theme a fair bit, it goes with the territory, but when the theme is as extraordinary and other-worldly as this one it barely seems to matter.”

“It's probably one of Barry's best - certainly it's amongst his darkest. Jazzy minor key pieces are the main tactic, and at times the tension is cranked to maximum - e.g. Meeting With Grantby & Fight. Although it's par for the course with a lot of OST music, I have to say this album does trade on reprising a bit too much for my tastes.”

"The Ipcress File hails from the most liberating experimental period in film music. Composer John Barry could choose an instrument such as the twanging cimbalom without worrying that it was geographically inaccurate. His Man Alone theme, therefore, made a big impression in 1965 and has proved one of his most lasting.”

“This album features the Man Alone theme in all its incarnations. There's Jazz Along Alone, Alone In Three-Quarter Time and Alone Blues. Even though the theme never overstays its welcome, there are other great tracks in between, most of which perpetuate the film's darkly mysterious atmosphere"