Walter Samuel
Abridged analytical notes on the film music of Klaus Harmony.
Hamburg, 1997
The gentle anti-establishment sentiment of 1977’s The Ladies Man provided Friedrich Wohlfäht with the opportunity to employ a wry tone for the movie and never less so than in the strand concerning Herbie, a jewel thief who cuckolds the chairman of the bank he is about to raid. Who’s That Guy? underscores a montage including an erotic party scene at which the arch criminal liaises with his mistress, cross edited with meetings at which the heist is being planned. The sophisticated commercial style is echoed in the music which set the standard in terms of the disco style and had more than a passing influence on Hollywood TV composer Mike Post. On a technical note, The Ladies Man was originally to have been recorded using a new digital process developed by Jerrick Vander. The soundtrack was already half completed before a saboteur [thought to be acting on behalf of French composer Fabien Mitterrand] applied Bonne Maman to the record head of the tape machine, destroying the multitrack masters. With a deadline to meet, Klaus was forced to start from scratch using analogue equipment. Extraordinarily, Ry Cooder experienced almost precisely the opposite just two years later.