As I have been rewatching episodes recently, I felt the need to acknowledge what a top-notch team of sound engineers Thundercats had working on them. We all know the music, and the mixing thereof, was a huge standout among the competition, but I feel that the sound FX themselves are easy to overlook.
While I am sure that some of the effects for lasers, clashing swords and shield, etc. were perhaps stock sounds, there is no denying that Thundercats created its own catalog of distinct SFX that perfectly blended with the show and also is part of what made Thundercats, well, Thundercats. I’m thinking, for example, the sound of the SoO as it grows. If someone asked me to make the sound of a metal blade growing three times, I wouldn’t have the foggiest clue of where to start. But Thundercats made it look (or is that sound?) easy.
My favorite Thundercat exclusive sound effect would, of course, have to be the Eye of Thundera’s beam shooting out of the sword, ending perfectly with the familiar Thundercat roar.
Do you guys agree? Do you have a favorite sound effect that is likely exclusive to Thundercats?
I agree, the sound effects are top-notch.
Curiously, whenever I see the credits listing the five sound editors, for their various contributions, I always feel they’re being presented like a band, and instead of “dialogue”, “music”, “effects” and “editorial” (one of those twice over), I expect it to read, “vocals”, “guitar”, “bass”, “keyboard” and “drums”. No idea why . . .
The best thing that could be said is that the sound effects never took me out of the story, due to the fact that they were so seamlessly created and integrated.
I have perhaps one single exception to this, and I dunno if its the effects people’s fault. They came up with an appropriate effect, but it still makes me go “ewww!” or “Owww!”
Which effect, you ask? In “Crystal Canyon” right after Tygra sees the Thundercat signal, he flexes and his muscle’s immediately return to him…accompanied by this sound that just makes me cringe. I think its the whole package that gives me the willies. It just seems like it had to hurt, a little. But I guess getting sober usually involves a lot more pain than that.
Took me a moment to remember what you meant there, but yes, I do. Comparing Thundercats’ writers to the rock band Styx, Leonard Starr is Dennis DeYoung, the primary genius responsible for the successes, Peter Lawrence is Tommy Shaw, who took over later on, and is fine in a supporting capacity but doesn’t have enough creative juice to lead the team.
Most of them. I’ve just looked up the end credits of Silverhawks:
Recording Staff:
John Curcio - dialogue
Tom Perkins - editorial
Tom Greto - music
Larry Franke - editorial
Michael Ungar - editorial
Pete Cannarozzi - effects
Greto and Ungar are new, but the other four were all on Thundercats.
Well, the music was by Bernard Hoffer, who again, also did Thundercats. Indeed, the Silverhawks theme sounds like an idea that he might have come up with for the Thundercats theme, or he was trying to just come up with something that close. Whichever it was, it’s a fair theme, but has the unfortunate effect of making the show feel like a Thundercats ripoff (the obvious Mumm-Ra influence on MonStar in both catchphrase and voice compounds this).
I’ve just had a proper listen to it for the first time in over a year, and yes, it’s a damn fine piece of music - which is what you’d expect from the man who wrote the Thundercats theme and all the incidental music.
The only problem I have with it is that it’s sort of trying too hard to sound like the Thundercats theme.
Compare this with the music of Shuki Levy, who wrote the theme tunes for:
Ulysses 31
M.A.S.K.
Jayce And The Wheeled Warriors
King Arthur And The Knights Of Justice
Pole Position
Levy and Saban wrote some of the best theme music of all cartoons.
And you didn’t even include some of their tunes for really iconic shows and really catchy themes such as:
He-Man
Inspector Gadget
Heathcliff
Mysterious Cities of Gold
