Part of Williams' limited film score production during the mid-1980's was due to scheduling issues (including the endless delays of Hook), but since becoming involved with the Boston Pops at the start of the decade and achieving almost God-like status on the conductor's podium, he began writing themes for concerts and special events that were all extensions of his Star Wars-born orchestral bombast. In the mid-1980's, Williams discovered this highly patriotic style of concert writing that would eventually lead to specialty themes such as "Liberty Fanfare," "Celebrate Discovery," "Jubilee 350," his Olympics work, and even the "Mission" theme for NBC News on television. His music for Steven Spielberg's popular "Amazing Stories" television episode, "The Mission," was also saturated with this sound as well. In his film scores, this uniquely American style of writing for Williams would debut in SpaceCamp and forever be best represented by that score. Between the concert track and album's finale, Williams' patriotic writing is at its very best. The grandeur and exuberance of these fully orchestral statements of broad, hopeful themes are what define Williams' career, and these two similarly-minded performances in SpaceCamp save the entire soundtrack from its otherwise average underscore. Despite Williams' seeming best intentions, much of this score dwells in non-descript regions of the composer's writing that takes a considerable number of pages from his disaster scores of the early 1970's, as well as some of the less interesting underscore from the original Star Wars film. The suspense presented in the latter half of the score fails to state itself with effectiveness (though "White Sands" is very similar in style to Jurassic Park), with flat performances and surprisingly poor sound quality hindering significant portions of the whole. Once you are spoiled by the solid brass fanfares of the title theme, the training cues do their best to mute their heroism with restrained but still hopeful brass solos, and such material cannot compete.

The identity of the kids really isn't addressed by Williams in SpaceCamp, even in the woodwind and string interludes over flowing harp; the composer seems to have his sights set on the expanse of space and little else. The only exception is the outrageously dated "Training Montage" cue, in which Williams poorly infuses a modern light rock rhythm with a drum machine. Some of the mechanized elements in the film are handled with subtle motifs, including the robot and the shuttle itself. A cute rising and falling string figure introduced in "In Orbit" cleverly represents weightlessness. The remainder of his score is pleasing despite the fact that listeners have heard every element of the music rendered with better results in other works, on screen or in concert. There are several outstanding moments in SpaceCamp, but a flat recording and lack of stylish performance aspects in its whole are the ultimate downfall for the entirety. A CD album was not released until 1992, when a limited, 1,000 copy run was produced in Japan to match original LP contents arranged by Williams in his customary fashion. This BMG/RCA "club" album escalated rapidly in value and sold in auction for over $200 at its prime. In 2010, Intrada Records was able to license and reprint an identical presentation for a 3,000-copy run that sold out within a single day. Unfortunately, the label's efforts to improve the sound quality are only moderately successful and a few notable cues from the score remain missing from the jumbled selection of cues by necessity of the licensing arrangement. Intrada returned to SpaceCamp in 2014 and made the score one of its regular commercial offerings, so its status as a storied rarity will be put to rest permanently. Note that the sound quality issues with the score remain on this 2014 re-issue; the product literally is a carbon copy of the 2010 predecessor. Overall, while the score would be a very strong find at normal used CD prices, or even at new CD bargain prices, its outdated sound and lack of distinct ideas reduce its attractiveness. It's an admirable effort from Williams, with two incredible cues, but you'll hear everything in SpaceCamp to a much finer degree in other places.  ***   @Amazon.com: CD or Download