[Nils Jacob Holt Hanssen]

OK, so I caved in and bought Intrada’s recent 3 CD edition of JAWS. But hey, it’s a Williams expanded / sound-improved release, and those are basically no-brainers for me (including three LPs, this is my eighth (!) version of this soundtrack). And the sound quality on this one is VERY good. The JAWS soundtrack releases over the years have steadily improved on the sound quality, starting from the quite abysmal-sounding original MCA LP, and this one is probably as good as it gets (well, until it isn’t…).

I think the extra material here more interesting than usual for this type of release, containing more elaborately orchestrated versions both of the score’s themes and many of the incidental cues, that were ultimately deemed too dense for the actual film (and album recording). The “reductions” to the versions we know from the film and earlier score releases were, according to Mike Matessino’s liner notes, done by Williams on the fly in the recording studio. Fascinating.