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In a curious knock-on effect from having an incorrect link, Jen from Brianmay.com got in touch with Brian May In February 2004 and he commented about Star Fleet and SFXB as follows (reproduced with his permission) - read on for fuller details of his Star Fleet connection:
AH! How amazing there's a site for this!
Yes, Jimmy and I used to get up incredibly early every Saturday morning and go down to watch the next episode of "Star Fleet" on TV, when he was very young. We loved it!! One of those "Father-Son bonding things!!" It was Jimmy's great idea for me to play the song. Since I had a will to get an impromptu session together with Edward (van Halen) I combined the two threads. It was one of the most exctiting days of my life - the session in the studio - I'll never forget it.
Must look at star Fleet again ...
Many Thanks to Andy for keeping this out there...
Cheers
brian
In December 2002 Dave Surridge was listening to Radio One here in the UK when he heard a very familiar voice on a track John Peel was playing. It turns out that a drum and bass group called Bad Company has used samples of Captain Carter's voice on a track called Torpedo, released on their Shot Down on Safari album. The album is available to buy at Amazon.
As part of my research into Star Fleet in the early days I inevitably ran into Brian May's Star Fleet Project. I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that it's a misnoma to call Star Fleet the series which had the music by Brian May. As my investigation revealed, Brian May only covered the Star Fleet theme, rather than actually writing it. This was reiterated by the man himself on 1 June 2002, at 10.35pm on Channel 4 during the airing of the Killer Queen! documentary. The small piece about Brian's solo work was also accompanied by parts of the Star Fleet Project video - the first time in almost 20 years that Star Fleet has appeared on terrestrial TV! You can watch a Windows Mediaplayer Video format clip of that part of the documentary by selecting these words.
It was actually Paul Bliss, a newcomer (see the Louis Elman interview), who was responsible for the Star Fleet themes. You can download mp3s of the themes from F Zero One's multimedia section.
The confusion over the soundtrack's origins may well come from the fact that Brian May's track has virtually identical lyrics to the original, which went like this:
Send a message out across the sky
Alien raiders just past Gemini
Who will come and save us now?
Who can defend us from their power?
CHORUS
Star Fleet, Star Fleet
Star Fleet, Star Fleet
Tell the people back at Earth Control
Send Star Fleet legions to save our souls
Always daring and courageous
Oooh, only they can save us
CHORUS
Star Fleet, Star Fleet
Star Fleet, Star Fleet
You can find out more from Mr May himself by following the links provided in the relevant links page. Basically he used to watch the show with his son and in the course of a jamming session with Eddie Van Halen decided to explore the show's tune. The contents of that session were released as part of the Star Fleet Project album and as a single. I've found or been pointed to a couple of clips of the single's video and the album tracks; the material can be found in the multimedia section. The associated artwork can be found in the gallery.
The French Connection also crops up here. A French group called Apollo provided a very different soundtrack for the French version of the series - having received a CD of their work, I can safely say that it resembles neither Paul Bliss' nor Brian May's work! The insert confirms that the show was Bomber X (pronounced Bomb-bear Eex) in France, shown by TF1 in 1980. It also mentions Saban, who's connected with Power Ranger style shows... You can see the front cover artwork in the gallery and the foreign links page will also give you some additional information. The Japanese soundtrack was provided by Bow Wow.
Last updated 01 May 2008
