Aladdin Central Messageboard

[AladdinFan92]

I might be getting the Aladdin soundtrack for my birthday,and I'm not sure whether to get the old one or the new one. I have done research on both,and from what I found out they're both almost exactly the same,except for the added songs Proud of Your Boy and High Adventure on the Special Edition Soundtrack.

So which one is better? Is there anymore information you can give me? If you know anything else,I'd really appreciate the help.

[AladdinsGenie]

It depends on if you want all the extra songs/the different version of the score "Happy End In Agrabah" or not. I have the old one and I'm just fine.

And if you are really adventurous, you could try to find an old soundtrack with the un-cut lyric.

[AmethystFae]

[Ariellen]

Well, I really want to tell you to find a copy of the very first release of the soundtrack because it had by FAR the most beautiful cover art.



I think there were 2 versions released with this art...one with the "Cut off your ear if they don't like your face" line in Arabian Nights and a version of Happy End in Agrabah that must have gotten scratched at the very last minute; the very beginning and the music right before Al and Jas start to sing again is different than the version in the movie.

I think that when they redid the soundtrack to include the PC lyrics and final version of Happy End..., they still used this cover art; don't think there's any way to tell which version it is without looking at the disk itself though; the one with PC lyrics and the final score has a little Roman numeral II on the disk itself, but I think the packaging is the same.

The PC/Happy End version was also released with this cover art if you got the Aladdin Deluxe Collector Gift Set (back in the VHS days)...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ALADDIN-COLLECTORS-SET_W0QQitemZ6621759394QQcategoryZ138QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

...and then again some point in the last 6 or 7-ish years with this (HIDEOUSLY DONE...really can't stand the layout; it makes Al and Jas look WAY too big in comparison the the background, IMO... WITH BORING STOCK ART /rant) cover art.



And then the Special Edition came and with it, the Special Edition soundtrack.



The "Proud of Your Boy" demo is very sensitively done, and "High Adventure" is really an awesome song with a lot of insight about the Aladdin movie that almost was (with the 2 genies, the buddies, and the mom). If you don't have the soundtrack already and want it, I'd probably say this one's your best bet on account of the bonus tracks of unused songs and the songs and score as close to actually watching the movie as you're going to get. But I'll second AG and say the search for the original politically incorrect version could be fun!

(Though WHY after all these years have they not released "A Whole New World" with the orchestral intro used in the movie?)

And I guess as a sidenote...definitely worth the extra splurge is The Music Behind the Magic.



Soundtracks to The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and a CD of demos of several songs from the aforementioned early version of Aladdin with the zillion and 2 extra characters. All of these movies' soundtracks have some demo and work tapes of songs from the films, as well as some of deleted and/or otherwise unused songs. Plus a cool book about Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Tim Rice, the making of the music of these 3 movies, lyrics, and Alan Menken liner notes. It's amazing, and you can find it on eBay (and I think Amazon) rather regularly for not terribly expensive. (I got mine sealed on eBay for around $30.)

[AladdinsGenie]

*has hideous stock art one*

The first one has the best cover, though. I'm not a big fan of the SE cover. They look really odd to me. Al looks like Jon Lovitz

[Guest]

[Guest]

Me again...still on school computer.

~*DP*~