Fans of  “The Fantasy Worlds of Irwin Allen” TV shows, composer John Williams, and 1960s television scoring in general have been thrilled to watch La-La Land Records’ years-long deep dive into rescuing the scores to Allen’s most beloved shows.

LLL first dipped their toe into Allen’s TV worlds with a 2005 40th anniversary 2-disc set of highlights from his most iconic show, Lost in Space. This came after three earlier discs of music from the show, released by GNP Crescendo between 1996-2000.

However, LLL began to offer definitive editions in 2015, with their colossal 50th anniversary 12-disc Lost in Space megaset. Williams scored the main title and five episodes of that series. The 2015 release was a huge improvement in sound quality over the GNP Crescendo release, and it featured hours of previously unreleased music.

Next came LLL’s 2018 4-disc set of music from Allen’s Land of the Giants, which The Roarbots previously reviewed here. Williams scored the main title and pilot of that show, which had previously been represented by a single disc from GNP Crescendo in 1996.

Then came LLL’s 2020 4-disc set of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. The 1996 release had similarly been a single disc.

Now comes their 3-disc set of music from The Time Tunnel. It was also only a single disc in 1996. LLL’s new set is labeled “Volume One,” suggesting more good things to come, but what’s here is already amazing.

We get John Williams’s score to the pilot episode, along with scores from five other episodes – three by Lyn Murray and one each by Paul Sawtell and Robert Drasnin. The set is rounded out with loads of bonus material.

The liner notes tell us that only 12 of the show’s 30 episodes actually had original scores recorded. TV shows at the time would often do this, reusing scores from earlier episodes for later ones, once they had a decent-sized toolbox of stock music recorded. Presumably, the remaining six episodes will be on Volume Two.

Be aware, however, that even though the LLL set features Williams’s full score for the pilot (where the 1996 GNP Crescendo disc contained only highlights), it does not make the previous release entirely redundant.

The 1996 disc also contained highlights from George Duning’s score for the episode “The Death Merchant,” one of the last in the show’s single-season run. That score will presumably be contained on Volume Two, so you’ll want to hold onto your 1996 disc until then.

As with Lost in Space and Land of the Giants, it would be silly to deny that the primary attraction for many collectors is the pilot score by John Williams, or “Johnny Williams” as he was known until the 1970s.

Irwin Allen (L) and John Williams (R)

Williams’s delightful “Main Title” music for the entire series certainly has similarities to his other Allen themes, but the driving, percussive nature of the piece, designed to suggest a clock, is arresting and distinctive.

Fans who know Williams for his sweeping, orchestral, melodic work on the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises – and so many other classic modern films – will be a bit surprised by his TV work for Allen. It’s dark, ominous, and moody, and it isn’t filled with hummable themes.

Much of the music is actually a close cousin to his work in the quieter moments of Star Wars or Raiders of the Lost Ark. The music doesn’t have the epic, thematic swagger of the biggest, most memorable moments in those scores, however. It’s gorgeously written, but it demands close attention.

The music here also suggests the scores Williams would write for Allen a few years later with The Poseidon Adventure and The Towering Inferno, also previously reviewed by The Roarbots. Poseidon is largely a subdued score, like this, wheras Inferno can be seen as a transitional score of sorts, with huge, powerful thematic cues and also dark, ominous, swirling cues more similar to those in this pilot.

“Rendezvous with Yesterday”

The pilot episode, “Rendezvous with Yesterday,” sets up the show’s basic premise, with our two heroes testing an experimental government time machine, only to find themselves lost in time, sent to a different historical or future setting each episode.

The pilot sends them back to the sinking of the Titanic in 1912. The highlights of the score are the powerful “The Iceberg Cometh” and the dramatic “Time Transfer,” both of which bring a cinematic scope to the score.

“Time Transfer” – John Williams – Episode 1: “Rendezvous With Yesterday”

Although Williams only scored the pilot, as mentioned above, it was common in that era to reuse music from earlier episodes over the run of a show. Williams’s recordings found their way into later episodes, too, and set a firm musical stamp on the shape of the series.

As with LLL’s previous Irwin Allen TV releases, Williams may be the most obvious draw, but additional riches are to be found in the previously unavailable scores by other composers.

“One Way to the Moon”

British composer Lyn Murray, probably best known for his score to Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch a Thief, has three episodes here. “One Way to the Moon” is set on a future manned mission to Mars. It mixes playful suspense with outer space music featuring eerie electronic elements, an electric organ, sweeping strings, and even a harpsichord, to thrilling effect.

“Flight Calculations/Meteor” – Lyn Murray – Episode 2: “One Way to the Moon”

The show was designed much like its later spiritual cousin, Quantum Leap, with the heroes thrust into a new historical setting in a sequence at the end of each episode that served as a teaser for the next episode. The finale of “One Way to the Moon” takes our heroes to a collapsed mine in 1910, for which Murray writes an exciting suspense piece, which is another highlight.

“Time Lock/The Mine/Mine Trap” – Lyn Murray – Episode 2: “One Way to the Moon”

Murry also scores that mine cave-in episode, “End of the World,” and an episode set during the War of 1812, “The Last Patrol,” which allows him to write exciting period martial music.

“The Last Patrol”

“Col. Laugh / Log Entry / 1812 Rocket / Artillery” – Lyn Murray – Episode 5: “The Last Patrol”

Paul Sawtell’s episode, “The Day the Sky Fell In,” takes our heroes to the eve of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The music mixes exciting suspense tones with more dramatic writing, along with some highly 1960s “Japanese” music that may dance perilously close to being offensive to some modern ears. However, it needs to be placed in context – this kind of faux “ethnic” music was entirely common 60 years ago.

Robert Drasnin’s episode, “Crack of Doom,” finds our heroes arriving on Krakatoa just before the volcanic eruption, facing locals who threaten to sacrifice them to the volcano. Again, the music here leans into 1960s “ethnic” tropes but also has some wonderfully exciting passages.

It must be said, the difference in sound quality between the Williams cues on the old disc and this new one is not massive. The 1996 disc sounded quite good, and both CDs are sourced from the same mono recordings, though they’ve been remastered here.

The biggest draw here is the massive amount of new material – both for Williams’s pilot score and the other previously unreleased episodes. Also, the 1996 disc is long out of print. Now you can get more than three times as much great music for a reasonable price. Just hurry, LLL has only produced 1,000 copies of this amazing set.