“Manos” The Soundtrack of Fate

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Now available, free to download, is the soundtrack to Manos: The Hands of Fate.

This should provide a good idea of the way the restoration sounds, though the EQ has been rebalanced here for easier listening. While it will never be a perfectly crisp listening experience, it’s miles better than the excessively damaged and noise-reduced audio of the public domain version.  As voices and sound effects could not always be removed without causing hiccups in the audio, we decided it was best that the soundtrack be released for free under Creative Commons. It’s also my hope that releasing it will bring us closer to finding out what happened to Russ Huddleston and Robert Smith, who are credited for the soundtrack and about whom very little is known.

Special thanks to Derek Singer for compiling and editing this soundtrack, and Cory Fujimori for his skillful audio restoration work.

18 thoughts on ““Manos” The Soundtrack of Fate

  1. It’s brilliant! That psychotic flute! The touching innocence of Row, Row Your Boat! The slinky allure of Love Inside This Magic Circle! The perfect soundtrack to not only the movie, but to my wearing my The Master T-Shirt all day.

    • We’ve hit our monthly limit of free downloads, then!

      Our free download credits will be replenished on the 14th. In the meantime, I’ve gotten the minimum price down to $1.00- it’s the best Bandcamp will allow for now.

  2. Years ago I ripped the audio from the public-domain DVD just so I could have some of this music, although it was really murky and hardly listenable…this cleaned-up version is a TREASURE!!

  3. Sounds super amazing! I’m really getting excited for the final product. (Speaking of which, any decision on the credits-formatting dilemma? I’d still vote for the off-center one that looks like the original, but maybe you can include both versions via branching or something!)

  4. Wouldn’t it be great if some dark metal drum and bass dubstep rap group sampled some of this dialogue (with proper royalty payments, of course)? I’ve already peppered my conversations with “Thy Will Be Done.”

  5. i find this song hauntingly beautiful. it somehow fits in perfectly with this very unique/unusual little film. does anyone know exactly who the singer is? i see credits given to the writers/musicians but not the woman singing. she had a great voice, similar to shirley bassey. any information on her would be appreciated, even if it’s just a name. thank you.

  6. I just heard a Rumor floating around that the Female Lead in this film Dianne Mahree is the one who sang this song? it hasn’t been confirmed, but it’s quite interesting nonetheless.

    • Unfortunately, I’ve confirmed with Diane that she did not sing this song. Both the identity of the singer, and the actress that did all of the female voices in the film, are unknown.

      • Thanks for getting Back to Me. Glad Dianne Mahree is still around. She was a very Beautiful Woman. too bad she didnt make more films. i wonder if we’ll ”ever” know who sang this song? she definitely had a wonderful voice.

  7. Didn’t realize this showed up until now (where have I been?).

    Now I wish this was a legit vinyl release, let alone one that mimic what a release of this would have been like back in ’66 or ’67, preferably with a rather campy back cover in black & white with the most bare bones linear notes imaginable. I sorta picture two or three stills from the film with something scribbled by either Mr. Warren or the music guys telling us what the experience was like and what you (the buyer) should take from listening to these tracks, and of course the track listing. I’m sure I’m leaving something out, but my years of collecting LP’s has proved to give me a knack for how cheap these LP’s use to be in the 60’s when they were just pressing them out without much care to A&D issues like that.

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