Limited edition numbered to 500 copies. Transparent red vinyl format / 180 grams + CD. Lee Van Cleef had already defined the archetype twice over: once as the cold-eyed Angel Eyes in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, once as the elegant Colonel Mortimer in For a Few Dollars More. But Gianfranco Parolini saw something else in that gaunt, reptilian face. Not a villain. Not a gentleman bounty hunter. Something slipperier. A con man with a rifle. A blackmailer in black. A gunfighter who'd rather outsmart you than outshoot you, though he could do both before you finished blinking.
Ehi Amico… C'è Sabata, Hai Chiuso! opens with a heist and never stops twisting. The corrupt businessmen of Daugherty, Texas think they've gotten away with $100,000 of army money. They haven't counted on a stranger who recovers the cash, then proceeds to extort them for double. Every assassin they send comes back in a box. Every scheme backfires. And through it all, Sabata grins like a man who's already read the last page.
The score comes from Marcello Giombini, a Roman composer who'd cut his teeth on peplum epics and spy spoofs before finding his voice in the dust and blood of the western frontier. What he delivers here is one of the genre's most distinctive soundtracks: a main theme that ranks among the most celebrated leitmotifs of Italian western music, sung by the Cantori Moderni di Alessandroni with that unmistakable blend of swagger and menace. But Giombini doesn't stop there. The score moves through desolation and ambush, saloon sleaze and banjo twang, building an atmosphere that matches the film's unique cocktail of action, irony and intrigue.
There's an organ in there, an unconventional choice that gives the music a slightly unhinged quality, as if the whole enterprise might tip into madness at any moment. Epic passages bleed into dramatic tension. Incidental cues pulse with rhythmic urgency. This is not Morricone territory, though the influence echoes. This is something looser, wilder, more willing to have fun with the conventions while still delivering the goods.
