Speelunker Cave Music And Sounds

Listen to the ride-through audio mp3 download! The mp3 link below is the most important content on this page. Skip it and you've missed everything! This page was created for and centers around this audio creation. Mixed in life-like stereo. Crank up your stereo speakers or headphones.

But, wait! There's more! Much, much more below on this page. If you are a Spee-Luker Cave fan, this is the web-page you have dreamed of!

Warning: If you are using browser accelerator software, some of the images on this page and linked pages may not show up at all. In addition, the GIF animations may not work. If this is the case, refresh page with full quality.

Note that this is a very long page. There are also links at the bottom of this page to my other Spee-Lunker pages as well as links to other peoples' related sites. It is advised that you scroll all the way down first thing to preview all the goodies you will encounter, then come back up and savor your way down. Enjoy!

Did you ever ride "The Spee-Lunker Cave" at Six Flags Over Texas during the 1960's and 1970's? Remember that mysterious, mesmerizing music? Ever wish you could ride it again? Well, this page is about as close as you can get due to my exhaustive efforts at reconstructing my recollections of this ride.

As a youth in the 1960's, I memorized this ride including the music and sound effects. I have still retained much of that and decided to document as much as I could, while I could. I have done so in three or so different forms, one of them being a ride-through audio replication. It is like riding one of the little boats through the ride with a stereo recorder going. Like sending your ears back in time. It was not that simple for me though, since the ride and all records and plans of the original 1960's version have perished.

The audio recording actually began many years ago as I discovered my music collection contained a couple of the pieces of music that were used in The Cave. Sometime during 2000, I was drawn into the idea of creating this audio project. Here and there I began collecting either identical or similar music and sounds of this ride. Toward the "end" of my collecting phase is where I struggled to learn to use an audio mixing and editing application. After I decided my collection was "complete", I began laying down tracks, looping, editing and mixing. Some of the individual tracks began as a separate multi-track project as I had to craft many of the sound effects and some of the music. I lost count of the total number of tracks I had to work with, but it is somewhere between thirty and forty. The total number of sound files I created toward the progress of this final track are 95! Some of those contain multiple tracks within. There could be hundreds of clips altogether!

The most critical music loops are identical to the original ride. I carefully auditioned substitutions for those where I could not obtain the originals. See the update box below for revisions and improvements. The result is a very close and convincing "feel" of the original ride in audio form. What I have provided in the link below is a MP3 file of my project. If you were a guest in this ride in the 1960's, you will be transported back in time! The ride-through (with new intro) is just under 6 minutes in length. I did take about 3 liberties adding sound clues to compensate for the absence of visual information: (1) I padded the entire ride-through with the gentle sound of rippling water to suggest we are riding on water, (2) At the lift and drop, I added a splashing sound, (3) During the thunderstorm, I added the sound of a Boatswain's Pipe to suggest the presence of a ship. Update: I have decided to remove the boatswain's pipe from the audio. Sorry to all of you who Googled boatswain's pipe. I guess I should remove the wording here, but then I want some history of this project to remain.

Tweak Updates
My commitment to make the audio in the link below more realistic.

Revision 02/17/08. I replaced the piece for the "twisting Spee-Lunkers" scene. This is as close to original as I can remember.
Revision 01/30/08. I finally filtered and tuned the hammer "ring" to sound a lot like the original.
Revision 12/15/07. The below two revisions uploaded. Much larger file size, near CD quality!
Revision 12/09/07. Remember the hissing water misters at the "blizzard" scene? Yep! I put them in both places; blizzard entrance & exit.
Revision 12/09/07. The Firbird clip at "lift" is as original (Thanks Bryan H.)
Revision 11/03/07. The music clip from the Spee-Lunker "string choir" (harps) is the original piece (thanks "Capstan").
Revision 08/20/06. Uploaded higher resolution MP3! By request. Not CD quality, but much better than before. File size is doubled, but far fewer artifacts resulting from MP3 compression.
Revision 04/02/05. Brig music upgraded to more closely approximate the original (this is the tune people would sometimes hum or whistle upon exiting the ride).
Revision 9/04. I replaced a music loop (calliope) for one closer to the original and I re-mixed the first half to sound more cacophonic like the actual ride.
Revision 02/09/04. I upgraded the water drops in the fishing-Spee scene. More true the original. I crafted the water drops from a synthetic source, then shaped the sound into dripping water, tuned and timed them just as my recollection.

What Next?

This has been nearly a six-year project to get it this far. I never intended to get this far! I am in need of few things before I can say I have "finished" with this wonderful waste of time. Basically, I am about to the point where 90% more effort will be required to make this 10% better. Soon, I will break away from this and abandon work on it for a few seasons until I see that I have enough additional resources and time to make a substantial improvement. By then, there will be another new operating system that will put my audio-editing software way out of date and require a start from scratch. Shame on you, Microsoft!

After my introduction, crank up the volume and close your eyes. Mixed in life-like stereo. Imagine floating from the hot Texas sun into the small, dark, cool opening. Imagine the little boat floating and bumping into the ever-twisting concrete flume sides. Imagine the dimly-lit, colorful black-lighted scenes, the odd-looking Spee-Lunkers, the surrealistic feel. Remember? It's like you are magically transported to another world! Scroll down below for links to my other Spee-Lunker pages.

This screen shot is of the editing software track labels of a stage of this soundtrack. It grows from time to time. Some of the tracks shown are imported from a separate multi-track project to craft that one track. Keep in mind, the tracks run parallel simultaneously. I have made notes to the left of each track. As you can see, some have been replaced and the old ones remain in the project but are muted. This has been a living project since early 2002.

I will appreciate any photos, audio recordings, etc. some of you may have personally taken inside The Cave. Especially any former SF employees. Don't worry about the quality. Anyone with any technical info, design info, stories, rumors, anything about this ride, please e-mail me. Many thanks to those wonderful folks who have already contributed. I hope to expand this little web section for the enjoyment of all.
-Barry

Back in 1989, Wes Helbling rode through The Cave with his camcorder running. That was a good thing because he has preserved the only known video recording with audio of this ride. Wes has provided a few refreshing crumbs for us Spee-Lunker starved fans! Though this recording is crude and a little dark in areas, it is an important record for fans of this ride. Although personally, I favor the 1960's version of the ride, this video gave me a creepy deja-vu for a few seconds! It has some powerful moments. Ken in Texas viewed this video and decided to administer a "fix" for us "Spee-Junkies". He provided web-space for this video formatted in Real Audio. Get your fix here:

We have the "blue water blues"! We miss the black-lights, the Spees, the eerie music, the musty smell, the cool air, the smooth floating boats bumping into the hard flume. We are obsessed! We are hopeless! Please, somebody help us! Feed us! Please bring back our Spee-Lunker Cave!