Wow, I thought it was written for the film until now! How embarrassing… Not only for the song suiting, but the title too. As it’s a bleak post-ecological society.

There is a story about how Ridley Scott wanted to use this specific piece and a couple more by Vangelis in Blade Runner, and Vangelis told him: why reuse my old pieces, I can make a new score for this film specifically.

And so he did, in some short timeframe.

I think Scott did this to Jerry Goldsmith for ALIEN as well, except Jerry wasn't happy about reusing music.

Don’t you have to ask the composer for permi$$ion anyway? Or do things work differently in Hollywood?

In the end, it's whoever pays for the rights.

I think it was a piece of music from another film, also by 20th Century Fox, that they used as a temp track, and Scott liked it so much he made it happen. Goldsmith was not best pleased.

It'll probably be the music for the opening titles, because when I bought the album in the 80s I was suprised (disappointed actually) that piece wasn't on it, and leaving off the opening titles is a real omission in a movie soundtrack.

not if you are stanley kubrick ;) (2001)

Wasn't there going to be an original score and then Kubrick decided that he liked his mockups better?