Movie Soundtracks

[Nitafrong]

In my mind there are two distinct kinds of movie soundtrack and these are generally in contrasting kinds of films. Up until the last couple of years I always viewed movie soundtracks as a collection of songs seemingly put together like a best of album. Depending on the film these could be a range of popular songs which had only recently been released, or they could feature artists who were not so popular and all playing songs with a similar theme (think Juno soundtrack). I never really thought about all the rest of the music that is generally featured in films- sometimes semi orchestral, sometimes a range of different effects and sounds, until I was presented with the Edward Scissorhands album and really enjoyed it.

Recently there has seemingly been a growth in popularity for both these styles of soundtracks- on one side, there was apparently much jostling and competition for artists to be included on the second Twilight film soundtrack and a number of artists including indie darlings Bon Iver and St Vincent, and even the venerable old man himself Thom Yorke all specially recorded songs for this album, which was one of the top selling albums of all year. On the other side, increasingly musicians are turning their hands to composing soundtracks- such as Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, Jonney Greenwood, and some like Clint Mansell or Danny Elfman do all their work nowadays in this field.

So anyways this is what this thread is dedicated around- soundtracks- both the popular and the orchestral kind. You guys are invited to post your favourites from whatever genre you choose

To start us off I would like to begin with Clint Mansell and his recently released soundtrack for the Moon film. Clint Mansell of course is best known for his song Lux Æterna from the movie Requiem for a Dream. After being rerecorded for the trailer for the Two Towers the song leaped into the mainstream and now used at sporting events frequently. I found the film, Moon, a little disappointing to be honest. While very atmospheric it wasn’t quite as dark or twisty as the trailers seemed to promise. However one of the best aspects of the movie was the background music. I didn’t realise how much of it had stuck with me until I started listening to his a couple of days ago and the familiar refrain instantly struck a cord.

The problem I always had imagined soundtracks had- was without the movie to support them- they were often limp and supported by a few good songs and maintained with lots of silence. While I do really like this album and it has yet to bore me, I must admit that it gets quite slow at times. Its generally a downbeat reflective album with some moments of dark energy and power. When it does kick in though it can really make the goose bumps rise on your arms

Here are a selection of songs from the album to let you get a feel for it.

Spoiler

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Anyways I hope you enjoyed that and please contribute some of your favourites.

 

[The People's Peep]

The first great movie soundtrack that comes to mind is Star Wars. John Williams created probably the greatest and most famous soundtrack in history. The songs are perfect for the scenario and they are some of the most famous orchestral pieces ever. Almost everyone knows how the song of the empire goes and its basically become symbolic for evil.

One that is not so famous, but is unforgettable in my mind is Office Space. The movie is about your normal, white, office workers. Yet, the soundtrack is all gangster rap. When i first saw the movie and saw the three main characters walking through the office in their shirt and ties with Ice Cube playing in the background, i couldnt stop laughing. The music is so wrong for the movie, that its perfect.

 

[Ferbian]

I have to admit I find Hans Zimmer to be incredibly talented with movie soundtracks, and has contributed the movie soundtrack to a majority of my favorite movies, and favorite movie sound tracks.

I've never really been too fond of the whole "actual song" soundtracks, I'm more to the whole instrumental orchestra like soundtracks.
Yet that doesn't mean I'm against a movie soundtrack because "Oh no you didn't just include an actual song.. shame on you" cause I have to admit I liked the main soundtrack for Transformer 2 (for the majority being that I'm a huge Linkin Park fan)

Either way, I have to say that my favorite movie soundtrack is probably the one made by Hans Zimmer to the movie The Gladiator, I loved the whole thing from start to end, and while I have to admit I probably wouldn't enjoy all of them if I had to listen to them cleanly through Youtube or a downloaded album, but I think the association with the movie and the placement of the songs has made it an absolute classic.

Spoiler

All the tracks were composed solely by Hans Zimmer except where noted.

1. "Progeny" – 2:13
2. "The Wheat"– 1:03 (Composed by Lisa Gerrard)
3. "The Battle"– 10:02
4. "Earth"– 3:01
5. "Sorrow"– 1:26 (Composed by Lisa Gerrard & Klaus Badelt)
6. "To Zucchabar"– 3:16 (Composed by Hans Zimmer & Djivan Gasparyan)
7. "Patricide"– 4:08
8. "The Emperor is Dead"– 1:21 (Composed by Lisa Gerrard & Klaus Badelt)
9. "The Might of Rome"– 5:18
10. "Strength and Honor"– 2:09
11. "Reunion"– 1:14 (Composed by Lisa Gerrard & Klaus Badelt)
12. "Slaves to Rome"– 1:00
13. "Barbarian Horde"– 10:33
14. "Am I Not Merciful?"– 6:33
15. "Elysium"– 2:41 (Composed by Lisa Gerrard & Klaus Badelt)
16. "Honor Him"– 1:19
17. "Now We Are Free"– 4:14 (Composed by Hans Zimmer, Lisa Gerrard & Klaus Badelt, Lyrics by Lisa Gerrard[1]

Track number 17 and Track number 3 has proved to be my absolute favorite, and the only 3 songs I could properly stand to listen to without the movie.

Hans Zimmer has provided a lot of composing for all kind of amazing Grammy or Oscar winning movies, big sellers, classics etc. and is associated with Steven Spielberg a lot, and the majority of his soundtracks would prove to fit onto this list if I had to make a top 3, 5 or 10 for that sake.

 

[Cookie]

I've posted about this in a different thread before, but the soundtracks Wes Anderson's films are absolutely brilliant. He just really knows how to pick the perfect music for his movies. So perfect that many songs often become synonymous with certain scenes in his films and because of that, they match up with a certain mood or feeling. I also love that I can pop in the soundtrack to a Wes Anderson film on any given day and listen to it as a stand alone album.

I found the film, Moon, a little disappointing to be honest. While very atmospheric it wasn’t quite as dark or twisty as the trailers seemed to promise.

Oh no you didn't! I am a huge fan of this film, so I'll save this for a more appropriate thread but the excuse "the trailers made it seem such and such" is one of the reasons why I hate most movie trailers these days- they mislead for the sake of garnering a bigger audience and it sucks. That aside, I don't really think the trailer to Moon points toward a dark and twisty film but that's just my two cents... apologies for going off on that little tangent.

 

[Davi323]

Song collection style: I personally love the Dazed and Confused soundtrack, and its companion, Even More Dazed and Confused. Both are a collection of mostly great songs from the 70s, good classic rock.

But, when I think soundtrack, I think orchestral scores first. Star Wars, obviously...but I highly recommend the soundtracks to Conan the Barbarian and The Hunt for Red October by Basil Poledouris, The Abyss by Alan Silvestri, as well as the softer soundtrack to The Princess Bride by Mark Knopffler (Dire Straits).

 

[Nitafrong]

I checked out that album specifically Ferbian (you really should have posted the videos ) and yeah those two songs were pretty good- though as far as I am aware the third song had a bit which was later used in Pirates of the Caribbean as the main theme. Zimmer is good for creating a conventional full orchestral movie song- I suppose that outside the movies I wouldn't really listen to that kind of classical- I prefer it to be a bit more dark.

Hey Cookie Well maybe you should post an appropriate thread in the movie section- either on Moon or trailers- I'll be sure to make my point there Trailers have given me Clint Mansell and Rachid Taha so I can forgive them a lot.

I will try and find those artists when I can Davi323 and The Peoples Peep but its harder when I have to go out of my way to find them I will try and get to them at some point.

Anyways being that I did an orchestral movie soundtrack last time I decided to go for the other example- a collection of songs. I decided to choose- Twilight- The New Moon soundtrack- one I mentioned in the previous post. Anything connected with Twilight at the moment is both highly popular and highly criticised- especially in a forum such as this. Without getting onto the subject of a teenage love story- this album deserves to be listened to on its own merits- if you can only just ignore the images on the front of the CD.

As I mentioned previously the soundtrack managed to get a surprisingly large amount of indie artists striking a good mix between those who you would have heard of- Muse, The Killers, Thom Yorke, The Editors and Death Cab for Cutie and some you perhaps would not have- Lykke Li, Anya Marina, Grizzly Bear, Bon Iver and St Vincent, who have received high critical if not popular success. All of these songs bar two are also exclusive material to the album which is pretty rare for a simple soundtrack album. Some people in the music magazines seem to thing this might be the start of a new trend for releasing music.

In any case I have wasted too much time talking about it rather than the actual songs themselves. Unfortunately for me the album represents something that had great possibilities and ended up falling into average territory. My first possible highlight ended up being a bit of a disappointment as the Bon Iver and St Vincent song didn’t end up as a collaboration- instead it was just a normal Bon Iver song with background female harmonies who could have been anyone.

Lykke Li and Thom Yorke do produce two great songs, and I also really liked Anya Marina who I had never heard of before. Death Cab for Cutie were also pretty good and so was Grizzly Bear- an interesting duet with Victoria Legrand showing their more vaulted peers above how a duet should really be sang.
The other nine songs or so are ok to good- not spectacular but the album is definitely worth a listen or two as it might help introduce you to some new artists and the pedigree of some of those involved here is pretty high. Have a look yourselves below and see what you think. No sparkly vampire jokes though

Spoiler

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[Ferbian]

I checked out that album specifically Ferbian (you really should have posted the videos ) and yeah those two songs were pretty good- though as far as I am aware the third song had a bit which was later used in Pirates of the Caribbean as the main theme. Zimmer is good for creating a conventional full orchestral movie song- I suppose that outside the movies I wouldn't really listen to that kind of classical- I prefer it to be a bit more dark.

Yes Zimmer has supplied the soundtrack to the Pirates of Caribbean, and has reused his themes every now and then, yet I have to admit I also enjoyed the Pirates of Caribbean too, guess I completely forgot about that one while I was making the thread.

Zimmer is incredibly talented and I've grown to love every single movie that he provided soundtrack to, seeing as a lot of his movies are on my top 10 list of favorite movies.

 

[Mr. Steve]

Two soundtracks come to mind for me: The Departed, and Watchmen soundtrack.

Watchmen Soundtrack

Spoiler

1. "Desolation Row" My Chemical Romance 3:01
2. "Unforgettable" Nat King Cole 3:28
3. "The Times They Are a-Changin'" Bob Dylan 3:14
4. "The Sounds of Silence" Simon & Garfunkel 3:07
5. "Me and Bobby McGee" Janis Joplin 4:31
6. "I'm Your Boogie Man" KC and the Sunshine Band 4:03
7. "You're My Thrill" Billie Holiday 3:24
8. "Pruit Igoe" and "Prophecies" Philip Glass 8:37
9. "Hallelujah" Leonard Cohen 4:37
10. "All Along the Watchtower" The Jimi Hendrix Experience 4:01
11. "Ride of the Valkyries" Budapest Symphony Orchestra 5:22
12. "Pirate Jenny" Nina Simone 6:39

The soundtrack, to me, it's sort of a pronunciation of what's going on in the movie itself. You have to watch the movie to truly see what went through Zack Snyder's mind when he picked these songs in particular.

The Departed

Spoiler

1. "Comfortably Numb" (Roger Waters Feat. Van Morrison and The Band, version from The Wall Concert in Berlin) – 7:59
2. "Sail On, Sailor" (Beach Boys) – 3:18
3. "Let It Loose" (Rolling Stones) – 5:18
4. "Sweet Dreams" (Roy Buchanan) – 3:32
5. "One Way Out" (Allman Brothers Band) – 4:57
6. "Baby Blue" (Badfinger) – 3:36
7. "I'm Shipping Up to Boston" (Dropkick Murphys) – 2:34
8. "Nobody but Me" (Human Beinz) – 2:18
9. "Tweedle Dee" (LaVern Baker) – 3:10
10. "Sweet Dreams (Of You)" (Patsy Cline) – 2:34
11. "The Departed Tango" (Howard Shore, Marc Ribot) – 3:32
12. "Beacon Hill" (Howard Shore, Sharon Isbin) – 2:33
Songs not listed here are "Gimme Shelter" By The Stones, "Thieves Theme" by Nas and "Well, Well, Well" by Lennon.

Same as Watchmen, Scorsese did a good job in choosing these songs. Not to mention having "Shipping up to Boston" in both the intro, and while jack Nicholson freaks out is badass.

All in all, I'm very much a fan of both these soundtracks. Another guy that knows how to pick songs is Zach Braff. He won a Grammy for his soundtrack in Garden State.

Spoiler

1. "Don't Panic" - Coldplay — 2:16
2. "Caring Is Creepy" - The Shins — 3:20
3. "In the Waiting Line" - Zero 7 — 4:33
4. "New Slang" - The Shins — 3:51
5. "I Just Don't Think I'll Ever Get Over You" - Colin Hay — 5:18
6. "Blue Eyes" - Cary Brothers — 4:18
7. "Fair" - Remy Zero — 3:54
8. "One of These Things First" - Nick Drake — 4:49
9. "Lebanese Blonde" - Thievery Corporation — 4:46
10. "The Only Living Boy in New York" - Simon & Garfunkel — 3:59
11. "Such Great Heights" (Postal Service cover) - Iron & Wine — 4:12
12. "Let Go" - Frou Frou — 4:12
13. "Winding Road" - Bonnie Somerville — 3:27

Nita, you posted you love for the New Moon soundtrack, and I actually though of Thom Yorke being in it . What I didn't like on that album was how Muse mixed their song. I heard both songs and I don't know why, but their album version is better.

As for Orchestral soundtracks, It's gotta be both Zimmer, and Williams. I love Zimmer's work on the Nolan-verse Batman, and Williams composed the Jaws theme, thus ensuring the fact that you can make a badass theme with just two notes.

 

[Dagger Dias]

Wow, I'm surprised. We have a thread about our favorite movie soundtracks, and nobody mentioned Top Gun? That'll be my addition to this thread then.

The Top Gun Soundtrack is my favorite movie soundtrack because it has such an incredible tracklist in it AND nearly every single track actually show up in the movie at some point. Most movie soundtracks contain one or two songs that show up in the movie (one of them often being the one that plays during the ending credits) along with some orchestral score tracks, and around 10 random popular songs that are thrown onto the cd just for the heck of it. Top Gun is one of the few exceptions where the tracks are all great AND all of them but one or two all show up in the film. In my opinion it's the standard that all other movie soundtracks should live up to, and will probably never be topped.

 

[Nitafrong]

So yeah this thing had slipped quite a bit down the list- time for some fresh music I would encourage those who are commenting on good or their favourite soundtracks to see if they can find some youtube clips of the music. I know myself its much easier for the reader to listen to the music when its just sitting there. But in any case I agree with you Mr Steve about the remix of the Muse song that was in the second Twilight soundtrack- the original always sounded better. On a Radiohead note 15 Step is also played in the first film which shocked me. As surprising as hearing songs from The Bends in Clueless

And yes Dagger Dias- Top Gun always sounded fun. We just to stick it on in the movie rental shop I work in whenever it got slow. Other than the Berlin song though I can't really remember too many other tracks from it.

I am a little embarrassed to say that today I am going to be writing about the next Twilight soundtrack. I had intended to go back to the orchestral side of the coin and do a Nick Cave soundtrack- but the Twilight soundtrack suddenly appeared and it has far too many good songs to avoid a mention. Apparently though a lot of people here have such an aversion to said Vampire movie any mention of it drives them into.... well a blood frenzy

Really though as I said before this is a really good compilation album- one of the best I have ever heard before. Who cares if the proceeds go on to help fund the Vampire uprising- I can guarantee you that if you listen to this album you will come away with new host of favourite songs and most probably a number of new artists that you want to listen to.

When I first noticed this album in the shop a number of key artists stood out to me- Metric, Muse, Florence and the Machine, Beck and Bat for Lashes. All of these are big favourites of mine and any new material (as far as I am aware this time all the songs are exclusive and in the case of these artists definitely so). Of these the Metric song is good but not outstanding, the Muse song is really good fun and just as overblown as Muse do so well. Florence also produces one of her best songs in my opinion and if this is the way her new album is going I am quite excited. Beck and Bat For Lashes do much better than the previous indie dream-team did and while their song may not be as heart wrenching or subtle as Bat for Lashes is at her best- its still a good song.

Spoiler

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Moving on from these there are a lot of other artists included here who I had heard a song or two from like Bombay Bicycle Club and Fanfarlo, The Black Keys, Cee-Lo Green before and produce good songs here too. The real standouts for me though were a host of artists I had never heard before. I am going to have to be as brief as I can here and just list my real favourites- really I could list most of the songs on this album as songs that are worth listening to.

Anyways of these on of the first which stood out was Battles. This is initially a pretty slow paced song which suddenly explodes midway though. It’s hard to describe exactly what style it is- I haven’t heard anything quite like it before. Really good drums and lots of interesting keyboard solos.

Spoiler

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The next band- Vampire Weekend I had of course heard before but I had never really paid much attention to. I think the song is pretty typical for their sound but its just a nice easy listening song which seems to carry a bit more power and presence than some of their previous songs have.

Spoiler

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Another song which grabbed my attention immediately was UNKLE ft The Black Angels. Being that I have never listened to either before I don't know who does what here, but in any case its another great song which is again that little bit different with lots of cool vocal elements.

Spoiler

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Finally the last song I would like to display is perhaps a style which people have stereotyped for this soundtrack- slow and melodic. This song by Sia displays some great vocal work and is a surprisingly calming and yet emotional and effecting song.

Spoiler

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Sorry if this went on for a bit too long and credit to everyone who manages to read the whole thing. However much you may hate the cover of this CD its worth ignoring and giving the music a listen. I must actually find out who puts together these albums. All he/she has to do for the last is include some Icelandic music and I will be in love

 

[The Jabroni]

The soundtrack for Hot Rod is definitely one of my favorites. It's full of cheesy hair metal and simple synth-y instrumental tracks. It really goes well with the absurdity and overall cheesiness of the movie. There's even an entire song based around the words "cool beans." About 50% of the soundtrack is made up of Europe's epic glam rock classics, which creates a hilarious contrast when compared to how goofy the characters are.

Another movie with a really great soundtrack is Forest Gump. I love how the music always corresponds to the time period that Gump is in at the time, and the orchestral soundtrack really catches the mood of the movie.