Earl Bostic - Up There in Orbit
Irma Thomas - It's Raining
Screamin Jay Hawkins - I Put a Spell on You
TW - Jockey Full of Bourbon
TW - Tango Til They're Sore
Little Junior's Blue Flames - Mystery Train
Otis Redding - Pain in My Heart
Rufus Thomas - Memphis Train
The Bar-Kays - Soul FInger
TW - Back in the Good Old World
TW - Good Old World (Waltz)
TW - On the Other Side of the World
Willie Williams - Armagideon Time
RZA - Flying BIrds
RZA - Fast Shadow
RZA - Samurai Theme
The Tennors - Ride Your Donkey
Mulatu Astatke - Yekermo Sew
Tegelle Tezeta
Gubelye
Everybody knows I love the films of Jim Jarmusch. Well, a big part of that is the music that he picks. I've learned about a lot of music that's very important to me now through his films. So I wanted to share a few. I've probably posted a lot of these before, but I like them all together. I added a few videos for context and because I don't actually own Neil Young's Dead Man soundtrack. And I don't have anything from the new film, which seemed to be a lot of Sunn ((()))). Don't really know how to spell that.
Anybody else have music they first met in a good movie?
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14 comments:
Nice post, will listen in depth later as I'm unfortunately off to the east first thing tomorrow. As for other examples, I'd add Hal Hartley- I think he even composed some of the music on Trust/Unbelievable Truth himself. Though probably Trust had the greatest effect on me.
And, err- various Bond soundtracks, and covers thereof, I guess. More the incidental music than the title songs, though.
I also loved the music on Beverley Hills Cop when it came out. Hey, I was 14. The Pointer Sisters, the electronic stuff by Harald Faltermeyer. Ditto Fletch, also with a Faltermeyer soundtrack.
There's also the Ennio Morricone soundtrack to Un Uomo da Rispettare which I recommended on RR this week, though I've never seen the film and don't really want to.
The Gabriel Yared score to Betty Blue (37.2 Le Matin)
I couldn't watch the last third of the movie ever again but the soundtrack and them painting the houses is a fond memory.. (I was stranded in France waiting for the morning ferry when I first watched it at an all night cinema - couldn't understand much - bloody well spoke French all the way though for crying out loud - but looked and sounded amazing to a little 16ish year old.. and boy did they look like they were having fun!)
and an obvious one for a arty farty type.. Drowning by Numbers and The Draughtsman's Contract..Michael Nymans music so perfect for Peter Greenaways painting with celuloid.
Amazing on a big screen and luckily the local 'Dirty old man' cinema owner would show them in the evenings after the naturist documentaries.. weird, but true... must have been the concomitant contrasts of costume and nudity that dragged the punters in (7 in total at drowning, 3 of us watched contract - me the owner and the projectionist)
I once had a cinema to myself watching Crash (the Ballard one), which was rather fun.
Nice post, steen. And yep, I've come across lots and lots of my fave music through films. Off the top of my head:
Celia Cruz - Te Busco (from Lantana)
Caetano Veloso - Cucurrucucu Paloma (from Hable Con Ella)
The whole soundtrack to Shortbus
Lots and lots of Bollywood...
Nothing makes a good film like a good soundtrack. Just ask Tarantino.
Oh, and I well remember being blown away on first hearing Marianne Faithfull's version of The Ballad of Lucy Jordan in Thelma and Louise.
And, once heard, who can forget Paris, Texas?
I can probably only enjoy hip-hop/rap with a film: Ghost Dog, Do The Right Thing, er...
One from the Heart soundtrack (Tom Waits and Crystal Gayle) comes to mind right now for some reason, although there were tonnes and I need to think.
I remember just before Down by Law going on release, being sent by my college newspaper to a Soho Square review theatre (with a bunch of other 4real journos) to watch it. I loved it immediately, although I was already a fan of Stranger than paradise and The Lounge Lizards by then. Most of all, like most reviewers I fell for Roberto Benigni, seeing him as a kind of latin Buster Keaton. Tom Waits was a real surprise as Zack, I remember. As I recall saneshane, that was the same year as 37.2 ce matin came out. My college years (1985 - 88) were great for films (Stand by me, Withnail and I, Working Girls, Captive, Hannah and her Sisters, Betty Blue, on and on..)
Hello everybody. Thanks for your comments. First of all...um...ah, yes... I wanted to say that I forgot to mention that for the most part (other than RZA's Ghost Dog contibutions) this list is songs picked for movies rather than soundtrack tracks. I know that a few of Jarmusch's films had excellent John Lurie Soundtracks that are well worth hearing, but I don't have them to play for you.
ALso, big donds for Hal Hartley (love that sonic youth moment) and for Ennio Morricone. ANd Shortbus and Cucurrucucu.
ALso, since we're talking about films, I've had the strangest... Don't know what to call it. It's like an odd mini-revelation. I've been disappointed by a few films I should have loved...production value/writing/story/general idea/actor- wise. And then last night I watched Pineapple Express. I was just tired and wanted some short, stupid thing. And David said it was a stoner comedy, but I thought he meant...a comedy stoners would appreciate, and I thought...I'm tired enough for that. But it turned out it was a comedy ABOUT stoners. And I was all set to turn it off...Bear (bare?) with me, I think I'm going somewhere with this...The film was dopey, ridiculously violent, just basically ridiculous...But there were a couple of moments of just...real human communication, emotion...soul, maybe. Or maybe I'm just very tired and crazy. It's a strange equation - 2 hours of dopiness, but some nugget of soul that made it a more valuable use of my time than a more highly anticipated, more beautiful and sophisticated film.
...I'm tired, I'm out.
No offense meant for the stoners among us, by the way.
I've only seen a few JJ films, but i've loved every one of them....is there a generally agreed upon "best JJ film" that I should see??
Co-incidentally, I picked up a cheap and battered LP a few weeks ago that has the soundtrack to "Stranger Than Paradise" on one side and "The Resurrection Of Albert Ayler" on the other. Both are by John Lurie. Not sure I liked them that much though, maybe I need to hear the tracks in the context of the films.
The tracks are ace by the way. I've got a "reinterpretation" of "Pain In My Heart" by Holly Golightly called "Ruler Of My Heart" that I had no idea wasn't an original..
As a relative stoner, steen, no offense taken. You can't get a lot better than The Big Lebowski - and if that ain't a stoner film, I don't know what is!
Jap: Ghost Dog is, IHMO, definitely his best. It has lots of the JJ hallmarks but also has a great structure and almost-conventional plot development. I'va always found his films to be 'must-sees' but have often come away less impressed than I wanted to be.
Mystery Train, Down By Law and Night On Earth are all rated highly by many but they didn't quite ring my bell. I enjoyed Dead Man more.
Chris - The Big Lebowski was certainly brilliant, and also certainly about stoners. Good point. Pineapple Express seems to have been made by the same people who made Superbad. They have a knack of adding depth to genres that don't usually have it.
Japanther - it's hard to pick a favorite Jarmusch film, and I have thought about it. I love Ghost Dog and Dead Man, too. But I think if I had to pick one that was Practically Perfect in Every Way I'd go with Down By Law. Although Mystery Train is right up there, and about a third of it is in Japanese, so that might be fun for you Japanese-speakers.
Holly Go Lightly did some songs for Broken FLowers! I was just reading about her yesterday as I painstakingly researched this post.
Here's a video for one...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSPhJvOsyY0
Not quite on topic, but...
I picked up an English-language DVD at the library, a film called 'Conversations With Other Women', which I'd never even heard of (the film revolves around a flirtatious encounter between Helena Bonham-Carter and a big blonde bloke at a wedding). A beautiful French song was featured, so I kept my eyes peeled as the credits rolled through... and it turned out to be Carla Bruni. I was really surprised, because I didn't think I liked her at all (possibly a case of overkill: the guys at work tend to go for ex-models as their foremost choice of chanteuse)!
thanks Chris and Steen. I have seen Ghost Dog, but didn't know it was JJ until this post!
I'll definitely check the local video shop for Down By Law in the next couple of weeks though...
I gave the John Lurie LP another spin and it's kinda growing on me..
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