It Just Works!

I'm always intrigued when a director or creator takes a greater than average risk when choosing a soundtrack for a movie. Anyone could take the dark visuals of "The Matrix" or "Max Payne" and realize that NIN or Manson would be a natural fit. That's a no-brainer. It always makes me wonder if the creators always had the soundtrack in their head or if they just discovered it by accident. "A Knight's Tale" comes to mind with its classic rock mix; however, that soundtrack felt really obvious and forced at the same time. Wasn't for me, it came off extra cheesy.

You ever hear a song that you would have never expected in a movie or show and it just works with perfection? I recently got sucked in to the movie "Marie Antoinette" partially because of Kirsten Dunst, but primarily because of the soundtrack. One scene in particular where they play New Order's "Ceremony" really caught my eyes and ears.


I was just taken aback at how well it worked. I know the movie is a few years old but I never paid much attention to it.

I am sometimes faced with creating a soundscape for a visual performance. The fashion shows were my favorite last year simply because I was allowed to choose all of the music. Since the visual arts portion of my brain is completely dead, this is the only chance I get to exercise it. At a recent gig, I was given the creative freedom to choose the music for most of the event with the exception of scheduled performances by gymnasts and cheerleaders. After the athletes entered the floor, in front of an audience of over a thousand people, I was to play something kind of upbeat while the athletes took their turn at random acts of gymnastery (lol). There are plenty of obvious songs out there that would have fit perfectly - I think the crowd expected it and would have been okay with anything. In rehearsals I had something up my sleeve that I wasn't going to leak to anyone. I wasn't given much time to prepare for the event but they did give me a sample DVD of previous year's performances. I used the dvd for a few hours trying to find what tempo worked best. Given that the focus would be the athletes I didn't want to use one of those obvious, loud, obnoxious, overplayed "Y'all Ready For This" techno songs. I thought that would just be sensory overload (especially given the amount of equipment I packed in there...I had to use my earplugs for the first time at an event).

Instead, while they were tumbling and flipping all over the place for the first five minutes I went with a Norah Jones remix (Things You Don't Have to Do - Sunrise Remix). The song has a really strong feeling of tension but never releases, and that's when I slide in to a heavy faster beat current electronic song. The Nora Jones song (as a long intro)...worked...and worked very well. Give it a listen and tell me if you can picture it:

http://mp3.rhapsody.com/player?type=track&id=tra.8684952&remote=false&page=&pageregion=&guid=&from=&hasrhapx=false&__pcode=