Soundtrack: Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist-- Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Yes, the playlist is here... but is it infinite?

Based on the hip, wildly popular young adult novel by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan, Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist follows the young, romantically burned bass player Nick (Juno and Superbad’s Michael Cera) over the course of an adventurous, sleepless night lived after hours in the underground indie rock scene of New York. Joining him in his musical scavenger hunt to discover the location of a secret show featuring a legendary band is the far worldlier Norah (Charlie Bartlett’s Kat Dennings). And the two opposites attract over their taste in killer tunes in director Peter Sollett’s cinematic adaptation of Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.

Arguably the Fall release that’s been receiving the most buzz in the film world with infectious trailers and interactive opportunities for fans to build their own streaming musical playlist, video, or photo filled widgets from Sprout Builder and Sony Pictures, while the film itself doesn’t open until October 3, the soundtrack has been garnering pre-orders since August.

Set to hit the street on September 23, the jam-packed, eclectic and catchy fifteen track album (which will also be released in limited edition in vinyl directly from Atlantic Records), offers listeners the chance to play musical detectives right along with Nick and Norah as we groove to the alternately snappy and splendorous offerings by some of indie rock’s finest bands who have yet to catch on to the general public.

After only a few listens, with refreshingly a different artist for each and every tune, I was hooked. Ready to track down more from nearly every act included and thankfully via MySpace and band websites, you’ll be able to locate them far quicker than Nick and Norah do in the film. Of course, had they just grabbed a laptop, there would’ve been no need for a book, let alone a movie.

The disc opens with the melancholic yet pretty “Speed Of Sound,” by the late Chris Bell which helps evoke Nick’s heartache audibly as it laments tragedy throughout the endlessly depressing lyrics making the beauty of the track seem like an ingeniously ironic counterpoint. However, Devendra Banhart’s “Lover,” a toe-tapping and peppy propositional come-hither tune with a great hook about ninety seconds in, establishes the sheer joy and optimism of whimsical and surprisingly funny new young love.

Ratcheting it up several decibels, Bishop Allen’s “Middle Management,” a ska-punk lite track is a highpoint and used throughout promos for the film and can be heard as one of many soundtrack tunes in the veritable musical scrapbook that is the film’s official trailer.

Theatrical Trailer

The quirky electronic keyboard sounding “Ottoman,” seems oh so much sweeter than one would assume given the band’s far scarier sounding name of Vampire Weekend. Additionally, it’s one of several tracks that I felt a kinship with as a fan of other experimentally prone bands like Belle and Sebastian and The Magnetic Fields as strings and other instruments join in while it continues. The retro sounding “Riot Radio” by The Dead 60s is exactly the type of bar band jump up and down song one would associate with the underground scene the characters navigate, not to mention it makes killer use of the guitarist. And wearing its punk roots proudly, it manages to work in a police siren as well, causing me to check my rearview mirror each and every time it played in my car.

The innocuous, lighter and gentle “Fever” by Takka Takka backs off from the loudness of the previous number and serves as a great intro to one of my absolute favorites on the disc, “Xavia” by The Submarines. An epic track that actually ends and restarts, it invites a sing-along more than any other offering in a truly great collection and the musicality augments the female singer’s voice to breathtaking effect. Picking up the pace and fitting to the film and plotline is the addictive “After Hours” by We Are Scientists, followed by the groovy yet minimalist Band of Horses offering “Our Swords” which uses the lyrics and singer’s delivery as a sort of a call and answer with the rest of the band who accepts the challenge and strengthens the piece.

Army Navy’s affable “Silvery Sleds,” is radio-friendly and has “now heard on the CW channel” written all over it. It builds with angst filled lyrics, sure to strike a chord with numerous characters on the teen friendly network and rocks harder as it builds. “Baby You’re My Light,” by Richard Hawley slows the album down with a romantic ballad, but just to make sure that we haven’t nodded off, Shout Out Louds serve up “Very Loud,” that deceptively begins slowly until it does grow very loud “little by little” as the lyrics promise, with a great hook again heard in the official trailer.

Paul Tiernan’s “How To Say Goodbye,” is unabashedly romantic and makes due with an appropriately minimal amount of instrumentation. Tiernan wistfully sings about love gone wrong with only keyboard accompaniment and his voice decreases into a little above a whisper as he bids the song farewell and strings come in at the last moment, possibly to bid him a mutual adieu. The Real Tuesday Weld’s aptly titled “Last Words” is the last vocal track on the album and again reminded this listener of Belle and Sebastian with its majestic, quiet beauty until the album wraps up with “Nick & Norah’s Theme.” The sole composition from the original score is by the ridiculously talented Royal Tenenbaums, Bottle Rocket, and Rushmore composer Mark Mothersbaugh.

As quirky and inventive as Mothersbaugh’s more famous works, it provides a terrific capper to a stellar album of mostly obscure artists. And no doubt that’s part of the reason they’re so damn cool and warrant including in a film about knowledgeable and hip music fans that you probably wouldn’t see caught dead listening to adult contemporary radio or Hannah Montana.

While initially, I worried that the eclectic mix may seem a bit too far flung to go together well or as a friend bluntly phrased it, fearing that it appeared as though “a hipster party threw up.” Instead it is just the opposite and will no doubt serve as a gateway album to get listeners more acquainted with the other work from the bands and no doubt making other legendary soundtrack compilers jealous such as the king of cool movie music himself, Mr. Cameron Crowe.

Complete Track-Listing

1. Chris Bell – “Speed Of Sound”
2. Devendra Banhart – “Lover”
3. Bishop Allen – “Middle Management”
4. Vampire Weekend - Ottoman”
5. The Dead 60s – “Riot Radio”
6. Takka Takka – “Fever”
7. The Submarines – “Xavia”
8. We Are Scientists – “After Hours”
9. Band Of Horses – “Our Swords”
10. Army Navy – “Silvery Sleds”
11. Richard Hawley – “Baby You're My Light”
12. Shout Out Louds – “Very Loud”
13. Paul Tiernan – “How To Say Goodbye”
14. The Real Tuesday Weld – “Last Words”
15. Mark Mothersbaugh – “Nick & Norah’s Theme”

Soundtrack: Chaos Theory

Composer Gilad Benamram's Henry Mancini styled score excels at musical theory... even if ultimately the soundtrack is a bit chaotic.

Originally Published at Blogcritics:

It’s ironic that the lyrics of The Damwells’ opening song “Golden Days” urge “baby, please don’t rush; keep the tempo slow” as this folksy and nostalgic, yet irresistible soft rock number stands for attributes which are the polar opposite of Chaos Theory's ead character, Frank. While actor Ryan Reynolds’ Frank is an efficiency expert who lives by catchphrases such as “a specific list is a happy list,” it’s Frank’s supportive yet justifiably exasperated wife Susan (Emily Mortimer) who seems to take The Damwells’ advice to heart.

This is especially apparent when, shortly after the film begins, in order to get her husband to slow down, Susan mistakenly changes a clock the wrong way. Thus, instead of giving him more time to relax, her thoughtful yet erroneous action throw his life off-balance and the day ends with a series of misunderstandings and chance encounters.

Now with his path thrown completely out of whack, Frank embraces the idea of chaos and tells his best friend Buddy (Stuart Townsend) that he’s “decided never to decide another thing again,” and to this end, he writes down everything he’d like to do on a series of cards, choosing one at random to guide his actions, which propels the rest of the film’s plot as you can see in the trailer.

Former music video director turned feature filmmaker Marcos Siega has proven in the past that he knows the right way to incorporate music into his work and the eclectic offerings available on the soundtrack to his latest film Chaos Theory are no exception. Although he reteams with his Pretty Persuasion scorer, the talented Israeli composer Gilad Benamram for Theory’s sixteen original works which are available on the compact disc, he opens with seven pop songs sure to grab hold of the listener.

And therefore it’s no wonder that he opts to begin with the strongest track by The Damnwells, who also contribute three other songs, including the sweet, yet forgettable, “Say” and “Graceless.” However, the group’s romantic and lyrically impressive “Tonight and Forever” makes a fitting closure to the album’s vocal inclusions before listeners venture further into Benamram’s score to relish in his extraordinarily colorful and sophisticated, playful selections.

Yet, it’s The Damwells that get the biggest boost off the contemporary tracks upfront, especially as Wikipedia reported, they came into the spotlight when the now engaged Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson appeared together as a couple at one of their concerts last fall. My favorite mainstream track was the extraordinary “Be Gentle With Me,” by indie UK artists, The Boy Least Likely To (which you can hear on their MySpace Page).

Employing bells to create a deceptively precious or — to quote the title — “gentle” feel, “Be Gentle With Me,” quickly turns into an infectious, hip and danceable track sure to put a smile on one’s face. The type of song that instantly calls to mind the upbeat songs chosen for iTunes and Target ads. Upon further research, I was unsurprised to discover that the song has been used in several television shows, commercials, and promotional videos for everything from One Tree Hill to Grey’s Anatomy to Juno as well as the fashion chain The Limited.

Like “Golden Days,” it’s the type of song you’ll instantly want to download, but it’s in the inventive and creatively bold arrangement that first hooks you from the start. Although I disagree with the band’s self-labeled style “country disco,” I couldn’t agree more with their Rolling Stone Magazine confession of likening their sound to what would happen “if all your childhood stuffed animals got together and started a band.”

In fact, given the enormous potential for repeat listens of “Be Gentle With Me,” it’s fairly easy to overlook the next two tracks, the faster drum based, bar band like “Calypso Slide,” by Walking Concert and the adult contemporary, easy listening feel of “You Fall Off,” by Gingersol which sort of sounded like what would have happened if the Wallflowers had had church choir training, with lyrics lamenting that they “won’t keep taking; faith you’re trading.”

And while the original, radio-friendly tracks are a bit forgettable, aside from the aforementioned standouts, Chaos Theory’s composer Gilad Benamram introduces us to his style with the mischievous, whimsical tone of his opening number “Back Door Exits.” Immediately grabbing our attention, he steps the quality up several notches, taking us on an auditory trip down memory lane by sliding right into the next three remarkable numbers “Careful Frank,” “My Wife, The Movies,” and “Five Minutes Efficiency Trainer.”

While together, they make a remarkable triple threat or — to pay homage to another hockey themed track — “Streak Ice,” a hat-trick, on their own, they’re quite remarkable. Beginning with the sultry and sweeping 1960’s cocktail lounge styling of “Careful Frank,” Benamram seems to draw inspiration from the old Sinatra standard “Young At Heart,” before he builds up the anticipation with the frantic plucking of strings until other instruments join into his larger, orchestral based and jazz influenced “My Wife The Movies.”

And while, on a first listen, these pieces did sound vaguely familiar, it wasn’t until it bridged into “Five Minutes Efficiency Trainer,” that I was able to place Benamram’s most overwhelming influence to the undeniable genius of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Pink Panther scorer Henry Mancini with Benamram’s homage to one of the greatest and most sophisticated comedic composers.

Unfortunately, these three tunes proved to be the standout, as the rest of the album all seemed to suffer the all-too-familiar fate of movie soundtracks. Specifically with clips that are far too short to seduce. Instead of reeling us in, Chaos Theory eventually flows together into amiable, unchallenging, background music which serves the feel of the movie but doesn’t provide an overly satisfying listening experience for soundtrack buyers. Although this being said, when Benamram swings, he really swings and I applaud his courage for refusing to phone in a simple, innocuous, romantic comedy score.

And those who are interested in the medium will definitely want to take note of those incredibly promising tracks, which may send you clicking over to Amazon to discover more by the composer, or at the very least — in spite of their Bart Simpson like under-achieving name — trying to track down other selections from The Boy Least Likely To. So therefore in the end, when it comes to analyzing Chaos Theory (read original movie review here), those are the boys who are most likely to succeed after all.

Soundtrack: Tropic Thunder

Originally Published at Blogcritics:

A veritable "Ball of Confusion" to "Run Through The Jungle”-- hilarity is this soundtrack’s “Name Of The Game.”

Propelled by one of the strongest movie marketing campaigns of the summer from offering up fake documentary clips online to echo the film’s Apocalypse Now roots, becoming the subject of a mock E! True Hollywood Story, and producing enough posters and ads to fill a football field, as a film critic I’ve been bombarded by Tropic Thunder imagery for months.

There’s a risk when the Hollywood hype machine goes into overdrive that by the time the film comes out, it’ll have annoyed audiences so much that they won’t spend their hard earned money on tickets since they felt they’d seen it already (i.e. Adam Sandler’s Click) but there's also a flip-side. This was evidenced in 2008's best case scenario, specifically the smash success of Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight, that by billing itself the “event” movie of the summer, Knight's marketers actualized that self-fulfilling prophecy in ways nobody predicted with records broken by the minute.

While it will no doubt pale in comparison to Knight, Tropic Thunder arrives in theatres at a time when audiences who were inundated with comic book movies and action heroes from Iron Man to Indiana Jones sorely need a comedy. Yet cleverly, unlike Step Brothers which billed itself as straight comedy and Pineapple Express which startled audiences by its emphasis on action, Tropic Thunder hasn’t been bashful about what it wants to be — namely the ultimate action comedy of the summer. Using the war film paradigm, Stiller combines it with his favorite subject of the out-of-touch, egomaniacal industry in which he works to tell the story of spoiled actors starring in a Vietnam movie who find themselves the targets of a real battle. For Thunder, Stiller lampoons Hollywood and stereotypical action films in one fell swoop and while I felt the results were mixed, when it works — just like war is hell -- the film is as funny as hell.

However, just as clever as their marketing campaign has been, Tropic Thunder goes one better by serving up an Original Motion Picture Soundtrack that not only builds up anticipation for the film but revels in its off-the-wall humor as just looking over the track titles alone will send CD listeners into giggles.


Opening the album with "The Name Of The Game" (The Crystal Method's "Big A** T.T. Mix) — which you can hear for Windows, QuickTime, and Real Audio — the track blends some of the most hilariously unspeakable yet quotable lines the cast delivered from the film with a head-bobbing beat, not only sets you up for the film but the rest of the disc’s eclectic offerings as well.

Serving up everything from typical war fare, including protest songs of the 60’s to a hip toe-tapping techno driven piece by Ben Gidsjoy called “Ready Set Go,” the album further deviates from standard fare with bizarre inclusions such as a power ballad, a New Age track by Enigma, classic MC Hammer, the theme song from The Jeffersons and the commercial jingle for his fictitious Booty Sweat soft drink line called “I Love Tha P***y,” by cast member Brandon T. Jackson.

As crazy as it sounds, as cast member Robert Downey Jr.’s Kirk Lazarus would say, "Crazy's better than nothin'," and the soundtrack manages to capture the spirit of the freewheeling film. While we’ve all heard Edwin Starr’s "War" and the music of Credence Clearwater Revival played in countless war films, “Run Through The Jungle” still sounds as great as it ever did and I defy anyone to listen without turning up the volume. In the same spirit of the era, by choosing the great protest themed “Ball of Confusion (That’s What The World Is Today),” which is one of the funkier tracks by The Temptations helps reintroduce the group to audiences who best remember them from their sweeter and far more overplayed hits like “My Girl.”

And while I admittedly did giggle the first three times I played Mc Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This,” on the fourth listen I was ashamed that not only was I on play-count number four but also that I do remember each and every word from that song when it was initially released. And what's more, I’ll even be brave enough to say it’s aged particularly well and still manages to hook listeners in.

Several of tracks play much better after you see the film and realize the way the filmmakers managed to work in the song cues such as the aforementioned Jackson “P***y” track which plays over a fake ad preceding the film as well as Enigma’s “Sadness, Pt. 1” which heightens laughs during a Brokeback Mountain meets The Thorn Birds mock movie trailer starring Downey’s character and actor Tobey Maguire. And while the pop-culture images evoked by some of the works including Ja’net Dubois’ “Movin’ On Up,” best known as the theme song to The Jeffersons seems especially out of place, it’s cited in one of many hilarious confrontations between Downey and Jackson and ditto for Steppenwolf’s Easy Rider featured “The Pusher” which subtly underscores the drug withdrawal of junkie actor Jack Black in a series of escalating scenes.

Oddly most of these tracks, like Dan Hill’s power ballad “Sometimes When We Touch,” that serves as a particularly funny ringtone of a supporting character, are barely used in the film. Yet they all make terrific soundtrack fodder, proving more consistently humorous than the film itself. Moreover, it’s a rare but admirable feat when a potential CD buyer and ticket holder are already sent into hysterics not by footage from a trailer but from an especially offbeat soundtrack.

Of course, it helps infinitely when one of the album producers working behind the scenes is the film’s co-writer, director and star Ben Stiller, who knows a thing or two about how to make an audience laugh. And while, given some of the language in the opening and closing tracks — much like the film — the soundtrack is probably best rated R, Stiller definitely serves his purpose in whetting our appetite, engaging our curiosity, and above all, cracking us up as we prepare for some Tropic Thunder.

Read the 2-Disc DVD Review

Soundtrack: Definitely, Maybe Original Score

Composer Clint Mansell is a Definitely; the soundtrack is a Maybe

Review Originally Published at Blogcritics:

Prior to his breakout success composing the score for Darren Aronofsky’s groundbreaking Sundance Film Festival winning directorial debut, Pi, Clint Mansell was best known in his native England as the front-man for his band Pop Will Eat Itself. And although he earned some cult status following the success of Aronofsky’s independent sensation, it wasn’t until he composed not just the score but the masterful track “Lux Aeterna” for Aronofsky’s follow-up Requiem for a Dream that he’d completed the work which would become synonymous with his name.

Arguably one of the most gifted and inventive composers working in the cinematic medium today with “Lux Aeterna” being used in countless trailers, as the official theme for several sporting events and more, nonetheless despite critical acclaim and awards, Mansell stayed true to his indie roots. While he’s earned enough fans that Wikipedia reported Lakeshore Records was forced to issue a second edition of the Smokin’ Aces soundtrack after the filmmaker, Joe Carnahan received “blatant threats” due to Mansell’s relative absence from the original disc release, Mansell still remains one of the industry’s best kept secrets.

Having contributed compositions for such films as Barbet Schroder’s Murder By Numbers (which launched Ryan Gosling), Nicolas Cage’s directorial debut Sonny (starring a then-unknown James Franco), twice collaborating with indie filmmaker Bart Freundlich for Trust the Man and World Traveler, it wasn’t until he reunited with Aronofsky that he earned a Golden Globe nomination for his score to the otherwise largely critically panned film, The Fountain.

However, most recently, he was offered the chance to move into considerably lighter genre territory with the prospect of composing the score for writer/director Adam Brooks’ clever 2008 romantic comedy Definitely, Maybe. To summarize my original review, the film surrounds Will Hayes, a thirty-something father (Ryan Reynolds) who is coerced into revealing the saga of his romantic life to his precocious ten year old daughter Maya (Abigail Breslin). Intriguingly opting to avoid the traditional tale of his courtship with Maya’s mother, Will crafts an impromptu love story mystery that features his associations with the three women with whom he had any serious attachment: Emily (played by Invincible’s Elizabeth Banks), Summer (Rachel Weisz; incidentally Aronofsky’s fiancé), and April (Wedding Crashers star Isla Fisher). Thus, in the end, Will leaves it up to Maya to decipher which one is her mother since the names and some facts have been changed. Ultimately, like 2007’s Peter Hedges’ romantic comedy-drama Dan in Real Life, Brooks’ Definitely, Maybe turned out to be one of the most sophisticated and intelligent offerings for adults in the otherwise predictable genre overly reliant on gross-out gags and clichéd stereotypes.

Eager to work on a romantic comedy “that won’t make you puke,” composer Clint Mansell confessed on his MySpace blog that as the film provided “a new challenge… compared to recent movies,” he’d scored, he was eager to take a “different approach,” adding, “it was just what I was looking for.”

Yet despite my deep admiration and respect for Mansell’s musical genius, I wish I could say that the soundtrack was as memorable as the film but unfortunately it isn’t. Ironically, with a soundtrack that clocks in at less than thirty-four minutes, the problem isn’t with his work per se. No, rather it’s that Definitely, Maybe’s eighteen track disc plays like a clichéd high school tease as just when Mansell's barely exited the set-up and moved into the song itself, the tune is over nearly as abruptly as it began. Despite this, it kicks off on a strong note with the album’s theme-establishing standout track “Will Hayes For President!” which could just have easily been titled “Download This Immediately,” as it’s a great song on its own.

And right away, we realize that we’ve been introduced to a softer side of Mansell than the masculine, hard-edged combination of metal, steel, and computerized techno offered in his earliest work for Aronofsky. In fact, initially, it seems as though he’s working in the same vein as Badly Drawn Boy’s score for the movie About a Boy and Mark Mothersbaugh’s work for Wes Anderson’s first few films (especially The Royal Tenenbaums).

However, some of the deliciously groovy, techno entrenched hooks, romantic guitars, and jazzy drums Mansell utilizes end far too quickly, making us crave longer, more complete tracks to revel in as a rather large majority of Definitely, Maybe’s singles average two minutes or less with a few concluding after just forty or fifty seconds. Thereby, it makes it hard to stay entirely invested or differentiate between some of the titles as a few feel like lukewarm, unfinished exercises in theme variation of the romantic motif he establishes in the first track.

And indeed, in the next four songs, “Here Comes Summer,” “For Emily (Whomever She May Be…), “April (Come She Will)” and “Jane Eyre,” he builds that theme to a passionate effect that’s pleasant to listen to as pianos, guitars, and other instruments are added in to reinvent the same theme but ultimately it still feels like it’s an unanswered musical phrase.

While admittedly, this fits in with the constant questioning the audience and Maya wrestles with throughout the film as we struggle to identify which woman became his mate, however to employ this musically makes it frustrating for listeners who want the phrase answered.

Moreover, I couldn’t help but wonder if additional romantic themes had been introduced (perhaps one for each woman) or some of the tracks which flowed into one another naturally had been joined for the soundtrack, if it would’ve benefited the experience, since it’s hard to imagine roughly thirty-four minutes of music filling the nearly one hundred and twenty minute running time of the film. While some nice playful musical exploration occurs in “Cometh The Hour, Cometh The Man” along with “Summers Over” (one of a few typos included in the track list), the brevity of the disc is bogged down as the same familiar theme creeps into nearly every song.

Although, to be fair, there are a few other standouts on the album, such as the painfully short forty second “Panic Situations” that sounds like vintage Mansell, the cool jazzy cocktail lounge feel of “An Evening At The Odeon” which wouldn’t have been out of place alongside David Holmes’ scores for Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven series, and another download-worthy, full-length track entitled “The Candidate.”

But the thing that’s the most heartbreaking is that some of the tracks such as “Sunday, Sunday” — which is staged like a rock song and would’ve benefited from a longer length and possibly lyrics — would’ve probably made outstanding songs in their own right, yet when they’re all packaged together as a whole, Definitely, Maybe’s Original Motion Picture Score mostly makes for likable background music on a Sunday morning. Needless to say, given the immense talent of Mansell, this is a major letdown. However, this being said, it did make me instantly return to some of my favorite titles from the composer’s catalogue like the incredible “Lux Aeterna” and wish that Definitely, Maybe had been given the “Lux” treatment.