It was a little less than one year ago when I gave a stellar review for the soundtrack to Robert Rodriguez's Desperado, and both the film and the soundtrack went on to be placed on my top ten lists at the end of the year. And now, here I am writing a review for the soundtrack for From Dusk Till Dawn, Rodriguez's latest picture, this one written by Quentin Tarantino.
It should come as no surprise that the soundtrack contains all the trademarks that assure you of its maker's origins. There are soundbites aplenty (and since From Dusk Till Dawn is surely one of the most vulgar movies ever made, it stands to reason that the soundbites are, as well - so beware), but like the soundtrack for Desperado, the music has a certain South-of-the-border flavor, featuring artists like Tito & Tarantula, ZZ Top, and the late Stevie Ray Vaughan.
The contributions by Stevie Ray Vaughan and his band Double Trouble, "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and "Willie the Wimp (and His Cadillac Coffin)" are the two highlights to the album. Vaughan's ability to create a six-minute song with only two minutes of vocals and not have the song become some mindless trek into the realm of "guitar gods" is one of the many things that made him such an incredible performer in life, and one that is sorely missed.
Other strong tracks on the album, are "Foolish Heart" by country/pop stars The Mavericks, "Dark Night" by The Blasters and "Texas Funeral" by Jon Wayne - a song which shows the truth in the DeNiro line from The Untouchables: "We laugh because it's funny - and we laugh because it's true."
Unlike the soundtrack for Desperado, From Dusk Till Dawn actually features some of the score for the film, composed by Graeme Revell. "Mexican Standoff" and "Sex Machine Attack" run about two minutes total, but do more to show the character of the film than all the sound clips on the album combined.
And indeed, the only weak link in the album has nothing to do with any of the songs or their contributors, but the film itself and Rodriguez and Tarantino's insistence to infuse the album with bits from the film. On the soundtracks for Pulp Fiction and Desperado, the bits from the film were interesting, from Samuel L. Jackson's memorable speech to Antonio Banderas discussing salvation with Steve Buscemi.
But in From Dusk Till Dawn, there really isn't that much interesting about the film. As it is, unless you have a serious love for B-horror films - or are a mindless follower of Tarantino, you won't get it. The movie revels in its excesses, be it in language (one scene alone featuring Cheech Marin insured the film of an R rating - and of course, it's on the soundtrack), or in violence (a five-minute sequence where body parts and blood continually fly around is surprisingly enough not the climax of the movie). But unlike the movie, the soundtrack for From Dusk Till Dawn could have stood on its own without giving in to the same excess - and Tarantino and Rodriguez would have been better to have let it.
(Ed. note: The author has also written a film review, at: http://www.linknet.net/sean/enter/movies/fdtd.htm )
