There's a right and a wrong way to do a movie soundtrack. And as luck would have it, we have examples of both on the market right now. But first, we must look at a couple of things which a good soundtrack album should have in order to be a success:
1) Good songs - period. Nobody wants to even watch a movie filled with crap, and they certainly don't wanna buy the crappy soundtrack of said movie. Where people seem to get confused with this point is in assuming that "popular" means "good". It doesn't. There are plenty of soundtracks out there (Ace Ventura II, Dangerous Minds, etc.) with fairly bad songs on them that just happen to be Top 40 hits. But enough of that, on to the next point.
2) At some point in the film, you should actually be able to hear at least one note from each song on the soundtrack. This in and of itself is a pretty deep point, and since one of the soundtracks we'll be looking at violates it in a most heinous fashion, we'll
elaborate on it more in a bit.
That's about it. No long list of demands, just two simple requests. Give us something we can hear in the movie, and make it work hearing. Just because Ace of Base has a hit song, that doesn't mean I want to see Uma Thurman and Christian Slater dancing to it. But enough speculation, because right now on the shelves we have two new albums with show us without a doubt the right and wrong way to make a soundtrack album - and not only are they two new soundtracks, but they're soundtracks to the two biggest films at the box office so far this summer.
The right soundtrack is Twister. This motley concoction of songs from artists ranging from Van Halen to Shania Twain not only works well as an album, but the songs also coexist perfectly in the film. From the back-home feel of Mark Knopfler's "Darling Pretty" to the country swagger of Twain's "No One Needs To Know", the songs are arranged so that you never go from one extreme to another in between songs, giving the soundtrack the feel of a damn good compilation.
And in the film itself, the songs are all visible. Got some trucks racing to catch a tornado? "Human Beings" by Van Halen, with its trademark drum sound and borderline rap vocals by Sammy Hagar, serves as the perfect backdrop. Got some people just sitting around and waiting for a tornado (these two actions make up the whole of Twister, by the way)? Then put on "BT's Tornado Mix" of "Talula" by Tori Amos and you're good to go.
On the other hand, the soundtrack for Mission: Impossible is the perfect example of how not to do a soundtrack. Of course, the album isn't really a soundtrack - why right there on the cover it tells us that these are "Songs From and Inspired By The Film Mission: Impossible". For those of you who don't know, "Songs From and Inspired By" translates roughly to "Only a couple of these songs have a damn thing to do with the movie, but the artists are hot or some (industry) people want them to be hot, so here they are".
Of the fifteen tracks on the album, only five of them actually appear in the movie, and what's worse is that three of them are portions of the Danny Elfman score and another is the Larry Mullen/Adam Clayton remake of the original theme song. So basically, with the exception of The Cranberries' "Dreams", none of the other ten tracks on the album ever appear in the film.
And this isn't an entirely bad thing, either. Many of the songs, from Bjork's "Headphones" to "You, Me and World War III" by Gavin Friday just aren't that good. And while they would probably make good album or B-side filler, they really don't have a place on this soundtrack.
So basically, let's sound the call now and sound it loud. With movies like The Crow II: City of Angels and Cable Guy rushing up on us, it's time to make it known that if all record companies are going to do for a soundtrack is recycle the same songs from the same artists over and over, then - and I'll just speak for myself on this one - I'd rather have the score...at least those can be useful for something, because as it is now, the majority of soundtracks make great coasters and little else.
