When I was young I wasn’t able to watch as many movies as I do now. It’s probably the reason why I loved listening to movie soundtracks. It’s a habit I no longer have. When I watch a movie I sometimes don’t even notice the music (which might be a good thing as it means that it’s part of the whole package) and if you would ask me to name some recent movie related soundtracks which stood out I probably wouldn’t get very far. I’d probably mention Drive and Inception (you know the unique sound I mean for that film), but that would be it. So today’s question is:
Do you listen to movie soundtracks and what are your favorites?
As I don’t listen to them anymore picking my favorites I’m afraid I’m going to name a few old ones which I remember fondly (by the way I remember that a lot of “urban” movies had some great R&B and rap related soundtracks, something which seems to have disappeared):
| The Hunt for Red October soundtrack
I don’t know what it was, but the bombastic Russian choir singing on this soundtrack is something I just absolutely loved! It was very powerful and to this day I’m still able to at least hum along with those songs. Must have heard them hundreds of times. |
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| Who Framed Roger Rabbit soundtrack
It was a fun movie and the soundtrack of it had all that joy on it. It could really cheer you up. |
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E.T. soundtrack
I had this soundtrack on a record and once I got my own record player I would put this one on a whole lot. Just like the movie it’s something that takes me back to growing up. |
| Adagio for Strings
Although you might think this has nothing to do with movies it was a movie which pointed me to this amazingly beautiful music. It was used as the opening music in the Al Pacino movie Sim0ne (which wasn’t that good). It really blew me away with the amount of emotion it has. I could imagine this being played at my funeral. |
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Once soundtrack
This is one of those unique movies where the music is just as good as the movie. Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova have made some beautiful music. It never gets boring to me and I’m still planning to learn to play Falling Slowly on the piano. |
Do you listen to movie soundtracks and what are your favorites?
I listen to a lot of movie scores and soundtracks, but most of them are not particularly famous. I’ll just list my favourite movie score composers:
Zbigniew Priesner (THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE, THE DECALOGUE)
Jon Brion (MAGNOLIA, ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND)
Clint Mansell (REQUIEM FOR A DREAM, THE FOUNTAIN)
Those are three big composers I love a hell of a lot.
Those are names I have never heard of (but then again I don’t really have looked into it much). At least I saw 4 out of the 6 movies you mention here 😉
* Clint Mansell (Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain, Black Swan, Moon etc)
* Hans Zimmer (Inception, The Dark Knight, Sherlock Holmes etc)
* Ennio Morricone (The Good The Bad And The Ugly etc)
* Philip Glass (Koyaanisqatsi, The Hours)
* Danny Elfman (Alice in Wonderland)
* Yann Tiersen (Amelie)
* 久石譲 (Spirited Away)
Wow, you listen to a lot of movie soundtracks. What makes you like listening to them so much?
I agree that most of the time I don’t pay a lot of attention to the soundtrack and it is good, because that means it fits into the package, as you said!
2 exceptions I have, that is 2 soundtracks that I have on my iPod, and yes, they are rather girly, but lovely at the same time: Dirty Dancing and 500 days of summer!
Those are girly choices 😉 Is it the original Dirty Dancing soundtrack?
Great question today matey.
I only have one soundtrack I listen to at the moment. It is also on my phone as my ringtone, my wife’s phone as her ring tone….can you guess it?
It inspired the theme to my website
Before your response I was already thinking that you were going to answer with the Drive soundtrack 🙂 Really must have a listen to that one.
Love The Lost Boys soundtrack. One of the few I listen to over and over again.
Is the movie good? Never saw it.
I don’t pay much attention to a film’s score (though there are exceptions, most recently Rango which had plenty of lovely music). As you said, it tends to mostly jut blend in with the whole of the movie. Which is good, because it means it works without pulling me away from the rest of the film. But I rarely listen to scores by themselves.
Soundtracks consisting of “real” songs with vocals, however, I can be quite fond of. Juno’s soundtrack, for instance, has plenty of tracks I find myself listening to on their own. And then there are musicals, such as the already-mentioned Once and The Lion King. My favorite would have to be the one for Chicago, which is just full of great catchy tunes.
Yeah, the music in Rango was great and added a lot to the movie. I don’t like it either when music pulls me out of a movie.
Personally my feeling about musicals really varies on the songs. Personally I didn’t like Chicago much, but loved Moulin Rouge.
I probably listen to soundtracks more than “normal” music. Favourites are:
Transformers (Steve Jablonski)
Inception (Hans Zimmer)
Pirates of the Caribbean (also Hans), and while were at it Rango!
Gladiator (Man I didn’t realise how much Hans Zimmer I listened to!),
You Only Live Twice (John Barry),
Juno soundtrack,
Daft Punk’s soundtrack to Tron Legacy is brilliant,
Warren Ellis and Nick Cave’s music to The Assassination of Jesse James etc etc is beautiful and heartbreaking,
music from Alien, Aliens and Alien3 is also very cool (Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner and Elliot Goldenthal).
I should really stop now!
Such is the joy of Spotify, you can listen to loads for a very minimal price.
That is a big number of soundtracks! Never used Spotify, but some of my friends that do are crazy about it, supposed to be a really good service.
Spotify is great; I pay £5 a month or something like that, which means I don’t get plagued by adverts. After that, if you can find it then you can listen to it, and it’s generally pretty good for soundtracks; just can’t get the Drive soundtrack yet! I would highly recommend it though.
I do listen to movie soundtracks, though not any recent films that I can think of right now. Some of my favorites are the soundtracks for Lawrence of Arabia, The Godfather, The Last of the Mohicans.
Just like me you like your classic soundtracks 😉
Hi, Nostra and company:
About the only soundtracks I’ll listen to are from ‘American Graffiti’ and ‘The Big Chill’.
Lucas complied a great collection of early 60s Kennedy era tunes all backstopped by the great corrupter of America’s youth, Wolf Man Jack.
Still think John Sayle’s ‘The Return of the Secaucus Seven’ is a far superior offering than Kasdan’s ‘The Big Chill’. About the only thing the ‘Chill’ has going for it is its familiar, well executed tunes.
So I’m not the only one who doesn’t listen to them much… Nice to see you writing about the older soundtracks though!
I don’t listen to soundtracks too often, but there are a few exceptions. I also love the Once soundtrack and pretty much all of Glen Hansard’s music. The Magnolia soundtrack is also really strong, and I’ve been listening to the Scott Pilgrim vs. the World soundtrack lately.
I don’t listen to a lot of movie scores, but one exception is the Serenity soundtrack, which perfectly captures the feel of that wonderful movie.
Is the rest of his music like that as well?
My favorite soundtrack from this year is easily…Drive
Some of my other favorites include:
Lost in Translation
Requiem for a Dream
Almost Famous
LOTR
Gladiator
I don’t think you are the only one! I forgot to mention the Lost in Translation soundtrack! That one was great as well.
‘Once’ is a great choice, that would be in for my top 5 favorite soundtracks ever. I think I would definitely put ‘500 Days of Summer’ to be my fave soundtrack ever, love every track in it. Others would be : Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Adventureland, and Reality Bites
Once seems to be very popular! Nice that it gets so much love…
‘Once’ is a great choice, that would be in for my top 5 favorite soundtracks ever. I think I would definitely put ’500 Days of Summer’ to be my fave soundtrack ever, love every track in it. Others would be : Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Adventureland, and Reality Bites
Oooh great topic, Nostra. I’m a huge fan of movie music. I listen to them every day in fact. Some of my faves are Batman Begins, Gladiator, Sense & Sensibility, Cinema Paradiso, the list goes on. I love the more classically-tinged stuff, though once in a while, a little techno is great too, i.e. the TRON soundtrack.
I posted my top twenty list here if you’re interested: http://flixchatter.net/2009/08/07/favorite-movie-music-%e2%80%93-my-top-twenty-list/
So you are one of the biggest movie soundtrack fans then! Will give that post a look!
As you could probably have guessed, The Lord of the Rings soundtracks are my favourites, they’re so atmospheric and I know exactly where each track was played in the film. Recently I bought the Drive soundtrack and the TRON: Legacy one 😀
Yes, no surprise there 😉 A lot of people were raving about those soundtracks, so I’m not surprised!
Great question, here are my favourites;
Pulp Fiction
Reservoir Dogs
Face/Off
The Last Samurai
I cant say that i remember the music from ‘Hunt for Red October’ but I am definitely going to revisit it now.
Interested to hear what you think of that soundtrack!
This is a GREAT question! Esp for me, because almost all that I listen to is movie soundtracks! I’ve mentioned before that my top Pandora stations are Alan Silvestri, John Williams, Howard Shore, Danny Elfman, and Hans Zimmer.
To answer this tough question, I’d have to refer you to a page on my site that was part of a blogathon from Castor at Anomalous Material entitled “Desert Island CD” because my answer was pretty chock-full of soundtracks.
http://wp.me/pWaTa-SY
wow what a great question this week!!
Will check out that article, sounds really interesting! I’d probably would take an mp3 cd as it holds more songs 😉
You must really love your movie soundtracks then if that’s almost everything you listen to!
oh. and super props for mentioning Adagio for Strings by Samuel F. Barber, most famously known for Platoon soundtrack. One of my top fave pieces of music!
I think it’s one of my favorite pieces of music as well, it’s just so beautiful!
Considering that most of the music made in India is for movies, yes I would say I listen to movie soundtracks, even if I don’t want to, I have no choice. I do like them and although I am slightly old school and not big on videos (I like just listening to music and imagining stuff in my mind), still I enjoy it. The same goes for western films, but I don’t get a chance to follow film soundtracks as much as I would like to. I’m not big on movie scores though.
So as long as the movie music has some singing, it means that you are happy to listen to it 🙂
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