Essential Soundtracks (The Ultimate Movie Album) - Various Artists

...this album.

Essential Soundtracks was released back in 1999, the second year of my A-levels and I bought this CD in Woolies for a mere £4.99 for a 40 track double CD, I purely bought this for the more trendy numbers from Leftfield, Iggy Pop & Orbital, being a bit of a dance freak at the time. What I didn't anticipate at the time it just how many fantastic tracks this album contained and how, 7 years later I'd find myself trawling ebay ...
...tracks on this album.
Essential Soundtracks is much a busy album, running from genre to genre, decade to decade, film to film, I do think as a listener you need something as good as Perfect Day to make you appreciate the album as a whole.
A wonderful finale to an album which crosses so many musical genres, awakens memories of our favourite films and makes us appreciate the music in them we may have missed first time round.

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I am a huge music fan, I have been since I was old enough to listen and since that day, I have had a diverse music taste, I cannot pin point my favourite genre and I find music very uplifting & I especially love music in films.

So, did you, like me, love the music used in Uma Thurman & John Travolta's dancing scene in 'Pulp Fiction', did you feel Donna Summer's 'Hot Stuff' dancing scene in 'The Full Monty' was great, did you love the hustle soundtrack to 'Lock, Stock & 2 Smoking Barrels'? Are you a Film Four fan? If you can answer yes to any of these questions, I am certain you'd find something you like on this album.

Essential Soundtracks was released back in 1999, the second year of my A-levels and I bought this CD in Woolies for a mere £4.99 for a 40 track double CD, I purely bought this for the more trendy numbers from Leftfield, Iggy Pop & Orbital, being a bit of a dance freak at the time. What I didn't anticipate at the time it just how many fantastic tracks this album contained and how, 7 years later I'd find myself trawling ebay for another copy because I'd worn it out!

Track Listing DISC 1
Lust For Life
Misirlou
Payback
There She Goes
Just Looking
Shallow Grave
Big Spender
Lets Stay Together
Stuck In The Middle With You
Play Dead
For What You Dream Of
The Saint
Fools Gold
A Life Less Ordinary
Hundred Mile High City
Heroin
Oye Como Va
Jungle Boogie
Machine Gun
Across 110th Street

As you can see, a diverse selection on this first CD. You have everything from Lou Reed through Shirley Bassey, this are all original recordings, not cover versions, so no magic is lost at all.
Rather than waffle about 40 tracks, I am going to select 5 favourites from each disc and review them in context with the CD.

1. Misirlou- Dick Dale & The Del-Tones (Pulp Fiction)
Infamous for the dancing scene between John Travolta & Uma Thurman in 'Pulp Fiction', This track has always been a major favourite of mine yet, before buying this CD, I had never known the piece of music as anything other than 'the song from Pulp Fiction'. The piece has rapid guitar playing with so much feeling, you cannot help but get some energy in your veins with this piece of music. Yes, it does remind me of 'Pulp Fiction' but that's not really a bad thing is it? I love how this song picks up from the first track of the album, 'Lust For Life' by Iggy Pop, two high energy songs really do work well together and really show the listener that this CD is going to fulfil your expectations and leave you to remember the best moments from the best films ever. Disappointing though that this high energy isn't kept up for longer of the CD, as track 3 is James Brown & 'The Payback', which although has feeling and soul, it just is a disappointing conclusion to 2 superb songs, however it isn't a major flaw when compared to how strong a song 'Misirlou' is in it's own right.
I just love the feeling I get from 'Misirlou', very rarely do I get such a good feeling from this genre of music but this captures me 100%.

2. Big Spender- Shirley Bassey (Little Voice)
How could I resist Shirley Bassey? As a lovely Welsh Diva she picks up the energy from where we left off with Misirlou. Of course, there are so many people who love 'Big Spender' and this track is impossible to not sing along to. In my opinion, it's one of the tracks on this first disc that starts to warm the album to the listener, OK, you had some really good song but you've also had some of the weaker links then you get Ms. Bassey's vocals booming out at you and the attitude of the CD changes, it's not all songs associated with films about guns, drugs and romance, it's also as much about the music as it is about the films from here on in, this CD isn't afraid to delve into the past and pick the best but it's equally not afraid to combine this with today's modern dance acts.
Big Spender really is a stick in the mind track from this album, it hasn't made me a Bassey fan but it has made me appreciate the diversity of music as a whole. This track is shown in this context as much more than a karaoke track!

3. Play Dead- Bjork & David Arnold (Young Americans)
Now I haven't seen 'Young Americans' and I am not going to make a special effort to watch it for the purposes of a Ciao review and I have to say, I don't particularly like Bjork either but this track is special. Why? Because it's the 2nd dance track on the album and it's better than Leftfield, seriously. This piece of classical music, combined with modern day synths and beats put with Bjork is really not something that I think would appeal to music people, no matter how eclectic they are but if you can get your head around Bjork actually sounding fantastic for one moment, you won't be disappointed. This track shows a non- Bjork fan that actually, she's pretty damn good and moreover, combined with the right producers, she's actually very effective in sending a chill down your spine with her music. The music is dark yet also wonderfully uplifting too. Ho can it be both? It, well, just, IS. The track has a gentle ferocity to it and I like that.
I like the fact that whoever was responsible for putting the soundtrack to 'Young Americans' was not scared to use such a diverse sound & I like the fact Film Four are not afraid to shun the norm and put a track like this on a compilation album.

4. Hundred Mile High City- Ocean Colour Scene (Lock, Stock)
Parallel to my dance music love at age 17, I also loved 'indie' music but much more. I'd go and see every up and coming band at the Guildhall and I'd also see bands like Oasis, Sleeper & of course, Ocean Colour Scene at the well known music venue, 'Gloucester Leisure Centre' (seriously Oasis did play there, 6 Oct 1995, I was at the front!). I remember this song being played when I saw OCS but it wasn't in the form that it appeared in Lock, Stock & 2 Smoking Barrels 3 or so years later. It had been made edgier, grittier and well in keeping with the indie sound. It's not unique on this album, we have already had, thus far in the album, contributions from The Stereophonics,The Stone Roses & Ash but it's equally a contender for the best indie track, maybe only level pegging with The Stone Roses & 'Fools Gold' (also from Lock, Stock) but this track has something about it which really suits the twist this CD takes now, we're being led down the path of The Velvet Underground & Santana and this track smoothly eases this transition, I doubt whether the other indie tracks of the album could do it as well as this track does.
I like the raciness and raw guitar rifting in this track, yes OK it for a film Vinny Jones was in that isn't the greatest film in the world but this track isn't assuming that isn't the case. It sounds just so fitting for Lock Stock & however picked this track for the soundtrack was a genius!

5. Heroin- The Velvet Underground (The Doors)
I couldn't NOT put The Velvet Underground in my top 5! I had never properly heard The Velvet Underground before purchasing this CD & I grateful for this tracking being on here as an introducer to Lou Reed, David Bowie as proper artists not just as random songs I happened to decide I liked by them at one point or another. This track slows our high action from Ocean Colour Scene right back down to where we're not imagining ourselves running down a street trying to avoid the law. This is mellow yet rough song, it crosses boundaries it almost entrances you to believe you are coming down from some sort of radical high, when of course you're not (well not me anyway) but I love music which can capture your imagination and thought so intensely that you can believe anything the music says.
I would suggest this is probably the best track of this disc, not because it's The Velvet Underground, but because this song has something that other tracks haven't and I just can't put my finger on WHAT it is & as frustrating as this is, it's great because I know that this song has really got inside me, no reason why in particular but it has.

Best Of The Rest-Highly Recommended Tracks:
Leftfield- Shallow Grave
Santana- Oye Como Va
Al Green- Lets Stay Together

Weaker Links- Disc 1:
As with any compilation you do get a few weaker links:
Stereophonics- Just Looking- as good as the 'phonics are & I do love them, this track from the slight obscure film, This Year's Love, does nothing to increase to listeners need to watch the film

Orbital- The Saint- Again, I like Orbital but there are some things you shouldn't do as a dance act and one of those is put big dance bass over the theme tune to 'The Saint'

Track Listing- Disc 2
Born Slippy
Little Green Bag
Son Of A Preacher Man
Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)
Trouble Man
Bullitt
Blue Velvet
Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive
King Of The Road
Soul On Fire
You're The First Last My Everything
Hot Stuff
Best Of My Love
Got To Be Real
I'll Take You There
Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)
Born To Be Wild
Green Onions
Laura Palmer's Theme
Perfect Day

1. Born Slippy- Underworld (Trainspotting)
Who can forget the cries of 'Lager, Lager, Lager, Shouting....' in the mid nineties when this reached the top of the charts. For how may people is Born Slippy an anthem of their youth, uni days? I am certainly one of them!
Born Slippy is a brave start to disc 2, it's a bold song, to say the least and of course, the film Trainspotting was equally as bold at the time. I love the fact that someone hasn't been afraid to start the next disc with Born Slippy!
I don't think this is a track you simply associate with Trainspotting and nothing else, it's a track that really hold it's own.
As a dance track, it shows how versatile the genre can be and it certainly doesn't look out of place on this compilation and I like the fact that the inclusion of Born Slippy has showed that where films are concerned, anything goes.

2. Son Of A Preacher Man- Dusty Springfield (Pulp Fiction)
Another contribution from Pulp Fiction and following suit from disc 1, we have 2 quite energetic tracks before proceeding to Dusty's luscious vocals. This track was going to be the first dance at our wedding as my husband is a son of a vicar but it wasn't as he thought it too tacky in the end & I was fuming.
That aside, this track shows that old style female vocalist NEVER go out of fashion, no matter ho old the songs get, some, like Son Of A Preacher Man, never date and you could as easily be in 2006 as in 1968 and I love the way a song can do that to you. I'd never heard any of Dusty's recording prior to this and I now have some of her tracks on download. Although she has only one track on this album and there could have been an argument for including her Lock, Stock contribution, 'Spooky', I think the right choice was made. Despite being very different to what we have already heard on disc 2, Springfield isn't a hair out of place here.
The inclusion of Dusty Springfield was a superb choice and it should serve to those, like me, who haven't fully appreciated her work to go an dig out some of her other work.

3. You're The First, The Last, My Everything- Barry White (Four Weddings....)
Who can resist this song? How many people have danced at some type of disco to this and not enjoyed themselves? I think this is a fantastic inclusion and it really it worth skipping to really make yourself feel good.
Again this song is a leader into a change of genre, after we have 'Hot Stuff' & 'Best Of My Love' and they couldn't have done it any better than get the good old walrus of love, sadly now departed, to take us into the realms of cheesy feel good.
There's not much I can say about this song as it speaks for itself!

4. Hot Stuff- Donna Summer (The Full Monty)
I don't think I have to say it do I? The dole queue, THAT dance? What a fantastic inclusion this song is for the chaps! Despite this being a seemingly cheesy choice, I love the memories of the film this song gives me & whilst I realise it's not a ground breaker of a song, like some of the other tracks on the album, it's one that you can really let yourself go to, have a dance, sing out loud and you don't feel at all out of place doing so.
The song is sadly maybe ONLY famous for it's use in The Full Monty, but it doesn't detract from the fact this is a great seventies disco track, pure, simple and absolutely fantastic and it just isn't at all out of place on the album and considering the genre which we have just hit in the CD I cannot think of a better inclusion from the film.

5. Perfect Day- Lou Reed (Trainspotting)
I did try hard not to include 2 songs by the same artist but I think Lou Reed & The Velvet Underground are allowed!
I simply adore the final track of the album and I really feel that a better choice to finish the album off couldn't be found.
I adore the simplicity of this track, the depressed and gritty vocals of Lou Reed, sounding as if he is a 80 a day habit singer, simple melodies and pure meaning in the verses.
With having such a varied compilation, it seems fitting that they have chosen a sort of cleansing track for the finale, a track which actually on the surface doesn't require much thought but really, has the most meaning out off all the tracks on this album.
Essential Soundtracks is much a busy album, running from genre to genre, decade to decade, film to film, I do think as a listener you need something as good as Perfect Day to make you appreciate the album as a whole.
A wonderful finale to an album which crosses so many musical genres, awakens memories of our favourite films and makes us appreciate the music in them we may have missed first time round.

Best Of The Rest- Highly Recommended Tracks:
George Baker Selection- Little Green Bag
Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive- Bobby Mercer
Born To Be Wild- Steppenwolf

Weaker Links- Disc 2:
Cheryl Lynn- Got To Be Real- A bit TOO much of a good thing on the disco genre here and as it's the last track of the genre, it's easily forgettable when preceded by Barry White & Donna Summer.

Overall
A superb compilation album with old favourite, classics, rock n roll, a bit of everything!
This is a CD I like to have in my car but I find myself driving to the music than to the rules of the road.
The album doesn't assume that as a Film Four fan you will only like songs like the films they are responsible (or partly) for, it assumes you love the music more than the films and it only serves to promote good music and it doesn't promote the films, in my opinion, very much at all.
This CD is great as it doesn't date at all and you'd never be ashamed to have this in your CD collection.
There is something for everyone on this CD and I would thoroughly recommend if you can get hold of this CD on ebay for £1 as I did, you will not be disappointed!

 

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