Niki N. Phaser

You can always count on Cameron Crowe when it comes to soundtracks. The man is a living encyclopedia of music. I bet he counts years in albums (like many of us do). Even though one of his characters, Jeff Bebe from Almost Famous, thinks popular music is usually the best music, you will find that Crowe’s selections for his movies are educationally eclectic. Maybe in time, each of his movies will find its soundtrack reviewed here, but I’ll start with my favourite: Vanilla Sky. And Vanilla Sky starts with Crowe’s favourite band at the time of shooting the movie: Radiohead. Everything in Its Right Place was chosen both for its unnatural sound and the line “Yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon”, which the director thought suited the bitter and the sweet dichotomy expressed throughout the film. Radiohead are even mentioned, right before Tom Cruise and Jason Lee nearly have a car crash. They aren’t the only alt legends present on this OST. REM provide sounds for two very different moods. First you have the start-the-week-in-a-good-mood tune All the Right Friends and the very sad hymn to isolation Sweetness Follows, which begins with the suggestive lyrics: “Readying to bury your father and your mother, What did you think when you lost another ?”. The slick bass opening from Jeff Buckley’s Last Goodbye is also used to great effect. Buckley and his untimely death are also referenced in another Crowe movie, Elizabethtown.

I wasn’t joking when I said Crowe’s choices are eclectic. There’s a lot of art dance music on Vanilla Sky and not just in the club scene. Looper contributes with two songs, Leftfield’s Afrika Shox (check this video, it’s wicked) adds a lot to the aforementioned scene. Still, the classics aren’t missing either – Chemical Brothers, Where Do I Begin.

And speaking of classics, Crowe pays his tribute to the names of his teen years, like Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan (even though his visual contribution is more pivotal), The Beach Boys, The Monkees and a title track by Paul McCartney. Peter Gabriel, who provided the love theme for one of Crowe’s most legendary scenes (John Cusack and his boombox from Say Anything) makes a comeback with Solsbury Hill, and it’s a successful one. From the 80′s we also get a hidden treasure, Freur’s Doot Doot, but I’ll dedicate an entire article to this track, for the Ignored-Gold section. Soon. Joan Osborne’s 90′s hit One of Us is hummed by Tom Cruise while his anesthesia kicks in. (It makes you wonder: what would you sing while your anesthesia kicks in ?). Your indie needs are quenched by Spiritualized, Sigur Ros and Red House Painters, while Crowe and his wife Nancy Wilson write the pretty good I Fall Apart, performed by Cameron Diaz. In fact, Nancy Wilson’s score, based on an acoustic theme, is not to be taken lightly either.

I’ve listened to this soundtrack as an album only after seeing the movie, but if someone would give it a go before, it will probably make the movie seem even more intriguing that its teaser trailer did, back in 2001.

LISTEN TO Sweetness Follows BY R.E.M. LISTEN TO Ladies and Gentleman… BY SPIRITUALIZED

LISTEN TO Solsbury Hill BY PETER GABRIEL LISTEN TO Mondo ’77 BY LOOPER