the importance of soundtracks

Over Memorial Day, my family and I were in Baltimore for a drive-in movie. There's a theatre there that does an all-night showing for Memorial Day weekend and again for Labor Day weekend. It kind of drove home to me how important it can be to choose the right background music for a movie.

The first show was The Pirates! Band of Misfits. It wasn't a particularly good movie. But I loved the soundtrack. "London Calling" by the Clash, "Swords of 1000 Men" by Tenpole Tudor... It kept me interested enough to that I was watching just to see what would be played next. It reminded me of the Shrek movies, which had great choices in their soundtracks.

Dark Shadows, which was the last feature (they showed four movies), was set in 1972, so they needed period tracks to enhance the sensation that you were watching the 1970s. During dinner, the daughter puts Donovan's "Season of the Witch." That came out in 1966, so it fits. I also couldn't help noticing the T. Rex album, The Slider, which came out in 1972.

Anyone interested in "Season of the Witch" can hear it here:

Men in Black 3 and Think Like a Man didn't have much memorable in their soundtracks (though I'll admit that the latter was very R&B heavy and I'm not much of a fan of what constitutes R&B today).