Movies Killed The Radio Star

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    Movies Killed The Radio Star
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    How Movie Soundtracks Are Making a Resurgence.

     

    In 2015, the ‘90s revival is in full-swing. Chokers, R&B and platforms are in vogue again and with that comes the return of the hit movie soundtrack. It’s probably not a generalisation to say that nearly everyone owns at least Titanic, Armageddon or City Of Angels on tape or CD. Each of them spawned massive hits with the track equally as memorable as the massive movie they soundtracked. Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On, Aerosmith’s Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing and Goo Goo Dolls’ Iris all went on to become huge hits in their own right but also tipped their hats to their respective movie. Over the course of the past decade or so, songs from movies deserted the charts. Until now.

     

    In the past twelve months, movie soundtracks for Pitch Perfect 2, Guardians Of The Galaxy, Fifty Shades of Grey and Furious 7 have all reached the top five on the ARIA Charts in Australia. Unlike many of the movie soundtracks of the ‘00s, most of these have been filled with original songs written for or inspired by the movie. Ellie Goulding’s massive Fifty Shades ballad Love Me Like You Do topped charts around the world, Jessie J’s Pitch Perfect credits-featured Flashlight found huge favour here in Oz and Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s emotional Paul Walker tribute See You Again rose to number one both here and in the US where it held the position for 12 weeks. The biggest tracks of the year are from movies and that’s something that hasn’t been said for a long time.

     

    Last year, after working her way up as an underground popstar, Charli XCX had her first hit with Boom Clap, written for The Fault In Our Stars. It helps that the track was a knockout pop-song but it was also attached to a film that pocketed over $300 million at the box office, giving the track advantageous exposure - the likes of which Taylor Swift had to create a blockbuster, star-studded music video to come close to.  While the song was written to aid the movie, the movie aided Charli in many ways as she explored chart territory she hadn’t even come close to previously.

     

    The latest name looking set to enjoy the same success as Charli is Sam Bruno whose track Search Party is leading the promotion for the Cara Delevingne-featuring Paper Towns. A stomping, youthful, rebellious anthem, the song embodies Delevingne’s character in every way but also stands on its own as a formidable track. Like Charli, Bruno’s instantaneously been introduced to an audience that identifies with her music. Chances are if you’re a fan of the movie, you’re going to be a fan of Bruno. Both Santigold and Grouplove among others have contributed originals to the soundtrack, nailing the slightly left-of-centre vibe of Paper Towns and simultaneously giving their fans yet another excellent track.


    It may seem like given the fact most of the movies mentioned are big-budget Hollywood films that therefore their accompanying songs are destined to be hits, but there’s a fine art to creating a movie soundtrack. Dreamworks’ Home, for example, spawned two original Rihanna singles, but they failed to take off despite the fact the film has taken home almost $400million at the box office. The songs didn’t stick and it’s probably because it didn’t use enough of the ingredients for a perfect movie track.

     

    Below is the recipe for creating songs for a movie soundtrack, should you be interested in entering that business.

     

    Start From Scratch

     

     

    The rise of streaming means that everyone has access to every song that pops into their head. A soundtrack made entirely from previously released songs is basically now simply a playlist with the movie, setting itself a hard task to encourage people to connect an old song to a new movie. Music is such an integral part in creating the general feel of a movie and an audience is much more likely to connect it to the movie if it’s never been heard before - particularly if it does its job well.

     

    Add A Pinch Of Emotion

     

     

    If you haven’t in your lifetime contemplated having a cry in Titanic when My Heart Will Go On plays it’s unlikely you have a heart - how are you still living? In many ways Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s See You Again is the My Heart Will Go On of 2015. It’s a genuine heart-tugger that perfectly fuses Furious 7’s street, hip-hop aesthetic while respectfully acting as a tribute to the late Paul Walker. No other art forms play on your heartstrings like movies and music and when they’re perfectly fused together, it’s a potent combination.

     

     

    Mix In Some Inspiration

     

     

    Jessie J’s Flashlight picks up on the inspirational side of Pitch Perfect 2 and is appropriately a mighty ballad. When you first heard I Believe I Can Fly in Space Jam, chances are you would’ve believed it. Movies and music together are good at doing that. They catch you when you’re in a headspace that’s uninterrupted by everything outside the movie and grab your heart while it’s beating purely for the movie. Almost two decades later Idol and X Factor contestants around the world are trying to match the inspiration of I Believe I Can Fly, with far less success than when it was accompanied by Space Jam.

     

     

    Choose The Right Artist For The Right Movie

     

     

    Good girl Taylor Swift on the Fifty Shades Of Grey soundtrack probably wouldn’t have made much sense. Similarly, David Bowie on the teen-centred Paper Towns would’ve been alienating. It’s got to be believable that the artist would actually watch the movie and enjoy it. The Weeknd had four sensual, sex-craved albums before he landed a spot on the Fifty Shades soundtrack with Earned It and it made complete sense for a movie that was similarly sex-crazed. So much so that fans of The Weeknd would’ve barely flinched when he released a bondage-themed video. After all this is the man who sang “Baby I can make that pussy rain, often” on his 2014 track Often.

     

    It’s also worth noting that The Weeknd was an underground R&B hero until that song. Now he’s a mainstage player at festivals and has just spawned another worldwide hit with Can’t Feel My Face.

     

    \

     

    Mould It To Fit The Storyline But Also To Stand Alone

     

    A movie usually stays in theatres for about two months. If Ellie Goulding’s Love Me Like You Do directly mentioned Christian Grey in the lyrics, the chances of you still hearing it on the radio are minimal. Movies have less time in the spotlight than music does. Once it leaves cinemas, there are months before it goes to DVD and in that time audiences aren’t going to want to be consistently reminded of Christian Grey. It alienates listeners that weren’t fans of the movie and starts to grate fans. That’s why the accompanying songs from High School Musical had a use by date on the charts, because the tracks were so intertwined with the movie - how many songs naturally work in wildcats on the radio?

     

    In stark comparison, Whitney Houston masterfully covered Dolly Parton’s I Will Always Love You in 1992 so that it fit the fabric of The Bodyguard but lasted far longer than the movie did. It spent 14 weeks on top in the US and went on to win the Grammy for Record Of The Year. At the time it sold more copies in one week than any song in US chart history, coincidentally taking the record from Bryan Adams’ (Everything I Do) I Do It For You, featured on the soundtrack for Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves. If you don’t remember that it featured it that movie then it’s done its job of standing on its own feet.

     

    Whisk The Right Ingredients In For The Right Scene

     

     

    It’s unlikely that a track written by a writer without a particular film in mind will really suit the scene it’s added to. While previous Fast & Furious films mixed originals and previously released tracks, Furious 7 consisted of an entirely original soundtrack featuring Iggy Azalea, Dillon Francis and T.I. Kevin Weaver the A&R representative and co-producer of the Furious 7 soundtrack told Billboard that each musical contributor sat in a room and watched the film together. "It was sort of a writers' camp with a movie screen and we laid it out as early as we could, to go spot-for-spot with a theater full of hit makers," he said. It’s worked too. Not only did the music marry with the film effortlessly but the soundtrack went to number one in the US, proving the music also worked as a standalone.

     

    Match The Film’s Audience To Their Favourite Music

     

     

    If you go down the list of artists featuring on the Paper Towns soundtrack, if you like the first, Santigold, you’re probably going to also dig Twin Shadow and The War On Drugs plus discover Saint Motel and Sam Bruno along the way.


    As much as some movies are universal, feel-good blockbusters many appeal only to a certain demographic. If the soundtrack curators correctly pick the film audience’s musical tastes it can do something pretty special. An example of that is Ryan Gosling’s cult film Drive which beautifully used Kavinsky, Chromatics and College. It made its twilight electronic sonic output just as important as its visual aesthetic and as such made the soundtrack just as important as the film itself. The soundtrack for Zach Braff’s Wish I Was Here became just as important as the actual visual. Bon Iver, Cat Power and The Shins all contributed to it pretty much foreshadowing the feel of the movie before it even dropped in cinemas.

     

    Sam (words) & Bianca (illustrations) aka the interns for Cool Accidents

    146666
    Tags:
    the interns, soundtracks,
Submitted by Site Factory admin on


 

 

How Movie Soundtracks Are Making a Resurgence.

 

In 2015, the ‘90s revival is in full-swing. Chokers, R&B and platforms are in vogue again and with that comes the return of the hit movie soundtrack. It’s probably not a generalisation to say that nearly everyone owns at least Titanic, Armageddon or City Of Angels on tape or CD. Each of them spawned massive hits with the track equally as memorable as the massive movie they soundtracked. Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On, Aerosmith’s Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing and Goo Goo Dolls’ Iris all went on to become huge hits in their own right but also tipped their hats to their respective movie. Over the course of the past decade or so, songs from movies deserted the charts. Until now.

 

In the past twelve months, movie soundtracks for Pitch Perfect 2, Guardians Of The Galaxy, Fifty Shades of Grey and Furious 7 have all reached the top five on the ARIA Charts in Australia. Unlike many of the movie soundtracks of the ‘00s, most of these have been filled with original songs written for or inspired by the movie. Ellie Goulding’s massive Fifty Shades ballad Love Me Like You Do topped charts around the world, Jessie J’s Pitch Perfect credits-featured Flashlight found huge favour here in Oz and Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s emotional Paul Walker tribute See You Again rose to number one both here and in the US where it held the position for 12 weeks. The biggest tracks of the year are from movies and that’s something that hasn’t been said for a long time.

 

Last year, after working her way up as an underground popstar, Charli XCX had her first hit with Boom Clap, written for The Fault In Our Stars. It helps that the track was a knockout pop-song but it was also attached to a film that pocketed over $300 million at the box office, giving the track advantageous exposure - the likes of which Taylor Swift had to create a blockbuster, star-studded music video to come close to.  While the song was written to aid the movie, the movie aided Charli in many ways as she explored chart territory she hadn’t even come close to previously.

 

The latest name looking set to enjoy the same success as Charli is Sam Bruno whose track Search Party is leading the promotion for the Cara Delevingne-featuring Paper Towns. A stomping, youthful, rebellious anthem, the song embodies Delevingne’s character in every way but also stands on its own as a formidable track. Like Charli, Bruno’s instantaneously been introduced to an audience that identifies with her music. Chances are if you’re a fan of the movie, you’re going to be a fan of Bruno. Both Santigold and Grouplove among others have contributed originals to the soundtrack, nailing the slightly left-of-centre vibe of Paper Towns and simultaneously giving their fans yet another excellent track.


It may seem like given the fact most of the movies mentioned are big-budget Hollywood films that therefore their accompanying songs are destined to be hits, but there’s a fine art to creating a movie soundtrack. Dreamworks’ Home, for example, spawned two original Rihanna singles, but they failed to take off despite the fact the film has taken home almost $400million at the box office. The songs didn’t stick and it’s probably because it didn’t use enough of the ingredients for a perfect movie track.

 

Below is the recipe for creating songs for a movie soundtrack, should you be interested in entering that business.

 

Start From Scratch

 

 

The rise of streaming means that everyone has access to every song that pops into their head. A soundtrack made entirely from previously released songs is basically now simply a playlist with the movie, setting itself a hard task to encourage people to connect an old song to a new movie. Music is such an integral part in creating the general feel of a movie and an audience is much more likely to connect it to the movie if it’s never been heard before - particularly if it does its job well.

 

Add A Pinch Of Emotion

 

 

If you haven’t in your lifetime contemplated having a cry in Titanic when My Heart Will Go On plays it’s unlikely you have a heart - how are you still living? In many ways Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s See You Again is the My Heart Will Go On of 2015. It’s a genuine heart-tugger that perfectly fuses Furious 7’s street, hip-hop aesthetic while respectfully acting as a tribute to the late Paul Walker. No other art forms play on your heartstrings like movies and music and when they’re perfectly fused together, it’s a potent combination.

 

 

Mix In Some Inspiration

 

 

Jessie J’s Flashlight picks up on the inspirational side of Pitch Perfect 2 and is appropriately a mighty ballad. When you first heard I Believe I Can Fly in Space Jam, chances are you would’ve believed it. Movies and music together are good at doing that. They catch you when you’re in a headspace that’s uninterrupted by everything outside the movie and grab your heart while it’s beating purely for the movie. Almost two decades later Idol and X Factor contestants around the world are trying to match the inspiration of I Believe I Can Fly, with far less success than when it was accompanied by Space Jam.

 

 

Choose The Right Artist For The Right Movie

 

 

Good girl Taylor Swift on the Fifty Shades Of Grey soundtrack probably wouldn’t have made much sense. Similarly, David Bowie on the teen-centred Paper Towns would’ve been alienating. It’s got to be believable that the artist would actually watch the movie and enjoy it. The Weeknd had four sensual, sex-craved albums before he landed a spot on the Fifty Shades soundtrack with Earned It and it made complete sense for a movie that was similarly sex-crazed. So much so that fans of The Weeknd would’ve barely flinched when he released a bondage-themed video. After all this is the man who sang “Baby I can make that pussy rain, often” on his 2014 track Often.

 

It’s also worth noting that The Weeknd was an underground R&B hero until that song. Now he’s a mainstage player at festivals and has just spawned another worldwide hit with Can’t Feel My Face.

 

\

 

Mould It To Fit The Storyline But Also To Stand Alone

 

A movie usually stays in theatres for about two months. If Ellie Goulding’s Love Me Like You Do directly mentioned Christian Grey in the lyrics, the chances of you still hearing it on the radio are minimal. Movies have less time in the spotlight than music does. Once it leaves cinemas, there are months before it goes to DVD and in that time audiences aren’t going to want to be consistently reminded of Christian Grey. It alienates listeners that weren’t fans of the movie and starts to grate fans. That’s why the accompanying songs from High School Musical had a use by date on the charts, because the tracks were so intertwined with the movie - how many songs naturally work in wildcats on the radio?

 

In stark comparison, Whitney Houston masterfully covered Dolly Parton’s I Will Always Love You in 1992 so that it fit the fabric of The Bodyguard but lasted far longer than the movie did. It spent 14 weeks on top in the US and went on to win the Grammy for Record Of The Year. At the time it sold more copies in one week than any song in US chart history, coincidentally taking the record from Bryan Adams’ (Everything I Do) I Do It For You, featured on the soundtrack for Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves. If you don’t remember that it featured it that movie then it’s done its job of standing on its own feet.

 

Whisk The Right Ingredients In For The Right Scene

 

 

It’s unlikely that a track written by a writer without a particular film in mind will really suit the scene it’s added to. While previous Fast & Furious films mixed originals and previously released tracks, Furious 7 consisted of an entirely original soundtrack featuring Iggy Azalea, Dillon Francis and T.I. Kevin Weaver the A&R representative and co-producer of the Furious 7 soundtrack told Billboard that each musical contributor sat in a room and watched the film together. "It was sort of a writers' camp with a movie screen and we laid it out as early as we could, to go spot-for-spot with a theater full of hit makers," he said. It’s worked too. Not only did the music marry with the film effortlessly but the soundtrack went to number one in the US, proving the music also worked as a standalone.

 

Match The Film’s Audience To Their Favourite Music

 

 

If you go down the list of artists featuring on the Paper Towns soundtrack, if you like the first, Santigold, you’re probably going to also dig Twin Shadow and The War On Drugs plus discover Saint Motel and Sam Bruno along the way.


As much as some movies are universal, feel-good blockbusters many appeal only to a certain demographic. If the soundtrack curators correctly pick the film audience’s musical tastes it can do something pretty special. An example of that is Ryan Gosling’s cult film Drive which beautifully used Kavinsky, Chromatics and College. It made its twilight electronic sonic output just as important as its visual aesthetic and as such made the soundtrack just as important as the film itself. The soundtrack for Zach Braff’s Wish I Was Here became just as important as the actual visual. Bon Iver, Cat Power and The Shins all contributed to it pretty much foreshadowing the feel of the movie before it even dropped in cinemas.

 

Sam (words) & Bianca (illustrations) aka the interns for Cool Accidents

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