The Great Gatsby OST

This philistine hasn't seen the movie yet*

, but he's finding that this OST literally*

that is literally-literally, not literally-as-in-for-emphasis

moves him to tears and fires his imagination and wrenches his heart.

I'd just like to understand the details of why and how this works. What's happening to me? It's just pop music, right?

edited 21st May '13 8:26:09 AM by TheHandle

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Well, the soundtrack derailed the movie discussion over in the main The Great Gatsby movie thread, but I'm interested to see what people here think.

It's not just pop music. It's pop music dabbling in jazz, implementing hip-hop and electronic music, using orchestras as backing, and lassoing in talent like second-tier Lana Del Rey, alt rocker Jack White, and behind-the-scener Sia, and then infusing the skills of everyone involved into the soundtrack.

I think the biggest flaw is that it doesn't completely match up with the novel's spirit, but as a separate entity, it rules.

Let's hope that "A Little Party Never Killed Nobody" gets some radio airplay sometime this summer.

Radio? This thing is destined to be the club hymn of a generation!

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

It certainly wrenches my heart. Mostly because of how incredibly unfitting most of it is and how much of a betrayal it is to the source material.

Insert witty and clever quip here. My page, as the database hates my handle.

Betrayal, of all things? Where is that promise that you say was broken? If it doesn't fit the cluster of ideas and impressions your mind has fitted the work with, then that's fine by me, old sport, but don't go qualifying other people's enjoyment as if they were being unfaithful and disloyal to one who trusted them.

Haven't seen the film yet, but I downloaded the audiobook by William Hope. It is quite excellent, and the mesmerizing voice acting does a good job of keeping me distracted from how amazingly judgmental Nick is, despite his protests of the contrary. It makes it very hard to sympathize with anyone at all. The unhappy are painted as pathetic, and the happy as undeserving! There's no winning with this man! But this is all a topic for another thread...

edited 23rd May '13 1:45:13 AM by TheHandle

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

It is set in the 1920s, based on a book written in the 1920s, and is a deconstruction of the ideals and excesses of the 1920s. The music should fit the 1920s and reflect the themes. It's that simple. Maybe if they wanted to get a little experimental with it, that's fine. But this?

This is not fine.

Insert witty and clever quip here. My page, as the database hates my handle.

The music conveys the themes to a modern audience far better than using time-accurate music would; it short-circuits Seinfeld Is Unfunny. If the film was made with twenties music, it would be a quaint nostalgic Period Piece, a fantasy of times past, rather than an immediate, gripping drama. This soundtrack says "party", "excess", "heartache", and so on. Using twenties music might have said "old elitst gentlefolk enjoying music no-one listens to anymore". Which... would fit well with Gatsby, I grant you that, but I wouldn't have planned to make the trip to the theater for it; it would be, I fear, Made-for-TV Movie material.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

It's a Baz Luhrman film - he's well known for using anachronistic elements in his work. Especially music.

He used Nirvana in a film set in turn-of-the century 1900s France and filmed a movie set in mid-1990s Florida using Shakespearean English and Prince songs. Using electronic music and hip-hop in an American 1920s setting is par for the course.

The purpose is to get a modern viewer to connect with a scene in a way that he wouldn't be able to otherwise. And like the above poster mentioned, it's usually always in scenes in which he's trying to convey decadence, parties, and excess.

edited 23rd May '13 9:08:11 AM by Completion

Well, even the romance bits are really great, and they're hardly atemporal. As for the book, I'm at the part where Gatsby meets Daisy at last. It's... Well, he's so happy it's kinda narmy. I already know that it won't end well, but the writer's throwing up disaster flags like they're confetti.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Yeah, which is why the SNL parody was dancers singing to "Everybody Was Kung-Fu Fighting" et al, except tacking "at the Moulin Rouge" at the end of each song.

I'm a skeptical squirrel

It's weird, but I like the effect.

Goodfellas has a similar thing going on with its pop soundtrack. It's period correct, but it accomplishes the same thing Luhrmann is doing.

Saturday Night Live makes for such a wonderful screensaver, don't you think?

edited 23rd May '13 9:56:41 AM by TheHandle

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

... I actually find myself liking that will.i.am song. ahahaha...

I'm a pretty big hip-hop fan(and I get down with Lana Del Rey), so I enjoyed the soundtrack a great deal.

I did think that it could have been applied better in-movie, though. They probably could have gone with an instrumental version of "Who Gon Stop Me" - it feels out of place when Kanye is rapping "This is something like the Holocaust, millions of our people lost" when Nick, Tom and his mistress, are getting plastered in the beginning of the movie.

https://soundcloud.com/rich-justice-hinmen Too white for the black kids, too white for the white kids.

What, that happens in the beginning? Ah, I hope we can get past that part quickly; not only is Tom debauched, he also sucks at debauchery. What an asshole. Also, I know this book is about a hundred years old, but, spoilers dude!

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

By the way, "Young and Beautiful" hit #22 on the Billboard 100, making it her first Top 40 hit. However, it's mostly through digital sales, and I predict that it will drop if radio doesn't put it into rotation.

Still, it's a good glimpse into the album's potential to have some good hits.

With my feminist hat on, I'd say that this is one of the most sexist songs I've ever heard. It's also amazingly appropriate; Daisy has absolutely nothing else to her but beauty and charm. She is, in all other respects, a worthless, spineless, brainless sucker.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

The thing with Lana Del Rey is that I have no idea how much of her music is unironic and how much is supposed to be satirical.

The closest hints toward the satirical part are the commentary on her own fame in "Ride" and "God and Monsters", but I wonder what Word of God has to say about her own music. In any case, her nostalgic sound really appeals.

So what do you think? Is "Young and Beautiful" supposed to be a shameless love song, or a subtle reflection of The Great Gatsby's true nature?

edited 23rd May '13 2:09:23 PM by chihuahua0

What true nature? As far as I can tell from where I am in the story, he's a fool of epic proportions. Worse, he's the sort of fool that I used to be. I could easily see myself making the same sort of mistake, prioritizing the wrong things, clinging to absurd dreams and false hopes and idolizing unworthy people. There is for me too a character that I would rather be than myself, whose form I need to fill out. As for his love for Daisy being everlasting... I do not think she could ever live up to his dream of her, but it does happen.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Personally, I think this is the best song on the soundtrack, but I could just be biased towards Florence.

edited 23rd May '13 9:33:28 PM by SixthSaint

That one, Crazy In Love and A Little Party are my favorites.

edited 24th May '13 8:24:01 PM by Mort08

Looking for some stories?

After reading the book, I think the party tracks and the rap tracks are very appropriate, but not the romance tracks; they suggest a depth of feeling and a strength of character in these, well, characters, that simply isn't there. What a bunch of assholes.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

White audiences in the 20s were probably more likely to listen to watered-down pop-orchestral-jazz than to hot jazz. This was the decade where the title "the King of Jazz" went not to Louis Armstrong or Sidney Bechet, but to Paul Whiteman.

So, since the music of the day was (arguably) already bastardized for the masses, it's somewhat appropriate that it be bastardized again for modern audiences.

Hear the elitism.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Do you have a substantial disagreement with my assessment of the music of the 20s, or are you just going to call me names?

Besides, some of my best friends are bastardized jazz bands.