Guardian Report and Messageboard
Interesting result, and good point about the quality of the soundtrack album not being related to the quality of the film. Purple Rain is an inferior album to Parade though, which has some lovely tracks on it. Purple Rain sounds quite dated and, despite it's merits, has much guitar wankery that would not go down well in todays market.
Of films I've seen recently, Spun makes lovely use of some good songs and I would certainly look out for that soundtrack. Withnail and I uses music well as well, as does Vanilla Sky and a lot of Cameron Crowe's stuff.
There's a debate about what makes a soundtrack though - songs specially written for the film, existing songs appropriated for the film (24HPP, Withnail etc) or a recording of the actual film score - incidental music and all.
In the latter category, I'd say Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid takes some beating, although if it was still the 80s Mark Knopfler's soundtrack for Local Hero would walk it.
So come on - let's have a heated debate!
I'm ashamed)
Always thought it was Eno
