Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Electronic soundscapes


There are a number of films that are about the electronic music scene yet wildly misunderstand the music.  Most of these films concentrate on clubbing and Ibiza and superstar DJs, where actually most of the time people are listening to this music in cars as soundtracks to cities and falling asleep to the repetitive  and utopian synths (just me...?).  These films below show a much more sophisticated understanding of electronic music and how it can build moods and moments

HACKERS - 1996
A cyberpunk film all about the Internet before people really knew what the Internet was capable of (see more here).  A great film with a pumping soundtrack from The Prodigy, Underworld, Leftfield and The Orb: All of the biggest electronic monster-groups from the mid ‘90s.  A classic.


BERLIN CALLING – 2008
A film all about the Berlin techno scene featuring the legendary producer Paul Kalkbrenner in the central role.  The entire soundtrack is by him and features huge tunes such as Bengang and Gebrunn Gebrunn.


TRON LEGACY – 2010
Who better to create a soundtrack to match one of cinemas most famous digital landscapes than Daft Punk – two artists that reinvented themselves as robots for their own classic art house film Electroma.  I cannot describe how much I love this soundtrack but a good place to start would be End of Line or The Game Has Changed.


DRIVE – 2011
A soundtrack of two halves: firstly the lush electronic soundscape of Cliff Martinez adds an apocalyptic feel to the harsh roads of Los Angeles, and secondly the ‘80s inspired songs of Kandinsky, Desire and College that create a nostalgia that hark back to earlier exploitation films.


TRANCE -2012
Contains a range of techno music from Rick Smith from the brilliant electronic duo Underworld.  Danny Boyle and Underworld teamed up firstly in Trainspotting to enormous success with Born Slippy [MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT] and then again for the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony.  The best techno track on here is probably Raw Umber...



Did we miss any?? Let us know in the comment section below

3 comments:

  1. This springs to mind, Squarepusher's Tommib in Lost in Translation - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDVZP4RmEMM

    For some of the duuf-duuf, the Pi soundtrack is still hard to beat.

    Going back some, John Carpenter's soundtracks have aged much better than some of his films.

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  2. what abourt 24 hour party people??
    Love the bit where they show the beginning of 'applauding the dj'

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  3. Hey keep posting such good and meaningful articles.

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