Twin Peaks - Fire Walk With me |
Anyone who knows me should already be well aware of my love of all things Twin Peaks. One of the best parts about the show and the eventual movie was the music.
I'm going to make a bold statement: Twin Peaks is the greatest piece of entertainment in American history. The show, the movie, everything about it was almost perfect. This would include the music created by Angelo Badalamenti. Badalamenti is a genius and has set the musical mood for many David Lynch productions among other films. His soap opera inspired, warped jazz numbers he created for Twin Peaks are just as recognizable as any of the characters or scenes themselves.
In 1992 David Lynch decided to tell the story of the final days of Laura Palmer and gave the world Twin Peaks - Fire Walk With Me. The movie was darker and much more disturbing than the TV show was ever allowed to be. The music reflected that. There are four tracks with vocal accompaniment. One is sung by Julie Cruise, whom Twin Peaks fans were already familiar with for her appearance on the show, as well as her vocal talents being utilized for three tracks that appeared on the original TV show soundtrack. Two songs are credited to Badalamenti and a group called Thought Gang (although the vocals were done by Badalamenti himself). Lastly the track "Sycamore Trees" (which might be the best song on the album and originally appeared in the final episode of the TV show) is sung by Little Jimmy Scott, who released a handful of cult classic jazz albums in the late 50's/early 60's. The rest of the album is the same ambient instrumental jazz that you would expect of a Twin Peaks production. It's the music done by the house band at both The Road House and The Black Lodge. That is to say (for you non-Twin Peaks fans) that this music would find a home not only in some non-descript smokey bar room but also travelling through time and space to the threshold of both heaven and hell. To put it another way, it's the perfect soundtrack for a mind-bending film about dark forces at play.
