Miami Vice Soundtrack Picks (and an iTunes Loophole)
In a sure sign of the times, iTunes released the Miami Vice Soundtrack Tuesday, a week ahead of the official release date for Amazon and the rest of the lowly terra firma music establishments. But there's a catch ... besides 2 tracks you can buy individually, you must buy the whole album, which costs $13.99. I've got two words for that: No fucking-way.
We've already let iTunes lure us in with the $9.99 per album model plus the option to purchase $.99 tracks when we don't want whole albums. So I don't see why anyone would pay a 40% markup for any album. Especially not for soundtracks, which are never good all the way through -- it's all about picking a few good soundtrack songs and moving on. So let's do that for the Miami Vice Soundtrack, while finding a way around the $13.99 pricing.
Mogwai: We’re No Here
Mogwai: Auto Rock
These are the two best songs off the MV soundtrack, and they’re both off Mogwai’s last album so you can get them without buying the whole soundtrack (if you choose only one, choose We’re No Here). Mogwai takes awhile to grow on you because it takes their songs awhile to build -- but that song structure is their great talent. Mogwai is often called progressive rock but I think they fall on the lighter side of sludge rock. The genre hounds over at Pitchfork would shoot daggers at me through their horn-rimmed glasses for saying that, but I stand my ground that Mogwai’s contemplative hard rock places them more in a class of rock that began with Sabbath and now includes bands like Isis and Queens of the Stone Age. These two songs exhibit Mogwai’s just-right mix of hardness and emotion, incorporating some rough bass, sprawling guitar and wistful keyboards.
Moby: Anthem
Michael Mann is clearly a big Moby fan, and for good reason. Moby can always deliver electronic music with just the right layers of instrumentation to hook listeners who aren’t all jacked up on E. However, if you’re going to download one of Mann’s handpicked Moby songs, you should download New Dawn Fades which is a Joy Division cover from the Heat soundtrack that is tragically overlooked. Speaking of instrumentation, New Dawn Fades is a guitar-led composition whereas Anthem is more straight-ahead club music.
Nonpoint: In The Air Tonight (movie)
Phil Collins: In The Air Tonight (tv show)
And finally, there is the signature Miami Vice song, In The Air Tonight, which became an inextricable part of American pop culture because of the TV show. It’s one of those songs that everyone -- even pompous music snobs like the horn-rimmed folk I mentioned before -- can at least appreciate because it’s got pop accessibility with just a hint of dark flavor. It was the pitch perfect anthem for the sordid yet stylized crime underworld Miami Vice depicted. For those who don’t know what the song is about, listen to Stan by Eminem – it tells you everything you’d ever need to know about In The Air Tonight (in minute 3:55) with a strong hint of it’s own dark flavor.
As for the movie soundtrack, wannabe metal band Nonpoint’s 2004 cover of the song will replace Phil Collins’ version. It’s too bad Collins’ version didn’t make the cut because it still stands the test of time and needed no update – especially not by some pseudo thrashers who wouldn’t know a hardcore riff if it was sitting on their face.
I think it’s well worth your $1.98 to download both songs just to compare for yourself, and if you don’t have that Emimen song, his In The Air Tonight riff alone is worth the $.99.
As we enter into the home stretch of Miami Vice Month, I will still do a few more music posts, because there’s a shitload of good music from the show's five seasons that I have picked out. In the meantime, happy listening.
We've already let iTunes lure us in with the $9.99 per album model plus the option to purchase $.99 tracks when we don't want whole albums. So I don't see why anyone would pay a 40% markup for any album. Especially not for soundtracks, which are never good all the way through -- it's all about picking a few good soundtrack songs and moving on. So let's do that for the Miami Vice Soundtrack, while finding a way around the $13.99 pricing.
Mogwai: We’re No Here
Mogwai: Auto Rock
These are the two best songs off the MV soundtrack, and they’re both off Mogwai’s last album so you can get them without buying the whole soundtrack (if you choose only one, choose We’re No Here). Mogwai takes awhile to grow on you because it takes their songs awhile to build -- but that song structure is their great talent. Mogwai is often called progressive rock but I think they fall on the lighter side of sludge rock. The genre hounds over at Pitchfork would shoot daggers at me through their horn-rimmed glasses for saying that, but I stand my ground that Mogwai’s contemplative hard rock places them more in a class of rock that began with Sabbath and now includes bands like Isis and Queens of the Stone Age. These two songs exhibit Mogwai’s just-right mix of hardness and emotion, incorporating some rough bass, sprawling guitar and wistful keyboards.
Moby: Anthem
Michael Mann is clearly a big Moby fan, and for good reason. Moby can always deliver electronic music with just the right layers of instrumentation to hook listeners who aren’t all jacked up on E. However, if you’re going to download one of Mann’s handpicked Moby songs, you should download New Dawn Fades which is a Joy Division cover from the Heat soundtrack that is tragically overlooked. Speaking of instrumentation, New Dawn Fades is a guitar-led composition whereas Anthem is more straight-ahead club music.
Nonpoint: In The Air Tonight (movie)
Phil Collins: In The Air Tonight (tv show)
And finally, there is the signature Miami Vice song, In The Air Tonight, which became an inextricable part of American pop culture because of the TV show. It’s one of those songs that everyone -- even pompous music snobs like the horn-rimmed folk I mentioned before -- can at least appreciate because it’s got pop accessibility with just a hint of dark flavor. It was the pitch perfect anthem for the sordid yet stylized crime underworld Miami Vice depicted. For those who don’t know what the song is about, listen to Stan by Eminem – it tells you everything you’d ever need to know about In The Air Tonight (in minute 3:55) with a strong hint of it’s own dark flavor.
As for the movie soundtrack, wannabe metal band Nonpoint’s 2004 cover of the song will replace Phil Collins’ version. It’s too bad Collins’ version didn’t make the cut because it still stands the test of time and needed no update – especially not by some pseudo thrashers who wouldn’t know a hardcore riff if it was sitting on their face.
I think it’s well worth your $1.98 to download both songs just to compare for yourself, and if you don’t have that Emimen song, his In The Air Tonight riff alone is worth the $.99.
As we enter into the home stretch of Miami Vice Month, I will still do a few more music posts, because there’s a shitload of good music from the show's five seasons that I have picked out. In the meantime, happy listening.
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