Labyrinth
EMI, 1986
http://www.trevorjonesfilmmusic.com
REVIEW BY: Roland Fratzl
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 05/24/2008
Ah, good 'ol 1986, the year that is notorious for being considered the absolute nadir of popular music by a great number of music critics.
The soundtrack to the film Labyrinth, a collaboration between David Bowie and a B-list film score composer by the name of Trevor Jones, certainly does nothing to dispel that perception.
You see, between albums and tours,
It's quite a powerful indication of just how overwhelmingly dreadful the musical soundtrack must be when just hearing snippets of it between breaks gasping for air (as there was no physical way that I could have fully listened to it other than being forcibly strapped to a chair à la Alex in A Clockwork Orange) is nearly enough to send one into violent convulsions.
It's… horrendous. This is one of those times that the written language is completely insufficient in expressing the full extent of my outrage upon being subjected to this, this rancid, festering, gelatinous pile of gloop masquerading as music. Even John Tesh would dash for the nearest exit.
Bowie's five contributions to the album make Tonight sound like Ziggy Stardust in comparison, and the seven laughably dated, New-Age instrumentals supplied by Trevor Jones are even worse, being nothing more than minimalist, thoughtless, comatose exercises of the cheapest Casio keyboard tones imaginable, and the bare arrangements only serve to magnify the complete lack of ideas as they don't even have any flash to distract you or hide behind. I've heard two-year olds randomly hammering away at keyboards with their fists while simultaneously filling their diapers play with more creativity.
While
When watching the film itself (quite good, by the way), the music safely hides in the background most of the time (except for a few song and dance scenes where the resulting nausea sets in), but listening to the soundtrack on its own is truly gag-inducing. If you were anything but a five to ten-year-old girl in 1986 and aren’t offended by the Labyrinth soundtrack, then your home should be the nearest lunatic asylum.
I guess I should be in a lunatic asylum then. I love the Bowie tracks on this soundtrack. The rest of the score works with the movie but I would never listen to them on the cd. I think Within You (the song in the upside down staircase scene) is Bowie at his best. The rest of the songs are great and they really fit with the movie. It sounds like Bowie was having fun recording these songs and that gives them a kind of charm. |