Various - American Beauty Soundtrack

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(Dreamworks)

Review: Russell Baillie



The music to Kevin Spacey's upcoming darkly humorous suburban drama offers its own arty edges. And some tracks which fit that movie title in a unconventional sense, like Elliot Smith's gorgeous take on the Beatles' Because, the Folk Implosion's Free To Go, Eels' Cancer for the Cure and honorary Yanks Gomez on one of the sensitively bluesy Brits' finest moments, We Haven't Turned Around.

There's also some old chestnuts both classy (Peggy Lee's Bali Hai, Bobby Darin's Don't Rain On My Parade, Betty Carter's Open The Door) and hoary (Free's All Right Now, The Who's The Seeker). Bookended by the spare, brooding instrumentals of composer Thomas (cousin of Randy) Newman, this soundtrack makes for a both an intriguing invite to the already much-praised film and a captivatingly eclectic collection of itself.