# Artists that supplied entire soundtracks for movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 13, 2006, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595 "2006-04-13T23:16:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![tsarina](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f4b2a3/32.png) [@tsarina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tsarina)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/41 "2006-04-14T12:40:05Z")
Cat Stevens and _Harold and Maude_. ---
**Author:** ![Sierra\_Indigo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f0a364/32.png) [@Sierra\_Indigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sierra_Indigo)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/42 "2006-04-14T12:45:03Z")
Rob Zombie did most if not all of the music for **House of 1000 Corpses** , as well as making the actual film, IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![Ichbin\_Dubist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ichbin\_Dubist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ichbin_Dubist)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/43 "2006-04-14T12:46:34Z")
Neil Young wrote and performed (solo, I’m pretty sure) all the music in Jim Jarmusch’s _Dead Man._ The Bad Livers’ Danny Barnes wrote and performed on all the music in Richard Linklater’s _The Newton Boys,_ both period jazz tunes and the orchestral stuff. The Gourds perform all the songs and incidental music in the excellent beard-growing documentary _Growin’ a Beard._ I seem to remember all the music in _Paris, Texas_ being written and performed by Ry Cooder, I could check into it – it’s hard to Google info on this, all you get is a million pages of people selling copies of the damn thing. ---
**Author:** ![TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tellmei_mnotcrazy/32/3419_2.png) [@TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TellMeI_mNotCrazy)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/44 "2006-04-14T12:51:52Z")
[QUOTE=Ichbin Dubist] I seem to remember all the music in Paris, Texas being written and performed by Ry Cooder, I could check into it – it’s hard to Google info on this, all you get is a million pages of people selling copies of the damn thing. [/QUOTE] [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087884/trivia](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087884/trivia) > [@](#): > > Composer Ry Cooder recreated blues guitarist Blind Willie Johnson’s 1927 tune “Dark Was the Night” as the centerpiece of his Paris, Texas (1984) soundtrack. Not hard at all if you know where to look 😉 Oddly, though, there are no actual details there on the soundtrack. ---
**Author:** ![Sean\_Factotum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Sean\_Factotum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sean_Factotum)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/45 "2006-04-14T13:43:11Z")
[QUOTE=Thudlow Boink] The Bee Gees: “Saturday Night Fever” [/QUOTE] True, they had the lion’s share of songs, but other groups have songs on the soundtrack: The Trammps and Yvonne Elliman come immediately to mind. Vince Guraldi did the soundtrack and score (I believe) to _A Boy Named Charlie Brown_ along with the first couple of television specials. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/46 "2006-04-14T14:10:11Z")
Speaking of **Ry Cooder** , he did the soundtrack for the movie [Southern Comfort](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083111/), though unfortunately they didn’t put out a soundtrack for that one. Too bad, because there’s some great eerie swamp-rock sounding stuff in that movie. However, there is a CD of some of Cooder’s movie soundtrack music, which contains some of the music from _Southern Comfort_ called [Music by Ry Cooder](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000002N0X/103-0797127-5159066?v=glance&n=5174). I might have to pickl that one up… ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/47 "2006-04-14T14:29:59Z")
[QUOTE=scotandrsn] Prince did all the songs in Batman. [/QUOTE] No, he [didn’t](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000384/) . Peince did a single (won an award for it too), but Elfman was the composer. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/48 "2006-04-14T14:54:32Z")
[QUOTE=EJsGirl] No, he [didn’t](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000384/) . Peince did a single (won an award for it too), but Elfman was the composer. [/QUOTE] Prince was credited with the 9 song soundtrack album (not just a single). Danny Elfman was credited with the Original Motion Picture Score. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/49 "2006-04-14T15:18:18Z")
[QUOTE=Eonwe] _The Sting_ uses Scott Joplin rags exclusively for its soundtrack. [/QUOTE] It occurs to me, it’d be a nice turnaround if they made a movie about Scott Joplin and had Sting do the soundtrack. ---
**Author:** ![Boulter\_s\_Canary](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Boulter\_s\_Canary](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boulter_s_Canary)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/50 "2006-04-14T17:00:03Z")
Mark Knopfler - _Local Hero_ Big Country - _Restless Natives_ Richard Thompson - _Grizzlyman_ ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/51 "2006-04-14T17:15:50Z")
Vangelis - _Chariots of Fire_ and _Blade Runner_. ---
**Author:** ![YaWanna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/bbce88/32.png) [@YaWanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YaWanna)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/52 "2006-04-14T17:20:53Z")
[QUOTE=Eonwe] It doesn’t quite match the OP, because the artist was dead at the time, but _The Sting_ uses Scott Joplin rags exclusively for its soundtrack. [/QUOTE] Not exactly - there is a medley of traditional pre-Joplin tunes (\*Listen to the Mockingbird, Turkey in the Straw, \* and some other that escapes my memory at the moment) in carousel-style, and there’s also one other on it that I’m sure Joplin didn’t write. I’ll have to take a look at my liner notes to that one when I get home. > [@Zsofia](#): > > Tangerine Dream did a whole lot of movies of a certain era - I’m thinking Thief and Manhunter. I’m thinking they did the soundtrack for _Legend_ (the fairytale/fantasy with Tom Cruise, Mia Sara, and Tim Curry). ---
**Author:** ![Ichbin\_Dubist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ichbin\_Dubist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ichbin_Dubist)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/53 "2006-04-14T18:07:14Z")
[QUOTE=TellMeI’mNotCrazy] Not hard at all if you know where to look 😉 Oddly, though, there are no actual details there on the soundtrack. [/QUOTE] What I meant was that there was no simple way to tell whether Cooder played _all_ the songs (or, as I believe, all the music) that were (was) in the film (movie). As you pointed out, IMDB was mute on the topic (well, sure, I’m not a picture of clarity myself, and I haven’t seen the movie in 15 years or more), and soundtrack albums don’t always contain just songs that were _in_ the movie, which is what I think the OP wants. I think. Anyway, one of things I find most irksome about movies these days is how they feel the need to stop everything and hype the soundtrack album every 20 minutes or so by playing intrusive bits of what often turn out to be bad covers of good songs by a bunch of anonymous group-de-jour bands signed to the label owned by the same mega-conglomerate that owns the movie studio. So did Britney Spears perform all the songs from her movie, or what? ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/54 "2006-04-14T18:31:51Z")
[QUOTE=Lobot] Trivia: Pink Floyd were going to do the soundtrack to Jodorowski’s _Dune_ (as a double album!) before he was dropped from the project. [/QUOTE] Here’s a link to that [Dune](http://www.duneinfo.com/unseen/jodorowsky.asp) project…it would have been the highest geek-cred-factor movie in history 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![mrklutz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ebca7d/32.png) [@mrklutz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrklutz)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2006, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/55 "2006-04-14T18:45:12Z")
I don’t recall if they did the _entire_ soundtrack or not, but The Alan Parsons Project did the music for _Ladyhawke_. I still like the movie, but it’s hard to not be distracted by the music – it just seems jarringly out of place now. ---
**Author:** ![jmwatts](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jmwatts/32/17348_2.png) [@jmwatts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmwatts)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/56 "2006-04-16T03:04:06Z")
Wang Chung did _To Live and Die in LA_ ---
**Author:** ![ASAKMOTSD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/919ad9/32.png) [@ASAKMOTSD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASAKMOTSD)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2006, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595/57 "2006-04-16T13:31:23Z")
Phil Collins did Disney’s _Tarzan_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/artists-that-supplied-entire-soundtracks-for-movies/352595.md?page=2)