I say “movie soundtrack” and what do you think? I know I’m immediately thinking big orchestral scores similar to The Pirates of the Caribbean and Lord of the Rings. To a lesser degree, I think of movies like Juno and Scott Pilgram vs. the World. Film is one of those places where you can get a hipster to listen to an orchestra or you can get someone with slightly more class to listen to Sonic Youth. It’s a beautiful dichotomy.
But what is it that makes these soundtracks so great? If you were to throw the Juno soundtrack in with The Pirates of the Caribbean it wouldn’t bode well for either. Music is set there to compliment the film. It helps you to experience the film on a deeper level. In my examples, we’ve got POTC and LOTR as these big epics with battles and adventure …and music that makes you feel like you’re in the midst of those exact things. With Scott Pilgram, the music helps you to feel like you’re in the midst of a video game. And with Juno, you feel like a lost indie kid in a big confusing world.
The music is there to remove you from your seat and place you in the movie. Consequently, when you hear the same music without the movie, it is emotive of those same feelings. When I hear the POTC soundtrack, for instance, I immediately am thinking of scenes from the movie.
But this is a rare case. Unless it’s the theme song, for most movies, hearing something from it won’t evoke anything reminiscent of the movie. And even a more rare case is that there is a documentary with such a mind-blowing soundtrack.
Enter, The Art of Flight. It’s a snowboarding documentary. When I think of snowboarding documentaries, after thinking of how awesome the footage is, I am reminded of how terrible the music is. It’s so often over-produced rap, angsty punk, or something else that’s way too much of a sensory overload when combined with watching guys drop off 70 foot cliffs. The music rarely makes you feel like you are there.
And really, snowboarding is a lot more tangible than most movies, so it should be easier to emulate the feeling through music. If music can make you feel like you’re sailing across the ocean in a pirate ship, shouldn’t it also be able to make you feel like you’re doing something a little less fanciful.
So often this is botched up, but not with The Art of Flight. Everything is perfect. There is literally nothing I would change about the movie, except to maybe make it longer. Since I first saw it about a month ago, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about snowboarding or stop listening to the soundtrack.
The soundtrack to this thing redefines what you think of as a soundtrack. It has variety, dynamic, and puts you right in the middle of the movie. Sure, I’m not out there hucking backflips over 100 foot gaps on a glacial melt, but I do snowboard and am pretty well familiar with the sport. And somehow, this soundtrack is snowboarding. It’s complimentary to the images to place you right in the middle of the action.
This is finally a soundtrack that recognizes that snowboarding is more than just about big tricks. When I’m listening to this, I’m doing what I do on a mountain. I like steep and fast and, occasionally, a good cruiser.
Right off the bat, you’ve got some house beats (that's what they're calling this stuff, right?), compliments of Deadmau5, that give the vivid feeling of flying down a chute, airing over small features, but in such a fluid manner and with such intensity. The bass is driving, but at a palatable pace that focuses on the control of every little muscle movement involved with keeping up with gravity. It’s not about going big, but about style. It’s the beauty of a well planned line and the thrill of the moments when your board leaves the ground.
After that, there’s this song by The Naked and Famous, “No Way.” It’s basically like cruising on some packed power and then dropping some fresh tracks. You’ve got the opening words of “When the daylight comes, do you feel it?” It’s in a soft voice and makes you think of cruising blues on packed power after getting first chair, bright and early in the morning. When I’m listening to it, I’m hearing the crunch of cutting through the snow through nice, relaxed carves down an empty slope. Every verse is like this – like cruising leisurely and enjoying life. Then you’ve got these big choruses that take you from the lift lines and packed powder to the back side of the mountain, laying fresh tracks through huge pow turns. It’s like floating.
Next in line is Apparat’s, “Ash/Black Veil.” It’s set by a delay driven, beat that seems to be comprised of some guitar, violin, percussion, and random sound effects. It’s light and open. Listening to this one, I’m envisioning a tree run. Not an east coast run, but out west, where you’ve got big, open aspen glades and powder. The song takes you along this trail, where you’ve got nothing but trees ahead of you and nothing but trees behind you.
Basically, the album continues at this pace – exploring the many facets of snowboarding, snow, and winter. You’ve got tracks for big jumps, tracks for steep lines, tracks for danger, and tracks for relief. This is what I want to ride to this winter. This is a soundtrack beyond the scope of a movie. It’s one that spans to reach the snowboarding (skiing, snowmobiling, etc.) subset of the population to the point of being the soundtrack to our lives for the next 4 months.
Check it:
And, of course, the rest of the soundtrack:
| Segment | Artist | Song |
| Intro 1 | Defrag | Element 1 |
| Intro 2 | M83 | Outro |
| So Far Gone 1 | Hendrickson/Dick/Harry | Before the Storm |
| So Far Gone 2 | Deadmau5 | Ghosts n’ Stuff (Nero Remix) |
| Down Days | Oswin Macintosh | Passion Victim |
| Wizard | The Naked and Famous | No Way |
| No Bueno | Apparat | Ash/Black Veil |
| Darwin 1 | Klaus Badelt | Nowhere to Run |
| Darwin 2 | Blockhead | Sunday Seance (Loka Remix) |
| Home 1 | The Album Leaf | Another Day |
| Home 2 | The Naked and Famous | Young Blood |
| Home 3 | Mel Wesson | Motional Rescue Pulse |
| Avalanche 1 | Mel Wesson | Stark Light |
| Avalanche 2 | Sigur Ros | Track 6 |
| Aspen | M83 | Intro |
| Revelstoked | Hum | Iron Clad Lou |
| More stoked | The Black Angels | Young Men Dead |
| Even more stoked | M83 | My Tears Are Becoming A Sea |
| Credits 1 | Okkervil River | Westfall |
| Credits 2 | We Are Augustines | Chapel Song |
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