OST - Natural Born Killers (1994) (@320)

I felt very happy that Trent Reznor, a hero of my late-teens, won the Oscar (along with Atticus Ross) for the original score of Social Network. It was very bizarre though, to see his brutal presence striving to fit in a tuxedo.
Today's upload is the soundtrack of Natural Born Killers which was produced and compiled by Reznor back in 1994. His stunning work though, deserved to be heard in a much better film since I still consider N.B.K. as one of the worst movies ever. Totally appalling, morally questionable (to say the least) was the result of the combination of Oliver Stone's immoderate ambition, shallow swank, strong belief of self-importance, confused ethics and artistic mumbo jumbo, it easily wins the title of the utter nonsense. After all I can't think of another movie which I rate with zero, where its soundtrack takes ten out of ten!

Tracklisting:
01-Leonard Cohen - Waiting For The Miracle (edit)
02-L7 - Shitlist
03-Dan Zanes - Moon Over Greene County (edit)
04-Patti Smith - Rock 'N' Roll Nigger (Flood remix)
05-Cowboy Junkies - Sweet Jane (edit)
06-Bob Dylan - You Belong To Me
07-Duane Eddy - The Trembler (edit)
08-Nine Inche Nails - Burn
09-BB Tone Brian Berdan feat. Robert Downey Jr. - Route 666
10-Remmy Ongala & Orchestre Super Matimila - Totally Hot
11-Patsy Cline - Back In Baby's Arms
12-Peter Gabriel and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan - Taboo (edit)
13-Jane's Addiction and Diamanda Galas (based on 'Ted, Just Admit It...') - Sex Is Violent
14-A.O.S. - History Repeats Itself (edit)
15-Nine Inch Nails - Something I Can Never Have (edited and extended)
16-Russell Means - I Will Take You Home
17-The Hollywood Persuaders - Drums A Go-Go (edit)
18-Barry Adamson - Hungry Ants
19-Dr. Dre - The Day The Niggaz Took Over
20-Juliette Lewis - Born Bad
21-Sergio Cervetti - Fall Of The Rebel Angels (edit)
22-Lard - Forkboy
23-Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra - Batonga In Batongaville (edit)
24-Nine Inch Nails - A Warm Place (edit)
25-Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan - Allah, Mohammed, Char, Yaar
26-Leonard Cohen - The Future (edit)
27-Tha Dogg Pound - What Would U Do

review link: here

download link: here (mirrorcreator) and here (rapidshare)

OST - When The Wind Blows (1986) (@320)

The whole world was holding its breath during the previous weeks; the nuclear threat in Japan was extremely serious. Fortunately, it seems that the worst have passed (?). What remains though, is that even in a totally organised country such as Japan a nuclear disaster can indeed take place. It is evident now that all these voices that and were deliberately downgraded all these years by the mainstream media for being "excessive screams from youngster with dreadlocks" were right, since it is the second time after 1986 that the "youngsters with dreadlocks" prove to be right: Nuclear energy cannot be used without a huge amount of risk. Even the strongest argument of those who insist in nuclear energy (all in all the same neo-liberals who run the markets and for whom "profit" being the one and only buzzword in their minds) is that the produced energy by the nuclear plants is cheap. Probably... in the short term. But if someone calculates in the produced energy's unit production cost (a) the cost of decommissioning of the nuclear power plants, who have a 30-year life, (b) the cost of abnormal situations such as in Chernobyl and Fukushima and (c) the cost for the safe disposal of the nuclear waste, the nuclear energy will become pretty expensive. I do not calculate of course the large number of human lives that each accident costs; the devastating ongoing effects of every nuclear accident on the health of some hundreds of thousands people is only an insignificant "detail" for the neo-liberals.

Today's upload is the soundtrack of When The Wind Blows, a strong animation film that presents the progressive physical effects of a nuclear assault on an old couple. The soundtrack's first side contains tracks from David Bowie, Hugh Cornwell, Genesis, the Squeeze and Paul Hardcastle, while side B contains music composed by Roger Waters.

You can also watch the whole movie here.

info link: here

download link: here (mirrocreator) and here (rapidshare)

Nikos Xidakis & Manolis Rasoulis - I Ekdikisi Tis Gyftias (1978) (@320)

Manolis Rasoulis, a unique Greek lyricist, passed away recently. A deliberate outcast, he always expressed himself in a direct and at the same time poetic (but not in its cheap form) way, he paved a new way for the Greek folk by handling a new ethos and meaning to it.
Today's upload, gives the chance to the 90% of the visitors of this blog (i.e. to the visitors outside Greece) to discover one of the best samples of Greek music, far away from the horrible, cheesy touristic covers of Zorba. As for the remaining 10%, a replay of this album will make us realise that Rasoulis is irreplaceable. Enjoy.

Further reading: Rasoulis official site: here

Further viewing: A documentary for Rasoulis from the Greek TV archives: here

download link: here (mirrorcreator) or here (rapidshare)

Various - A Tribute to John Barry (@320)

Although in a totally different genre from Gary Moore, John Barry's death was another great loss for music within just a few days; film music is now extremely poorer without him. It is difficult to think of the classic James Bond films without his music and the same applies to Midnight Cowboy, Dances With Wolves to name just a few of the many films for which his music earned them a higher ranking. The home-made compilation uploaded here offers some of his first hits (from 1960) with which he and his group had success in the UK, some of the most characteristic scores from the body of his work including of course most of the great songs he wrote for the Bond films as well as pieces from the three of the four scores for which he won the Oscar. An interesting trivia is that the famous James Bond Theme, although played by John Barry & his Orchestra, officially, it is not a track that Barry composed since the credited composer is Monty Norman.

Tracklisting:
01-John Barry Seven - Hit And Miss (1960)
02-John Barry Seven - Walk Don't Run (1960)
03-John Barry Orchestra - Beat For Beatniks (1960)
04-John Barry Orchestra - The James Bond Theme (1962)
05-Matt Monro - From Russia With Love (1963)
06-John Barry Orchestra - 007 (1963)
07-Shirley Bassey - Goldfinger (1964)
08-Tom Jones - Thunderball (1965)
09-John Barry - The Ipcress File (1965)
10-John Barry - The Knack (1965)
11-John Barry - Wednesday's Child (1966)
12-Matt Monro - Born Free (1966)
13-John Barry - The Girl With The Sun In Her Hair (1967)
14-Nancy Sinatra - You Only Live Twice (1967)
15-John Barry - Midnight Cowboy (1969)
16-Louis Armstrong - We Have All The Time In The World (1969)
17-John Barry - The Persuaders Theme (1971)
18-Shirley Bassey - Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
19-Lulu - The Man With The Golden Gun (1974)
20-Shirley Bassey - Moonraker (1979)
21-John Barry - Out of Africa (I Had A Farm In Africa) (1985)
22-John Barry - The John Dunbar Theme (1990)

download link: here (mirrorcreator) and here (rapidshare)

Gary Moore - Wild Frontier (1987) (@320)

Late as always, this is the post dedicated to Gary Moore, one of the best guitarists of his generation.
I know that some of you will disagree with the selection of Wild Frontier, but as it is one of the first records I bought, I tend to judge it more sentimentally than anything else. Moreover, the beautifully presented Irish-trad influences, apparent throughout the album, make me forgive the other weaknesses. Finally, the dedication "For Philip", seen on the lower right of the rear cover, gives to the album an eerie feeling now that Gary and Phil Lynott jam together.

Real also: Metallica's Kirk Hammett remembers Gary Moore

album info link: here

download link: here (mirrorcreator) and here (rapidshare)

Various - Yalla: Hitlist Egypt (@320)

The Egyptians struggled and managed to get rid of their PM. It's always the same story. No matter how strong an oppressive regime is, the common people, sooner or later, find the strength to oppose it. So, within a short period, after the Tunisians, this is the second successive uprising in the Mediterranean. Hoping the next uprising will soon come from the people of a nation from the northern part of the Mediterranean, we celebrate the Egyptians' victory with an enjoyable compilation of the contemporary music scene of Egypt, released by Mango, a subsidiary of Island records in 1990.

review link: here

download link: here (mirrorcreator) and here (rapidshare)

Decemberists - Castaways and Cutouts (@320)

Last year it was the Vampire Weekend (read here for the relevant post) that reached the no1 of the US album chart, this year it's the Decemberists. When a group that I like of the so-called indie finally finds its way to bigger audiences without selling out, I always feel it as a small victory. Moreover, I notice many such small victories during the last weeks. Mumford & Sons entered the top10 and remain there from Jan, 15 (!), the Cake (!) were no1 before the Decemberists and Amos Lee (!) after them, while Iron and Wine (!!) is at no2 this week. The cherry on the cake was of course the Social Distortion's (!!!) first top 10 ever; it's for sure that Mike Ness would never expect this after almost three decades from his group's first release. Unfortunately though a fact that cannot be overlooked is that the album sales show a constant decline (check here for some very interesting figures).
In order to celebrate this fantastic array of albums at the top 10 of the US album chart, I upload the Decemberists' brilliant first album from 2002.

review link: here

download link: here (link removed due to a relevant request :-((