I love to drive. Always have. And there is no better driving than nights like these—warm summer nights with a cool breeze. I love the feeling of immersing myself completely in the night air, and isolating myself in it—the breeze a barrier between myself and the rest of the world. Then the night is mine, and I feel freer than I do any other time of day.
Well, for those of you who love to drive, and need a good some good tunes, I believe I have found the ultimate CD. It is the soundtrack of Elizabethtown. Now, Elizabethtown’s producers seem to have made two such CDs, but I’m talking about the one entitled Elizabethtown: Music from the Motion Picture. It’s got a red cover; it’s not the one with a “Vol. 2” label, with (beautiful) Orlando Bloom on the front.
In the movie, Orlando Bloom’s character, Drew, receives a homemade CD with many of these songs from his love interest, Claire (Kristen Dunst), along with directions and a detailed, personalized map, to take him on the road trip he tells her he’s never been on. “I want you to get into the deep beautiful melancholy of everything that's happened,” she tells him.
So . . . enjoy!
1. 60B (Etown Theme) - Nancy Wilson
I generally don’t enjoy purely instrumental songs as much those with lyrics, but this song is an exception. Sweet guitar melodies are intertwined to create a song that can’t not make you envision someone on a journey.
2. It’ll All Work Out - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
I love this song’s opening lyrics: “She wore faded jeans/and soft black leather/ She had eyes so blues they looked like weather/ When she needed me I wasn’t ‘round/ That’s the way it goes/ It’ll all work out.” In about six lines, a whole bittersweet romance is chronicled, and the song only gets better. With its mostly-guitar background, it incorporates an instrumental backdrop that sounds almost Japanese; strangely, it mixes in perfectly with this almost-country ballad.
3. My Father’s Gun - Elton John
A song that feels like the epitome of old southern America. It tells the story of a fallen father/soldier during the Civil War, Elton asserting “It wouldn’t do to bury him where any Yankee stands.” He cries “I’d like to know where the riverboat sails tonight .” It’s impossible to not get completely wrapped up in the sorrow and pride that said narrator feels for his Confederacy, even if you are a northerner through and through.
4. Io (This Time Around) - Helen Stellar
A song that could be soundtrack to any emotional scene in any movie. Really, any. The lyrics are simple, concise, but words that anyone wants to relate to: “ You can be anyone/ This time around.”
5. Come Pick Me Up - Ryan Adams
A song that lives up to the hype about Ryan Adams. He weaves harmonica riffs amongst melancholy lyrics about a confused, insomniac, and lonely life to create a truly modern blues song.
6. Where to Begin - My Morning Jacket
In short, a quiet song. For a few seconds, the singer’s voice almost seems to echo a blues-y Elvis. Lyrics are free for interpretation.
7. Long Ride Home - Patty Griffin
Patty Griffin does wonderful things with words and acoustic guitar in this song—the story a sad, but upbeat (somehow) ballad about a woman’s dead husband, and her thoughts on the long ride home from his funeral. She reminds us that anything can happen when you aren’t expecting it.
8. Sugar Blue - Jeff Finlin
The opening chords suggest a song with a harder edge, but the lyrics which follow are those of a wanderer, in love perhaps—the song softening quickly. “The raven’s song, it breaks the night/ And I rise from me through broken hues” he sings.
9. Don’t I Hold You - Wheat
A song about the sometimes futility of love. The song is fairly fast-paced (for a song about lost love), tinged by desperation.
10. Shut Us Down - Lindsey Buckinham
A different style of vocals, but laced with the same acoustic guitar in most of the CD. The words pick up pace as the song progresses, becoming more and more urgent, more and more frantic. “Oh, I won’t shut us down/ No I will stay around/ As long as I can” he tries to reassure his lover.
11. Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) - Los Hombres
A fun, upbeat song, ideal for day driving in the country. To enjoy this song, just find a two-lane highway cutting through farm fields, roll down the windows, and, most importantly, lay on the accelerator.
12. Hard Times - eastmountainsouth
The song on the CD that sounds like a campfire song, reminiscent in some moments, of the campfire classic “Linger. “Hard times come again no more,” female vocalists harmonize.
13. Jesus Was a Crossmaker - The Hollies
Elizabethtown features several versions of this song. This one begins with tame church hymn-sounding vocals and progresses to a spirited gospel version.
14. Square One - Tom Petty
Just one more mellow, something-of-a-love-song song. In some verses, he seems to mimic Cat Steven’s quiet melodies and story-telling style. “Square one, my slate is clear/Rest your head on me my dear/It took a world of trouble, it took a world of tears/It took a long time to get back here” he sings.
15. Same In Any Language - I Nine
The movie features various version of this song . . . which is great. The acoustic riffs and lyrics tell the story of a wanderer, her unquenchable wanderlust, and her realization that brotherhood and camaraderie are universal—“The same in any language/ Wherever you go.”
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