The indie brats are all abuzz about the Ethan Hawke’s “The Hottest State” soundtrack with it’s indie-approved artists, Cat Power, Feist, Bright Eyes and M. Ward. How do they feel about the Starbucks-lite associations with Norah Jones and multiple Grammy winner, “The Hottest State,” soundtrack composer Jesse Harris (he actually wrote all the songs these totally independent artists covered)? That’s really a moral indie problem they’re going to figure out on their own (Willie Nelson, has probably accrued enough indie-cache to count too).
For the rest of the world that isn’t 15 and punk-rock, the soundtrack is yes, a little light, folky, country and breezy, but there’s nothing wrong with sweet, plaintive tunes and many of these songs are simply, beautiful and simple in that traditional Jesse Harris manner (you certainly get Harris-like music when you ask for it). The rest of the soundtrack features Emmylou Harris, Rosario Ortega and Brad Mehldau.
The soundtrack is due August 7 and the film, starring Mark Webber, Catalina Sandino Moreno (“Maria Full of Grace”) and Michelle Williams, Laura Linney and the director (based on Ethan Hawke’s eponymous debut novel), is out in late August.
Ethan, who asked buddy Harris to write the score writes:
“From our first conversation, I was overwhelmed by the quality of Jesse’s songwriting and how perfectly matched it was to my aspirations for the tone and mood of the film. An idea began to develop: What if we scored the film entirely with original songs written by Jesse and performed by contemporary artists hand-picked to match certain scenes? To my mind this would give the entire film a continuity of authorship while still providing massive shifts in energy.”
Jesse Harris said Feist knew which one of his songs she would cover immediately. “When I opened for Feist in Europe, I sang ‘Somewhere Down the Road’ every night. She loved it and asked me to teach it to her—she wanted to cover it. So when this project started, there was never any question what song she was going to record.”
The collaboration with Cat Power however, wasn’t as smooth. “It was quite an ordeal just getting in touch with her; she’s a woman without an email address, she doesn’t answer the phone, she doesn’t have a manager and she only text-messages,” Harris said, sounding annoyed. “I only talked to her once before going to Miami to record the track. We did it live in the studio, sitting across from each other, and then I added some banjo and she sang some backing vocals—that was it. She was really fast in the studio, and really great.”
We also found an official trailer which has proved to be elusive thus far (aside from a badly dubbed Italian one we found a few weeks ago).
Watch: “The Hottest State” trailer
