When you watch the new trailer for A24’s “The Last Black Man in San Francisco,” you’ll immediately be taken aback by the beautiful visuals and the moving words from actor Danny Glover. But eventually, you’ll hear the song that plays during the trailer and fall in love with everything director Joe Talbot has put together in the film.
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And in honor of the film arriving in theaters in a couple of weeks, along with its soundtrack, we are proud to give our readers a chance to listen to that standout song, “San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair)” as performed in the film. And unlike other music chosen for trailers or films, this song holds a special place in the heart of Talbot, as he described to us recently.
Oddly enough, even though the song feels perfect for the film and is now redone into this beautiful version you can hear below, “San Francisco” was not a song that the filmmaker grew up listening to. Describing the reasons why the song makes its way into the new film, the filmmaker said that the song was viewed as “corny” when he was younger. But over time, that changed.
“By the time I was growing up, that corniness had aged into a warm nostalgic testament to a lost optimism and magic, in large part due to the timeless great songwriting of John Phillips,” Talbot said. “As me and my cohorts, now adults, got closer and closer to a having shooting draft of the script, the music from San Francisco’s heyday played out in our brains… ‘Somebody to Love,’ ‘Piece of My Heart’ and so on. So many native San Franciscans my age are raised on this music — it’s a quintessential part of growing up here and a huge source of pride.”
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He continued, “But for our film, we wanted to re-imagine these classics in our darker, present-day San Francisco — a city where musicians no longer play to starry-eyed teens in Golden Gate Park and live in palatial Victorians in the Haight. At best, they’re sleeping in front of those houses.”
This new version of “San Francisco” is composed by Emile Mosseri (who composed the film’s beautiful score), Talbot, and Daniel Herskedal, and includes vocals from Mike Marshall (who you may recognize as the voice in the chorus for Luniz’s “I Got 5 On It,” featured in “Us”). The song also features Herskedal on tuba. Talbot said that the first time he heard Marshall sing the song, he wept. And when you hear the song now, you can completely understand why.
This “corny” song is now the emotional centerpiece of the recent ‘Last Black Man’ trailer and will probably carve its way into your brain forever. You’re welcome.
“The Last Black Man in San Francisco” arrives in theaters June 7. The soundtrack will follow suit the same day. And if you preorder the soundtrack tomorrow, “San Francisco” is included for your listening pleasure right away.
You can hear the song by itself below (by itself and in the trailer), as well as take a look at the new poster below:
