Yesterday we noticed indie-folkie Will Oldham had dissed Wes Anderson for his seemingly random, “Iphone-mix” use of music in his films (we’ll mostly lead that contentious swipe alone, but we’ll say Anderson’s use of pop is not what it was).
What we didn’t realize that there was more to Oldham’s griping in the original A/V Club interview. Here’s the excerpt, but it’s candid and amazing and it’s kind of awesome that Oldham points out the bullshit politics and dubious choice of music supes and their “special relationships with record labels.” But not that we’re thinking about anyone in particular or anything.
AVC: You mentioned talking to Richard Linklater and Caveh Zahedi about your ideas on movie music. Can you summarize those ideas? WO: Well, for a while, it seemed like you were always seeing movies where all the music was determined by the music supervisors and their special relationships with certain record labels. And I just felt like, “Wow, I’ll bet they spent months or years writing this screenplay, and I’ll bet they spent months shooting this, and I’ll bet they spent months editing this, and now they’re spending no time at all picking these completely inappropriate songs with lyrics to put under a scene that has dialogue.”
How does that even work? How can you have a song with someone singing lyrics under spoken dialogue and consider that mood-music, or supportive of the storyline? As somebody who likes music, when that happens, I tend to listen to the lyrics, which have nothing to do with the movie. And then I’m lost in the storyline. Not only is that a crime, but it’s a crime not to give people who are good at making music for movies the work. It’s like saying, “We don’t need you, even though you’re so much better at it than I am as a music supervisor.”
People are constantly contacting me saying, “I’ve been editing my movie, and I’ve been using your song in the editing process. What would it take to license the song?” And for me it’s like, “Regardless of what you’ve been doing, my song doesn’t belong in your movie.” That’s where the conversation should end. Music should be made for movies, you know?
A-fucking-men, brother. Down with weak use of pop music in movies. When was the last time you saw a music and movies moment that was truly inspired? It’s not that often these days.