Be Cool - Soundtrack

Genre soundtrack Publisher TVT Soundtrax

I read where John Travolta, who reprises his role as Chili Palmer in the new film Be Cool, listens to a lot of Brazilian music these days--bossa nova, samba. (Entertainment Weekly, March 4, 2005 interview.) There's a really good example of classic MPB (Popular Music of Brazil, a post-bossa-nova genre that includes artists like Chico Buarque and Elis Regina) here--the 1966 Elis Regina recording "Roda" (Round), written by the great songwriter, singer and guitarist Gilberto Gil (who is the Brazilian equivalent of Paul McCartney, except he's better). Funny to include a song that talks about the exploitation of the poor (lyrics include couplets like "In this world those with money/Just want to have more") in a movie about making it in the music business, I guess, but it's a great song. Regina covered many Gil tunes, and although his originals are mostly better than her interpretations, this is one example of a song she actually improves. And since I'm on the subject, I'll just add that Elis Regina is one of the finest popular singers of the era, on a par with Dusty Springfield or Sarah Vaughan, and one can only hope that this soundtrack will lead some listeners to her work.

Enough of my undisguised love for Elis. This is a pretty nifty soundtrack compilation. It includes a classic tune by Earth, Wind and Fire, "Fantasy." "Hollywood Swinging" by Kool and the Gang is certainly one of their greatest moments, pre-sellout period. William DeVaughn's "Be Thankful for What You've Got" is another classic (covered well by Massive Attack a while back). James Brown's "The Boss" is also excellent. I think all films should include a James Brown song, if not James Brown himself--I'm sure he has a few stories about the influence of organized crime on pop music that would make for a certain gritty realism.

The originals are all right, although certainly not up to the standard of the other tunes. The Black Eyed Peas do one called "Sexy" which interpolates into a relaxed hip-hop groove the classic bossa nova song "Insensatez," written by Antonio Carlos Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes and done in its definitive version by the inventor of bossa nova, João Gilberto, in 1961. They rhyme "kama sutra" and "anything that suits you." Perfectly pleasant if not earth-shaking. Oh yeah, there's a Sonny and Cher tune too, "A Cowboy's Work Is Never Done." And The Rock kind of sings, I guess that's the word, "You Ain't Woman Enough," the 1966 Loretta Lynn hit. A brave move on someone's part, good clean fun.

Christina Milian, who plays the singer who Chili takes up in the film, does a couple of tunes. Well, she's no Elis Regina, but she sings well and her songs are pretty standard-issue modern pop. "Believer" is a slow piano-driven ballad about how she's going to realize her dreams; certainly having a connected guy on the case helps, in real life as well as in movies. 777's "Brand New Old Skool" shows the pervasive influence of Eric B. and Rakim, and moves along nicely in an old-school fashion.

OK, so it's a nice soundtrack. I don't know about the film itself. Travolta has had, what, sixteen comebacks at this point. Uma Thurman is always nice to see in movies, as are Vince Vaughn and Harvey Keitel. Most movies about making it in the music business gloss over the realities--I myself wish Cameron Crowe, for example, would volunteer to be shot out into space so that we wouldn't have to put up with any more of his lame films. I mean, once you've seen The Harder They Come it's a little difficult to get excited about some fictional '70s popsters singing along to "Tiny Dancer" on a bus. What would the real Lester Bangs say? Being an old-fashioned socialist R&B fan, I want to see a music-business film in which James Brown plays a former-soul-singer-turned gangster who marries Avril Lavigne, becomes President of the United States, and institutes a plan under which all royalties from pop-music sales for five years are used to provide everyone in the country with health insurance. A man can dream, can't he?