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There is no better ‘get rich quick’ scheme in the music business than soundtracks.  I can understand why people buy soundtracks for musicals; that makes sense to me.   However, shelling out money for a movie or TV soundtrack is obscene, which is why I do it rather infrequently.

I hate to admit it, because I’ll lose my street cred, but I did buy the soundtracks for True Blood and Eclipse.  I had no plans on endorsing either until I read up that Beck and several other interesting artists were contributing original material.  And there is the ploy: original.

Why buy a soundtrack for a few songs you already have on an album?  There is no point.  Now, when you use phrases like: obscure B-sides, original material, rare tracks, etc. I begin to salivate.  One of my favorites is the Coneheads album since it is the only place you can get ‘Soul to Squeeze’ by Red Hot Chili Peppers.  Stubbs the Zombie is a video game I’ve never played but the track listing is 50’s songs redone by Indie bands.  Pulp Fiction needs no explanation.  X-Files, Singles, Clerks and Mallrats are all out of print and had some great mid-90’s alt rock.  Until recently, Mallrats was the only place to get the classic ‘Susanne’ by Weezer.  O Brother, Where Art Thou?, is great and the Dexter album has some nifty Latin music.  Charlie Brown, need you question it?

Soundtracks are a clever way to suck money out of loyal fans, or tweens that don’t know any better.  For the most part I buy these albums for a handful of songs that you can’t get anywhere else.  It is a rare occurrence that I enjoy most of the material.  Of course, the evil twin of the soundtrack is the compilation but we’ll get to that another time.