Godzilla: The album
Various artists (Epic)
“Bigger is better,” insist the ads for “Batman” . . . oops, I mean, “Godzilla.” Which may explain why the latest megastar soundtrack for the latest would-be blockbuster movie dispenses with subtlety.
The first two tracks (also scheduled to be the first two singles released in North America) are blatant remakes of established songs: the Wallflowers’ straight-forward cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes,” and Puff Daddy’s reworking of Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir.” Both are major disappointments.
“Heroes” might as well have been played by a Bowie tribute band for all the freshness the Wallflowers bring to it. As for “Kashmir,” Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page is credited as a co-creator of this “new” version of the song (retitled “Come With Me”), but he sounds like he phoned in his part. And guess what? He did. Puff and Page “collaborated” via satellite from studios in Los Angeles and London, respectively, and they do little more than wrap the “Kashmir” riff around Puff Daddy’s typically pedestrian rap vocal.
Far more vital is “No Shelter,” a foundation-rattling Rage Against the Machine track, that sounds like an oversized lizard marching through Brooklyn. Jamiroquai’s “Deeper Underground” plays off the movie’s dark instrumental score with its droning synthesizer textures and lyrics that declare, “There’s too much panic in this town.” The connection between the music and the movie is harder to discern in new songs by Ben Folds Five, Days of the New and Foo Fighters, among others, but why kid ourselves? “Godzilla: The Album” (scheduled for release May 19) isn’t about artistic cohesiveness. It’s about economic opportunity.
The idea is to pack as many name artists onto a disc as possible and hope that commercial radio and MTV find something to play. “Godzilla: The Album” is a hodgepodge of styles and sounds designed to attract a wide demographic: teenage Silverchair and Green Day fans, graying Led Zep disciples, hip-hop heads smitten with Puff Daddy, hip clubgoers dazzled by Jamiroquai’s electro-funk.
Nonetheless, it would have been nice to see a track that pays tribute to the movie’s big star. My candidate is Blue Oyster Cult’s “Godzilla,” a minor metal classic from the ’70s that could have injected a much-needed shot of humor and provided a far cooler marketing slogan: “Oh, no! There goes Tokyo! Go, go, Godzilla!”
