The Needle and the Lens: Pop Goes to the Movies from Rock ’n’ Roll to Synthwave

Music critic Patrin (Bring That Beat Back) explores in this enthusiastic survey the “transformative power” of preexisting songs that have been added to films to steer tone, create subtext, or otherwise shape audience experience. Spanning 1964’s Scorpio Rising to 2011’s Drive, Patrin’s study considers so-called “needle drops” for such films as Easy Rider (1969), in which Steppenwolf’s “The Pusher” backgrounds motorcyclists Wyatt and Billy Porter’s freewheeling road trip across America after the two complete a cocaine deal, drawing out the contrast between the “good-natured escapists the [protagonists] see themselves as” and the agents of disorder society assumes them to be. Meanwhile, 1979’s Apocalypse Now opens with the Doors’ “The End,” a semi-absurdist musical choice that ushers in a “sense of ultimate finality, and the fear that comes with facing that oblivion” befitting the film’s Vietnam War backdrop. The song selection also led director Francis Ford Coppola to reorganize the movie’s structure, bringing elements from the end to the beginning. Interweaving director interviews, behind-the-scenes set gossip, and film and music criticism, Patrin unpacks with a fan’s devotion and a scholar’s precision how song and scene interact to become more than the sum of their parts. Lovers of film and music will be delighted with how Patrin brings the two together. (Nov.)