Nobody does it like Baz Luhrmann. While there are arguably more narratively rich filmmakers out there, nobody treats the medium more like a product than him. He understands the appeal of making an all-encompassing universe where the film has a singular style and voice alongside memorable trailers and, more importantly, soundtracks that are always vying for timeless status. Much like how Romeo + Juliet (1996) made Generation X care about William Shakespeare, he is seeking to make Gen-Z care about Elvis Presley with his latest film Elvis (2022). Given that he was once an inescapable icon, it shouldn’t be all that a surprise that he wants to make him seem cool for a generation who grows up on short attention span TikTok videos and a more fluid approach to pop.
The thing is that where most of his other films can make sense for being indebted to other artists, Elvis is a wonderfully confusing affair. While the soundtrack doesn’t come out for another few days, a few of the singles have been released and the Gen-Z push is oh so clearly there. Starting with Doja Cat’s “Vegas,” one can hear her splicing a remix of Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog” and wonder just what is going on. With the soundtrack list recently released, oh boy is this going to be a juicy affair. There are 36 songs listed, not all by Presley. Some are by his movie stand-in Austin Butler, but elsewhere one will notice that Doja Cat isn’t an outlier but part of the bigger picture. Surrounding her on the album are: Eminem/Cee-Lo Green, Diplo, Kacey Musgraves, Tame Impala, and Denzel Curry. To say the least, the boomer crowd is going to be writing complaints to Warner Bros. for a good few months at least.
Then again, there’s nothing new to Luhrmann recontextualizing American history specifically. When he was last seen on the big screen, he created one of the most phenomenally assembled soundtracks of his career. Sure, it wasn’t as renowned as Moulin Rouge! (2001), but who could argue that he didn’t understand soundtrack manufacturing was an art? Whereas others like Quentin Tarantino knows the value of catchy music, soundtracks like Django Unchained (2012) are mostly reliant on older songs that, while fun recontextualization, lean too much on nostalgic hits of yesteryear. Luhrmann rarely if ever leans on them, at least directly. With The Great Gatsby (2013), he attempted one of the most nutso things imaginable. He was going to make F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 masterpiece into a lush, noirish contemporary adventure for millennials.
Something to admire about the album, properly known as “The Great Gatsby: Music from Baz Luhrmann’s Film,” is that in an alternate world it could be a Top 40 hit-maker even today. Few soundtracks feel like they put the legwork into releasing THREE singles that stand out in their idiosyncratic love of the past. Wonder what it sounds like to have two members of The Black Eyed Peas donate songs that mix James P. Johnson and Louis Armstrong with party rock? That’s on here. As vapid and throw away as it is, Luhrmann deserves points as a genius who took the biggest, most unnecessary swing imaginable and made something that is lovingly artificial in the correct ways.
It should be noted that as a complementary work to the film, this works very well. Luhrmann set out to make one of the most overly-produced adaptations imaginable to the point of becoming a two time Oscar winner for production and costume design. It’s among the most beautiful movies of the 2010s, and what’s most impressive is how even with the glitz, the discordant quality works to make the partying seem hollow and empty. If the music is lacking in substance, it is intentional. Everything is designed to tie into the hollowness of Jay Gatsby’s lifestyle, and it does so with a subtext that’s even found in executive producer Jay-Z’s involvement.
According to reports, Jay-Z worked with Luhrmann and Anton Monsted over two years to craft a Roarin’ 20s aesthetic for the modern age. He assembled an impressive soundtrack that, if nothing else, manages to have the most 2013 fad quality imaginable. Given that it’s a near decade since its release, it’s interesting to look down the list and realize who has and hasn’t aged all that well. It’s also hard to forget a time when Lana Del Rey was the “Gangster Nancy Sinatra,” when will.i.am and Fergie had viable solo careers, Jack White broke up The White Stripes, the death of Amy Winehouse was still heavy on the music community, and “Watch the Throne” temporarily combined the forces of hip-hop heavyweights Jay-Z and Kanye West. This is a snapshot of an era as well as an attempt to interpret an era through modern aesthetics. Is it successful? To be totally honest, it’s not always my favorite album but in hindsight, it’s nice to have a movie try this hard.
An issue that I had with the time was definitely the idea of contemporizing “The Great Gatsby” with such a bone-headed soundtrack. Very little of it resonated with me and there was something irritating about the songs not even being reverential to the time. I think specifically of the opener, Jay-Z’s “100$ Bills” which finds their executive producer establishing the gangster ethos by initially comparing his money laundering schemes to historical figures before going in the wrong direction as he compares himself to John F. Kennedy, Marvin Gaye, Jackie Gleason, and Marilyn Monroe to name a few. While these figures have become timeless icons in hindsight, they don’t really say anything about Fitzgerald’s work to a modern audience. I am fine with him pulling the hustler schtick elsewhere, but so much feels like an afterthought.
In some respect, this isn’t an issue because of how the music functions inside the film. Everything has a fleeting touch where what’s important is the chorus and the eagerness with which Jay-Z raps. It’s not so much that this feels like a catchy B-Side (or that the republished “No Church in the Wild” is in every way better), but given the artist’s involvement with the rest of the project, it’s concerning that this never quite achieves more than a “vibe.” In fact, many of the biggest songs on this album are closer to “vibe,” meaning tracks like will.i.am’s “Bang! Bang!” don’t offer up a lot outside of a Charleston pastiche, suggesting “Love stupid, I know it.” This is transparently designed as dance music and in that respect, their choice to get the Late-2000s Beatles of insipid pop for two songs deserves a standing ovation.
It should be noted that this is also another early example of how Jay-Z and Beyonce were designing themselves as a power couple. Following the opener, Beyonce teams with Outkast’s Andre 3000 for a cover of Winehouse’s “Back to Black.” It’s a sludgy song that never quite lands, but reflects the flip side of the album’s party ethos with internal sadness that runs through tracks like Florence + the Machine’s “Over the Love (Of You),” The xx’s “Together,” and Jack White’s “Love Is Blindness.” To be honest, this side is more difficult to appreciate as it’s less pulsating and more about the atmosphere. They’re not as reliant on hooks or cheekiness, so the cuts are often difficult to enjoy as more than moody background music.
But for “Back to Black,” there is something fitting about it in theory. It’s a song about letting go, and it’s something inherent in Gatsby’s character. An interesting sidestep to this release is that with Winehouse’s death in 2011, her father became more involved with her estate and had on and off complaints about Beyonce’s cover. He believed that they owed his daughter’s charity money for covering it, especially since he claims they didn’t get his permission. In a fun turn of events, he would go from liking it when an initial sample was released to hating Andre 3000’s part, which… fair. It’s not nearly as successful in capturing the painstaking heart of the music.
Another fun irony is that the main thing I remember about Fergie’s “A Little Party Never Killed Nobody (All We Got)” is that the single came out the week of The Boston Marathon Bombing (August 6 and August 15, 2013 respectively) and many joked that it was an inappropriate release. While it’s an inoffensive song that gives a shoutout to Duke Ellington’s “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing” in-between a song whose whole point is that partying is fine. Just dance the night away. Much like with “Bang! Bang!” there was a music video release where she was dressed in a flapper-era wardrobe and doing elaborate dance routines. Still, if one wanted a full spectrum of where Luhrmann’s version is going, imagine flappers dancing to GoonRock which in itself feels the most disconnected from the sound. It reminds me more of LMFAO’s party rock style which is undoubtedly catchy, but whose electronic beat doesn’t quite connect to the gangster ethos. It’s more of a university student partying during Spring Break in Florida than West Egg.
If there’s one song that has transcended the album’s shelf life, it’s Lana Del Rey’s “Young and Beautiful.” Some have considered it to be among her best work and immediately connected her as being a cinematic performer. As a song released between her breakout “Born to Die” and her moody gem “Ultraviolence,” it captures her first real jump into something more mature and speculative. She sings from the perspective of Gatsby’s unrequited lover Daisy Buchannan, thinking about the fragility of beauty. For starters, it’s the most sincere contribution to the soundtrack, finding purpose immediately within the heightened emotion that still is allowed some campiness but overall an earnest longing to be accepted. For many, this was the moment Lana Del Rey became an icon and not just that artist who bombed on Saturday Night Live. As someone accused of being artificial, Luhrmann being her collaborator made perfect sense.
But what helps beyond her ability to layer vocals and harmonies that wade through the entire song is the strings. Even in the film, it manages to work as this grandiose celebration of youth and this nostalgic fear of the future. There is a desire to live in the past. The listener believes Lana Del Rey’s obsession with the past because it is her image. The strings that accompany it are also breathtakingly beautiful and big, capturing a classical approach that makes this feel like a standard out of time. Whereas “100$ Bills” or “Bang! Bang!” are parodying the past, “Young and Beautiful” is romantic for it. Everything is meticulously placed for chills, creating something that frankly should’ve garnered her an Oscar nomination and, at very least, a Grammy win. With that said, she’d never win since this was the year of Frozen (2013) and “Let It Go.” Imagine releasing your perceived masterpiece against one of the most inescapable bops of the 21st century. Now there’s a reason to feel hopeless.
It honestly amazed me that The Great Gatsby produced THREE music video-worthy singles. While only “Young and Beautiful” can be argued to have aged gracefully, it’s still something that shows Luhrmann’s awareness of what the market needs. He’s about making trends, and I love what this is going for even when it fails to appeal to me. With that said, I do love that this is an album that thinks to jump from hip-hop to noirish balladry to a big band cover of Beyonce’s “Crazy in Love” by Emeli Sande with The Bryan Ferry Orchestra. If one was to be immersed in the world of Gatsby, this is a pretty effective way of answering “What if he was a big deal in 2013?” It may be somewhat dated now, but even then I can’t deny it’s at least singular in vision, no matter how self-indulgent the whole thing actually is. If anything, it exploits how little others are trying to make immersive populous art.
I don’t believe that “The Great Gatsby: Music from Baz Luhrmann’s Film” is at all a great album. With that said, I would love it if more films tried to make something like this. Given that Elvis is the director’s first film in nine years (he briefly did an entertaining Netflix series called The Get Down), there is something exciting about him trying to get people to care about Elvis Presley in the modern age. He’s been dead for 45 years and yet his legacy lives on. What will hearing it mixed with a little Swae Lee do to inspire teenagers today? Will it have the same atmosphere as Jay-Z convincing us he’s a modern Gatsby? To be completely honest, I’m not sure it will work as well, but then again I didn’t expect the 2013 soundtrack to resonate with me as much after a decade. I don’t love it, but certain songs have been implanted into my brain and I immediately recognized them. I can’t say the same for films I love more whose soundtracks are lacking a real sense of identity. If anything, they could listen to this album and realize that there are whole worlds worth building to improve your film. It just takes time and a little money. Still, it would be totally worth it if you can get the right people involved if just for the lasting impression even the worst decision is likely to leave.
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