Pump Up The Volume: Music From The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

You don't have to pump this one too loud

Mediocre 90's collection tries to be all things to all people but fails being much to anyone simply because most of the material has worn away or the songwriting wasn't there to begin with. A few exceptions to this rule hardly justify a purchase, I'm sure these tracks can be found elsewhere. September 19, 2008

Pumped Up

Hard to find CD with some excellent tunes. Dissappointing and surprising that the original Leonard Cohen tune isn't on this soundtrack, but it still is worth buying. September 13, 2008

Talk Hard - Classic Music from a teen angst era of classic movies

This was one of those great teen angst films of the 90s. The songs brought me back to when this film spoke to me. I had this in cassette once. It has two versions of "Everybody Knows" to include the slower blues version. There are also a lot of that early grunge-type rock without the moodiness. There is also that song by the Pixies "Wave of Mutilation" that is now in the Rock Band video game and "Southland Tales" by Richard Kelly. All in all, if you loved the movie, you'll relive it with the soundtrack, but if not, then it all depends on if you can vibe with the early 90's music. May 21, 2008

Good, But Could Have Been Amazing.

This is a decent soundtrack, but the frustrating thing is that it could have been incredible. As other reviewers have stated, it is missing quite a few songs that were featured prominently in the movie. Leonard Cohen is not on it, and songs by The Beastie Boys, The Descendents, Ice-T and Was(Not Was) are all absent as well.

What is on it is not bad, though. It's a mix of different styles of music all thrown together. Some songs stick out more than others. Here are some of the highlights. Concrete Blonde gives us a nice version of Cohen's "Everybody Knows" and Ivan Neville contributes a cool little song. I absolutely love the UK Surf Mix of "Wave Of Mutilation" by The Pixies and it is almost impossible to sit still while listening to the cover of "Kick Out The Jams." The lone hip-hop track is pretty good and has a jazzy feel to it and lyrics about censorship.

So, as I said it's not a terrible soundtrack, but the exclusion of certain songs hurts it a little. I also think it would have been cool if they would have had little clips from Hard Harry's show in between the songs so that you would feel like you were listening to his show. Oh, and one more thing, English singer-songwriter John Wesley Harding wrote a song for this soundtrack that was rejected. You can find it on his Dynablob album. It's called "Ask Why."


September 1, 2005

Frustrating Must Have

The Surf Mix of the Pixies is a must-have.. as is Rollins/Brains crushing Kick Out the Jams. And my finest memory of this time.. I hung out in a boring college town (I know- what horrible irony) and the bars all had the same bland, JACKED-UP collection of CD's at the time: classic rock / U2 / Pearl Jam / Matthew Sweet / "new" country... Frat boys wearing polo shirts and playing pool.. smelling like cologne. Well, someone stocked this CD in the jukebox. And when Rollins started screaming "Kick out the JAMS, MOTHERF****!!!" All the vanilla clones would jerk the heads around and wonder how something like THAT! Something they didn't RECOGNIZE! Something they didn't play at their bull**** frat parties could show up in THEIR bar!!! God it was a brief, wonderful moment in a long dark time. June 30, 2005

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