Soundtrack

Soundtrack.

Below is the research i did on the conventions of a gritty realism soundtrack in order to gather ideas for our own work


We came up with out soundtrack in a music workshop we had after school in the term after Christmas. we were inspired but the acoustic sounding soundtrack to submarine written by Alex turner and decided a simple soundtrack would be better as it wouldn't take away from the action. We asked our music teacher if he could come up with any ideas and he gave us some chords for a melody on his guitar. From there as a group we wrote some very simple lyrics and then went back to our music teacher and by the end of the session we had an idea of a song to play in our opening sequence.

Here is the first recording.

Over the next week we continued to write lyrics for the song and kindly our music teacher sang them with the melody he came up with and it sounded great so we asked him to record it. Although the quality isn't amazing with this audio we have cut it to size and it works well with the image track we have filmed.
The embedded video is the audio we have used in our opening sequence.

I really like this audio because the lyrics relate well to the image track and the themes of the film so much that in this opening sequence it seems like a narration as well as a basic soundtrack. We chose the lyrics carefully so that it would hint at a theme of mental illness or depression. For example "running from my shadow" suggests another personality in Chris and as the song goes on to use phrases such as "cant escape my shadow" and "itching under your gaze" it further depicts the stress occurring on screen and subtlety hints at Chris' emotions in this first sequence.Moreover the simple guitar doesn't take away from the image track while adding to the feel of the piece, giving more focus on the lyrics and the image track.

Lyrics:

"Running, running from my shadow,   

 I cant escape my shadow.

 Seems like every time I turn around he's standing there, 

 watching me.

 Got me itching,

 itching under your gaze. 

 I can't escape from your gaze.

 Seems like,

 everything I do, 

 isn't good enough for you.

 Hiding, 

 hiding from my shadow,

 cant escape my shadow. 

 Feels like,

 I spend my life trying,

 tryna' hide from my demons.

 Listenin', 

 listening for his footsteps.

 I can't unhear his footsteps

 Approaching, 

 always getting closer."