Instead of using something predictable like "Tangled Up in Blue," for example, the producers include Dylan's gorgeous, dreamy and forlorn 1989 song "Most of the Time." Like the Thirteenth Floor Elevators' howler "You're Gonna Miss Me," "Most of the Time" is about sadness hiding behind vanity and injured pride. Canonical musicians like Bob Dylan, the Velvet Underground, the Kinks and Stevie Wonder are represented, as are indie darlings like Smog, Stereolab and the Beta Band and often-forgotten older acts like Love and Thirteenth Floor Elevators.Įven though many of the artists are rock idols, the songs included are ones that haven't lost their power through endless radio repetition. The characters in both book and movie are the types of music snobs who both worship the classics and revel in obscurity, and the soundtrack balances perfectly between the two tendencies. As Rob's emotions consist largely of variations on the themes of romantic dejection and hangdog longing, it's no surprise that the soundtrack is largely a journey through several decades of jangly rock melancholia. The thrilling compilation plays like a dream mix tape made by a friend with an impeccable, expansive record collection and plenty of time to waste - someone like Rob. While the book puts you inside Rob's head and thus forces you to empathize with all his romantic clumsiness and half-assed rationalizations, watching someone behave that pathetically on-screen is an entirely different affair.Īt least the movie comes with a great soundtrack. The movie, perhaps inevitably, is disappointing. One of the book's - and now the movie's - most telling moments is when Rob arranges his massive album collection "autobiographically." Like so many obsessive music fans, he can only identify his emotions by song titles. Detailing the romantic floundering of a record-store owner and vinyl fetishist named Rob, "High Fidelity" is partly about the difference between real love and the way love is expressed in pop music. Nick Hornby's "High Fidelity" is the kind of novel that you wish came with a soundtrack.
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