Brian Eno launches first collection of music from film – for David Lynch, Michelangelo Antonioni, Michael Mann, Peter Jackson, Derek Jarman, Danny Boyle

(Photo by Cecily Eno ) “Film Music 1976 – 2020” is a brand new Brian Eno release out on double vinyl / CD and download on November 13th in the UK and followed by a US release on January 22nd.

“Film Music 1976 – 2020” is the first ever collection of music from his film and television soundtrack oeuvre. Spanning five decades, this release features classic Eno compositions, lesser-known gems and seven previously unreleased tracks.

Eno’s long-standing affair with film goes all the way back to 1970 with his soundtrack to Malcolm Le Grice’s short experimental film “Berlin Horse”. In 1976 he followed this with “Sebastiane” and a long forgotten Greek b-horror film, “Land Of The Minotaur” AKA “The Devil’s Men”.

Early classic Eno film moments include “Prophecy Theme” from David Lynch’s “Dune”, “From The Beginning” from Dario Argento’s “Opera”, “Force Marker” and “Late Evening In Jersey” from Michael Mann’s “Heat”, “Under” from Ralph Bakshi’s “Cool World” and his cover of William Bell’s soul classic, “You Don’t Miss Your Water”, in Jonathan Demme’s “Married to The Mob”.

His 1978 studio album, “Music For Films” was a loose compilation of material recorded between 1975 – 1978. It was intended as a conceptual soundtrack for imaginary films and only the last track, “Final Sunset” was written for an actual film. It proved to be a fruitful project with nearly every piece on the album going on to be used in future films.

Eno again explored the above approach with U2 as passengers on their collaboration album, “Original Soundtracks 1”. Four of the tracks from the album were used in films prior to release: “Beach Sequence” and “Your Blue Room” in Michelangelo Antonioni’s “Beyond the Clouds”, “Miss Sarajevo” in an eponymous documentary about a beauty pageant held in the midst of besieged ‘93 Sarajevo, and “One Minute Warning” in Mamoru Oshii’s Japanese animation classic, “Ghost in the Shell”. Another track, “Always Forever Now” later appeared in “Heat”.

In the mid-seventies Eno began a collaboration with British film maker Derek Jarman, who initially commissioned Eno to record “Final Sunset” for the closing scene to his first feature film, “Sebastiane”. The collaboration continued all the way through until Jarman’s untimely death in 1994.

“An Ending (Ascent)” and “Deep Blue Day” are taken from “Apollo: Atmosphere & Soundtracks”, Eno’s collaboration with his brother Roger and Daniel Lanois. The music was originally written for Al Reinert’s documentary of the Apollo moon landing, “For All Mankind” although since then “An Ending (Ascent)” has taken on a life of its own and is now remembered just as much from Steven Soderbergh’s “Traffic”, Danny Boyle’s “28 Days Later” and Miguel Arteta’s “Beatriz at Dinner”. It even made an appearance in the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony. And then there’s “Deep Blue Day”, which will forever be identified with Ewan McGregor’s legendary toilet dive in “Trainspotting”.

Besides this and more filmwork, Eno has also scored extensively for television, including all three series of award-winning UK crime drama “Top Boy” and Danny Boyle’s “Mr Wroe’s Virgins”. Other television credits include his scores to BBC Natural World’s “Hammerhead”, “Francis Bacon’s Arena”, Neil Gaiman’s futuristic urban series, “Neverwhere”, and Stewart Brand’s BBC mini-series “How Buildings Learn”.

Check out the “Ship In A Bottle” video.

Track-list:

1. ‘Top Boy (Theme)’ from ‘Top Boy’ – Series 1, directed by Yann Demange, 2011
2. ‘Ship In A Bottle’ from ‘The Lovely Bones’, directed by Peter Jackson, 2009
3. ‘Blood Red’ from ‘Francis Bacon’s Arena’, directed by Adam Low, 2005
4. Under’ from ‘Cool World’, directed by Ralph Bakshi, 1992
5. ‘Decline And Fall’ from ‘O Nome da Morte’, directed by Henrique Goldman, 2017
6. ‘Prophecy Theme’ from ‘Dune’, directed by David Lynch, 1984
7. ‘Reasonable Question’ from ‘We Are As Gods’, directed by David Alvarado / Jason Sussberg, 2020
8. ‘Late Evening In Jersey’ from ‘Heat’, directed by Michael Mann, 1995
9. ‘Beach Sequence’ from ‘Beyond The Clouds’, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, 1995
10. ‘You Don’t Miss Your Water’ from ‘Married to the Mob’, directed by Jonathan Demme, 1988
11. ‘Deep Blue Day’ from ‘Trainspotting’, directed by Danny Boyle, 1996
12. ‘The Sombre’ from ‘Top Boy’ – Series 2, directed by Jonathan van Tulleken, 2013
13. ‘Dover Beach’ from ‘Jubilee’, directed by Derek Jarman, 1978
14. ‘Design as Reduction’ from ‘Rams’, directed by Gary Hustwit, 2018
15. ‘Undersea Steps’ from ‘Hammerhead’, directed by George Chan, 2004
16. ‘Final Sunset’ from ‘Sebastiane’, directed by Derek Jarman, 1976
17. ‘An Ending (Ascent)’, from ‘For All Mankind’, directed by Al Reinert, 1989