Last year, I posted about how much I enjoyed the music on True Blood, even as I thought season 4 was a total letdown. I even mentioned Music Supervisor Gary Callamar by name. So, it's been one of the very fun parts of my new job that I've been writing a series of weekly posts on CBS Local websites that covers the music of True Blood. And I get to talk to Mr. Callamar himself!
This year has had some great music moments, both for the soundtrack and in the context of the show. Here's a brief synopsis:
The season premiere, "Turn! Turn! Turn!" had some great moments, but none topped Jessica and Jason rocking out to The Runaways' "Cherry Bomb" on Guitar Hero. The episode's title track was a new take on the song by My Morning Jacket, which worked quite well.
"Authority Always Wins" featured a very cool and very different cover of John Mellencamp's "The Authority Song" by a rockabilly artist who I never heard of, Bosco Delrey, who I'd never heard of. Actually writing this reminded me that I have to check him out, so I just downloaded another one of his songs, "Wild One," on iTunes.
"We'll Meet Again" features the World War II hit as covered by the great Los Lobos, a great musical moment. The funniest music moment, however, was Sookie lying on her couch, drunk, singing "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)."
"Let's Boot And Rally" features a brand new song written for the episode, penned by Mr. Calamar himself. Nice work if you can get it! Read the story about it here. It is a duet between Iggy Pop and Best Coast singer Bethany Costentino. An interesting combination: I personally would love to see someone pair Iggy up with Kills singer Allison Mosshart, who would have been amazing on this song. You can buy "Let's Boot And Rally" on iTunes now (but Mr. Calamar told me the next True Blood soundtrack wouldn't come out until season six).
The episode called "In The Beginning" featured a song by the same name by an artist named K'naan. But the best music moment featured a karaoke version of "You Light Up My Life" that has to be seen to be believed.
The latest episode, "Somebody That I Used To Know," had an interesting music twist. The episode originally planned to use the very odd smash of the same name by Goyte. But as the song got more popular - and has been used on American Idol, The Voice and Glee - it got a little too popular for True Blood. They ended up not using it, instead opting for a song with the same name by the late Elliott Smith. I think they made the right choice. As unusual as Goyte's song is, it would have been a bit too obvious for True Blood at this point (I actually thought there'd be a cover by an unlikely artist). But the best song in the episode was Howlin' Wolf's "Smokestack Lightnin'" which was used during a particularly steamy scene.
I'm looking forward to the music from the rest of the season. Also, I should mention that I ended my last True Blood post hoping that season five would make up for season four. I'm glad to say that I think it has, and then some: this season has been pretty great. I really dig The Authority.
By the way, I'm not going to use my CBS stories as launching points for all of my posts this month. Tomorrow I plan on writing a review of Helmet's show at Webster Hall. I haven't seen them in years, and I'm wondering if they'll be as great as I remember.
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