Customer Reviews

41 Original Hits From The Soundtrack Of American Graffiti

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What more can you say? This is quite possibly the best collection (and most eclectic sampling) of 50's and 60's music available. I was a kid when American Graffiti came out in 1973 and went week after week to the theatre to see it. It's held up beautifully all these years later. I owned the vinyl version of this double album, also the casette and even the eight track. The quality of the CD is leagues ahead of the original vinyl album, all the scratches and bumps have been removed and it results in a joyous listening experience. Each and every one of these songs is riveting, fun to listen to and just plain great!

If you're too young to remember these years, this album will give you a taste of what it must have been like to have grown up in the 50's and early 60's. An additional note: if you're never seen the movie, rent it or buy it immediately. It's a deserved classic!

Of all the categories of music available on compact discs (or cassettes), one of my favorites has always been the movie soundtrack. Not only does a good soundtrack album helps listeners remember favorite scenes from the movies, but it also may inspire them to explore musical styles they would have otherwise never listened to.

Just as John Williams Romantic-era stylings of his Star Wars scores opened my ears and mind to classical music at the age of 14, the songs of various artists featured in the soundtrack for 1973's George Lucas nostalgia-laced American Graffiti opened my heart and soul to the early rock 'n' roll and doo-wop of the late 1950s and early '60s. Having been born in 1963 into a household where only my older sister listened to such artists as The Beatles, Tom Jones and Englebert Humperdinck, it was only in the days of "Happy Days" (a TV sitcom that was inspired by the success of Lucas' first real successful movie) that I got a taste of early rock 'n' roll songs in the vein of "(We're Gonna) Rock Around The Clock," the song that kicks off this 2-CD, 41-song album.

The songs presented here were not only chosen by director George Lucas because they fit the time period (no song here was released after 1962), but also because the songs themselves were like a Greek chorus commenting on the on-screen doings of Steve, Laurie, Curt, John, Carol, Debbie and Toad. If the mood is upbeat, then songs like "Rock Around The Clock" are featured. For more emotionally charged sequences (Steve and Laurie's heart-rending argument at the school dance, for instance), The Platters' famous cover of Kerns' "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" and "Only You" are perfect accompaniment.

From that first track by Bill Haley and the Comets (such a whimsical and punny band name) to the surfin' crowd-pleasing Beach Boys' "All Summer Long," the original soundtrack album of American Graffiti will not only have listeners who saw the movie remembering the film's various characters and situations, it will also evoke the seemingly more innocent era of that pre-Cuban Missile Crisis summer of '62, with its cruising teenagers, drive-in diners with roller skating waitresses and the optimism of the Kennedy years.

This is a fun soundtrack album to listen to. If you're old enough to remember the era, it will be a personal musical portal to the past. If you're like me, born after 1962 and more familiar with Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, Usher, and Britney Spears, give it a listen. It may open your heart and soul to older, yet still wonderful styles of early rock 'n' roll.

This is a fantastic soundtrack. The oldies are fading away from every day radio. Now is the time to buy CD's like this to keep that era alive.

Great fun in this collection of great Classic songs.

Getting right to the point, this CD is an essential addition to any music lover's collection.

Buy it and get the party mood going!

WONDERFUL WONDERFUL WONDERFUL..it makes the movie come to life in the car...it brings Wolf Man Jack back into our lives...he is missed

This is by far the best soundtrack to a movie in the world (according to me). First I saw the movie, then someone talked me into buying the soundtrack, I'm not a big fan of movie soundtracks, but AMERICAN GRAFFITI is a classic american soundtrack that proves it's time. I'm only 13 years old, and I've told some of my friends about this soundtrack, but they didn't sound very excited. I never was interested in oldies music until I purchased the CD last year, and I instantly fell in love with it. If you get the chance, see the movie, and if you like the music on it, purchase the CD, it will soon become an instant classic to you. TRUST ME!

This 41-song soundtrack to George Lucas' "American Graffiti" excels in all the same dimensions as the landmark film. Much like Lucas' script, the soundtrack is a story of transition from the repression of the Eisenhower '50s to the exuberance of the Kennedy '60s. The music opens with the first rumblings of rock 'n' roll freedom and closes with the broadening palette of the '60s. When the film's hot-rodder, John Milner, dismissively sneers at the Beach Boys you can feel the outlaw being fenced in by the civilizing forces of early-60s rock.

The film's music, composed of existing rock and pop jukebox hits rather than a score, is both a soundtrack to the storyline and a character in itself. Specific songs illuminate their scenes so innately that the music's first few notes make the film reappear in your head; the teen-angst at the dance to "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," the end-of-the-night sunrise to "Green Onions," and the credit sequence accompanied by the effervescent "All Summer Long" make indelible references to Lucas' images.

The original 1973 issue of this soundtrack was a revelation. The psychedelic rock movement of the late '60s had all but divorced itself from rock 'n' roll's roots, and oldies radio was not the potent force it would become in the '80s and '90s. It may be hard to imagine in this CD era of reissue cash cows, but it was tough to find original '50s music in the early '70s. The intervening years have seen these songs reissued hundreds of times, but their potency remains intact. And with oldies radio moving the early part of their playlists into the late '60s and early '70s, these seminal golden oldies are once again falling from the public's consciousness.

MCA's remastering is very good, with true stereo on tracks 6, 7, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 24, 30, 31, and 37. All tracks appear to be original versions except for "At the Hop" and "She's So Fine," which were recorded by Flash Cadillac & The Continental Kids. Collectors may object to the Wolfman Jack radio raps that overlap a few of the songs, but fans of the film will enjoy the additional context. There are thousands of oldies collections on the market today, but few others have the emotional heart and storyline of American Graffiti, making this a great place to start your journey into the roots of rock 'n' roll. [©2006 hyperbolium dot com]

"American Graffiti" was one of the first movies to use wall-to-wall pop music, and Lucas used the songs to underscore or counterbalance his nostalgic high school fantasy set in '62. "Graffiti", therefore, features three times the songs of a typical movie, since the labels had not yet noticed that they could rake it in by licensing songs to Hollywood, and stands as the best collection of the music that defined the late 50's, early 60's.

This is a soundtrack, after all, and the movie's omnipresent DJ, Wolfman Jack, introduces (and even sings over) some of the songs. For fans of the movie, this is a good thing. Wolfman's howl snaps you right back into the film. For non-fans or for anyone who hasn't seen the movie, this CD set approximates what a teen in 1962 may have heard coming from the tinny speakers in his Douce Coupe.

Simply, if you want a great sampling of the favorites from the era, this is it.

I originally saw this movie back when It came out in the early 70s (when I was a kid) and Loved the movie and the music. Though the music was from before my time, it is timeless stuff. This just might be the best soundtrack ever. Its just one great song after another from start to finish, 41 great tracks.

This record had such an impact on my life. I got into this LP in 6th or 7th grade, after seeing the film it was based on. It was one of the first LPs I bought with my own money, and I was proud to own it. The film is great, and is perhaps my favorite movie of the 1970s. I probably watch it at least once a year.

As far as the soundtrack, I love a good majority of these songs - in particular, Runaway, That'll Be The Day, She's So Fine, Almost Grown, Little Darlin', Maybe Baby, Ya Ya, Ain't That A Shame, Johnny B. Goode, Get A Job, Love Potion No. 9, I Only Have Eyes For You, & Green Onions. All of the songs here, though, are nice representations of a lost era. They also evoke the film's particular scenes. In fact, one of the things I loved in the film was that the soundtrack would sometimes be coming out of the car radios in the film, with the figure of Wolfman Jack looming large as a kind of spectral presence (in contrast to his cameo scene, an amusing moment in which he offers the film's hero a melting popsicle).

As I said, this record had a major impact on the child me. It was, for one thing, the equivelent of a history textbook, teaching me of the importance of the likes of Del Shannon, Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper, and Wolfman Jack. It also gave me an appreciation for the iconicty of 50s greasers. But perhaps most importantly, for me, from this record, I developed a direct interest in music from earlier eras. This then led directly to my interest in collecting music on vinyl, then later tape and CD.

Nice to know that this is available on CD as my vinyl copy is, by now, a bit worn out.