There are some songs that will forever be associated with the movie they were written for. (A certain monster ballad from a certain aquatic-themed disaster film springs to mind.) Then there are songs that have a healthy life independent of the movies that spawned them. For instance, the Goo Goo Dolls wrote “Iris” for City Of Angels, but you don’t think of Nicolas Cage every time you hear that, right?
What fascinates me is a third category: well-known hit songs, created for movies I’ve never ever heard of. And my friends, I have heard of many, many movies. I tackled this subject once before, and it was a lot of fun to write. Did you know “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” was written for a Western, and sung from the perspective of Slim Pickens? Or that “New York, New York” was the theme song for a Robert DeNiro flick? But as usual with this site, the commenters thought of a few things I’d overlooked. It’s been about three years, but I’ve finally taken their suggestions and added a few discoveries of my own.
But I warn you before we begin: you will never hear these songs the same way again. One of them involves giant rats.
“Unchained Melody” by Alex North and Hy Zaret, from Unchained (1955)
Ever wonder why this song is called “Unchained Melody?” As OTI commenter Binx pointed out, the single most recorded song of the 20th century was actually written for a prison film… called Unchained. Therefore, “Unchained Melody.” The song and the movie came out in 1955, a full ten years before the Righteous Brothers version that karaoke singers worldwide know and love. Here’s the original recording, sung by a guy named Todd Duncan:
Duncan’s singing seems kind of hokey to modern ears, but the guy was one of the great classically trained African American singers of his day. According to Wikipedia, George Gershwin handpicked him as the original Porgy in Porgy and Bess.
Unchained is about an inmate who is torn between escaping to live as a free man (presumably on the beach from the end of The Shawshank Redemption) or serving his time and returning to his family, years in the future. And you’ve got to admit, that information radically changes the meaning of the lyrics:
Oh, my love, my darling
I’ve hungered for your touch
A long lonely time
And time goes by so slowly
And time can do so much
Are you still mine?
Sadly, Unchained doesn’t seem to have ever been released on DVD, but I did find a chunk on YouTube:
Todd Duncan is credited as an actor in the film, so I’m guessing he sings the song in the rec room while the other prisoners stare into the distance wistfully. I’ve got to say, all this would make a lame episode of Oz. Schillinger would eat all these guys for breakfast.
So are you ready for your daily dose of irony? The megahit version of “Unchained Melody” was produced by Phil Spector in 1965. He probably deserves most of the credit for taking a tender little ballad and applying his “wall of sound” technique, layering on the strings until the thing soared to the heavens.
Anyway, guess where Phil Spector is today?
POINTLESS TRIVIA: The main character was played by Elroy “Crazylegs” Hirsch, who is known less for his acting skills than for his football career (three Pro Bowl appearances). He only appeared in three movies: Unchained, Crazylegs (a movie about his own life), and Zero Hour!, which was the airplane disaster movie that Airplane! mercilessly mocked. It’s kind of a weird coincidence that two of his three movies were pretty much forgotten, but inspired timeless classics.
“The Greatest Love of All” by Michael Masser and Linda Creed, from The Greatest (1977)
I ain’t too proud to admit it: I love obscure pop culture trivia. The day I found out that the actor who played Michael Myers in the original Halloween was the same person who directed The Last Starfighter, I told everybody. I walked up to random strangers on the street to make sure they knew. Anyway, I feel the same irrational giddiness about the odd pedigree of “The Greatest Love of All.” This was mentioned by OTI commenter “Slokes,” who is probably just Stokes with a typo.
What if I told you that Ali was not the first movie to dramatize Muhammad Ali’s life? In fact, there was a 1977 film called The Greatest, co-written by Academy Award winning screenwriter Ring Lardner. Ali’s trainer is played by Academy Award winner Ernest Borgnine. It also starred Academy Award winner Robert Duvall, and Sith of the Year winner James Earl Jones. But when the filmmakers went to cast their lead, they knew there was only one man alive who had the necessary charisma to play Muhammad Ali: Muhammad Ali. He played himself, otherwise known as “pulling a Crazylegs.”
Okay, so how does the Whitney Houston song factor into this? Well, it was originally a George Benson song written for the movie. The lyricist, Linda Creed, wrote it about her own struggle with breast cancer, which doesn’t have a ton to do with Muhammad Ali. That didn’t stop them from using it over the opening credits:
I suppose the lyrics kind of apply to Ali too. He does really like children, as anyone who has listened to Ali and His Gang vs. Mr. Tooth Decay knows well. He did not walk in anyone’s shadow, he lived as he believed, and they did not take away his dignity. And you’ve got to admit, he certainly knew how to love himself.
Benson’s original recording had some decent chart performance, but when Houston covered it nine years later, it was a smash hit. It reached #1 on the Billboard charts in May of 1986. Sadly, only weeks before, lyricist Linda Creed finally succumbed to the very cancer that the song was written about in the first place. So I guess you now have double your daily dose of irony. It’s like hail on your wedding day.
By the way, as strange as it seems to have the greatest sports star of his day act in a biopic of himself, in about 20 years somebody will be writing about Space Jam and “I Believe I Can Fly” for a future edition of “Hit Songs From Obscure Movies.” Of course, that movie wasn’t based on Michael Jordan’s actual life… so far as I’m aware.
“I Try” by Macy Gray, from Love Jones (1997) and Picture Perfect (1997)
I remember a car trip I once took with Shechner, during which we realized that “I try to say goodbye and I choke/I try to walk away and I stumble” could be describing early onset Parkinson’s Disease. Have that checked out, Macy!
It was OTI commenter “clickliter33” who noted the odd history behind this song. It was officially released on January 25, 2000, as part of Macy’s debut album. But it actually popped up during the romantic comedy Love Jones, in March of 1997. That’s nearly three years earlier. Confusingly, it was not part of the Love Jones soundtrack album.
The best I can figure out, Macy was originally signed to Atlantic Records, but that relationship went sour before she could record much. She regrouped with Epic Records a couple years later. While her career was in limbo, her not-officially-released single turned up not only in Love Jones, but also in a Jennifer Aniston romantic comedy, Picture Perfect. Good God, Jennifer Aniston has been making romantic comedies forever. In this one, Jennifer is pretending to be engaged to Jay Mohr to advance her career, but then they actually fall for each other. Meh.
Anyway, I hope Macy got some royalty checks to tide her over, but there’s a happy ending. On February 21, 2001, she took home the Grammy for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for “I Try.” For those of you keeping score, that’s nearly four years after Love Jones.
Those three songs were recommended by OTI commenters. Here’s some that I came up with myself (with a little help from Mr. Google).
You mean that monster hit from an aquatic disaster movie?
I’ve always strongly associated “Ben” with Ben — I didn’t realize the song was known outside the context of the (rather creepy) film.
And I do believe that poster is the first time I’ve seen anyone describe the pages of Readers’ Digest as “searing”,
Amazing list. I can’t think of anything interesting you may have overlooked. Keep doing what makes OTI great.
Thanks for pointing out that Ali record about tooth decay, really inspires me to take care of my teeth. I wonder if that record is where South Park got the idea for the episode of Mr. Mackey’s taking his play about tooth decay way way too serious, probably coincidence.
You may have hit on something with that pinball movie “Tilt.” I always thought pinball was lame, but it turns out it was a badass game for badasses and illegal until 1976, it’s actually still illegal in Ocean City, NJ, on Sundays at least. This drastically changes my viewing of “Tommy” I always thought he was suppose to be a dork, very much not so. “Tilt” looks like it may have been the movie that marked pinball officially lame for all time.
But what I thought was interesting was that it was illegal because it was based on chance and thus gambling. Only once it was proven to be a game of skill it was legalized. Got that info from popular mechanics, http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/toys/4328211-new#fbIndex1
I don’t know, that may say something about how we view skill. That’d be an interesting movie to see, Roger Sharpe playing pinball in court to prove it’s legitimacy. There’s probably already 15 different independent movies about it, all starring Vincent Gallo.
Or one could also add a few more layers of “whoa” by connecting Tom Cruise to “Eyes Wide Shut” and the mention of Ebay with the notion of the “women are selling/men are buying model of heterosexuality.”
http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/buyers_and_sellers
I guess Ebay could be a good example of the everyone’s a little bit of a seller no one’s cast as a buyer notion the author presents at the end as a possible solution to the entitlement problem.
Pretty interesting article. I’d like to see one on obscure songs that become popular due to cinema.
Tarantino does this quite a bit. I never heard the Coasters’ song “Down in Mexico” until I saw “Death Proof”.
The theme song for House is a pretty old song by Massive Attack called “Teardrop.” Also, the song “Welcome Home” by Coheed and Cambria was featured in the TRAILER for the movie 9 and got a ton of sales on iTunes. I could prolly come up with more, but I find this phenomena easier to come up with examples for than the one in the article, since, you know, the movies are obscure. Although I can honestly say that I first heard “I Try” in Picture Perfect, at least.
And there’s the fact that “Bohemian Rhapsody” was the first song to hit number one twice because it was featured in Wayne’s World, although that song was never obscure, of course.
And I know a lot of people that have never seen Footloose and don’t realize how many of those songs are from that movie. I’m… holding out… for a remake that will help that, though.
Cooley High is a real high school that the members of Boyz II Men attended. They must have liked the song in part because its from a movie set at the school where they all met. So there’s that.
Sorry to “well actually” you, but WELL ACTUALLY, Boyz II Men definitely did not attend Cooley High, which is in Chicago. They’re from Philly, of course! Here’s the lyrics from their very first single:
It’s long overdue but now
Philly is slammin’
Boyz II Men, A B C, B B D
The east coast family
Never skipped a beat, na
While cooling on South street
Jet black Benz, plenty of friends
And all the Philly steaks you can eat
The group actually formed at the famous Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia_High_School_for_the_Creative_and_Performing_Arts#Notable_alumni
Like the Fame high school, but with different accents.
Music is the universal language that bonds all humanz to humanz.
That was suppose to be a reply to you Cornelius. I missed the button somehow, ah well.
The Warren Zevon song Searching For A Heart was first used in Alan Rudolph’s film Love At Large (1990) and then later in Lawrence Kasdan’s Grand Canyon in 1991 (the same year WZ released it on his own studio album Mr Bad Example. For his vocab alone, Warren Zevon should be on every overthinker’s permanent playlist.
Another odd one I noticed is the Jim Croce song I Got A Name. It was written by Norman Fox and Charles Gimbel for the film The Last American Hero. Croce just sang it (and had quite a monster hit, though I prefer the music of his son, A.J.
Patrick
Wow, really this is awesome, love all the songs. I’m not too proud to say I cried listening to “Searching for a Heart.”
The video for “Teardrop” was really interesting. It’s good to see all the great heartfelt songs I wouldn’t have found on my own, thanks everyone.
I’m not quite sure it qualifies, but it’s the best I can come up with.
Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose” was one of the lead singles off the Batman Forever soundtrack. It was hugely popular on the radio at the time, and has worked itself into a nice little niche on adult contemporary stations today, far outlasting any impact Batman Forever might have had beyond making Batman fans hate Joel Schumacher.
Full Disclosure: I love both Batman Forever and Batman & Robin, non ironically. And yes, I know I’m the only one.
I am so exasperated “Endless Love” is nowhere to be found on Netflix! It looks amazing. I’m also embarrassed to admit that I saw “Picture Perfect” (the Jennifer Aniston/Jay Mohr movie) in the theater.
The woman who stars in “Against All Odds” may be better known (OK, at least to me) as the woman in the best Lifetime movie of all time, My Stepson, My Lover, where she is married to Locke from Lost and sleeps with…well, you read the title.
Endless Love is on hulu. I feel like I already knew about the origins of the song. I think I watched Brooke Shields on Inside the Actors Studio or something similar.