On the Music of Ghost World

My own likes and dislikes, musically speaking, are so out of touch with the rest of the worldâs that it was problematic choosing tunes to use in Ghost World that would connote the same message to the audience as to myself. I suppose that to have done it in a very broad way wouldnât have been too terribly difficult, but I wanted to sustain a more nuanced and subtle deadpan tone throughout the film.
For the world at large in the film, I wanted horribly contrived commercial slopâwhich usually translates, in my opinion, to the most popular music of the day. I wanted this music to heighten the alienation and the general feeling of paranoia and cynicism I was attempting to create. I temped in âOops! . . . I Did It Againâ during the fifties diner scene (âWho can forget this great hit from the fifties?â), and it was very funny (and passĂ© enough for even the most mainstream audience member to get the joke), but way out of our price range. Ditto with some Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC. (I still cannot tell them apart for the life of meâcall me retarded if you must.) This modern pop music is almost impossible to parodyâitâs a parody of itself. (Câmon, howâre you gonna parody Björk?) You want the audience to get the fact that the music is supposed to be bad, but that can just make it hard to sit through the scene. It also fights how the audience has been conditioned to react by most other film music. Theyâre used to films where the director clearly endorses the source music chosen for a sceneâand the viewer is also supposed to love it. (In many films, the lyrics often comment on the scene as well.) I first became aware of this while watching Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid in 1969 and enduring âRaindrops Keep Fallinâ on My Headâ during that insipid bicycle-riding interlude.
Seymourâs music was somewhat easier for me because his musical taste was based on my own, and I had my vast collection of 78s to draw upon. (I have about 1,500 78sâI try to keep my collection down to the essentials.) However, I was stymied sometimes by records I wanted to use being construed as âWoody Allen music,â as Mr. Allen has virtually cornered the market on using old jazz in modern films. (From now on, any director using a Django Reinhardt or Louis Armstrong 78 in a film will seem derivative of Woody Allen.) I tried a lot of my favorite 78s with different scenes, and it was very satisfying when they worked. Thereâs something very mysterious at times about what works and what doesnât. Itâs not always what you expect will work. Skip James I knew would work, and it was a great privilege to be able to use his music as part of this film. âDevil Got My Womanâ was the first old 78 I ever heard that stopped me dead in my tracks. I have been in awe of Jamesâs music ever since and believe him to be the greatest blues musician ever to record. Later, I learned more about him from the excellent liner notes of a Yazoo LP reissue of his complete 1931 recordings. Stephen Calt, who befriended James in the sixties, wrote: âHe was a solitary, secretive person who never had his own family, regarded women with contempt, and was seemingly wary of the entire human race, several members of which he had coolly eliminated in shoot-outs. He was mistrustful of merriment: Once he passed a caravan of cars departing from a wedding. When he heard the honking, he said, with no attempt at humor: âBet you wonât hear that when they get divorced.â His bleak outlook made blues songs a natural outlet for him. He had no concept of blues as entertainment, or crowd-pleasing music. It was his goal to startle with his musicianship.â In many ways, his music seemed perfect for the Seymour character and the film.
One further note about Skip James: His âIâm So Gladâ was part of a huge hit rock LP by Cream during the sixties. When I was in college, it was impossible to escape that damn LPâit was playing in every house, apartment, and coffeehouse, or so it seemed. Although aided by the blasting volume of electric guitar, bass, and drums, Creamâs version was vastly inferior in every way to Jamesâs intense, frenzied masterpiece, which was fueled, no doubt, by the immense inner anger he clearly possessed. Although Creamâs version sold over a million copies and Jamesâs probably sold less than one hundred, it is Jamesâs version that will be remembered (while Björk and Cream records are rotting in some New Jersey landfill). If youâre interested in hearing more of him, buy the CD (Yazoo 2009) that reissues his entire 1931 recordings. Avoid the inferior recordings he made after being rediscovered by blues enthusiasts in the sixties.
Iâve been wanting to use the King Oliver and Tiny Parham records in a film for years now. I used one for the original opening title sequence to Crumb but had to replace it when it proved too expensive to license. Our music budget was so small on Ghost World that, again, I couldnât afford it. I turned to Vince Giordano, who leads a New York band that plays old jazz better than anyone else still living, and had him recreate some of the jazz tunes we couldnât afford. He did a remarkable job duplicating not only the notes but the bittersweet emotion of this music.
Mostly what worked in Seymourâs room was something quite unexpectedâthe 1920s recordings of Lionel Belasco, a West Indian bandleader-pianist. Belascoâs mother was a Trinidadian Creole who taught classical music on the piano; his father was a Sephardic Jew who played the violin and sang baritone. Although classically trained at home, Lionel would sneak off into the countryside to hear the âjungle musicâ (calypso) that he loved. His own music reflects all these influences and somehow also works for Seymour, with its charming yet poignant quality. The Belasco tunes chosen for the film, âMirandaâ (1933), âVenezuelaâ (1929), and âThe Palms of Maracaiboâ (1930), were taken from extremely rare original 78 rpm recordings that are among the few copies known to exist.
The last big hurdle musically was finding a composer who could write a score that would lend a thread of cohesiveness to the film. When I started meeting with prospective composers, I kept telling them I wanted something classical (to stand apart and ground the film), something haunting, something distant yet moving. A tall order. All I could offer in the way of guidance was to watch and listen to Barry Lyndon and Eyes Wide Shut, as those films came the closest emotionally in my memory. Of course, it couldnât sound too datedâsomething more timeless was needed.
Most of the composers wanted to try something hipper and trendier, with zany, oddball instruments, but I steered clear of them. I wanted violins, cellos, violas, and basses. I met with David Kitay, whose rĂ©sumĂ©, though quite accomplished, led me to fear heâd be incapable of anything like what I was requesting. Even he, at the end of our initial discussion, admitted he thought I was crazy and what I was asking for would probably never work. Two days later, he called me and said heâd had an inspiration while driving his car. He came over and played me a bit of it, and he was hired.
This 2001 piece appeared as liner notes for the Ghost World soundtrack. The author updated it slightly for our release of the film. And we put together this playlist, which gathers all the songs from the film and on the soundtrack currently available on Spotify.