Magical Musical Tour

Winner of the Southwest Popular and American Culture Association's 2016 Peter C. Rollins Book Award in the category of Film/Television
The popular music industry has become completely interlinked with the film industry. The majority of mainstream films come with ready-attached songs that may or may not appear in the film but nevertheless will be used for publicity purposes and appear on a soundtrack album. In many cases, popular music in films has made for some of the most striking moments in films and the most dramatic aesthetic action in cinema, like Ben relaxing in the pool to Simon and Garfunkel's 'The Sound of Silence' in The Graduate (1967), and the potter's wheel sequence with the Righteous Brothers' 'Unchained Melody' in Ghost (1990). Yet, to date, there have only been patchy attempts to deal with popular music's relationship with film. Indeed, it is startling that there is so little written on subject that is so popular as a consumer item and thus has a significant cultural profile.
Magical Musical Tour is the first sustained and focused survey to engage the intersection of the two on both an aesthetic and industrial level. The chapters are historically-inspired reviews, discussing many films and musicians, while others will be more concentrated and detailed case studies of single films. Including an accompanying website and a timeline giving a useful snapshot around which readers can orient the book, Kevin Donnelly explores the history of the intimate bond between film and music, from the upheaval that rock'n'roll caused in the mid-1950s to the more technical aspects regarding 'tracking' and 'scoring'.

Kevin J. Donnelly is lecturer in Film and Media Studies at Staffordshire University, UK. He has published a number of articles about music in films and television.

Chapter 1 - Introduction: Rock Aesthetics and their Relation to Film Aesthetics
Chapter 2 - The Beatles and the Beat Boom: Exploitation Cinema
Chapter 3 - The Psychedelic Screen
Chapter 4 - Obscured by Pink Floyd
Chapter 5 - Progressive Rock and Visualized Live Albums
Chapter 6 - Blaxploitation: Singing Across 110th Street
Chapter 7 - Bowie Falling to Earth: The Failed Film Soundtrack
Chapter 8 - Cohabitation: Elfman and Prince's Batman
Chapter 9 - New Careers: Rock Musicians Become Film Composers
Chapter 10 - Golden Years: 90s Hip Song Compilation Films
Chapter 11 - Copyright and Musical Censorship: Gangsta Rap and Bad Lieutenant
Chapter 12 - New Music for Old Movies
Bibliography
Index