OK. Are we good? Right. Let’s move on.
So the mockumentary follows Spinal Tap on their ill-fated tour of the United States, and apart from the ‘behind the scenes’ filming, there are the parts of the ‘mocko’ that concentrate on the concert scenes, with scenes showing the songs being performed on stage, as well as several playback scenes where songs from previous albums are shown of the film clips made for TV shows in the past.
All of this is very cleverly done, with the songs matching the style of songs from each era that they are taken from. But in order to do this, these songs had to be written and recorded in the first place, and that is where the extreme musical talent of McKean, Guest and Shearer comes into play. Because they DO write and perform all of the songs in this show, and they are quite brilliant. Yes, they are meant to be a parody of the genre, and yes, their double entendre lyrics are both quite accurate as well as being perfectly formed – but beyond that, they make buying this soundtrack a worthwhile option, because most of the songs are actually quite good WITHOUT relying on the comedy aspect of them. Which makes the show far more brilliant that it would have been without them and makes this album worthwhile listening to as well.
The soundtrack contains all of the songs that are used in the movie, and also has the plain black cover, in which the movie contains the great line by Guest’s Nigel Tufnell saying, “you ask yourself how much more black could this be... and the answer is none... none more black!” In the movie the album with the all black cover is Spinal Tap’s new release called “Smell the Glove”, whereas this is not THAT album, it is just the soundtrack album.
In order to show off the songs of the career of Spinal Tap in the film, the writers had to produce a number of songs of a varied genre in order to portray those times. That’s why you have songs such as “Cups and Cakes” on here, that is tied to the era of the early 1960’s, and then a song such as “(Listen to the) Flower People” that has the hippy era of the late 1960’s as its genre based musical style, and “Gimme Some Money” that comes across in the same sort of era. These are the songs that are cut in when the band is asked about their history, and they are well written to equate to that part of the film.
Then you have the songs that are written to not only be a part of the “Smell the Glove” album, but the songs off their previous albums, albums with the great titles such as “Rock n Roll Creation”, “Bent for the Rent”, “The Gospel According to Spinal Tap” and “Shark Sandwich”. Some of them are brilliant songs in their own right, and others are great songs for the right moment.
These songs come in two sections – the songs with lyrics that are unambiguously double entendre lyrics, and the ones that have the hard rock music anthemic lyrics. “Big Bottom” and “Sex Farm” are very much in the first category, leaving nothing to the imagination. These are the kind of songs Spinal Tap lead guitarist Nigel Tufnell thinks are being described as ‘sexy’ by their record company execs, when in fact they are describing them as ‘sexist’, not something he seems to understand. Then you have the terrific “Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You Tonight” which mixes both, the lyrics that play both ways but backed up by the hard rock drums and guitars that make for a great song. And then there is the pure rock songs, such as “Heavy Duty”, the slower and heavier grinding track which describes the life of a band with heavy duty rock and roll. This is followed by “Rock and Roll Creation”, a song that imagines the creation of rock much in the way of the creation of the universe. And then the song that could be a part of so many bands of the 1980’s,”Stonehenge”, with that excellent synth keys opening before the band breaks in for the first riff and vocals, and the song is off. This is a killer track, which in the movie of course is interrupted by the 18-inch stone arriving on stage that should have been 18 feet.
All of these songs are perfectly written and performed for their place in the movie, but are also so well written that the soundtrack becomes a brilliant album in itself, filled with songs that you will sing along to long after you have watched the movie a hundred times over.
I first watched this film sometime towards the end of my high school years, and I’m pretty sure it was late on a Saturday night on commercial TV when it came on, and like a lot of people I wasn’t 100% sure of what I was watching on that first time. It was obvious that it was a parody, but also it was a very good one, so much so that because it was filmed in the documentary style you couldn’t be certain that it WASN’T real. When it was finally released on VHS and you could buy it, and watch it over and over again, was when it became ingrained.
Sometime in the early 1990’s, I was browsing at a regular haunt, Redback Records in Wollongong, when I came across this soundtrack on CD, and at first I thought it might actually be “Smell the Glove”, the album Spinal Tap released in the film, because it had an all black cover with nothing else depicting what it was. I’m pretty sure I bought it with that belief, so that when I arrived home and discovered it was the soundtrack, Ithink I had some disappointment. That of course was overcome by hearing full versions of all of the songs from the film, and being able to listen to them whenever I wanted. And that is the beauty of this soundtrack. Sure, they might be parody songs, but they are very good ones and enjoyable to listen to. Well... I think they are enjoyable, anyway.
One of the best albums that was released in the 1990’s was an album called “Break Like the Wind”, which Spinal Tap released ten years after this mockumentary, and is leaps and bounds ahead of this, because it was written and recorded as an album, not a soundtrack. I love it to this day. But this album still provides lots of laughs, and while playing it at work over the last couple of weeks, and singing along to all of the songs, I have had a ball. And, if ever anyone was going to do a cover version of a song, and ramp it up and metalize the crap out of it, it should be this song.
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