This month, I’m looking back at movies and tv shows to rediscover songs that graced the screen. The scenes and the music are inseparable. They’re engrained in our heads and our hearts. And they’re proof that the best music we have doesn’t exist in isolation. It attaches itself to a moment or an experience. #SceneSongs
Movie: Wall Street
Talking Heads is one of the quintessential music acts of the decade. They helped round out the new wave genre with songs that dared to mingle in the universe of world music. No else did this. Songs like “I Zimbra”, “Slippery People”, “Born Under Punches” and “(Nothing But) Flowers” were global in scope. No one else could’ve made those songs. Their recording studios and concert stages were strewn with instruments most bands have never touched. But, if I’m honest, my favorite Talking Heads anthem is almost the antithesis of what made them so unique. The song is called “This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)”, which played on the closing credits of Wall Street.
It lacked funk. There was not a single polyrhythm to be heard. No djembe. No congas. No surdo. It was almost all synthesizers, with Weymouth switching to guitar while Harrison played the bass lines off a Prophet synthesizer. And here’s the kicker. It was repetitive as hell. Almost monotonous. Which is the brilliance of the song. Truly a naive melody, the song hypnotizes you with its sameness. It always puts me in a good space. It always gets me good. Locks me in its groove. After hearing it, I know. This truly must be the place.
“Home, is where I want to be. But I guess I'm already there.”