Various Artists: The Runaways: Music from the Motion Picture (Atlantic)

Various Artists

The Runaways: Music from the Motion Picture

Atlantic

Apr 01, 2010 Web Exclusive By Frank Valish

It's supremely odd to hear movie stars singing their own soundtrack material, especially since the characters they're playing are actual musicians. The main attraction to the soundtrack from the Kristen Stewart/Dakota Fanning portrayal of '70s all-girl rock band, The Runaways, is not the period punk music included (fine tracks by David Bowie, MC5, The Stooges, and Sex Pistols). It's the fact that Fanning and Stewart actually sing four of The Runaways tunes on the soundtrack. And to add a thinly veiled stab at credibility to their performances, the Fanning/Stewart performances are sequenced sandwiched among actual Runaways songs from the '70s, as if to challenge the listener to separate the real from the fake. It works. The actresses do spot on impressions of The Runaways. The problem is that few would peg The Runaways as musical geniuses. This is not exactly Radiohead (or even Deep Purple) territory here. The classic punk songs included here seem like more of an afterthought than anything else. The Runaways soundtrack fails in that it tries too hard and forces its point, seeming to mask its sequencing chicanery by a musical sleight of hand. To steal a line from the band whose "Pretty Vacant" works as the soundtrack's penultimate anthem: "Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?" (www.runawaysthesoundtrack.com)

Author rating: 4/10

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Average reader rating: 6/10