Zabriskie Point (Soundtrack, 1970)

I've had this album for a long time, but can't say I've listened to it a lot. The reason for the purchase was that there are some Pink Floyd songs that are not found on any other album. It's a cut-out, I probably didn't pay much for it.

The film was made by the Italian Michelangelo Antonioni, who a few years earlier made the perhaps more famous Blow-up. I haven't seen the movie, and have no thoughts on doing it, but have read what it's about online. Student riots, policeman is shot, student escapes into the desert, meets woman, student returns to the city and gets shot. Something like that. The film wasn't received very well, neither the people nor the critics liked it, and it became an economic flop. But over the years, its reputation has increased somewhat and gained something of a cult status.

The Pink Floyd songs that motivated purchase are three in number, an instrumental psychedelic jam that opens the album, Heart Beat, Pig Meat, then a more "normal" song with verses and chorus, Crumbling Land, which is actually quite good, best song on the record, kind of a druggy song. The closing number is a rerecording of the classic Careful With That Axe Eugene, which got the creative title Come In Number 51, Your Time Is Up. It sounds quite different from the original in my ears, but it makes no difference, I've never liked the song.

After discovering Grateful Dead in recent years, I think it's interesting that they also are represented on the album. A 2½ minute excerpt from the jam Dark Star and then you get the honor of hearing Garcia on his own, sitting and playing the guitar on the instrumental Love Scene. But to be honest, neither of the songs are necessary for a good and meaningful life.

The song that actually glues itself into my brain, and which I somewhat annoyed suddenly finds myself humming, is the classic Tennessee Waltz, written in 1945 and performed by Patti Page. My family members also don't like when I sing it.

It's a pretty eclectic and sprawling album. It offers psychedelia, country & western, folk and you name it. It becomes an experience that is too mixed. Michelangelo's idea, according to the back of the cover, was that the film is not something you see, it is experienced, and the music is part of the film and is thus experienced in the same way. Or something like that. But the soundtrack doesn't become major musical experience for me, maybe the visual stimulus of the movie is needed to make the experience complete. Nothing you must have in your shelf, in other words.


Tracklist

Side A
1 Pink Floyd - "Heart Beat, Pig Meat" 3:10
2 The Kaleidoscope - "Brother Mary" 2:39
3 The Grateful Dead - "Excerpt From Dark Star" 2:32
4 Pink Floyd - "Crumbling Land 4:13
5 Patti Page - "Tennessee Waltz" 3:05
6 The Youngbloods - "Sugar Babe" 2:10

Side B
1 Jerry Garcia (The Grateful Dead) - "Love Scene" 7:03
2 Roscoe Holcomb - "I Wish I Was A Single Girl Again" 1:53
3 The Kaleidoscope - "Mickey's Tune" 1:39
4 John Fahey - "Dance Of Death" 2:39
5 Pink Floyd - "Come In Number 51, Your Time Is Up" 4:57