By VINCENT CIVITILLO
Features Editor
National Lampoon,
the comedy team that burst onto the Hollywood big screen with Animal House in 1973 and picked up momentum in the 80s with
the Vacation series before
dying out in the 90s with a series of flops, has returned with their comedy
comeback, Van Wilder.
If it turns out as
anything like their attempts during the past decade, the film, due out in April
and starring Ryan Reynolds (Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place) and Tara Reid (American Pie), will undoubtedly join their other failures
like Loaded Weapon 1 (1993)
and Senior Trip (1995) in a
long line of easily forgettable movies.
However, the
soundtrack, which hits streets on March 26 and features songs from
up-and-coming bands like American Hi-FI, The Living End and Sugarcult, is a
surprisingly great mix that will probably garner more success than Van
Wilder itself.
Although soundtracks
are usually stereotyped as being random mixes of songs thrown together from
various scenes in their movies, Ultimatum Music’s Lampoon’s effort is a continuous blend of easy-listening,
punk rock music tarnished only by two songs (N.E.R.D.’s “Things Are
Getting Better” and Sia’s “Little Man”) which do not
seem to fit well and would have been better left excluded from the album.
The CD begins with
“Roll On,” a high-energy track by The Living End that starts things
on—no pun intended—a good note. Wilder picks up momentum in the second track with
“Bleed American” by Jimmy Eat World and solidifies listener
attention with its next song, “Hit the Ground” by 6gig. All of these
make a nice blend and, despite coming from different bands, all sound like a
continuous mix by the same artist.
“Bouncing Off
The Walls,” by the Ultimatum-signed Sugarcult, is a
happy-go-lucky-meets-hard-punk song that stood out as a highlight of the CD,
but didn’t mesh well with the six surrounding songs.
The album’s
best song stood out as American Hi-FI’s “I’m A Fool,”
which combined light rock sounds with a high-energy tempo and great lyrics to
give listeners the impression that they might have heard this one on the American
Pie soundtrack. They sing,
“No, I can’t fight, I can’t sleep at night / just thinking
about you girl, / I’m a fool for you. / Yes I am.”
David Mead’s
“Girl on the Roof” follows with a modern-Beatles sound, in which
the lead singer surprisingly sounds like Paul McCartney. The cut, very
off-the-mark from the punk rock theme of the rest of the disc, actually fits in
well, but leads into a series of songs which simply do not belong.
N.E.R.D.’s
“Things Are Getting Better” and Sia’s “Little
Man,” rap and rap-like songs respectively, halt the flowing mix of the CD
to a standstill and ruin the harmony of the album while remaining solely
responsible for the parental advisory on the album cover.
The rapper rants,
“Now it really seems that things are getting better in my life, / so
y’all better watch how y’all are acting, ‘cause I’m the
s***,” over and over throughout the duration of the four-minute-15-second
song.
“Little
Man,” while not being quite as harmony-killing, is just as annoying, as
Sia simply moans to a light beat for about four minutes.
Van Wilder concludes with “Start Over” by
Abandoned Pools, a song that has a unique sound in contrast to the rest of the
album. But before looking at the CD case to see the name of the band, I was
convinced by the sound of the track that it was Oasis performing.
The “Wonder
Wall”-sounding hit is about a guy who, after breaking up with his
girlfriend, is yearning to begin again, but finds himself at a dead-end. They
sing, “Can we start to start-over? / It’s all over. It’s all
over. It’s all over.” The song is excellent and leaves the CD on a
thoughtful mood, but left me wondering if the soundtrack had revealed the
movie’s finale.
At just short of the
46-minute mark with 13 tracks, the Van Wilder soundtrack seems to run a little short.
However, when the amount of songs that can really fit into a comedy film is
taken into account, the run-time is easily forgivable.
Despite the two rap
songs that ruin the album’s flowing harmony, the National Lampoon’s
Van Wilder soundtrack is a
great mix and easily recommendable to anyone who enjoys today’s blend of
prevailing punk rock music.