This started out as a project some 7 years ago. At least 2 albums worth of demos in - of varying quality, style and lyrical obscurity - it was intended to make sure I write something outside whatever habits I was starting to lean on.

Films were the obvious choice of inspiration: the leisure activity of choice after music. The initial plans were a list of rules worthy of Dogme ’95:
- The song title should be the film title;
- the lyrics should be drawn directly from the plot (if not the dialogue itself);
- the key was to be the first letter in the title to fall between A and G (e.g. Five Easy Pieces is in F, Texas Chainsaw Massacre is in E);
- and the atmosphere of the film (if not the actual score) should inform the music/ arrangement.

Limitations can unlock productivity but then again, as with all creative endeavours, rules are waiting to be broken. Two songs each inspired by a cultural figure who had recently passed away - one a white, male wrestler, the other a black, female poet - do not relate to films at all but feel like they belong, if only to add variety.

The choice of inspiration was neither a list of my favourite films (The Godfather had drafted lyrics but was never completed) nor a neat canonic survey of cinema history, but just things that seemed to suggest themselves. They span over half a century, include cult films, european arthouse and beloved blockbusters.

It is my hope that you’ll enjoy the songs, and then notice a bit of dialogue or pick up some extra atmosphere the next time you watch the films. Maybe some will even seek out films they haven’t heard of before this album.

MDH
Michael Humphrey
Hither Green, London
Summer 2016

Review by David Knight:

"#Writetrack

Creativity takes many forms. So does art. Most comes from an urge, a deep seated demand, to make new things. But against what criteria do we judge the new?

Mass media has provided a market for a vast proliferation of creativity in entertainment, and the business of show-business colours our view of what the point of it all is. Do we really need to see a remake of an original film of a book based on a stage play with one of the seven plots?
And yet that chain is human. It is the story; the story of telling stories creates a dialogue with society. In his system model of creativity, the psychologist Cskiszentmihalyi talks about the “domain” – the range of acceptable ideas within which creativity can happen. This is our idea of a culture or a society, and whether an idea is valid is judged by the “field”. These are the gatekeepers, the people that are affected by that idea and hence judge whether they can accept it. Inter-reference and inspiration merge into one in the long chain of additions to the domain, as we judge and accept new things all the time. Into this comes SOUNDTRACK; an explicitly referential and rule based album from MDH which takes the artist’s beloved films and uses them as a constraint to create original work.

Why? Because. Because the constraint drives the work. Because the reference helps the acceptance of the idea into the domain. The listener’s own knowledge and cultural references provide a way in and also a way through, giving an insight into the depth of the work that MDH is creating despite the perceived superficiality of the reference. Which is were the joy is to be found - in spotting the repetitive similarities between Episode IV, Episode V and Episode VI that critique but glory in the films; in noting the lack of the pianist in Five Easy Pieces; and in the acknowledgement of references when MDH writes about Sunset Boulevard, a film about film making.

In some cases, the rules that MDH has set are invisible to the uninitiated. For example, the choice of key defined by the first useable letter of the title is a constraint for the composer and not necessarily the listener. However, this can be like a wildflower erupting from a cracked pavement, and the constraints on lyrics and mood make the listener want to seek out the films that they have not yet seen. The depth of filmic knowledge on display is intimidating but welcoming, echoing a love of the source material that is communicated effortlessly.

Creativity takes many forms. In SOUNDTRACK, the tunes and harmonies conjure “new” from the tightest of spaces, and tell a story of both the superficial and the deep, without forgetting to do the hardest job - creating joy and delight from the raw material of the listener.

So here I am, writing about music based on a remake of an original film of a book based on a stage play with one of the seven original plots. Who wants to use it to inspire a opera?"