Perhaps you’ve heard of that little cinematic endeavor, The Hunger Games, and its accompanying soundtrack featuring the likes of Taylor Swift, Arcade Fire, Kid Cudi, and Civil Wars?
This week The Hunger Games arrived on DVD and Blu-Ray with all kinds of extras, including a never-before-seen music video for precocious U.K. songstress Birdy‘s contribution to the soundtrack, “Just a Game.”
Check out its exclusive online premiere below.
Image Credit: Nick Rau
When an album reaches the top of the Billboard 200 in its first week, there’s only One Direction it can go.
After making history as the first artists to have their debut album bow at No.1, the British boy band One Direction ceded the top spot this week to the star-packed Hunger Games soundtrack.
Dubbed as a “companion” to the Jennifer Lawrence-led cinematic juggernaut (most of the songs don’t actually appear in the film), the album sold a whopping 175,000 copies, becoming the first theatrical soundtrack to debut atop the chart since Michael Jackson’s This Is It back in 2009.
Of course, the Hunger Games soundtrack was certainly bolstered by its enviable roster of artists, which includes Taylor Swift, the Arcade Fire, and Maroon 5 — just to name a few. The movie itself grossed $155 million in its first weekend.
So how steeply did One Direction’s Up All Night fall? The album clocked in at No. 4 with 55,000 units moved (a 69 percent drop from last week’s 175,000) — bested by, yep, Adele’s 21 (No. 2, with 130,000) and the Shins’ Port of Morrow (which debuted at No. 3, with 75,000).
If you want to remember what it felt like the first time you saw the trailer for The Hunger Games, or just pretend you’re a tribute during a workout, this might help: “Deep Shadow,” the instrumental track used in the preview, is now available to download for free on SoundCloud.
It’s composed by T.T.L. (ThroughTheLens), a duo made up of Italian musician Tying Tiffany and her producer, Lorenzo Montanà. They’re currently working on an EP for label ZerOKilled Music, which was founded by an Italian musician, Costanza Francavilla, who began playing their tracks for film and TV music supervisors before they even officially became a duo.
Preview “Deep Shadow” below. READ FULL STORY »
Image Credit: Murray Close
Though The Hunger Games soundtrack won’t officially hit stores until Tuesday (you can find our lead review in the new issue of EW out this Friday), two new tracks from have leaked.
Taylor Swift’s “Eyes Open” counters the ethereal sound of her Civil Wars’ collab “Safe & Sound,” expressing the fiery side of Katniss with lyrics like “Everybody’s waiting for you to break down.”
Meanwhile, Kid Cudi’s “The Ruler and the Killer” is an appropriately grimy-gothic mood piece with a pounding, arena-ready beat. Listen below: READ FULL STORY »
Image Credit: Tec Petaja
By now, Hunger Games fans are well acquainted with “Safe & Sound,” the soundtrack’s lead single cohelmed by Taylor Swift and the Civil Wars.
But the Grammy-winning folk duo (John Paul White and Joy Williams) also have their own song on the album, “Kingdom Come,” which you can preview exclusively here.
“It’s our homage to a survival song,” Williams told EW. “And also to trying to keep your cool and stay rational in a ridiculous situation,” White added. “It’s a little bit of ‘It’s going to be okay, it’s going to be all right, we’re going to make it through this,’ even when the situation around you is more dire than you’d care to admit. I think it’s how we all cope.”
“We wrote ‘Kingdom Come’ on the road in Jackson Hole, Wyoming,” he continues. “We were out there for a show, in one of the most beautiful places in the world. I think the landscape helped us capture the mood. We were unfettered, out in the middle of God’s country.”
As for the other songs on the soundtrack (out March 20)? They’ve heard most of them, but…”I think ours are better,” White joked. “Let the headline be: The Civil Wars Are Carrying the Rest of the Artists on the Soundtrack on Their Backs.”
Take a listen to the 90-second snippet below and let us know if you agree:
Last week, an initial list of songs slated for the upcoming Hunger Games soundtrack landed online — and it turns out that information was actually incomplete.
But worry not, Mockingjay-pin possessors! EWs’s got the final, for-real tracklisting here, with some very interesting new additions:
