review of "rising son" soundtrack

The official soundtrack to the film "Rising Son, The Legend of Skateboarder Christian Hosoi" (I loved the film; see my review here) doesn't contain a single song that was actually used in the film. Instead it contains a selection of rock and hip-hop songs that were "inspired by" the film. This is a pity, as many of the songs in the film were quite good and are actually from the time period (mainly 80s) that the film is set in, and I think it would have been nice to have those collected onto a single album. However, the actual soundtrack album contains some great high-energy tracks. It also contains some mediocre and some pretty lame ones, too.

The tracks I find myself repeatedly listening to are:

The high-energy rap of "One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven" by The Transplants, the ska-tinged "Cheyenne" by Fishbone, the kick-ass rap-rock of "Pot of Rain" by Optimus, Lexicon's none-too-serious hip-hop take on the Ramones' "I Wanna Be Sedated" entitled simply "Sedated", and "Transitions of a Rider" by Murs, which seems to be the only track that lyrically has anything to do with skateboarding.

Also worth listening to:

A very stipped down version of "Mexican Radio" by Charlie Early and "Standing in the Way of Control" by The Gossip.

I find the rest of the songs mediocre to not worth bothering with, although there is such a range of styles on this album I'm sure other reviewers disagree with this assessment. Being somewhat of a Foo Fighters fan, I wanted to like the album-opening Dave Grohl track entitled "Vile", but I found its high-speed thrash with screaming vocals boring and monotonous.

One other thing: the Parental Advisory on this album is well worth heeding. I don't really have a clue what The Transplants track is all about, but the lyrics are definitely violent and not for kids.

`