2013 FAVORITES / CINEMA SOUND

Sammy here with a quick post on my favorite records and films of 2013, and a link to my annual playlist of film score selections from the year. Read on if you'd like and find the download link and tracklist to my soundtrack mix below.

2013 Music

1. William Tyler - Impossible Truth

2. Norm - NORM

3. Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience

4. Angel Olsen - Half Way Home

5. Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

6. Sigur Ros - Kveikur

7. Hotpipes - Dust

8. Atoms for Peace - AMOK

9. The Flaming Lips - The Terror

10. The Features - s/t

honorable mention: Kurt Vile - Wakin on a Pretty Daze, Caitlin Rose - The Stand-In, Tristen - C A V E S, Those Darlins - Blur the Line, Four Tet - Beautiful Rewind. Phoenix - Bankrupt, Jon Hopkins - Immunity, The National - Trouble Will Find Me

2013 Film

1. SPRING BREAKERS

2. BEFORE MIDNIGHT

3. THE WIND RISES

4. HER

5. THE ACT OF KILLING

6. THE GREAT BEAUTY

7. MUD

8. ALL IS LOST

9. GRAVITY

10. TO THE WONDER

honorable mention: CAPTAIN PHILLIPS, MAIDENTRIP, BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR, LIKE SOMEONE IN LOVE, AT BERKELEY, 12 YEARS A SLAVE, AIN'T THEM BODIES SAINTS, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS, STOKER, COMPUTER CHESS, POST TENEBRAS LUX, ROOM 237, KISS OF THE DAMNED, BLUE JASMINE, BASTARDS, BEHIND THE CANDELABRA.

And as I've done for the past few years, I've compiled an hour-long continuous playlist of selections from my favorite film scores of the year. It took a while to get the flow here, and it doesn't flow so quite as perfectly as in past years, but I'm always suprised to find how well certain cues match up with others (about a third of these ended up being in the same key). The tracks I selected-- mostly original scores with a couple exceptions-- are mostly very dark and very ambient so consider yourself warned. It was hard to pick which track to include from these great scores; I encourage anyone interested to seek out the rest of these featured scores and when possible support the artists and labels that have worked to release this music commerically. Listen and download at the link below.

Cinema Sound 2013 http://www.mixcloud.com/SamsMyth1/cinema-sound-2013/

0:00 - John Tavender - "The Lamb" - THE GREAT BEAUTY

3:30 - Shigeru Umebayashi - "Love Theme I" - THE GRANDMASTER

5:19 - Graham Reynolds - "Forgetting Little Things" - BEFORE MIDNIGHT

7:46 - Daniel Hart - "Ruth and Sylvie" - AIN'T THEM BODIES SAINTS

10:42 - Andy Quin - "Awakening" - TO THE WONDER

12:30 - M83 - "Oblivion" (excerpt) - OBLIVION

13:39 - Johann Johannsson - "I Can't Find Them" - PRISONERS

17:36 - Broadcast - "Beautiful Hair" - BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO

18:34 - Steven Price - "The Void" (excerpt) - GRAVITY

20:29 - Steve Hufsteter - "KOTD Love Theme" - KISS OF THE DAMNED

23:11 - Thomas Newman - "Very Sick Girl" - SIDE EFFECTS

25:26 - Explosions in the Sky & David Wingo - "Alone Time" - PRINCE AVALANCHE

30:12 - Pastoral - "Honey Wine & Bread (Instrumental)" - COMPUTER CHESS

32:55 - Skrillex feat. Ellie Goulding - "Ride Home" - SPRING BREAKERS

34:59 - Alexander Ebert - "Excelsior" - ALL IS LOST

37:30 - David Wingo & Lucero - "Ending" - MUD

39:29 - Joe Hisaishi - "Squad Falcon" - THE WIND RISES

41:00 - Clint Mansell - "In Full Bloom" - STOKER

43:29 - Tindersticks - "Opening" - BASTARDS

47:00 - Rob - "Headache" - MANIAC

50:39 - Shane Carruth - "Leaves Expanded May Be Prevailing Blue Mixed With Yellow of the Sand" - UPSTREAM COLOR

53:00 - Hanan Townshend - "Sweet Prospect" - TO THE WONDER

58:00 - Cliff Martinez - "Sister, Pt. 1" - ONLY GOD FORGIVES

Bonus tracks (THE SONGS) (didn't put these together but seek them out if you'd like)

Emily Wells - Becomes the Color, STOKER

Skrillex - Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites, SPRING BREAKERS

Collie Ryan - It's Gonna Rain, COMPUTER CHESS

Damien Jurado - Everything Trying, THE GREAT BEAUTY

Oscar Isaac & Marcus Mumford - Fair Thee Well (Dink's Song), INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS

Arcade Fire - Supersymmetry, HER

M83 featuring Suzanne Sundfor - Oblivion, OBLIVION

Ellie Goulding - Lights, SPRING BREAKERS

Yumi Matsutoya - Kaze Tachinu (Vapor Trail), THE WIND RISES

SPRING BREAKERS & 2013 IN POSTERS

Over at my ongoing Frames column at The Dissolve, I've posted a new design for what is (at press time) my favorite film of the year, SPRING BREAKERS. See the full design at The Dissolve, and if you'd like a copy from a very limited run of screenprints you can get one here at my shop. 

In the same column at The Dissolve I've also posted a roundup of my ten favorite poster designs I saw this year. Check it out and leave a comment if you'd like. 

As for other stuff I liked this year? I'll get to that soon; Still a few more movies to see, and a long soundtrack mix to put together. In other news, Nashvillians can catch me at The Stone Fox's holiday market this Saturday from 10am-4pm. Happy holidays!

2013 WORK

It's been a fun year filled with great and interesting design projects that I've felt fortunate to work on. Here's a long look back. 

DR. STRANGELOVE

This new screenprint I designed for Spoke Art and the Castro Theatre is for sale now. Signed and numbered edition of 100. Always intimidating coming up with a Kubrick design... DR. STRANGELOVE is probably my favorite comedy of all time. Pick up a print at the Spoke Art store.

ROOM 237

Here's a new cover I designed for Death Waltz Recording Co, for ROOM 237. Available in both a condensed LP (with CD) and standalone CD with pop-up digipak. I wrote some liner notes as well and was very psyched to be involved with this release, a synthy, Italo-influenced score by Jonathan Snipes and William Hudson.

WILD STYLE

I did this new poster for the 30th Anniversary of the classic hip-hop movie WILD STYLE. We made some mini posters for a recent anniversary concert, and I believe the film will be making the rounds theatrically and on home viewing as well. Check it out!

FANTASTIC PLANET

I'm really happy to share this poster I designed for Cinefil Imagica's release of FANTASTIC PLANET on Blu-ray in Japan, as well as the below inlay and booklet designs. The poster will be an exclusive for Japanese customers who purchase the Blu-ray at certain retail stores. Even if you've seen this classic, surreal animated film from René Laloux and Jiri Trnka Studios, you've never seen it like this; Cinefil Imagica has produced a gorgeous restoration more colorful and striking than any I've seen. The region-free Blu-ray is available September 27th. (note for English-speaking customers: it does not contain English subtitles)

JAKUB EROL

Jakub Erol's Polish posters had it all. Surreal illustrated portraits of transformed heads and hands, creative photograph treatments, colorful cartoon drawings, you name it. He's one of the Polish poster artists you can't necessarily pin down to one recognizable style. But when you see an Erol poster, you know it's an Erol poster. Here are some of my favorites, starting with the above poster for WEEKEND AT BERNIE'S, a combination of type and image so interesting that it became one of the first Polish posters I added to my collection. Erol's work is certain to please 80's movie lovers, with his striking designs for THE TERMINATOR, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, and MY STEPMOTHER IS AN ALIEN (another personal favorite), all seen below. See more at Terry Posters.

FRAMES: BEFORE MIDNIGHT

Exciting announcement! Today at The Dissolve, a new site for all film lovers, you can find the first entry in my new monthly column there called Frames. Each month I'll be presenting a new original movie poster design to readers of The Dissolve, and writing a bit about the film I chose and my various points of reference and inspiration from the world of movie poster design and graphic design in general. 

Head to The Dissolve now to see the full poster design and read some thoughts behind the process, and visit my shop to purchase a new silkscreen print for Before Midnight, completing the trilogy that began with my Before Sunrise and Before Sunset screenprints (the new print is available individually for folks who already have the first two prints, or in a set of three with the other two). I'm excited to be part of the Dissolve team and looking forward to exploring wherever this series takes me. Come along...

SHOAH PROCESS 2

In 2010, for the 25th anniversary of Claude Lanzmann's landmark holocaust documentary SHOAH, I was asked by IFCFilms to design a new commemorative theatrical poster. The design reappropriated an image from the film of train conductor Henrik Gawkowski, the same image that has long been associated with the film since its original release:

For The Criterion Collection's DVD/Blu-ray release, I went back to some original concepts for the anniversary poster in an effort to help Criterion find a new way to present SHOAH visually. In the poster design process (which I about briefly here) I experimented with many different images from the film, all of which I found beautiful, but only some of which captured the idea of human memory and narrative that guides SHOAH. I had grown really attached to one image in particular, a perspective looking back on a pair of train tracks disappearing into a foggy woods, as well as another image of Chelmno survivor Simon Srebnik in a field. These would both end up being used in my SHOAH package for Criterion, the train track image transforming into a new cover design.

But through the process, Criterion asked to see some other ideas, just to have more options to consider. Art director Sarah Habibi asked me to consider the idea of circular thought-- the way in which Shoah and its human subjects approach their personal histories through a circular, reflective process-- and to try some cover concepts that perhaps didn't even use imagery from the film, but represented the film iconically… A tall order for a film as psychologically and emotionally expansive as SHOAH. Out of this suggestion came a large group of comps (a sample of which are shown below) made by photographing a circular pattern traced into the Earth by a human hand. It was a very abstract concept-- ultimately too abstract-- but it was interesting attempt at representing SHOAH using original imagery.

It was decided that the image of Gawkowski would be presented on interior cover, and the outside of the slipcase would feature the train track image. I mocked up this cover using the same saturated color fields I had applied to my poster concepts, and then more natural versions upon Criterion's request. We also started looking at cleaner, taller typefaces. Both of these changes were part of Criterion's overall effort to remove any aesthetic interference from the imagery-- to present the entire package as naturally as possible out of respect for the film and its beauty.

I applied this philosophy to the rest of the package, its menus and booklet. I'm really proud to have worked on this presentation of SHOAH for Criterion. The DVD and Blu-ray set is available now.

ARTIST COPIES NOW AVAILABLE

Artist copies of my HOUSE and RAY HARRYHAUSEN screenprints for the Belcourt are now available in my shop here!

ÑIKO

Born in Havana, Antonio Pérez Ñiko began his career drawing for an ad agency in Cuba as one of many artists executing images of propaganda for the state. Upon the Revolution, he devoted himself passionately to his own artwork, creating what eventually amounted to hundreds of posters. Many of these were film posters commissioned by the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (founded in 1959); Ñiko also designed countless political and cultural posters, and his works are among the most definitive of the Cuban Revolutionary Style. 

Living in Mexico since 1988, he has continuously designed posters and is currently a professor of design. Among the revolutionary poster artists still with us today, he couldn't be more beloved; Ñiko has won countless awards and has had many exhibitions, programs and books published of his monumental work, including a new exhibition that appears to be currently active at the University Gallery Ramón Alva de la Canal in Xalapa, Veracruz (entitled 1/4 Century in Mexico, the exhibition features Ñiko's work from the past 25 years as well as a special series of 25 new posters based on Pablo Neruda's The Book of Questions). 

Most wonderfully of all, Ñiko prolifically updates his own personal blog, a treasure trove of personal writings on art and design, lectures, interviews, favorite records and books, cat pictures, links to his students' work as well as beautiful catalogs of Niko's work viewable in PDF form. In a recent interview, Niko described his blog "a demonstration of all that sustains me in this world."

When I began designing movie posters in pursuit of a potential career, it was a book of Cuban posters that inspired me more than anything else. Thanks to Ñiko's blog and website, as well as Carol Goodman and Claudio Sotolongo's indespensible book Soy Cuba, I've been able to identify the man behind so many of my favorite designs. I present just a small sampling of them below, all shared respectfully from Ñiko's site (where you can view so many more). I know that I am only one of many, many young artists for whom Ñiko's work-- simply, colorful, humorous and constructed around iconic ideas-- remains a huge inspiration.