‘The Hunger Games’ Goes To ‘Twilight’ Territory With Arcade Fire And, Um… Taylor Swift!

Movies
Posted by EvanDickson on December 26, 2011 @ 8:36pm
Category: Movies / News

Lionsgate is taking a page out of Summit’s playbook when it comes to the soundtrack for The Hunger Games.

Around the time of New Moon it became pretty apparent that they synergistic opportunities of a youth-driven film with a huge built in audience were too great for most musicians (and labels) to pass up. Kids who almost never buy CD’s or full album downloads will still shell out 12 bucks for something if it reminds them of their favorite franchise. Whether or not they’re breathlessly waiting for the film and are trying to eke out a fraction of that experience ahead of time, or simply because the CD has their favorite characters on the cover – units will be sold. Are you a parent that doesn’t know what to get your kid? Boom. You know they like Twilight right? Buy the soundtrack.

Well Lionsgate (along with Universal Records) is hoping that the Suzanne Collins fan base has as much disposable income as Stephanie Meyer’s. As if it wasn’t apparent already, everyone’s hoping The Hunger Games is the next sure fire youth franchise, despite having sold only a fraction of the aforementioned heavy hitter’s books.

Per Variety, “Taylor Swift, Win Butler, T Bone Burnett, the Civil Wars, the Decemberists and Regine Chassagne of Arcade Fire have contributed songs to the companion album for Lionsgate’s upcoming franchise tentpole “The Hunger Games.” Lionsgate and Universal Republic Records made the announcement Saturday. The album’s produced by Burnett and will be released next year in advance of the film’s opening.

Butler and Chassagne have written a song with Burnett entitled “Horn Of Plenty,” and the Decemberists have contributed an original song, “One Engine.””

Since Butler and Chassagne are the nucleus of Arcade Fire I’m curious to hear their collaboration with Burnett. Also – those guys have donated millions of dollars to Haiti for earthquake relief, so before you cry “sell-out” consider where their money often goes.

In theaters March 23 from director Gary Ross, the film stars Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Elizabeth Banks, Dayo Okeniyi, Amandla Stenberg, Chris Mark, Jacqueline Emerson, Wes Bentley, Lenny Kravitz, Toby Jones, Stanley Tucci. READ MORE