Puneet Varma (Editor)

Crossroads (1986 soundtrack)

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Released
  
1986

Producer
  
Tom Whalley

Movie
  
Crossroads

Genre
  
Rock music

Length
  
37:06

Release date
  
1986

Label
  
Warner Bros. Records

Crossroads (1986 soundtrack) httpsimgdiscogscomIw0oc6s2bYXiShxwjvqM6kkA8s

Recorded
  
Ocean Way Studios, Nashville, TN

Artists
  
Ry Cooder, Steve Vai, Arlen Roth

Similar
  
Ry Cooder albums, Rock music albums

Crossroads is the soundtrack to the 1986 film starring Ralph Macchio, Joe Seneca and Jami Gertz, inspired by the legend of blues musician Robert Johnson.

Contents

The film was written by John Fusco and directed by Walter Hill and featured an original score featuring Ry Cooder, Arlen Roth and Steve Vai on the soundtrack's guitar, and harmonica by Sonny Terry. Vai also appears in the film as the devil's guitar player in the climactic guitar duel.

Miscellaneous Information

  • The "Eugene's Trick Bag" is based on the Caprice No. 5 by Nicolo Paganini.
  • The movie was filmed in some of the same Mississippi Delta locations where screenwriter Fusco once hitchhiked and hopped trains, searching for lost blues legends much like his characters.
  • Macchio's fingering on the guitar was a studied acting job in itself because he didn't know how to play guitar prior to taking on the part of a guitarist. He received intensive training from classical guitarist William Kanengiser of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet and Blues and slide guitar Master Arlen Roth to approximate playing realistically enough to hide his inexperience.
  • The "train" riff that Jack Butler plays to intimidate Eugene at the beginning of their duel was later used in Bad Horsie, the opening track on Steve Vai's Alien Love Secrets.

    • Gear

  • The guitar used by Jack Butler (Steve Vai) is a Charvel San Dimas.
  • The guitar amplifier used by Jack Butler (Steve Vai) is a Carvin X100B.
  • The battery-powered guitar amplifier used by Macchio is Pignose Legendary 7-100.
  • The Fender Telecaster Ralph Macchio carries along his hobo trek in the second half of the film is a 1970s CBS Fender with block lettering on the headstock. Very realistic for the film because not only were they affordable and easy to acquire (in the 1980s, that is), their heavy polyurethane finish made them near impervious to the tests of the road, as seen when Macchio and Seneca are walking through the rain, sleeping in barns, abandoned shacks and the outdoors.

    • Songs

    1Crossroads
    2Down in Mississippi4:26
    3Cotton Needs Pickin'2:58

    References

    Crossroads (1986 soundtrack) Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA