Original Soundtrack - Strawberry Statement (CD)

All Music Guide

The double-LP soundtrack to the film featuring Bruce Davison, Kim Darby, and James Coco is a coup for record executive Mike Curb, who composes the ultra-tacky liner notes, which contain the keyword "relevance." It's a compilation of songs by Crosby, Stills, Nash Young, Neil Young, Crosby, Stills Nash, Buffy Saint-Marie, and Thunderclap Newman, along with instrumentals by Ian Freebairn-Smith, a minor public-domain track by the Red Mountain Jug Band, and Karl Bohm the Berlin Philharmonic to boot. Some copies of the album contain Graham Nash's "Our House" from Crosby, Stills, Nash Young; on other copies the track was missing. Each of the album's four sides contains a different theme to Strawberry Statement with different titles; these are the instrumental tracks from Ian Freebairn-Smith. The music in between is incidental; the meat and potatoes here are the Neil Young and Crosby, Stills Nash titles, along with Buffy Saint-Marie's great rendition of the Joni Mitchell classic "The Circ...le Game" and Pete Townshend's production of the exquisitely brilliant and timeless "Something in the Air" by Thunderclap Newman. It all fits perfectly in an anti-war protest film based on the book by James Kunen and, along with companion albums to the film Easy Rider and other trendy flicks, brought the rock roll music soundtrack to a level beyond the cheesy Psych Out and Wild in the Streets collections of the '60s. You've heard most of this music before, but MGM and Curb found some luck by combining these powerful forces under one roof. - Joe Viglione, All Music Guide Read more Less