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Top 11 Uses Of Classic Rock In Cinema

Nothing moves a montage along like power chords and a drum fill. Here are our favorites.

August 17, 2007

He started it and he killed it. You are looking at a photo of Martin Scorsese and he is the one responsible for the marriage of awesome movie sequence and classic rock tune. No, it wasn't Easy Rider because those songs were still new at the time. It was Mean Streets, really, with its slo-mo barroom intro to the Stones' "Jumpin' Jack Flash," a pool hall brawl to "Please Mr. Postman" and car chase shootout to "Steppin' Out" by John Mayall's Bluesbreakers that really blew the door open. It seems like a cliché now - from Nike and Cadillac ads to kiddie flicks (none better than James Brown's "I Feel Good" in Soccer Mummy) but at the time it was revolutionary. With fists in the air we roll the projector: here's our Top 11 Classic Rock Moments in Cinema.

Selected by Jordan Hoffman so flame him if he missed your favorite.

11. Combination of the Two by Big Brother and the Holding Factory in Fear and Loathing in Las Vega
11. "Combination of the Two" by Big Brother and the Holding Factory in Fear and Loathing in Las Vega

11. "Combination of the Two" by Big Brother and the Holding Factory in Fear and Loathing

Hunter Thompson's book opened with Sympathy For The Devil, but this actually works better. It is more manic, more aggressive, intensely sloppy and (not to put to fine a point on it) quite fu@#%d up. Terry Gilliam's interpretation of America's obsession with self-destruction begins with Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro zooming through bat country (just outside of Barstow, CA, should you ever want to visit) on a quest to face the dashed dreams of their generation. The road leads to jagoff cops, vortex carpets, spinning casinos and lots and lots of vomit. We are welcomed to this world with Janis Joplins guttural screams, lyrics as visceral as a simple "woah, mama, mama, mama, mama!" and the awesomely unrehearsed guitar ejaculations of whoever it was that played guitar in the band at the time. It is an ugly song, but if you can take it, it rocks. Just like the movie it opens.

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