So today the soundtrack for Hannah Montana: The Movie was released. To start with one thing; most of it is nothing like any previous Hannah Montana soundtrack. Part of it is though and it’s not surprising that it’s the Hannah Montana part but that’s only seven of the eighteen songs. It’s actually quite long for today’s standards with a playtime of pretty much exactly an hour.
Lets start with the Hannah Montana songs (which are of course are performed by Miley Cyrus, I doubt there is anyone left in the world who doesn’t know that); the quality of the songs varies immensely. While You’ll Always Find Your Way Back Home is actually a fun song even though it falls in the category of Bubble Gum pop. The more surprising is that Taylor Swift is one of the writers of the song. Let’s Get Crazy is just a Hannah Montana song just nothing special. The Good Life is ruined for one simple reason; it sounds like someone turned Miley’s voice into a chipmunk in parts of the song.
Especially when you compare it to other Hannah songs like Let’s Do This where Miley’s voice sounds much lower, where she pretty much sounds like Miley. The song still isn’t anything special and neither are the other Hannah songs Spotlight and What’s Not To Like. It’s not that they’re bad songs but they’re just the same kind of descriptive songs as on the other soundtracks. There is no hidden meaning, they just mean what they mean. There’s no real emotion to them. Oh yes, they also stuck another remix of Best of Both Worlds on There.
Steve Rushton is someone I’ve never heard of before this soundtrack but apparently he comes from a UK band known as Son of Dork which I’ve never heard of either. He has two songs on the soundtrack being Everything I Want and Game Over. Based on those songs I can’t say that I’m impressed by the guy though I don’t know if this is his usual style of music. Again the problem with these songs is that they’re nothing special and you can’t help but think he’s on there because he’s a new signing to Hollywood Records.
That’s the less impressive stuff of the Hannah Montana soundtrack out of the way; it gets better from here. Rascal Flatts is on the soundtrack with two acoustic versions of their songs; Backwards and Bless The Broken Road. Though Bless the Broken Road is a song which has been recorded by a lot of country artists. Backwards is actually slightly modified to include certain aspects from Hannah Montana, like changing name from Jack to Jackson and things along those lines. It’s just a fun country song while Bless the Broken Road is more of a heartfelt song.
Taylor Swift didn’t just write one of the Hannah Montana songs but she’s also on the soundtrack herself with a song she wrote herself. Crazier is in Taylor’s classic style and thankfully not in her new pop style which seems to be something her label is trying to create. It’s just a solid song which isn’t really surprising seeing it comes from Taylor Swift.
Billy Ray Cyrus of course can’t be left off the soundtrack; in this case he’s on it with the song Back to Tennessee which is also the title of his next album which comes out next week. Compared to his other recent work which has been lacking in the last couple of albums; this song is actual quite good. It’s not his only song on the album though, he also sings the duet Butterfly Fly Away with Miley. It’s not really the way you’re used to hearing either of them as it is a very slow paced song with only very subtle music track in the background.
The main problem with the song is that there is also a version on the internet where Miley sings it solo. Though I can see the point of them singing it together and no offense to Billy Ray. There’s no doubt it’s also related to the narrative of the movie it just works better solo. It makes the song feel more heartfelt; even more simple than the version on the soundtrack giving it a bigger impact.
So we get to the four last songs on the album; the four Miley Cyrus songs. Lets start of with the first one and the only one Miley wrote herself (she’s less involved in the Hannah soundtracks than her own albums). Don’t Walk Away actually leaked almost a year ago and a lot of people liked it, it just didn’t make it onto Breakout. Which makes it rather strange to see it on here all of a sudden, unless it was always intended for the movie. The song is still the same as back then except for some tweaks to the music but that didn’t really improve the song but didn’t make it worse either. The song just leaves you with a feeling that this is an old song and that Miley could probably do a lot better now as far as writing is concerned.
Now to Hoedown Throwdown or Miley’s Macarena as it is being called; the song even made it on the Billboard Hot 100 as a single. I’m sorry but it’s just silly; Disney should know better than anyone else that fads are often created by accident. The success of Hannah Montana was a surprise itself and the Macarena is just one of those songs where no one would ever have imagined that it would become a hit. So why does Disney think they can create a fad like that? Not to mention the dance that goes with it seems overly complicated to learn quickly though it helps that the description is in the song itself.
Leaving the Hoedown behind comes Dream which is a cover of a song previously recorded by Diana Degarmo of American Idol “fame”. Miley’s rendition of the song is far superior to that; it’s actually a nice song though some critical points could be made about the music. The last song is The Climb which is already Miley’s biggest hit to date and it’s just a good song. Nothing more really needs to be said about it.
So to the final conclusion and it’s not an easy one. How do you rate an album which on one end has bubble gum pop on it and country on the other? The country part is good while really nothing special can be said about the pop part. Also raises the question who is going to buy this album? No doubt the Hannah Montana and Miley fans will but will it be able to appeal to a bigger crowd due to the other songs on it? We’ll know next week when the sales numbers come in. If the final verdict were to be from the Hannah music fan perspective it would be good but from a sheer critical view it can’t go higher than three out of five. Miley being on the album herself with songs besides the Hannah songs just shows the weakness in them.
Tags: Miley Cyrus, Taylor Swift
