Guardians Of The Galaxy’s James Gunn Reveals Retro-Awesome Soundtrack
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When director James Gunn debuted the first Guardians of the Galaxy footage at Comic-Con in July 2013, it was already accompanied by Blue Swede’s “Hooked on a Feeling,” a song that perfectly set the fun-loving, tongue-in-cheek tone of the movie. Since then, music has been a key part of the Guardians marketing campaign, adding other classic rock tunes such as Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit in the Sky” to the mix in more recent trailers. Now you can listen to the full Guardians soundtrack online, and scope out the retro-brilliant cover art up top.
You can actually listen to the full soundtrack via the embed at the bottom of this article, courtesy of MTV. Gunn revealed the full track listing last night on his Facebook page, but he’s also warned that, as is typical with movie soundtracks, some of the titles could hint at spoilers. It’s certainly not as bad as some official soundtracks where the song names specifically reference stuff that happens on screen. I’m sure many Star Wars fans still remember the whole “Qui-Gon’s Funeral” debacle with the Phantom Menace soundtrack. Still, we’re going to put the track listing after the jump, just in case.
Possible musical spoilers beyond this point!
- Blue Swede – “Hooked on a Feeling”
- Raspberries – “Go All the Way”
- Norman Greenbaum – “Spirit in the Sky”
- David Bowie – “Moonage Daydream”
- Elvin Bishop – “Fooled Around and Fell in Love”
- 10Cc – “I’m Not in Love”
- Jackson 5 – “I Want You Back”
- Redbone – “Come and Get Your Love”
- The Runaways – “Cherry Bomb”
- Rupert Holmes – “Escape (The Pina Colada Song)”
- The Five Stairsteps – “O-O-H Child”
- Marvin Gaye/Tammi Terrell – “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”
The cool thing is that the soundtrack is more than just some retro flourish to accompany Peter Quill and his gang of misfits as they reluctantly save the galaxy. Instead, the tracks represent the music Quill has on his old-school Walkman, one of the only artifacts he has left from his home of Earth after being spirited away into the sky (ahem) by…something. At any rate, they serve as an emotional connection to his roots, and Quill’s tunes are very important to him in a totally un-ironic way — so important that, in the trailers, he freaks out and starts a fight with an alien at least a head taller than himself, just because the big dude happened to put on his headphones and fiddle with the Walkman.
But while you’re jamming to the Spotify playlist below, don’t think you’re in on all of Guardians of the Galaxy’s musical surprises. See, Gunn actually gave actor Chris Pratt a mix tape of songs to help him get into the part, and Gunn specifically said last night that the official soundtrack doesn’t represent everything that was on Pratt’s mix tape. He’ll reveal the rest closer to the movie’s release, so stay tuned. In the meantime, you can pre-order the soundtrack for yourself right here, and it’ll be out on July 29, just before Guardians hits theaters on August 1.
Finally, just for fun, here’s a shot of Gunn’s dog, Von Spears, sitting atop Ronan the Accuser’s throne inside the “Dark Aster,” which I’m presuming is the name of Ronan’s ship. It looks almost like a more angular riff on H.R. Giger’s set designs for Alien. I dig it.
