Times Square (film) - Soundtrack

Soundtrack

The movie features a soundtrack of punk rock and New Wave music with a wide range of artists including The Ramones, The Cure, XTC, Lou Reed, Gary Numan, Talking Heads, Suzi Quatro, Roxy Music, Robin Gibb & Marcy Levy, Patti Smith and The Pretenders. The song "Down in the Park" is credited as being performed by Gary Numan although technically it was recorded when Numan was using the band name Tubeway Army. The Suzi Quatro track, "Rock Hard," is identified in the film as being Nicky and Pamela's favourite record.

The soundtrack also features original songs sung by the film's actors, "Damn Dog" by Johnson, "Your Daughter Is One" by Johnson and Alvarado, and "Flowers of the City" by Johnson and David Johansen. The soundtrack, as a compilation of some of the most important new wave and punk music from the era, achieved far more notoriety than the film did on its release. It also became a collectors' item among fans of XTC, because it included the specially-written XTC track "Take This Town", which for many years was only available on this soundtrack.

In his audio commentary for the Times Square DVD, Alan Moyle mentions that David Bowie was commissioned to provide a song for the movie's soundtrack, but Bowie's label at that time wouldn't let the filmmakers use it (at the time, Bowie was still under contract with RCA Victor Records, and the Times Square album was issued by RSO Records, at the time distributed by RCA Victor competitor PolyGram; however, it's also notable that Lou Reed, who does appear on the album, was also under contract to RCA Victor). Desmond Child has mentioned in a magazine interview that he collaborated with David Bowie on the song "The Night Was Not" (the song did appear on the Times Square soundtrack, performed by Child's band, Desmond Child & Rouge). Another rumour is that Bowie intended to provide a re-recorded version of his 1971 song "Life on Mars?" for the Times Square soundtrack. Although it has not been confirmed whether or not Bowie re-recorded a studio version of "Life on Mars?" in 1980, it is worth noting that in that same year, Bowie performed a rearranged, punkier version of the song during a live appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.