Head (film) - Music

Music

While the film's music disappointed fans of the band's more traditional pop sound, it features what some critics considered to be some of the best recorded work by The Monkees, including songs contributed by Carole King and Harry Nilsson. Jack Nicholson compiled the soundtrack album, which approximates the flow of the movie and includes large portions of the dialogue. The film's incidental music was composed and conducted by Ken Thorne, who also composed and conducted the incidental music to the Beatles' second film, Help! The most famous song from the film, The Porpoise Song appeared at the film's start and finish and left viewers feeling they were watching something dreamlike: even the editing of the bridge scene and the slow motion was almost meant to feel like a dream. Bright Color filters heighten the visual effect and dreamlike touch of the passages, which include mermaids rescuing member Micky Dolenz in the film's start: it was a psychadelic touch that recalled the visual and musical elements used for the Beatles TV film Magical Mystery Tour and the animated feature film Yellow Submarine, also with the Beatles and directed by George Dunning.

Andrew Sandoval, Rhino Entertainment's archivist who co-produced the company's reissue of the film, commented on the songs in a 1995 article published when the film was first reissued: "It has some of their best songs on it and, as you know, the movie's musical performances are some of the most cohesive moments in the film."

The music of the Monkees often featured rather dark subject matter beneath a superficially bright, happy sound (the song "Last Train to Clarksville", for instance, is actually about a young man who has been drafted, and is trying to arrange one last date with his girlfriend before he ships out, and includes the line "And I don't know if I'm ever coming home"); the music of the film takes the darkness and occasional satirical elements of the Monkees' earlier tunes and makes it far more overt, as in "Ditty Diego-War Chant", or "Daddy's Song," which has Jones singing an upbeat, Broadway-style number about a boy abandoned by his father. (Jones' own father, Harry, died just prior to Head's release.)

The soundtrack includes:

• "Porpoise Song (Theme from Head)" - Gerry Goffin and Carole King
• "Ditty Diego – War Chant" - Bob Rafelson and Jack Nicholson
• "Circle Sky" - Michael Nesmith
• "Can You Dig It" - Peter Tork
• "As We Go Along" - Carole King and Toni Stern
• "Daddy's Song" - Harry Nilsson
• "Long Title: Do I Have to Do This All Over Again?" - Peter Tork
• Excerpts from the film, spliced in random order that is not consecutive to the movie itself