Judgment Night Soundtrack

In most cases, the music selected for a soundtrack is meant to fit the action of the movie. For Judgment Night, the soundtrack project brought a whole new style of music into being. While hip hop and hard rock had been mixed before, the results, such as 'Walk This Way' were considered mostly novelty songs. However, the songs on the Judgment Night soundtrack inspired many bands and musicians to meld the sounds in a new way. Groups like Korn and Limp Bizkit are direct descendants of the music found on this album and certainly used it for inspiration.

When producer Rick Rubin set out to make the Judgment Night soundtrack, he enlisted some of the top hard rock and hip hop performers in the world. With names like Pearl Jam and Cypress Hill attached to the project, it was guaranteed to be a success. Each hard rock band was attached to a hip hop group to record a single song. The studio collaborations were largely mixed, with some artists being able to conform to a middle stylistic point and others not finding a common ground. Clearly one of the best examples on the album came from the hard rock group, Faith No More, when they were paired with the Boo Yaa Tribe. The name of the song was Another Body Murdered and featured a heavy beat complete with distorted guitars.

The contribution of hip hop group De La Soul was another highlight on the album. Playing opposite was Teenage Fanclub, a pop rock band that seemed out of place when compared to the louder hard rock acts listed on the credits. Still, Fallin’ was a strong song and attracted considerable radio airplay. At the other end of the spectrum, some of the acts imposed their style on the other groups without making a compromise. An example would be Freak Momma, a song from Sir Mix A Lot and Mudhoney that failed to show any rock traces and is simply a hip hop song with guitars.