Alex Pastavas Commentary on the Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 Soundtrack

I’ve done a lot of posts on the music of Breaking Dawn lately, part of that is due to the fact there have been plenty of opportunities, another reason may be that I love the soundtrack so much that subliminally, I am just looking for reasons to write about it.  Earlier this month I shared about Spotify’s exclusive streaming of the Breaking Dawn Soundtrack and mentioned a number of bonus features that came with it.  One of those features was commentary from Alex Pastavas on each of the songs on the Soundtrack.

For those of you who have followed my Twilight writing for a while, you may recall that Catherine Hardwicke did a similar feature for Imeem soundsessions in 2008, which sadly no longer exists and now I’m left kicking myself wishing I had done a transcript of her commentary.  Because of that, I decided to create transcripts of the Alex Pastavas commentary for our readers.  Below is her commentary for each song transcribed for your enjoyment.

Endtapes – “One of the first submissions that we received for the Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn movie was a song called Endtapes by the Joy Formidable.  This Welsh trio wrote such a beautiful song for us.  It has such exuberance and such depth that I can’t imagine a better way to start the soundtrack.“

Love Will Take You – “Love Will Take You by Angus and Julia Stone was a beautiful lilting, sort of mournful and yearning song we use within the body of the picture.  This brother and sister duet from Austrailia has done really well in the past few years and we couldn’t be happier that they contributed to the soundtrack.”

It Will Rain – “I know so many of our Twilight fans will be familiar with Bruno Mars.  He really needs no introduction.  I remember the first time I heard the demo for It Will Rain, and it seemed like the impossibly perfect song for Breaking Dawn.  A beautiful love song and a perfect ballad for the wedding.”

Turning Page – “Sleeping At Last is actually Chicago based Ryan O’Neal.  His song is really interesting because we actually use it twice in the movie.  It’s a beautiful love song and we use the instrumental version only for a key scene and also later in the picture we reprise the song with the vocals.”

From Now On – “From Now On was written by an American rock band from Tennessee called the Features. [It] has such exuberance and such joy, and actually we found many places that we were able to use it in the movie and settled on the very best one.”

A Thousand Years – “We are so lucky to have a Twilight fan like Christina Perri contribute a song to the soundtrack.  A Thousand Years, written specifically for the movie.  It’s a beautiful ballad, it tells the story of Twilight in such a beautiful way, and all the producers and director were very excited to hear it.”

Neighbors - “Brookly based, indie artist, hip hop artist, he’s so amazing he’s sorta indescribable, Theophilus London contributed a song called Neighbors to the Breaking Dawn Soundtrack.  The song has elements of rap, It has, you know, a beautiful melody line and I love the way we used it in the picture.”

I Didn’t Mean It – “Our second brother and sister band,w hich is very unusua, is a band from Los Angeles called the Belle Brigade.  These two come from an interesting musical lineage.  Their grandfather is actually John Williams, the very important and renowned film composer.  I love this song.  I Didn’t Mean It has such swagger.  It’s so beautifully fierce and I couldn’t be happier about how it’s used in the picture.”

Sister Rosetta – “Sister Rosetta by the Noisettes is an interesting contribution to the Twilight Saga.  It’s the first time we’ve actually had a band re-record a song that was previously released, but they did a very special version for us.  The song, so memorable that we could never find anything that worked as well.”

Northern Lights – “Northern Lights by Cider Sky contributed a beautiful wedding reception song to the Twilight Saga.  This is a collective of song writers who came together specifically to create a song for Twilight.”

Flightless Bird, American Mouth – “So much to say about Iron and Wine and so important to the musical template and point of view for Twilight.  This is another song that’s making it’s second appearance in the Twilight Saga.  We of course used it during the first movie, during the very important prom scene.  Sam Beam came in and saw the movie and sat down with Bill Condon and he created this very special version for Twilight fans specifically.”

Requiem on Water – “Imperial Mammoth is an indie rock band from Los Angeles.  They contributed a song called Requiem on Water and Bill Condon, it was one of the very first songs that we submitted for Bill to look at and it was a song that he always, always loved and I’m, we’re, so happy to introduce a band like Imperial Mammoth to the Breaking Dawn fans.”

Cold – “Continuing our tradition of duets, you know we’ve had Beck and Natasha Khan, we’ve had St. Vincent and Bon Iver, for Breaking Dawn we’re thrilled to have Aqualung and Lucy Schwartz create a song specifically for Breaking Dawn.  The song is called Cold.  It’s beautifully mournful and touching and dark in the way that only a Breaking Dawn song could be.”

Llovera – “We’re especially lucky to have a contribution from Mia Maestro called Llovera.  It scores a beautiful moment in the picture and not only is she an important artist, but an actor in Breaking Dawn as well.”

Love Death Birth – “And finally our last track on the Breaking Dawn Soundtrack is a beautiful contribution by Carter Burwell.  Carter of course scored the first movie Twilight, and is back again for Breaking Dawn recreating his beautiful themes and important score for the movie.”

The commentary in my opinion was less than stellar and lacked any sort of depth.  It was mostly, here is this song this is where we used it.  I would have liked to get more insight into why it was chosen and how the songs were selected.  If you’re not sure when some of the songs play, be sure to head over to my Breaking Dawn, What Plays When.. post for a breakdown of when each song plays during the film.  Also, if you wish to listen to the commentary you can listen to it on Spotify.