thus spake drake: Now Downloading: New Releases 11.18-11.25.08

Once again, releases are in holiday mode, so 'new' releases are sparse (hence the combining of weeks). On Monday, I profiled the new albums from Kanye West, The Killers and Tom Jones, and besides that there's releases from the Paul McCartney project The Fireman, Anathallo, Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan, Femi Kuti, Ludacris and Momus. (Chinese Democracy is a Best Buy only, so I'll happily ignore.) Special EP's from Coldplay, The Raveonettes, Feist, Sixx:AM and Surf City litter the landscape as well along with compilations from post-punk faves Magazine and Rivers Cuomo. Reissue to get this week is R.E.M.'s Murmur: Deluxe Edition, and there's a special 2-CD edition of last year's fave soundtrack Juno. Speaking of soundtracks, my current fave is Slumdog Millionaire, which gets early digital release this week.

Playlist: New Releases 11.25.08
Playlist: New Releases 11.18.08

Slumdog Millionaire - Music From The Motion Picture
Stream / Purchase [mp3]

The film Slumdog Millionaire is a frenetic portrait of Mumbai, a gritty fairytale of beating long odds and standing firm in the face of adversity, and propelling it forward is the pulsating score by A.R. Rahman. In the wake of the recent tragic events of the city portrayed, the film -- and even it's soundtrack -- becomes even more visceral than it's already ebullient depiction of Mumbai. Since the news broke while I was writing this review, I've decided to either attempt to write a bigger review on it's own, or can it all together, so some notes will have to do:

At only 42, A.R. Rahman is the 8th best-selling music artist of all-time, and with a long career still ahead of him he will undoubtably work his way further up the list.

Director Danny Boyle originally wanted Jack Black to do the score, but settled on Bollywood king Rahman after realizing his naivete in thinking that Black would have time to hang out in India for a year or so to work on it.

The song "Ringa Ringa" is a reworking of "Choli ke peeche" from the Bollywood film Khalnayak (1993). Rahman utilized the same voice talent, Alka Yagnik and Ila Arun, that sang in the original chart-topping version.

"Aaj Ki Raat" is another reworked song, which originally appeared in the Bollywood gangster film Don - The Chase Begins Again

More on the radar (and in the mp3 player) this week (AOL Streams rollover 11/17)