PILOTPRIEST – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Thirty tracks, two hours long, and every single one named after a cult film from the 70s and 80s. On paper that sounds like a gimmick. It absolutely is not.

Pilotpriest is Anthony Scott Burns, a Canadian director and visual effects guy, and he put this out in 2009. That timing matters. This was years before the whole retro synth thing had a name anybody would recognize, before Drive, before Stranger Things made old synthesizers a personality. He was just out there doing it, fully formed, waiting for everyone else to catch up.

If you know the story about the fake Daft Punk “Tron” leak, the track that floated around online that everybody including Kanye lost their minds over before it turned out to be fake, that was Burns. That’s the level we’re talking about. The guy basically out Daft Punked Daft Punk by accident.

But the album is its own thing. “Body Double” opens it with twelve minutes that just build and build and set the tone for everything after. “Manhunter” and “Thief” have that cold Michael Mann feeling. “The Black Hole” and “Legend” go somewhere darker and stranger. By the time you get to the end you’ve been on a whole journey and nobody said a word the entire time.

What makes it work isn’t nostalgia. Burns has said he wasn’t trying to copy these movies, he was trying to bottle the feeling of a whole childhood. Renting a tape on a Friday night. The glow of a TV in a dark room. That specific mix of wonder and unease that only that era really had.

The vinyl pressing on Waxwork is one of the most beautiful physical releases in this whole world, neon colored records with amazing artwork. If you ever find one, grab it.

This one lives in my rotation permanently. Not because it reminds me of something. Because it sounds like everything I felt.

https://pilotpriest.bandcamp.com/album/original-motion-picture-soundtrack