Misc. Reviews

You know what's so great about high school? The free time. You can sit around all day, popping zits, talking about which girls have the biggest hooters, imagining what it would be like if Axel F had fallen in love with his pal Jenny in Beverly Hills Cop. OK, maybe everyone didn't wax philosophical about '80s blockbusters, but not everyone's stuck in rural Vermont like Marco Panella and Joe Weisenthal were. Throughout the mid-'90s, the duo — who now live in San Francisco and New York City, respectively — came up with the idea of an alternative soundtrack to the Eddie Murphy comedy, in which his character pursues an old flame from Detroit to Los Angeles, with music that would play right alongside the film, like those Pink Floyd-meets-The Wizard of Oz sync-ups.

Karen Lembke

Dark Side of the Cop's Marco Panella.

Details

9:30 p.m.

Admission is $5

546-6300

www.thehotelutahsaloon.com

Hotel Utah

Related Content

• Wine Clubs Are the Coffin Nails of Rock 'n' Roll
  November 29, 2011
• Abby Normal
  August 17, 2011
• Plug's Back On Time: Get High and Watch the Walls Melt
  January 6, 2012
• Maternal Gratitude
  May 4, 2011
• Great Moments in Craigslist: Southern Guy Is So Amped to Be Your Roommate
  August 19, 2011

More About

• Joe Weisenthal
• Eddie Murphy
• Tyler Gibbons
• Harold Faltermeyer
• Bryan Ferry

Like this Story?

Sign up for the Music Newsletter: Keep your thumb on the local music scene with music features, additional online music listings and show picks. We'll also send special ticket offers and music promotions available only to our Music Newsletter subscribers.

Privacy Policy Cancel Continue

After years of playing in jazz and indie-rock bands, Panella and Weisenthal have completed the first third of the score, releasing Dark Side of the Cop's eponymous debut on Panella's Auger Down Records. On tunes like "Paradise Lost and Found" and "Flying Fists and Flashing Lights," Panella re-envisions the blockbuster soundtrack — and vintage Prince, much like Hot Chip — by layering cheap synths and drum machines over acoustic guitars for a sleepy, glitchy, quietly addictive kind of electroni-funk. Fellow Vermont native Tyler Gibbons serves as vocalist, delivering the stanzas in a sexy whisper. The lyrics occasionally drop allusions to the movie — mentioning Motown, freeway chaos, and the art world — but ultimately this is a story of unrequited love, full of clever imagery ("Feels like shooting blanks at a zombie/ He just won't go down") and melancholic phrases ("The scars that heal quickly are the ones on your face"). In the end, it's like Harold Faltermeyer remixed by Aphex Twin, with Bryan Ferry's nephew crooning along. Can't wait for the Bronson Pinchot song in installment two.