By Patrick Cremona

Published: Monday, 23 January 2023 at 12:00 am


Damien Chazelle’s new film Babylon finally arrived in UK cinemas this weekend – and although the reaction to the three-hour epic has been decidedly mixed, one thing that just about every critic can agree on is that it features one of the very best scores of the year.

Justin Hurwitz – who has collaborated with Chazelle on each of the director’s four features – has provided a host of jazzy compositions for the film, while the soundtrack also includes a couple of more familiar tunes, including the iconic Singin’ in the Rain.

“We wanted to give Babylon a musical universe of its own, a sound that wouldn’t be so anachronistic as to take anybody out of the 1920s, but also a far cry from the usual depiction of quaint ’20s jazz,” Hurwitz explained.

“It’s a lot wilder and more aggressive. Something to keep in mind is that the music which was recorded and survived from the ’20s is just a tiny sliver of the music that was actually being played in Los Angeles at the time.

“There was underground music that was never recorded,” he added. “We wanted to imagine the depth and variety and wild range of sounds that could have been, though we’ll never know. Music that we felt hadn’t been depicted on film before.”

The score has already picked up the Golden Globe for Best Original Score – and you can find a full list of tracks below.

Babylon soundtrack

All tracks composed by Justin Hurwitz unless otherwise stated