Two decades into their career as a band, the avant-rock lifers of Deerhoof seem at least as animated by their various extracurricular projects as they are by the business of making Deerhoof albums. The latest of these is a forthcoming 7″ single called Deerhoof Plays the Music of the Shining, which is just what it sounds like.
Today, the band released their version of “Midnight, The Stars And You,” the 1930s jazz tune originally sung by Al Bowlly that plays over the Kubrick film’s final scene. The single’s other side features Deerhoof playing Hungarian composer Béla Bartók’s Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, which plays when Danny Torrance approaches room 237 of the Overlook Hotel on his tricycle. Deerhoof Plays the Music of the Shining will arrive October 26 via Famous Class records, with a cover that parodies the film’s “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” manuscripts.
Last year, Deerhoof released the heavily collaborative protest album Mountain Moves, as well as a set of four other LPs containing music from four different Deerhoof side projects. This isn’t the first time they’ve toyed with film music: their 2011 album Deerhoof vs. Evil contained a killer cover of “Let’s Dance the Jet,” from Mikis Theodorakis’s score to the 1967 film The Day the Fish Came Out. Hear their suitably eerie take on “Midnight, The Stars And You” below.
