Music Matters

True Blood not just soft-core vampire porn: It's rock with bite

True Blood is more than vampires getting busy.
Yes ... this lead to good music.

Full disclosure: I’m not really a fan of True Blood, the Southern gothic vampire series on HBO which has become quite the cultural phenomenon.

I must admit that I tried to pick it up midstream, leaving me baffled at the plot machinations, but I don’t think it would have mattered much either way. To me, it seemed an uneasy mix of acting hambonery and soft-core porn. Hey, whatever floats your boat; it’s just not my cup of tea. (Or cup of blood, as the case may be.)

That said, the one refreshing thing about True Blood the fact that these vampires had little regret about their bloodlust. No brooding seems to be allowed in Bon Temps, Louisiana, which certainly bucks the trend among the nightwalkers these days. Luckily, the curators of True Blood: Music From the HBO Original Series — Volume 2 have seized upon this abandon and delivered a compilation that might as well be subtitled Undead And Loving It.

All you need to do is look at the collection of oldies chosen for inclusion here to get a sense for the prevalent mood. You’ve got Screamin’ Jay Hawkins making maniacal noises on “Frenzy.” There’s some full-bore garage rock from the 13th Floor Elevators on “You’re Gonna Miss Me.” And Junior Walker & The All Stars deliver boisterous horn-filled bop on “Shake And Fingerpop.” Each of those songs comes just shy of being a novelty, but the sense of fun they bring goes a long way.

Too much of that stuff could have been wearying though, which is why the soundtrack strikes a balance with newer acts a little more studied in their raucousness. Beck plays like Jack White with the scuzzy riffs of “Bad Blood” and the results are slightly askew, but in a good way. Eels contribute “Fresh Blood,” a menacing album track from a few years ago featuring Mark Oliver Everett’s microphone-piercing holler, and darn if it doesn’t sound like it was tailor made for this show.

And M. Ward kicks the album off in fine fashion with his signature hazy rockabilly on “Howlin For My Baby.”

You’ve also got a rock legend pitching in, as Robbie Robertson locks into a sultry groove on “How To Become Clairvoyant.” With his songwriting and guitar-playing gifts clearly intact, the former Band leader certainly raises hopes for his solo album coming out later this year.

Some of the newer faces and lesser-known names don’t fare quite as well. “Evil (Is Going On)” by Jace Everett and CC Adcock goes too far over the top in asserting its wildness, while Chuck Prophet’s “You Did (Bomp Shooby Dooby Bomp)” doesn’t go nearly far enough. And the Thievery Corporation’s use of dialogue clips from the show in “The Forgotten People (Bon Temps Remix)” veers a little close to “Batdance” territory.

Dropped into the middle of this strange mélange of sounds is Lucinda Williams’ stunning ballad “Kiss Like Your Kiss.” With good buddy Elvis Costello harmonizing, Williams’ achingly elegant lament effortlessly digs past all of the silliness to get deep into the wounded core of the vampire myth: The way that the ardor of lust gives way to unfathomable emptiness once it departs.

“Kiss Like Your Kiss” reaches levels of profundity that the rest of the album can’t hope to match, but that’s all right, because the show itself doesn’t get there either.

You’ve still got a mix with about six or seven keepers, which isn’t a bad batting average these days, along with one classic which is worth the price of admission all by itself. If you’ll permit me one more lousy vampire pun, I’d say that certainly doesn’t bite.

Adobe Flash Required for flash player. "Frenzy" by Screamin' Jay Hawkins

Adobe Flash Required for flash player. "Bad Blood" by Beck

Adobe Flash Required for flash player. "Kiss Like Your Kiss" by Lucinda Williams

Movie Review

Robert Pattinson and Zendaya face pre-marriage jitters in The Drama

Robert Pattinson and Zendaya in The Drama

Photo courtesy of A24

Robert Pattinson and Zendaya in The Drama.

Robert Pattinson and Zendaya will be seen together a lot at the movies in 2026, with mega-films like The Odyssey and Dune: Part Three coming out later in the year. But fans can get a much more intimate look at the two stars in a film that offers a unique take on relationship struggles, The Drama.

Emma (Zendaya) and Charlie (Pattinson) are a New York couple who are engaged to be married. After a quick-but-effective montage of their courtship, the story joins them as they are just days away from their wedding. As they get all the details like music, flowers, and food finalized, a visit to the caterer with married friends Rachel (Alana Haim) and Mike (Mamoudou Athie) proves fateful.

A few too many drinks leads to each member of the group deciding to divulge the worst thing they’ve ever done. While each story is slightly shocking, Emma’s takes the cake, so much so that Charlie starts to question their relationship. As they get closer to the wedding date, Charlie finds it increasingly difficult to get beyond Emma’s revelation, with each real or imagined conversation threatening to derail their previously tight bond.

Written and directed by Kristoffer Borgli, the film is provocative, funny, and cringey as it tries to get to the center of human dynamics. Charlie, Rachel, and Mike have starkly different reactions to Emma’s story, and the way those play out over the course of the film provides, well, the drama. The harder Charlie tries to justify Emma’s past, the more his underlying feelings start to eat at him, causing friction not just between him and Emma, but in other parts of his life, as well.

Strangely, especially for a character played by Zendaya, Emma recedes more than expected. Her explanations for her previous actions are timid at best, and she mostly seems to be waiting for Charlie to forgive her instead of questioning why she needs forgiveness. Borgli favors the male side of the equation, and in so doing he doesn’t dig as deep into the root of the issue as he could have.

Still, the downward spiral at the center of the story has a propulsive nature to it, and each successive step proves to be both hard to watch and impossible to turn away from. It also helps that Borgli manages the tone well, keeping interactions between characters relatively light so that the film doesn’t turn into one like Marriage Story.

Pattinson, who gets to use his own British accent for once, put on an interesting performance that is much better than his last two roles in Mickey 17 and Die My Love. He has good chemistry with Zendaya, who manages to shine despite being laden with a role that doesn’t play entirely to her strengths. Haim and Athie do good work in small roles, while Hailey Grace and Hannah Gross make an impact in brief appearances.

The situation in which Emma and Charlie find themselves in The Drama is not one to be wished on anyone, but it’s presented well by Borgli, keeping tensions high for the bulk of the film. Despite the two main characters not given completely equal footing, the story finds a way to get to a satisfactory ending.

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The Drama opens in theaters on April 3.

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