Since the early '90's Mary J. Blige has held onto her title as "The Queen of Hip-Hop Soul" by writing and performing soul-baring songs culled from her personal battles with abuse, drugs and bad relationships. Blige has since overcome those issues, but she used their lasting imprint on her life as the inspiration for a new song, "I Can See in Color" -- the first single from the soundtrack to the new movie Precious: Based on the novel "Push" by Sapphire.

Precious tells the story of Claireece "Precious" Jones (Gabourey Sidibe), a pregnant Harlem teenager who overcomes illiteracy, sexual abuse and health issues as she learns to discover and love her true self. It's a harrowing on-screen tale that was first published in 1996 as novel by the poet Sapphire. The movie adaptation, directed by Lee Daniels, won the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at this year's Sundance Film Festival in addition to audience prizes in three other film festivals. When Precious opened in limited release this past weekend in only eighteen theaters, it averaged an astonishing $104,025 per screen compared to the weekend's top grossing movie -- A Christmas Carol -- which averaged only about $8,100 per screen.

Blige immediately connected with the character of Precious when Daniels first showed the film to her at a private screening. At a press conference for Precious at the Toronto International Film Festival in September, Blige explained that seeing the movie brought back memories of her own rough childhood, saying, "Some of those situations that happen to Precious happened to me."

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Last week Australian rapper N'fa, of hip-hop collective No Fixed Abode, released a music video that was directed by actor Heath Ledger. N'fa and Ledger had been friends since childhood and the clip for N'fa's song "Cause An Effect" is believed to be Ledger's final directorial work.

The three-and-a-half minute music video was shot in 2007 at Ledger's beach house in the Australian town of Bronte, a beachside suburb of Sydney. A few days before the production, Ledger woke N'fa at 5AM with a surprise phone call and an idea for the video. According to the rapper, Ledger wanted to do an "artistic" video that had "a kind of a revelatory kind of feel about it."

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Rapper 50 Cent, best-known for chart-topping hits like "In Da Club." "Candy Shop" and "P.I.M.P.," is further laying the groundwork for a career in film with the upcoming release of his directorial debut, Before I Self Destruct.

The 90-minute movie, written, directed and starring 50 Cent (nee Curtis Jackson), is a gritty inner-city tale about a supermarket clerk named Clarence (Jackson) who turns to a life of crime to support his younger brother after their mother is murdered. The story is somewhat similar to Get Rich or Die Tryin' -- the 2005 movie directed by Jim Sheridan loosely based on 50 Cent's life. Get Rich or Die Tryin' (also the name of his 2003 major-label debut album) marked 50 Cent's feature film acting debut alongside Terrence Howard, Viola Davis and Joy Bryant.

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Adam Lambert's first post-American Idol single, "Time for Miracles" -- the theme song to Roland Emmerich's upcoming apocalyptic flick 2012 -- has leaked online ahead of its scheduled debut date of Oct. 27.

Last week a snippet of the song, paired with some of the movie's footage, premiered as planned on AOL's Moviefone website. The full version of the song and its music video were then supposed to premiere globally on Oct. 27 as part of a special 2012 promotional trailer tied to screenings of the Michael Jackson documentary This Is It. Instead, the track appeared prematurely over the weekend on the iTunes Store in Italy and, as expected, savvy techies quickly uploaded it to YouTube and other websites.

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The Fall movie season is officially in full-swing, and along with it comes a solid set of  soundtrack albums worth checking out. Whether you're into classic rock, punk, hip-hop, indie, or world music...if you're a movie and music buff, there's definitely a soundtrack here for you.

Girrl Power: Whip It
During filming, avid music fan (and first-time director) Drew Barrymore played all kinds of music on the set to keep the mood upbeat for her roller derby coming-of-age movie. Whip It's soundtrack album selects nineteen of the 75 songs heard in the film, culled together with the help of Wes Anderson's music supervisor, Randall Poster. It's an ADD collection of rebellious tracks including cuts from The Ramones, The Breeders, The Ettes, Dolly Parton, The Raveonettes, and .38 Special's classic "Caught Up In You." There's already talk of a second soundtrack album.

Tropical Tunes: Couples Retreat
The cast of this Vince Vaughn-starrer spent three weeks shooting the movie on the French Polynesian island of Bora Bora, so naturally the soundtrack is full of contemporary island-flavored selections. A.R. Rahman, the two-time Academy Award winning composer/songwriter of music for Slumdog Millionaire, composed the score and songs for Couples Retreat. It was Rahman's first time creating music for an American comedy, so he deliberately dialed back the Indian vibe heard in Slumdog.

Continue reading "Jay-Z, The Ramones and Hatebreed Headlining Fall's Movie Soundtracks" »

With the release of the upcoming movie Michael Jackson: This Is It, not to mention a new song, a new album, and a traveling exhibition of memorabilia, October promises to be a lucrative month in the posthumous career of Michael Jackson.

Jackson died of cardiac arrest on Jun. 25 at the age of 50 (it has since been ruled as a homicide). In the months leading up to his death he had been rehearsing in Los Angeles for a string of 50 farewell concerts -- billed This Is It -- that would have started in July at The O2 arena in London.

Footage from those rehearsals and behind-the-scenes clips were quickly culled together for This Is It by the tour's director Kenny Ortega (High School Musical). Ortega had been a longtime friend and collaborator of Jackson's, having directed the singer's Dangerous and History concert tours. "I'm proud of the many years of friendship and creative association I shared with Michael and I'm happy that people will get a chance to see his spirit and drive in action," Ortega said in August. "This Is It may go down as the greatest concert that no one got a chance to see, but with this film, we get a rare portrait of Michael as he prepares for his final curtain call and what I believe was going to be his master work."

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Scarlett Johansson is living a double life. She's primarily known as an accomplished actress with roles in Lost in Translation, Match Point, Vicky Cristina Barcelona and next year's Iron Man 2, in which she'll work a Russian accent to play the leather-clad, raven-haired Natasha Romanoff (aka Black Widow). But acting isn't Johansson's only gig. In the past few years she's also been slowly building a music career. With last week's release of Break Up -- a duets album she recorded with singer/songwriter Pete Yorn -- Johansson is moving into the realm of actor/singer.

Break Up was initially inspired by the late 1960s duet recordings of French singer/actor/director Serge Gainsbourg and European bombshell Brigitte Bardot, best known for their 1968 album and song, "Bonnie and Clyde." Yorn would play that song as part of his house music during his 2006 concert tour. One afternoon, after the tour had wrapped, he awoke suddenly obsessing about creating a duets album like Gainsbourg and Bardot.

Yorn immediately thought of Johansson, whom he had met through his brother, as his Bardot-like singer for the album. He told Billboard magazine, "Within ten minutes, I was texting Scarlett, 'We have to make a record!'" Yorn knew she was dabbling in music but had never actually heard her sing. Johansson quickly texted back and agreed to the project.

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The soundtrack album for the second Twilight movie New Moon has been a top-secret project for months. Until now that is. "Meet Me On the Equinox" -- the first soundtrack single by emo rockers Death Cab For Cutie -- will debut this Sunday night on MTV's website during its Video Music Awards telecast.

Death Cab For Cutie wrote and recorded "Meet Me on the Equinox" specifically for the sequel, which stars Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and a newly buff (and often shirtless) Taylor Lautner. In New Moon, Bella (Stewart) is in the throes of a deep depression after her vampire soul mate, Edward (Pattinson), leaves her. She seeks comfort in her new friend Jacob (Lautner), who's also a werewolf, as she struggles with her newly broken heart. DCFC bassist Nick Harmer told MTV News that the band's lyrics -- penned mostly by frontman Ben Gibbard -- often tread this kind of bumpy emotional landscape.

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Since its world premiere last year at the Toronto International Film Festival, there's been very little buzz about the upcoming LeBron James basketball documentary More Than a Game. But that all changed when four of the hottest MC's in rap and hip-hop suddenly announced that they had recorded a song together for the film's soundtrack.

The song, which leaked on the Internet last week, is called "Forever" and it's a six-minute jam with verses by Eminem, Lil Wayne, Kanye West and newcomer Drake that has ignited rap and hip-hop fans and renewed interest in the doc.

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After several stops, starts and delays there's growing anticipation for the October release of Where The Wild Things Are. For the past two years, the music world has been buzzing about the movie too, specifically about its soundtrack.

Karen O, the arty and brash lead singer of Brooklyn-based rock trio Yeah Yeah Yeahs, has been writing and recording new songs for the movie with a rumored list of respected indie rock musicians. Last week details about the film's soundtrack were finally revealed further fueling the anticipation.

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