Various Artists A Mighty Wind--The Album

The key to the success of Christopher Guest’s satirical comedies is that, not so deep down, he harbors real affection and deep understanding for the targets of his lampooning. So, while A Mighty Wind lay the hopelessly square excesses and petty jealousies of the early ‘60s folk movement bare for all to see, it also captured the naïve, yes, but charming idealism of the time…and wound up presenting performances that do such a good job of imitating the original recordings that inspired them that sometimes you had to squint pretty hard to see the wink and the nod behind the songs. And the resulting soundtrack album, which, of course, featured Guest’s amazing troupe of character actors (who doubled as songwriters here), including Folksmen Michael McKean and Harry Shearer (playing acoustic versions of the instruments they played in Spinal Tap), Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara as the Ian & Sylvia-esque Mitch & Mickey, and Jane Lynch and Parker Posey as part of the New Christy Minstrels parody The New Main Street Singers, stands as a pretty fair folk-pop record in its own right. A Mighty Wind—The Album also includes a couple of tracks not in the film, including The Folksmen’s hilarious rendition of the Rolling Stones’ “Start Me Up” (you haven’t lived till you hear the line “you make a grown man come” sung in three-part folk harmony). First-ever LP reissue, pressed in forest green vinyl!