The soundtrack from Walter Salles' recent adaptation of Jack Kerouac's On the Road brings together Kerouac's love of jazz and the sparsely percussive themes of award-winning Brokeback Mountain film composer Gustavo Santaolalla. Some of the non-originals are predictably bebop – Bird's ‘Koko’ and Diz in ‘Salt Peanuts’ but others correctly reflect Kerouac's love of bluesmen and hipster swing; Slim Galliard's great ‘Yip Rock Heresy’ and ‘Hit that Jive Jack’, Dinah Washington (‘Mean and Evil Blues’), and Billie Holiday (‘A Sailboat in the Moonlight’) and blues master Son House (‘Death Letter Blues’) are equally valid. Additionally these Various Artists tracks work well sandwiched between Santaolalla's originals which are mostly him on keyboards such as prepared piano and percussion in trio with double bassist Charlie Haden and drummer Brian Blade; it is essentially mood music reflective of both the harshness and tranquility of the wide open backdrop of life on the road. They eschew melody, but are dynamically percussive, and Blade and Haden provide a seductive sound and creativity that would be lost on Hollywood session musicians. It ends with a Kerouac reading from On the Road, the author's voice accompanied on guitar by Santaolalla.