The music for Fire Walk with Me, David Lynch's brooding feature film follow-up to the groundbreaking TV series Twin Peaks, again uses the talents of Angelo Badalamenti to create a chilling backdrop to Lynch's dark psychosexual thriller. Film noir is once again the touchstone for this perfectly pitched score, and these 10 tracks stand repeated listening in their own right. This is in part due to the use of some top notch jazz players such as Buster Williams, Grady Tate, and Vinnie Bell, as well as vocalist Jimmy Scott's haunting delivery on "Sycamore Trees." Sax, vibes, upright bass, and percussion set a smoky atmosphere, and the eerie synthesizer and string arrangements augment the general spine-tingling melancholy and menace. Singer Julee Cruise also appears, lending angelic repression to "Questions in a World of Blue"; Lynch contributes compositions and percussion throughout this exercise in bleakness and love gone awry. --Derek Rath