Michael Andrews Issue #25

Me and You and Everyone We Know soundtrack (Everloving)

By Mairead Case
Published: September 1st, 2005 | 4:30pm

“If you really love me,” breathes Miranda July at the beginning of the Me and You and Everyone We Know soundtrack, “then let’s make a vow.” The phrase comes in a fuzzy, glowing tone, melted onto composer Michael Andrew’s jeweled web of Moog, Vocoder, and modified piano. “Right here, right now.”

Here and now: a sweet-not-saccharine haze of deceptively simple melodies, flowing like poems. Andrews, a triple-threat musician, engineer, and composer best known for his work with the Greyboy Allstars and on the Donnie Darko soundtrack, composed the album in three days at a California studio. He wrote carefully, surrounded by July’s script, hotwired Casio keyboards, vintage synthesizers, drum machines, and pianos capped with felt. The resulting sound is dreamy, richened occasionally with warming vocals from Inara George, plus gems from Cody ChesnuTT, Virginia Astley, and Spiritualized. Things whine, and there seem to be clocks whirring. It’s like Amelie’s Yann Tiersen, albeit with backbone and some of Jon Brion’s beeps and clicks. Overall, a listen feels like floating upward, through water and toward the light.

Two years ago, Andrews met Me and You’s producer’s husband at a party. The man gushed over his wife’s new script until Andrews asked for a copy. He was hooked, postponing his own solo album to create the score. Some titles — “Goldfish” or “Socks on Ears,” for example — will connect more immediately with moviegoers, but in the end, everyone will find something to grasp, whether it’s the rhythmic, whirlpooling moans on “Fuck” or the cautious piano on “Peter and Sylvie.”

Like July, Andrews is attracted to grittier aspects of human existence. The music is deeply emotional yet the perfect thing for coffee shops or headphones on a crowded bus. Andrews and July know the real world: the world of uncomfortable shoes, cereal dinners, and pixilated conversation. They just grabbed a handful of it to create Me And You And Everyone We Know.