Nick Cave and Warren Ellis to score Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black

Virgin Radio

8 Feb 2024, 14:30

Nick Cave and Warren Ellis are at the helm of the soundtrack for the upcoming Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black. 

Both Cave and Ellis, who are frequent collaborators, were hand-picked by the film’s director Sam Taylor-Johnson to provide the music for the film, and were seemingly “the only musicians” for the job. There’s said to be around 20 to 30 minutes of music for the score. 

Speaking in a statement (via Variety), Taylor-Johnson said: “Over the years, I’ve listened to everything they’ve composed and longed to realise the dream of working together. Their sensibility as well as understanding of this story has led to a profoundly deep and moving film score.”

Cave and Ellis first joined forces in 1993 when Ellis jumped on the violin for several tracks on Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds album, Let Love In, before joining as a full-time member for 10 albums. 

The talented duo have a very illustrious soundtrack career too. Together they have composed music for  The Proposition, Lawless and Marilyn Monroe biopic, Blonde. 

Outside of Cave and Ellis, music will also be provided by Amy Winehouse actress Marisa Abela, who recorded some of Amy’s biggest hits for Back To Black. 

Industry star Abela stars the late Rehab singer in Back to Black, which follows her journey to fame from her early years living in London to becoming a Grammy Award-winning artist.

The stellar cast includes The Crown star Lesley Manville as grandmother Cynthia, Jack O’Connell as ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil and EddieMarsan as dad Mitch. 

The soundtrack news comes after Amy’s frequent collaborator Mark Ronson gave his two-cents about the movie in January. 

While at The Critics’ Choice Awards, where he collected the Best Song statue for Barbie song I’m Just Ken alongside Ryan Gosling, Mark addressed the movie’s mixed reaction about the first trailer.

He explained: “The only thing I know about the film is I know [director] Sam [Taylor-Johnson] quite well, and I read the script and I feel what it did really nicely was… I was reminded of [Winehouse’s] humour and it really caught that well.

“I think she just had this whip-smart razor sense of humour which is one of her many gifts and they got that very nice in the film. I’m looking forward to seeing it.”

Back to Black will hit UK cinemas on 12th April 2024.