Various Artists, "morvern Callar" Ost

Lynne Ramsey's bleak "Morvern Callar" begins when the titular character discovers her boyfriend's suicide, covers up his death, then treks across Europe passing his novel off as her own. She also takes along a tape he had made -- marked "Music for You" -- which serves as the film's soundtrack.

The "Morvern Callar" companion CD replicates that mix tape, and while the film leaves much about the boyfriend a mystery, the soundtrack does make one thing clear: he had very, very hip taste. A virtual who's who of underground bands and groundbreaking artists, the "Morvern Callar" soundtrack serves as a sort of Rough Guide to Cool drawn from both the past and the present.

In the former category is the ever-entrancing Can, represented by the funky neo-disco of "I Want More" and also the skittering jazz of "Spoon" (Can bassist Holger Czukay gets a pair of tracks as well). Other hipster icons include the Velvet Underground, Lee "Scratch" Perry, and Nancy Sinatra's sleepy collaboration with Lee Hazlewood, "Some Velvet Morning."

In the contemporary category are such boundary pushing electronic artists as Aphex Twin and Boards Of Canada, plus the left-field pop of Stereolab, Broadcast, and Ween. While nothing from the soundtrack is previously unreleased, it all adds up to a nice souvenir for fans of the music and a great introduction to the Canon of Cool.