It’s Monday again and I’m working from home and using a post-rock salve on the punch in the plums that first alarm beep of the week brings.

I’ve also got another take on defining a genre that – having grown so wide and varied – is as full of contradictions of such attempts as is examples: “[post-rock bands] rejected the traditional song structure of rock music, based on chorus and verses, guitar solos, and energised mood, for a more introspective, unconventional structure defined by broader sonic experimentation. In post-rock, subtle suggestions and atmospheres reign free, shaped in the form of the influences that define the band’s background.”

So far, so much chin-stroking.

A side-effect of the ‘typical’ post-rock track – starting quietly, building atmospheres and rising to crescendos – is that such tunes offer a great option for film makers. Think of your traditional classical score, a usually string-heavy arrangement that builds mood and tension, aims for emotional soft spots and can emerge from the background to reach a dramatic conclusion. Post-rock has provided just such a guitar-driven take in many a film….

This Will Destroy You – The Mighty Rio Grande

2011’s ‘Moneyball’ is – for someone who knows nothing about baseball – a surprisingly compelling film anchored by both its actors’ performances and some great pacing, helped along at one point by This Will Destroy You and a tune that also featured in films ‘Earth to Echo’ (never heard of it either) and ‘Lone Survivor’ in which Marky Mark Wahlberg leads the Funky Bunch on a treacherous hike across Afghanistan to a mostly post-rock soundtrack dominated by Explosions In The Sky.

Sigur Ros – Hoppípolla

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZTb8WxEW78

One of those post-rock tunes probably heard more than any other as its stirring and euphoric arrangement has graced screens for a huge range of films and documentaries from the BBC’s ‘Planet Earth’ to the serious, myth-busting ‘Eurovision: Song of Ice and Fire’ and that slasher flick about the time Matt Damon bought a zoo.

Mogwai – Autorock

Mogwai have created many a great soundtrack themselves – from the deliciously atmospheric Atomic, to scoring Les Revenants and Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait – eight soundtrack albums, in fact, stacked up against their ten studio albums ‘proper’. Using a soundtrack example seems a bit of an easy push though so I’m going with ‘Autorock’ from their fitth album Mr Beast as used in the Michael Mann take on ‘Miami Vice’

Now I’m gonna call an audible and pivot for two takes on post-rock using movies as I do love a good sample in a tune…

Explosions In The Sky – Have You Passed Through This Night

65daysofstatic – Retreat! Retreat!