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Cliff Martinez




Raised in Columbus, Ohio , Cliff Martinez's first job composing was for the popular television show, Pee Wee's Playhouse . At the time, however, he was more interested in rock bands, and played drums in a variety of them, mostly in a temporary capacity. Eventually, his interests shifted and he focused his attention toward professional film scoring.

His first soundtrack was for the film Sex, Lies, And Videotape , directed by Steven Soderbergh . Soderbergh would later call on Martinez to produce soundtracks for all but one of his films, popularly including Traffic in 2000 and Soderbergh's 2002 adaptation of Stanislaw Lem's novel, Solaris .

It was for his work on Traffic that Martinez is best known, not only because it is widely regarded as his finest work but it also established Martinez's niche in soundtrack work, a combination of electronic sounds and samples with sparse orchestral arrangements, often very ambient. Martinez's work has for this reason been criticized as uneventful, though in the case of psychological films like Solaris, this lends an effective uneasiness to the overall film.


COMPOSER FILMOGRAPHY



DISCOGRAPHY

With The Weirdos:


With Lydia Lunch:


With Captain Beefheart:


With the Red Hot Chili Peppers:


With The Dickies:



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