Only In Dreams: A frieze Playlist

In tribute to the visionary auteur David Lynch and in celebration of our Film issue, frieze magazine presents ‘Only in Dreams’, a film soundtrack playlist curated by artist, musician and composer Gazelle Twin, aka Elizabeth Bernholz.

Gazelle Twin’s work encompasses the realms of visual art, music and film composition. Her critically acclaimed albums include Black Dog (2023), Unflesh (2014) and the groundbreaking Pastoral (2018), which topped The Quietus’s Albums of the Year list and was later reimagined as Deep England (2021), in collaboration with NYX. Her soundtracks for film include The Power (2021), Then You Run (2023) and Black Cab (2024), each showcasing her ability to sculpt mood and tension through sound.

For ‘Only in Dreams’, Gazelle Twin has curated a spellbinding selection of film music that delves into the art of soundtracking - exploring how sound can unsettle, captivate and transform the cinematic experience. The playlist weaves together pieces from an eclectic array of films, from the dark surrealism of Poor Things (2023) and the folk horror of Midsommar (2019), to the cosmic wonder of Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). At its core is a fascination with the way music intensifies sensations – heightening tension, distorting reality and amplifying terror, excitement, unease.

Bookending the playlist are selections from the works of Lynch, a filmmaker whose mastery of sound and music shaped modern cinema. Lynch’s collaborations with composers such as Angelo Badalamenti defined a unique sonic world - one where the beautiful and the uncanny merge, where dreamy atmospheres are undercut by dread and where music is as evocative as the images on screen. Lynch was a true leader in the art of mood creation, crafting iconic mergings of sound and vision. His influence resonates throughout the playlist, which acts as an enduring reminder of the power and terror of screen dreams, from one of the most exciting composers working today.

^{Main image: Dark blue velvet texture (detail). Courtesy: Adobe Stock/Ruslan Khismatov}