I just finished watching Michael Mann’s Thief (1981), which is one of these Tangerine Dream scores like William Friedkin’s Sorcerer (1977). The score is so present and almost highlighted in the film, such that it feels like you are really supposed to notice the musical choices.
Suspiria (1977) would be so much less, almost forgettable without Goblin’s weirdo score. A lot of old John Carpenter films are majorly influenced by his own scores.
I could go on with examples, but I think you get the point. It feels like modern scores are almost more meant to be only experienced subconsciously to enhance what’s actually on the screen, and if the score is present its often just like the director’s favourite songs instead of something weird created for the film.
When I try to think of modern films that have hired artists or groups to lovingly create an interesting pop score I struggle to think of any films that stand out in my memory. The remake of Suspiria (Thom Yorke), Swiss Army Man, a few old Jim Jarmusch films (Neil Young, RZA). Tron Legacy is maybe the closest I can remember in spirit with Daft Punk but honestly most of that was just normal orchestral score? I guess David Fincher has been working with Trent Reznor, The Social Network is probably a good example of this now that I think about it.
I guess I just miss weird synthed out scores 
thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.
american films are so artistically lazy and engineered to appeal to boring ass people so they don’t have the same kinda personality they used to. even needle drops are just the most general 'everybody heard this song 238403840348 times in their life" obvious bullshit when you used to get some curveballs.
and the 80s and 90s were loaded with good soundtracks and scores. the most bullshit B movies like killer workout put effort into their soundtracks!! check out the main theme of house on sorority row or anything by richard band which are some of the most blatant examples -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKCa9ln4Mik .
How do Danny Elfman and Mark Mothersbaugh fit into this?
Danny Elfman
As far as I know - he always writes the music and then it’s performed by an orchestra. Are there exceptions to this?
Mark Mothersbaugh
I don’t know who that is.
-–
Ninja edit
co-founder, lead singer and keyboardist of the new wave band Devo,
Oh, now I know!
Yeah Mothersbaugh does soundtracks for a lot of stuff. I actually first learned about him from the cartoon Rugrats.
I think Mothersbaugh would have been a better band name than Devo.
I’m still thinking about this - maybe other good examples are Fight Club (1999) using The Dust Brothers, or Paul Thomas Anderson working with Johnny Greenwood on There Will Be Blood (2007) and The Master (2012).
Tangerine Dream also made Legend (1985) a particularly magical movie. And Tim Curry as Lord Darkness can Get. It.
I miss good original scores much more now that so many movies have taken the cue from Galaxy Defenders or whatever the fuck that Marvel movie was called, the one where they did the mix-tape of licensed songs. So many movies now have parts where it’s just some bullshit set to a licensed song to try to force some attitude or association, and it does not work for me at all.
So many of those movies don’t realize that the music in Guardians of the Galaxy was diegetic and it worked in storyline because Star-Lord had been stuck with the same music for decades after being forced to leave Earth. It’s not the same if you just shove old songs into your movie for no reason.
For anybody interested in excellent film music done by a band (or one person) check out Paris, Texas. Ry Cooder did the music on solo acoustic guitar.
