How ‘The Pursuit Of Love’ Reinvents the TV Period Drama Soundtrack

It’s the Roaring Twenties and, just hours after walking down the aisle with a wealthy but obnoxious conservative, aristocrat Linda (Lily James) has just realized she’s made a grave mistake. If this was Downton Abbey, then the newlywed’s despair would no doubt be soundtracked by a melancholic chamber piece befitting of a grand interwar wedding. In Amazon’s latest British import The Pursuit of Love, however, the bride’s reception blues are heightened by “Modern Girl,” a world-weary anthem from riot grrrl survivors Sleater Kinney. 

Anachronistic-sounding TV period dramas appear to be all the rage lately. Netflix’s recent journey back to Regency-era London in Bridgerton featured orchestral versions of chart smashes from the Teen Choice Awards brigade. Set several decades further into the 19th century, Apple TV+’s Dickinson even saw its literary heroine twerking in her bodice to rapper iLoveMakonnen much to purists’ dismay. 

But this latest adaptation of Nancy Mitford’s 1945 novel about the contrasting fortunes of two cousins – first screened by the BBC back in May – isn’t interested in what’s dominating Spotify playlists. The latest full-time addition to Nick Cave’s backing band The Bad Seeds, music supervisor George Vjestica has instead dug deep into his eclectic record collection with choices spanning from the late 1950s Neapolitan jazz of Marino Marini’s “Guaglione” right up to Catalan folk duo Maria Arnal and Marcel Bagés’ 2017 single “A La Vida.” 

Vjestica was essentially given free rein from his sister-in-law, series writer and director Emily Mortimer, apart from one small caveat: “anything except for music that is contemporary to that period.” Speaking at the BFI and Radio Times TV Festival earlier this year, the Brit explained she was allergic to the “sexless, weird jazz” that emerged post-World War I and wanted something that represented heroine Linda’s “rock and roll soul.”  

Mortimer, who also plays wayward mother The Bolter in the three-part miniseries, was heavily inspired by Sofia Coppola’s daring Marie Antoinette during her first time in the director’s chair. And her love of the divisive 2006 biopic appears to have partly rubbed off on Vjestica, too. New Order’s brooding debut single “Ceremony” also graces The Pursuit of Love in its opening episode. 

Like Marie Antoinette’s curator Brian Reitzell, he also occasionally breaks up all the out-of-place offerings with classical compositions that would be familiar to its characters. Here, the likes of Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville: Una voce poco fa” and Strauss’ “Thunder and Lightning Polka Op. 324” are played to represent Dominic West’s Uncle Matthew and his unwillingness to move with the times. The formidable patriarch, who’s prone to hunting down his children through fields on horseback, even pops the former on his gramophone while sharpening his whipping techniques. 

Yet for the most part, Vjestica, who makes a brief cameo as a member of a ballroom band, repurposes tracks that have never been anywhere near a corset. Played in the opening scene where Linda’s relaxing au naturel on a roof terrace, The Who’s unusually-optimistic ditty “Blue, Red and Grey” initially positions the drama in the swinging seventies. That is, until the bomb that interrupts her ‘me time’ makes it clear we’re in the midst of The Blitz.  

Unlike the modern pop hits blatantly designed to reel in the TikTok generation elsewhere, The Pursuit of Love’s songs rarely sound incongruous. The Y2K electroclash of Le Tigre’s “Deceptacon” – which appears when Fanny (Emily Beecham) and Linda steal a car on their way to a party – exemplifies the cousins’ rebellious spirit better than any big band standard could. Cat Power’s beautifully pensive cover of Phil Phillips’ “Sea of Love,” meanwhile, perfectly captures both the heartbreak and quiet sense of optimism in Fanny’s closing monologue. 

And the moment where the flamboyant, silk pajama-clad Lord Merlin (Fleabag’s “hot priest” Andrew Scott) livens up a dull debutante ball to the vibrant glam-rock of T. Rex’s “Dandy in the Underworld” may well be the most effective character entrance you’ll see this year.

If there’s one criticism of Vjestica’s crate-digging, it’s that he relies a little too heavily on the literal. Only French speakers will know that Juliette Gréco’s playful chanson “Déshabillez-moi” – heard during a boutique changing room montage – translates as “Undress Me.” More blindingly obvious, however, is Nina Simone’s “Be My Husband” (played when Linda ensnares her Parisian lover) Joan Armatrading’s “Woncha Come On Home” (played while Linda is waiting to hear from him) and Karen Dalton’s “Are You Leaving for the Country” (played while Linda, yes you guessed it, returns home to the Oxford countryside).   

Still, it’s not every day you get to hear the latter, an idiosyncratic folk-blues interpreter who operated on the fringes of the Greenwich Village scene, on mainstream TV. Likewise cabaret veterans Yves Montand (“Rue St. Vincent”) and Blossom Dearie (“Plus Je t’embrasse”). On the nose it sometimes may be, but The Pursuit of Love proves that even the British costume drama can sound très chic. 

Jon O’Brien (@jonobrien81) is a freelance entertainment and sports writer from the North West of England. His work has appeared in the likes of Vulture, Esquire, Billboard, Paste, i-D and The Guardian. 

Watch The Pursuit of Love on Amazon Prime