Stream A Track From Jay Farrar And Ben Gibbard’s Kerouac Soundtrack

Jack Kerouac loved music, from hot jazz to pre-war standards. He regarded rock and roll with suspicion, however. It wasn’t the music of his generation. So what would Jack Kerouac make of Jay Farrar and Ben Gibbard of Death Cab For Cutie’s attempt to turn his prose and poetry into rock lyrics?

Well, since he spent much of his life hungry for discovery and acknowledgment, we think there’s a good chance he’d dig it.

On October 20, Gibbard (newly married to She and Him’s Zooey Deschanel) and Farrar will release One Fast Move Or I’m Gone, the soundtrack to a new documentary on the iconic author. Kerouac authored the alcoholic masterpiece “Big Sur,” which Gibbard used as inspiration in writing the latest Death Cab album. 90% of the lyrics to the songs on the soundtrack are taken from “Big Sur.”

One song, “These Roads Don’t Move,” is now available for streaming at NPR.

Gibbard takes lead vocals on the track, a laconic alt-country cruise through some of Kerouac’s less frantic imagery. The steel guitar hugs the melody like a car hugging the black top.

Check it out here.