The Princess and the Frog soundtrack. In the early years of the 21st century it appeared that the hand-drawn animated feature was operating on borrowed time. While the pencil lines of Treasure Planet and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas were stinking out the box-office, audiences were lapping up the CG-antics of Ice Age and anything at all bearing the Pixar seal. In America at least, traditional animation seemed destined to go the way of the woolly mammoth, the penny farthing, and Axl Rose’s humility – relegated to the status of historical curiosity. Computers were the shiny, shiny future of cartoon film-making, and any Luddite pencil-wielders who didn’t like it could naff off and go listen to an eight-track, while burning a witch, and moaning about the increasing influx of marauding Viking immigrants.

However, as the dazzlingly perceptive Cheryl Cole recently noted, too much of anything can make you sick (for international readers not fully acquainted with Mrs. Cole, try to imagine a waiflike blend of Paula Abdul and Mother Teresa, but equipped with a conviction for biffing a nightclub toilet attendant and a diligently money-conscious soccer-playing spouse). And when it comes to CGI animated flicks, it certainly appears as if a deluged movie-going public have been blowing an increasing number of chunks. This burgeoning indifference to lacklustre algorithmic cartoon offerings has prompted Disney to go back to the drawing board with The Princess and the Frog, breaking out the crayons for their first hand-drawn feature in half-a-decade. The movie itself looks to tread well-worn animation territory, with anthropomorphic animals singing and mugging their way through a fairy tale-riffing narrative, and this sense of the familiar extends to The Princess and the Frog soundtrack too, as five-time Pixar scorer Randy Newman tackles composing duties.

If we politely bypass Ne-Yo’s pop-pap opener Never Knew I Needed (slicker than a marble floor coated in urine, and only one-thirteenth as pleasant), then we find a collection of tunes which deliver an almost parodical honkily tonkily, bluesy wuesy interpretation of The Princess and the Frog’s New Orleans setting. The brass ‘n’ piano accoutrements of Newman’s songs pay superficial homage to the musical heritage of the American Deep South, but without giving proper elucidation to those influences. Epitomising this shortcoming is the main version of Down in New Orleans, sung by one of that city’s most famous sons, Dr. John. Though Mac Rebenack’s voice is as rich a pleasure as ever – and one would hardly expect him to revive his Night Tripper persona for a flick from the same directors as The Little Mermaid – the song still comes across as a pretty cursory hat tip towards the cultural diversity of the Big Easy.

Yet if the songs themselves are thinly-disguised variations on an established Disney formula, then most of the vocal performances themselves are rather good. Newman wisely gives his own pipes a rest, leaving The Princess and the Frog cast members to pick up the slack, and they rise to the challenge in largely admirable fashion. Female lead Anika Noni Rose displays range and clarity, without sacrificing any sensitivity of delivery, while Jim Cummings (playing a firefly in the film) brings humour and character to his moments behind the mike. Best of all though is Friends on the Other Side, a gleefully bragging romp dripping with moustache-twiddling nefariousness, delivered by Keith David in his role of villainous voodoo priest Dr. Facilier (“I just cannot believe any of this voodoo bullshit” memorably declared David in The Thing). It is then left to Newman to round out the soundtrack with his instrumentals from the film – these doing very little to imprint themselves onto the listener’s consciousness.

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The Princess and the Frog Soundtrack – Track-Listing
1. Never Knew I Needed – Ne-Yo
2. Down in New Orleans (Prologue) – Anika Noni Rose
3. Down in New Orleans – Dr. John
4. Almost There – Anika Noni Rose
5. Friends on the Other Side – Keith David
6. When We’re Human – Michael-Leon Wooley, Bruno Campos and Anika Noni Rose
7. Gonna Take You There – Jim Cummings feat. Terrance Simien
8. Ma Belle Evangeline – Jim Cummings feat. Terence Blanchard
9. Dig a Little Deeper – Jenifer Lewis feat. the Pinnacle Gospel Choir
10. Down in New Orleans (Finale) – Anika Noni Rose
11. Fairy Tale/Going Home – Randy Newman
12. I Know This Story – Randy Newman
13. The Frog Hunters/Gator Town – Randy Newman
14. Tiana’s Bad Dream – Randy Newman
15. Ray Laid Low – Randy Newman
16. Ray/Mama Oldie – Randy Newman
17. This is Gonna be Good – Randy Newman

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