Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift Soundtrack (CD)

The Fast and the Furious franchise offers fans a twist with the third installment, 2006's Tokyo Drift, where an American street racing refugee finds himself in Japan, taking on the best drivers in the underground world of "drift racing," where customized vehicles race across slick surfaces, harnessing the out-of-control sideways momentum on sharp turns.

Produced by top American hip-hop and electronica maestros like The Neptunes' Pharrell Williams and DJ Shadow, the accompanying urban soundtrack exploits the movie's Asian setting with the lead single, "Tokyo Drift (Fast & Furious)" by the Japanese hip-hop group Teriyaki Boyz. For those not yet familiar with this J-hip-hop posse, Toklyo Drift serves as a great intro. Not only do they have an American record deal with Def Jam, they have high-profile fans that run the gamut from the Beastie Boys to Daft Punk. The single is slick and larger than life, yet playful, with the Boyz raiding the mic in both Japanese and silly-cool English, with a high feminine vocal on the chorus.

The next track is remix of DJ Shadow's Number One dance track from 2002, the tense, moody "Six Days," with vocals from Mos Def. The East-meets-West theme is reinforced with the next track, from the all-girl Japanese garage rock band from the '90s, The 5. 6. 7. 8.'s, with the reckless tongue-in-cheek swagger of "Barracuda." The urban soundscapes continue with Brighton, England's electronica bad boys Evil Nine. Their "Restless" features fantastic deep bass and Rasta-style vocals. More multi-cultural goodness comes down the pike from Don Omar, the Puerto Rican reggaeton crossover king with "Bandaleros" and "Conteo."

Before the disc spins out, the Teriyaki Boyz make a return with the Neptunes-written and produced "Cho Large," this time featuring a chorus hook by an R&B female vocalist. What's most amazing about the Boyz is how when they switch to English, it's accentless. Speaking of the Neptunes, they offer a track themselves via their side project, N.E.R.D. The cut, "She Wants to Move" melds neo-soul, psycho-funk and horny weirdness in the vein of OutKast, which reflects a sensory overload that an American might experience after landing in an exotic metropolis like Tokyo.

The disc skids to a sweaty, adrenaline-soaked stop with "Mustang Nismo," a hard-rock-meets-electronica instrumental by Hollywood film composer Brian Tyler that gives Guns N' Roses' guitar god Slash one of his best Gun-for-hire showcases in years.

Is there a better collection of songs to have in the car than Tokyo Drift? We think not. If you drive, you need this one. That is, as long as you can keep to the speed limit while you listen.