Donnie Darko

In early 2000, Jim Juvonen gave Andrews a copy of the script for the as-yet-unmade feature film Donnie Darko. Director Richard Kelly knew Andrews worked with The Greyboy Allstars, and made music under the name Elgin Park.

Like his role models John Barry and Ennio Morricone, Andrews wanted a song on his otherwise instrumental score. He chose "Mad World" by Tears for Fears (originally released in 1982), which his childhood friend Gary Jules sang as Andrews played piano.

The first soundtrack record was released by Andy Factor, a friend of Andrews, through his Everloving Records label in 2002. As Donnie Darko was not a hit at first, there was little interest in the soundtrack in the US. The film was more popular in Europe, especially in the UK, where it outgrossed the US release.

This sparked interest in the soundtrack and "Mad World", which was a 2003 Christmas #1 on the UK Singles Chart. It reached the top 30 of the American Billboard Modern Rock chart in 2004 and hit #1 on the Canadian Digital Singles chart in January 2007.^[3] It charted in countries like Ireland, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Australia in 2003 and 2004, and a snippet was used in the television commercial for the 2006 Xbox 360 video game Gears of War.

Me and You and Everyone We Know

In 2005, Andrews scored Me and You and Everyone We Know, a film by Miranda July praised at both Sundance and Cannes film festivals. The score to the film was released on Everloving Records on July 12, 2005.

Initially taking cues from the characters' dialogue, Andrews began writing the score. He came to understand the film's world as a kind of alternate reality where people believe in fate and chance—and this was the world he needed to paint with his music. He also saw the feelings July was trying to get across in her film as very primary. "She tries to break things down to very basic, simple shapes—the simplest shapes possible, and that totally influenced me in my music".

Andrews at the Unsung Heroes tribute to Eleni Mandell, January 2017.

Working out of his custom-built backyard studio in Glendale, California, Andrews spent three months creating the score using an orchestra of obscure vintage synthesizers (a miniature hotwired Casio keyboard was unearthed at a garage sale for $10) and drum machines. His concept was to play what he termed amateurish, emotional, naïve, magical and simple music on highly unemotional, inorganic instruments—for example, a calculator with built-in twelve-note keyboard that lends a haunting portamento melody to one of the film's motifs.

Other instruments used in the score include Andrews's modified piano (rather than hitting the strings directly, the hammers first make contact with a piece of soft felt, creating a warmer, slightly muffled tone), as well as his Moog and Vocoder synthesizers. Despite all the electronic gear, no MIDI was used in the recording, so that all the humanness, all the subtle variations of rhythm, are intact. Inara George adds vocals in several climactic moments throughout the film. In some cases, cues were composed of only two or three tracks in order to attain the magical simplicity for which the film called out.

Albums

• Elgin Park (2000)
• Hand on String (2006)
• Spilling a Rainbow (2012)

Singles

Productions/appearances

• The Origin – The Origin (1990)
• The Origin – Bend (1992)
• 'The Greyboy Allstars – West Coast Boogaloo (1993)
• Robert Walter – Spirit of '70 (player) (1994)
• Brendan Benson – One Mississippi (bass, guitars, background vocals) (1994)
• DJ Greyboy – Land of the Lost (guitar) (1996)
• Gary Jules – Greetings From The Side (producer) (1998)
• Elgin Park - Elgin Park (2000)
• DJ Greyboy – Mastered The Art (guitar) (2000)
• The Greyboy Allstars – Greyboy Allstars Live (2001)
• Gary Jules – Trading Snakeoil For Wolftickets (piano, producer) (2001)
• Michael Andrews – Donnie Darko: Music from the Original Motion Picture Score (songwriter, performer) (2002)
• Brendan Benson – Metarie EP (producer) (2003)
• Metric – Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? (producer) (2004)
• Les Sans Culottes – Fixation Orale (producer) (2004)
• DJ Greyboy – Soul Mosaic (guitar) (2004)
• Inara George – All Rise (producer) (2005)
• Michael Andrews – Me and You and Everyone We Know (Original Motion Picture Score) (composer, performer) (2005)
• Michael Andrews – Hand on String (2005)
• Charlie Wadhams – Free Up Your Schedule (producer/player) (2007)
• The Greyboy Allstars – What Happened to Television (2007)
• Inara George & Van Dyke Parks – An Invitation (producer) (2008)
• Inara George – Accidental Experimental (producer/cowriter) (2009)
• Michael Andrews – Spilling a Rainbow (2012)
• The Greyboy Allstars – Inland Emperor (2013)
• Robert Walter – Get Thy Bearings (producer/player) (2013)
• Inara George – Dearest Everybody (producer) (2019)
• The Greyboy Allstars – Como De Allstars (2020)
• Brooks Nielsen – One Match Left (producer/player/songwriter) (2022)
• Brooks Nielsen – The Circle EP (producer/player/songwriter) (2023)