MUSE. The Killers. Death Cab for Cutie. Editors. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Radiohead’s Thom Yorke. Now that is what I call a powerhouse line-up of artistes. So what are they doing on the soundtrack for the adaptation of a teenage vampire romance novel series, you may ask?

Love it or hate it, Stephenie Meyer’s four-book Twilight thriller has been one of the most successful young adult’s novel series in recent years, and the film adaptation of the first book, Twilight, sparked a worldwide craze.

But even the phenomenal success of the movies and books can’t explain why this soundtrack to a movie with a mostly pre-teen audience has managed to attract such an eclectic rock line-up with nary a Taylor Swift or Miley Cyrus in sight.

Maybe the movies’ somewhat dark and brooding mood appealed to these bands. Or it could be because the director of Twilight, Catherine Hardwicke, managed to get the ball rolling by including Muse and Radiohead in the first movie.

Hardwicke may not have directed the second venture, New Moon, but her musical influences (or rather, those of her music supervisor Alexandre Desplat) have carried over to the sequel (helmed by Chris Weitz). Besides the aforementioned big names, there are also some pretty good indie bands and singers in the album, namely Sea Wolf, Bon Iver, Lykke Li, and Grizzly Bear, to name a few.

And the soundtrack doesn’t just contain songs lifted directly from the bands’ respective albums but features all original compositions or (in Muse’s case) exclusive remix versions. The result ranges from decent to stellar.

Death Cab for Cutie’s Meet Me at the Equinox is pretty standard fare, while Yorke’s Hearing Damage isn’t exactly one of his most memorable so far. Elsewhere, The Killers’ slow ballad A White Demon Love Song is one of their most eclectic songs yet while Black Rebel Motorcycle Club’s Done All Wrong is more suited for a western than a teen vampire movie.

The surprise here is Editors’ gloomy No Sound But the Wind, which sits perfectly in the angsty, moody context of the Twilight movies. Other highlights include Sea Wolf’s jangly The Violet Hour, and the sweet, dreamy duet Roslyn by Bon Iver and St. Vincent.

The odd one out is New Moon (The Meadow), the movie’s theme music scored by Desplat. That little piano-driven instrumental piece aside, this is still a pretty strong set of songs by some really good artistes. Whether you like the Twilight movies or not, you’ve got to admit that they both have awesome soundtracks.