heaven's gate | t-bone burnett + david mansfield

One of the most effective scenes in Michael Cimino's leisurely western epic Heaven's Gate (1980) is the roller skating sequence set in the dance hall of the title. The Heaven's Gate band includes both T-Bone Burnett and David Mansfield - the latter stealing the show in an extended fiddling and fancy skating feature. Mansfield also composed the film's soundtrack. Burnett and Mansfield toured together on Bob Dylan's 1975/76 Rolling Thunder Revue, after which they formed the Alpha Band (1977/78). Burnett's first solo album, "Truth Decay," was released in 1980, the same year as Heaven's Gate.