Floating Into the Night

Floating into the Night is the debut studio album by American singer Julee Cruise. It was released on September 12, 1989 on Warner Bros. Records, and features compositions and production by Angelo Badalamenti and film director David Lynch. Songs from the album were featured in Lynch's projects Blue Velvet (1986), Industrial Symphony No. 1 (1990), and Twin Peaks (1990–91).

Filmmaker David Lynch and composer Angelo Badalamenti's collaboration with Cruise first came about during the scoring for Lynch's 1986 film Blue Velvet, in which a key scene was intended to feature This Mortal Coil's version of "Song to the Siren" by Tim Buckley. With the rights to the song proving prohibitively expensive, it was suggested that Badalamenti compose a pop song in the same style and recruit a vocalist with a haunting, ethereal voice. Badalamenti recommended Cruise, who had sung in a New York theater workshop Badalamenti had produced. The result was the track "Mysteries of Love." Lynch and Badalamenti were impressed with the results, and elected to record subsequent tracks with Cruise.

Writing a retrospective review for AllMusic, Ned Raggett referred to Floating into the Night as "more or less unofficial soundtrack Twin Peaks" and added that "the combination of Cruise's sweet, light tones, Lynch's surprisingly affecting lyrics … and Angelo Badalamenti's combination of retro styles and modern ambience, is a winner throughout. The feeling is one of a 50s jukebox suddenly plunged into a time warp, dressed with extra sparkle and with a just-sleepy-enough, narcotic feeling." In 2010 Pitchfork included "Falling" at number 146 on its staff list of "The Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s"; Tom Ewing said that " catches you with its dreamy, echo-drenched gentility—like Les Paul and Mary Ford inventing shoegaze in 1961—and inside is one of the decade's simplest and warmest love songs."In 2013 Fact included the album at number 25 on its list of "The 100 Best Albums of the 1980s"