Rob Gordon, John Cusack’s character in “High Fidelity,” said “The making of a great compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do and takes ages longer than it might seem. You gotta kick off with a killer – to grab attention. Then you got to take it up a notch, but you don’t wanna blow your wad, so then you got to cool it off a notch. There are a lot of rules.”

Eminem may want to get a few tips from Gordon, as the soundtrack to his debut film, “8 Mile,” plays like a poorly put-together mix tape – plenty of good songs, but almost no thought was given to the order in which the songs appear.

The album starts off just as Gordon suggests, with the killer Eminem single “Lose Yourself.” Although the song mentions Rabbit, Eminem’s character name in the film, the song sounds more autobiographical than anything else on the album. Another of the song’s lyrics is “And it’s no movie/there’s no Mekhi Phifer/this is my life.”

Joined by Shady imprint members Obie Trice and 50 Cent, Eminem rags on the state of the music industry in standard Eminem form. He leaves his old targets – Christina Aguilera and Moby – alone in “Love Me,” and instead attacks D’Angelo, Lauryn Hill and R. Kelly. The slow beat of the music contrasts beautifully with the harsh and cocky lyrics of the song, creating the best song on the album.

Besides Eminem’s protégés, the album features a number of established rappers, although each vary in the success of the songs.

The best of the rest is a joint effort from Jay-Z and Freeway, a song titled “8 Miles and Runnin’.” The song, another about overcoming doubters, also features a nice blend, this time between the vocal sounds of the two artists. Freeway’s gravely voice provides a nice opposition to the more listener-friendly sound of Jay-Z.

Unfortunately, not every song on the album sounds as good as this. “Spit Shine,” a song from Xzibit (who also makes an appearance in the film), sounds very much like Freeway would if he did a whole song – deep, gritty and just plain unlistenable.

The song following Xzibit is perhaps the most abusive of the mix album rules of Rob Gordon. The soft Macy Gray track “Time of my Life” clashes with Xzibit’s sound, creating a very odd jump from hardcore rap to Gray’s soul-pop hybrid. On its own, the song would rank as one of Gray’s better tracks, but on the album, the song just stands out like a sore thumb, because Gray has nothing to do with the film.

The other strange song on the album actually does have to do with the film. Singer-actress Taryn Manning (who plays Janeane in the picture) and her brother Kellin, the duo behind the band Boomkat, have the relatively light song “Wasting my Time” on the soundtrack. Singing about getting the run-around from a boyfriend, Boomkat’s slow ballad stands out in between two rap songs, one from 50 Cent and the other from Rakim, which, along with Xzibit’s track, is the only other disasterous performance on the album.

Despite these few shortcomings, the album is reminiscent of another soundtrack – the best-selling soundtrack of all time, “The Bodyguard.” Not only does that album feature a few tracks from star Whitney Houston, but the film was Houston’s screen debut. While “8 Mile” still needs to sell a few more copies to catch up with “The Bodyguard,” Eminem’s tight lyrics may one day create a battle for that top spot.