From Carpenter's press tour for Lost Themes, he got interviewed about In the Mouth of Madness where he mentioned that the excellent main theme track was inspired by a then contemporary Metallica temp track, which I can only assume was "Enter Sandman" at the time.
Why did you decide to go with a hard-rock sound for the film’s theme, as opposed to your usual synth approach?
Carpenter: We did temporary scoring, which you tend to do on movies when you want to show them to people to get their reactions, and the editor put Metallica out front — a famous Metallica song that eludes me right now — but it was fabulous. I saw the audience bopping their heads, and I said, oh, let me do something like this. I mean not something like it, but something along these lines. That’s where it came from. Blame it on Metallica.
I like to know these things. I can bop my head to a bit of Metallica any day of the week (well, I can kind of nod slowly), but that Carpenter take was totally inappropriate for the film. Sometimes a Carpenter score does work, but more often than not I think he's his own worst enemy.
All in my humble, aged and conservative opinion, of course.
I'm not a fan of Carpenter's music when he strays into Rock music. I much prefer his electronic collaborations with Alan Howarth. It seems he must feel the same way, with Lost Themes echoing that period (and Goblin, it appears).
That title track from Mouth of Madness along with his Ghosts of Mars score I can really appreciate for the heavy rock influences, I can appreciate it as much as his earlier scores with Howarth. I guess I'm in the minority here when it comes to enjoying a good guitar solo on the big screen.
I don't mind heavy rock on its own, or in film when the context is right. It's just that neither IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS nor GHOSTS OF MARS benefitted from that approach. What was the other one... VAMPIRES or something?
I think John Carpenter is a pretty cool dude, but he doesn't have to prove how cool he is by using headbanging rock for psychological thrillers, monster movies and SF. I suppose it's his stylistic fingerprint, but I find it very resistible.
It reminds me a bit of when I was a kid and bought a lot of monster mags, only to find that there was an awful lot of coverage of wrestling and tattoos. Never quite got the connection... has it anything to do with Alice Cooper or something like that?
I don't mind heavy rock on its own, or in film when the context is right. It's just that neither IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS nor GHOSTS OF MARS benefitted from that approach. What was the other one... VAMPIRES or something?
Well to be fair Mouth of Madness only had the one track for the main and end titles, the rest was synth. Ghost of Mars is definitely more guitar heavy and Vampires is more of a biker blues western approach, I never cared that much for the latter (movie either though Woods is ok in it).
I think John Carpenter is a pretty cool dude, but he doesn't have to prove how cool he is by using headbanging rock for psychological thrillers, monster movies and SF. I suppose it's his stylistic fingerprint, but I find it very resistible.
I think it also has to do with his movies being embraced by the metal genre, guitarist buckethead even fashioned his whole image after Halloween's Michael and performs on Ghosts of Mars. I'd say it wasn't uncommon in the late 80s or throughout the 90s for metal songs to be featured on soundtracks and even in the movie itself.
It reminds me a bit of when I was a kid and bought a lot of monster mags, only to find that there was an awful lot of coverage of wrestling and tatoos. Never quite got the connection... has it anything to do with Alice Cooper or something like that?
