Halloween arrives early at Dublin's Vicar Street next Tuesday when veteran filmmaker John Carpenter comes to town for a unique 'live retrospective' of the music he composed for his own classic movies.
For horror movie buffs, Carpenter remains one of the true masters of the form, having directed such classics as Halloween, The Thing, The Fog and Christine, as well as beloved cult movies like Escape From New York, Starman, Big Trouble In Little China and Assault On Precinct 13. He also composed the iconic electronic scores for most of his movies, his spare, minimalist style influencing future generations of musicians, Daft Punk among them. Quentin Tarantino is a massive Carpenter fan, borrowing his preferred leading man, Kurt Russell, for his movies Death Proof and The Hateful Eight.
In recent years, directing has taken a back seat to music-making, with Carpenter releasing a pair of acclaimed albums, Lost Themes and Lost Themes II, best described as moody and magnificent instrumental suites intended to, in his words, "score the movies in your head".
“Lost Themes was all about having fun,” Carpenter says. “It can be both great and bad to score over images, which is what I’m used to. Here there were no pressures. No actors asking me what they’re supposed to do. No crew waiting. No cutting room to go to. No release pending. It’s just fun.”
In Vicar Street next Tuesday, Carpenter and his band (which includes his son Cody and godson Daniel, son of The Kinks' Dave Davies) will be performing themes from his classic films and new compositions backed by projections of montages of pivotal scenes from his classic movies, as well as compositions from the Lost Themes records. As unique events go, this one's going to keep the geek cognoscenti happy until Xmas.
John Carpenter plays Vicar Street, Dublin, on October 25th - more info here.
