Legendary composer/director John Carpenter has returned with his first
non- soundtrack music since 2016's Lost Themes II. Collaborating again
with son Cody Carpenter and godson Daniel Davies, his bandmates and
co-composers for the David Gordon Green-directed Halloween films,
Carpenter is sharing the propul- sive new single "Skeleton" and it's
B-side, the haunting "Unclean Spirit." The sessions for these songs saw
the trio shifting their focus from scoring for the screen and engaging a
totally different creative muscle. Instead of being guided by what was
happening in the world of Halloween, they were free to work toward other
ends. "It was refreshing to be able to write music that didn't have to
fit to any sort of locked image," John said. "We also had a specific
focus and direction we wanted to follow when working on Halloween, both
in terms of mindset and instruments, and being able to return to working
without that narrow focus was refreshing. Although working on Halloween
didn't specifically influence any of these new compositions, there is
always a honing of craft that must take place when work- ing on a film
like Halloween, and our improved skills definitely helped us in writing
these songs." Working together to score a major Hollywood production
only deepened the collaborative chemistry between the three composers.
That comfort level paid dividends, as the songs developed largely in the
room where they were recorded. "Like the majority of the songs that we
write, both 'Skeleton' and 'Unclean Spirit' mainly started with an
improvised riff, which was then expanded and built upon to create the
full song," John explained. "Like the previous Lost Themes album, we
each handled duties of writing and recording, with all three of us
contributing ideas and parts."
English