Bonus Post: Happy Halloween! 🎃 My Top 5 Horror Scores

Throw these on for background atmosphere at your next spooky party, or, do as I do and order the collector's edition vinyl for active listening enjoyment.

Oct 31, 2024

It’s a miracle that the Twin Peaks cinematic universe aged as well as it did considering the controversy and drama that surrounded its production. Director David Lynch and Co-Creator Mark Frost, as well as the studio executives at ABC all seemed to disagree on the direction of the series. All of which culminated in the 90’s with Lynch breaking from Frost to create a feature length adaptation of the series called Fire Walk With Me after the cancellation of the series in season two. Ratings had plummeted, critics turned on the franchise, and when Fire Walk With Me was premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 1992, it’s reported that it was met with “boo’s” and considered a deliberate act of sabotage from Lynch.

I began watching Twin Peaks the first season shortly before the much anticipated The Return aired in 2017. I was haunted by this series–the mysterious allure of the pacific northwest, and the masterful, indescribable terror and lurking danger that Lynch has become so renown for.

Part of this atmosphere was lovingly crafted by composer Angelo Badalamenti who was a long-time collaborator of Lynch. The score composed for the Twin Peaks series is very similar and reprises often throughout Fire Walk With Me, but the feature-length film score is sexier, jazzier, and much, much darker.

The track The Pink Room is my go-to loop for Halloween parties.

In 2018, Swedish director Ari Aster burst onto the scene with his debut feature-length film Hereditary, which to this day, might be the scariest movie I have ever seen in my life: to which I tip my hat to him and lovingly say: dude, get some help.

Aster enlisted the expertise of saxophonist and composer, Colin Stetson to create the memorable score for the film, which utilizes silence to build dread and anticipation in a way I had never seen a film do so effectively. In many of the scenes I felt like my ears were reaching for a sound desperately, just to have something to cling onto.

There is a melodic beauty in Stetson’s score not often encountered in horror films. Through the horrific things happening on screen juxtaposed with the calming, twittering oboes and clarinets, Stetson creates a masterful cognitive dissonance in the audience, who feel confused and laid bare about the emotions they are supposed to be feeling.

3. The Thing (1982)

Of course a John Carpenter film had to make this list, and my personal favorite of his is The Thing. The myth and the legend, composer Ennio Morricone crafted this iconic 80’s droning synth score with eerie orchestral swells to match the cosmic eldritch horror of The Thing.

The ending track, Humanity Pt. 2 reprises the opening iconic bass synth drone while adding rhythmic and orchestral interest to really cement tension and the final implications of the closing scene. No spoilers!

2. Suspiria (1977) Honorable Mention: The 2018 Release

Italian Art-Film director Dario Argento enlisted the help of an Italian band, Goblin to create the score for his suspense pièce de résistance, Suspiria. The film utilizes a unique and bold neon color pallet of reds and purples, which matches the recognizable wackiness of the Moog synthesizers and the uneasy breathiness created by Goblin very aptly.

In 2018, another Italian director Luca Guadagnino released a remake of Suspiria, and kept the focus on bold visuals and a unique score–however this time created by Thom Yorke of Radiohead fame. I also highly recommend Yorke’s iteration of the score.

1. The Shining (1980)

The tagline to the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack really says it all: “A Masterpiece of Modern Horror”, although this credit comes with a big asterisk, and I’ll explain why.

Based on the novel written by Stephen King, legendary director Stanley Kubrick (2001: A Space Odyssey, Dr. Strangelove) began to adapt King’s creation into one of the most famous horror movies ever made. The Shining is a brooding, terrifying example of how places can haunt us, hurt us, and feed on our propensity for addiction and violence.

Kubrick enlisted Moog Synthesizer queen and openly trans icon, Wendy Carlos (most well-known for her album Switched-on-Bach) to create the score for The Shining. Kubrick, a notoriously difficult director to work with, had collaborated with Carlos earlier on A Clockwork Orange, which she described as… “A lot of fun… a pleasurable venture.”

There are few title-cards as memorable as the opening to The Shining, with Carlos’ low synths paired with aerial views of the Colorado mountains and a stark blue sans serif font.

Carlos’ relationship with Kubrick would take a turn for the worse at the world premiere of The Shining, where she and her co-composer, Rachel Elkind would discover that of the complete feature-length score they submitted, Kubrick only used two of Carlos’ tracks in the movie, totaling about five minutes in length.

In production, Kubrick had decided to forgo Carlos’ score for the most part and instead purchase the rights to a few avant-garde tracks which he mainly used in the film. Carlos left the film premiere that night rightfully furious.

Despite shafting the most talented composer Kubrick had ever worked with, the avant-garde noises of The Shining do continue to culminate in the most unsettling score I have ever heard in a movie. Through just the opening sequence alone, Wendy Carlos deserves my top spot. Although, I will always long for what her full score would have sounded like in The Shining.

The Unused Score

Below is a link to the 40th anniversary release of Wendy Carlos’ unused score for The Shining. It does not seem to exist on Spotify.

Spotify Playlist

Would you like to put on these soundtracks for a spooky halloween evening? Never fear! I created a Spotify playlist for your enjoyment: