John Carpenter Reveals His Dream Musical Collaboration

By Patrick Cavanaugh

Throughout his career, John Carpenter has been able to show off a number of creative skills he has, from directing to writing to producing, as well as getting to show off his musical abilities by crafting the scores for a majority of his projects. In recent years, Carpenter has even put most of his filmmaking projects on hold to instead focus on his musical endeavors, which includes three albums of original songs and collaborating with other musicians on remixes and rearrangements. If there's one musical act that Carpenter himself would like to collaborate with, he recently revealed that working with ZZ Top would be a dream come true.

"I want to play with ZZ Top," Carpenter shared with ComicBook.com when asked about a dream collaborator. In regards to whether he'd use his synth skills to reimagine one of their tunes or join them on stage, he continued, "I'll do anything. I want to join them. I don't have a beard, but..."

Carpenter's earliest scores were largely crafted out of necessity, as he could more quickly capture the sonic landscape he was interested in with films like Assault on Precinct 13 and Halloween, though with those scores proving his effectiveness as a musician, future projects allowed him more opportunities to fully explore those elements of his creativity. 

Back in 2017, composers Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross tackled Carpenter's iconic Halloween theme to offer a remix of the ominous tune, opening the doors for more collaborations. Just last year, synth-pop band CHVRCHES reached out to Carpenter in hopes of getting a remix of one of their tracks from their latest album Screen Violence. In addition to Carpenter signing on for such a project, he then offered up a track from his latest album, Lost Themes III, for CHVRCHES to remix.

The last film that Carpenter directed was 2010's The Ward, though he has also since directed a music video for a re-recording of the theme song for his film Christine. Having co-written and directed the original Halloween, Carpenter made his first return in nearly 40 years to the franchise in an official capacity with 2018's Halloween, serving as a producer and composer. He, along with Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, returned for the scores to Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends, as well as recently having crafted the theme for the film Studio 666 and the score for the upcoming Firestarter.

Halloween Ends is scheduled to land in theaters on October 14th.

Would you like a collaboration between Carpenter and ZZ Top? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!

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