Horror Film Musical Scores

All right which ones really scared you. That were great,and terrorfying. That had funk The more the fun the better for me. I really like scary ones,that chill you. After all it's the music that makes the movie.

My favorites

Nightmare on Elm Street
Friday the 13th
Exorcist
Halloween
Psycho

 

Halloween's clasic.

 

The music from Hellraiser I, II & III is surprisingly good but I like Poltergeist, The Omen trilogy and Psycho the best.

 

In seventh grade music class, my teacher did a short unit on film music. I don't remember much about the lessons other than the fact that he showed us the horror movie classic Psycho, which he believed to have the greatest film score in cinema history.

I can't say that I agree with his opinion, but I can't say that I disagree either. Psycho had some lovely cues which really helped the audience get into the heads of the characters. Plus, the music for the shower stabbing scene is arguably the most famous piece of film music aside from the sharks' theme from Jaws.

Thoughts?





Mace Windy,
too windy for spoilers!

 

Nightmare on Elm Street. The others were creepy, but they just kept repeating. At least Nightmare was an actual score.

 

The Others has some fantastic stuff.

 

From Hell

 

I saw "Near Dark" the other day and thought that the soundtrack by Tangerine Dream was brilliant. Unexpectedly good, especially since a lot of Synth-shock soundtracks have aged badly.

It is hysterically difficult to get hold of the soundtrack album in England, though.

UKS

 

"The Fury" by you-know-who...

Very elegant,particularly the last sequence..

 

Darkness Falls by Brian Tyler
The Ninth Gate by Wojciech Kilar

 

Personally I like what James Newton Howard is doing with "horror" movie score. With him writing all the music for the Shamalayn movies, it reminds me alot of what the scores of Hitchcock films sounded like.

 

Although not technically a horror score, Jurassic Park has some pretty intense moments, great themes, and it just plum sounds great! Also (though, still not technically horror) "The Miracle of the Ark" track on Raiders of the Lost Ark isn' exactly the first thing I'd listen to with no one in the house in the middle of the night in a thunderstorm, if you know what I mean. And still, while it has its freaky moments (listen the first time the spirits turn monstrous and the choir has a long "AaaaaaAAAAHHHHH!"), it maintains a grand feeling of awe with it that makes it a terrific track to listen to on its own.

 

The Omen by Jerry Goldsmith is freaky.

Hellraiser by Christopher Young also can be scary.

A Nightmare on Elm Street by Charles Bernstein can be creepy.

Puppet Master by Richard Band can be very unsettling also.

 

I'll answer it differently; let me list my Top 21 list of the spookiest and most effective horror themes , not necessarily whole soundtracks.

I'll list them alphabetically:

Alien

Brainscan

Children of the Corn

Christine (Plymouth Fury - that's the main theme!)

Creepshow

Dressed to Kill (it is a horror movie!)

The Final Conflict (Omen III) - I actually prefer the epic main theme to the original "Ave Satani" from the first Omen.

The Fog

Friday the 13th VII: The New Blood

The Hitcher (I consider "The Chosen" to be the most important "John Ryder theme"... it's an excellent 'illustration' of the car-passing scene which at first seems to be the picture of happiness and tranquility, and then breaks into a sudden shock as John Ryder's face appears...)

Halloween

Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Hellbound: Hellraiser II

A Nightmare on Elm Street

The Ninth Gate

The Omen

Phantasm

Puppet Master

Rosemary's Baby (Komeda's Lullabye)

The Serpent and the Rainbow

The Thing

Bonus tracks - comedy horrors:

Fright Night

Leprechaun (superficially, it may sound like a cheery theme, but it's creepily effective...)

The Lost Boys (Thomas Newman's officially unreleased score, though the title song is a good listen as well)

 

Poltergeist by Jerry Goldsmith is an excellent horror score. Equally scary, exciting, and stirring.

Jaws and even Jaws 2 are also classics in the genre.

Alien, Aliens, and Alien 3, while each one is completely different from the last, are excellent horror scores.

Any one of James Newton Howard's horror scores are better than most of the stuff out there in the genre, IMO.

 

I have the CD set "Sci Fi's greatest hits" and it has everything frio "The Day the Earth Stood Still" to Halloween. It's great. I also have this CD that Rob Zombie put out. It's like the music and spoken words of the orignal Frankenstein movies.

 

UP

Just watching Leatherface: TCM III,This have some intersting opening scene music for when Leatherface is sewing a new mask.

 

I think that Goblin's score for Profondo Rosso ( Deep Red ), is one of the all time great horror scores. I also really love their score for Suspiria.

I love John Carpenter's score for Halloween.

A Nightmare On Elm Street is great.

The score for The Shining is very disturbing.

 

Goblin rules. I saw them live a few years ago in NY. Unbelievable show.

Here are some goodies:

Tenebre
Deep Red
Phantasm (not Goblin)

 

Most of Carpenter's score are great as well. I met him at the DGA NYC screening of Ghosts of Mars. Very nice fellow.

You've got to admire a fellow who has a hand in the writing, scoring and editing of most of his films. A true argument for the auteur theory.

Christine
The Fog
They Live (not strictly horror, but...)
In the Mouth of Madness

 

I really like the stark simplicity of Carpenter's scores. Because they are so minimalist in nature, they are always very memorable. He usually focuses on the repetition of a basic synthesiser riff or melody, and uses it to underscore key scenes. It's very effective for the type of films he makes

Goblin are really superb, Emos. It must have been great when you saw them live I always thought that they were at their very best, when they were working with Argento.

If I was ever fortunate enough to produce a horror film, I would definitely want Claudio Simonetti to write the score.

 

My top choices for horror score are "The Exorcist" and "The Shining". Although I believe both are scores complied from other sources (and both have Penderecki pieces in them), they are most effective.

"Alien" has a very effective score, as does "Poltergeist" (both Jerry Goldsmith).

I like John carpenter's scores to a degree. However, his scores sound more or less the same, from "Escape from New York" to "Ghosts of Mars". The major exception that I've seen was "Starman". Even "The Thing" had it's Carpenter moments, although Ennio Morricone is credited.

I'm also a big fan of Wojciech Kilar's score for "Bram Stoker's Dracula" and Elliot Goldenthal's score for "Pet Sematary".

 

Call it horror or thriller, but I like Howards music for Shyamalan's movies, especially Signs.

Physco is good.

I also like (while not a horror film) the music in Return of the King at Shelob's Lair. That is a "horror"/"suspense" part of the movie, but the song, if not knowing it was Lord of the Rings, could be seen (more like heared) in a horror movie if one imagined it.

Jaws is classic.

Also William's freaky chanting song in Temple of Doom. That is "horrific" in it's own way.

 

Warlock--J Goldsmith.

Forever Knight.

 

I`ve been hooked on Hellraiser since I rented it,the score is very creepy.