John Carpenter is back-back-BACK! The Horror Master and his regular collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, son of THE KINKS’ Dave Davies, present the fourth instalment of the ‘Lost Themes’ series.

Very few have had a successful career as a film director while also soundtracking their own work like John Carpenter has, with ‘Assault on Precinct 13’, ‘Halloween’, ‘The Fog’, ‘Escape From New York’, ‘Big Trouble in Little China’, ‘Prince Of Darkness’ and ‘Village Of The Damned’ to name just a few…

A family unit of father, son and godson, the trio were inspired by a book of stills from noir films and their titles; John Carpenter’s wife Sandy King gave him the book one Christmas. While these are “soundtracks for the movies in your mind”, whereas the original scores for these noir films were largely orchestral, the trio interpreted the images with their usual synthesizer and guitar template.

The opener ‘My Name is Death’ offers gothic Spaghetti Western resonances before climaxing with a blistering guitar solo picturing the standoff. Despite opening with a stark piano motif surrounded by sweeping synths, ‘Machine Fear’ morphs into a percussive death rattle enhanced heavy guitar riffage, while inside a desolate apocalyptic backdrop, ‘Last Rites’ offers a sense of foreboding in its ragged metal.

A complete contrast, ‘The Burning Door’ could be music to a Cold War spy drama with its haunting East European mood. Meanwhile, with classic keyboard runs augmented by some six string menace, when ‘He Walks By Night’ drops to a church organ, it becomes even more sinister before reprising itself powerfully.

With a slight pentatonic flavour, ‘Beyond The Gallows’ is not surprisingly embroiled in fatalistic tension but galloping along with a compelling electronic bass sequence, ‘Kiss The Blood Off My Fingers’ is ominous although synths do also creep in. ‘Guillotine’ sits in a solemn bed but as it rocks up, it drops back to its spacier beginnings that recall Avro Part before heading back to where it left off.

‘The Demon’s Shadow’ is unsettling as it should be based on its title alone but to close, ‘Shadows Have A Thousand Eyes’ is a hypnotic metronomic closer that brings together strung textures, sparkling arpeggios, power chords and electronic drums inside a cocoon of reverb.

‘Lost Themes IV: Noir’ is the first one in this series to be billed as a John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies collaborative record. But while Davies makes his presence felt on his guitar and the younger Carpenter provides his schooled musicality, the end result is characteristic John Carpenter.

“I’m the experience. I’ve done music for movies before” said The Horror Master about his role in the collaborative process. For that reason alone, ‘Lost Themes IV: Noir’ will delight John Carpenter fans and those who favour the rockier end of synthwave to be shown how it’s done.

‘Lost Themes IV: Noir Out’ is released on 3 May 2024 by Sacred Bones via https://lnk.to/LTIVNoir

Format variants include:

• Sacred Bones exclusive Red splatter on Clear (Silver foil), with poster and a clear 7” with exclusive bonus track ‘Black Cathedral’ and screen printed B-Side
• Sacred Bones Society exclusive black and white splatter on Clear (Silver foil), with poster and a clear 7” with exclusive bonus track ‘Black Cathedral’ and screen printed B-Side
• All retail Transparent Red (Gold Foil) with poster
• All retail tan and black marble (Gold Foil), with poster and a clear 7” with exclusive bonus track ‘Black Cathedral’ and screen printed B-Side
• Rough Trade exclusive Oxblood red and black marble with splatter (Gold Foil), with poster and a clear 7” with exclusive bonus track ‘Black Cathedral’ and screen printed B-Side
• Shout exclusive Black and clear cloudy (Gold Foil), with poster and a clear 7” with exclusive bonus track ‘Black Cathedral’ and screen printed B-Side
• Black LP (Gold foil) with poster
• CD
• Cassette

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
30 April 2024