Music in Horror - Scores & Original Soundtracks Part 1

When music in horror is mentioned, most people immediately think of the classic theme tunes we've all come to love, like Halloween and Psycho, just for example. But we'll come to that side of things later.

First of all, I'm going to look at Original Soundtracks. This is where MY taste in music comes in to play. Some of you may know already, but for those who don't, I'm a METAL HEAD!

What sounds better accompanying a gory, bloody death scene than a face-melting, ear-grinding metal song? Let's face it, HORROR and HEAVY METAL go together like Freddy Krueger and his glove of knives or Jason Voorhees and his hockey mask! In fact, I'd dare to say that all those "do gooders" out there in the world that think horror movies and heavy metal music are the Devil's work probably have this image in there head...

"Check this riff, it's fucking tasty!"

"Yes you are fucked! Shit out of luck! Now I'm complete and my cock you will suck! This world will be mine, and you're first in line! You brought me the pick and now you shall both die!"

This seems as good a place to start as any, although not really horror, I'm giving Beelzeboss (The Final Showdown) from Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny (2006) a special mention. Why? Because it features the Devil (played by the extremely talented David Grohl) in a "rock-off" against Jack Black for the soul of Kyle Gass. And to put it in plain English, it's awesome!


Here's the video...

Headed back to 1985 now with Dario Argento's Phenomena (known as Creepers in the US).

This movie soundtrack not only boasts music by Motörhead, but also features work by Goblin, who have been scoring soundtracks for Dario Argento, such as Suspiria (1977) and George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead (1978).

But my pick from the this film is Iron Maiden - Flash of the Blade.

Check it out...

Skippy forward to 2011, Matt Farnsworth gave us a look at a new breed of slasher with The Orphan Killer (review here). It's probably one of the heaviest soundtracks you'll here and covers metalcore, industrial metal, symphonic black metal/death metal, deathcore, progressive metal and melodic/hardcore.

Affiance, Asking Alexandria, Deception of a Ghost, Anew Revolution, This or the Apocalypse, Most Precious Blood, A Bullet for a Pretty Boy, Dawn of Ashes, Born of Osiris and No Bragging Rights are all featured, but it's First Blood that have 3 tracks on the OST.
So here's one of those tracks...

Now on to a franchise with great soundtracks, Resident Evil.
Over the course of the franchise the more notable artist/bands are:
Slipknot (my favourite band), Marilyn Manson, Coal Chamber, Fear Factory, Static-X, The Cyrstal Method, Rammstein, Lacuna Coil, Killswitch Engage, DevilDriver, Cradle Of Filth, CKY, Deftones, 36 Crazyfists, Rob Zombie, Chimaira and Shadows Fall. My top 2 picks though are as follows...

Slipknot - My Plague (Resident Evil)...

And Killswitch Engage - The End Of Heartache (Resident Evil: Apocalypse)...

Another franchise is Underworld. There's 2 versions of the Underworld: Rise of the Lycans OST which is made up of remixes, so too is Underworld Awakening. For the OST, my top pick out of the 4 movies would have to be Underworld Evolution. Featured on it are: Atreyu, Trivium, Slipknot, Lacuna Coil, Alkaline Trio and Cradle Of Filth. The 2 tracks I'm going to share with you are from Underworld Awakening and Underworld Evolution.

First up is Evanescence - Made of Stone (Renholdër Remix) from Underworld Awakening...

And Atreyu - Her Portrait In Black from Underworld Evolution...

 Yes, that's right, Bride of Chucky (1998)!

The music behind the killer doll is brought to you by White Zombie, Coal Chamber, Judas Priest, Type O Negative, Slayer, Bruce Dickinson, Static-X and Motorhead among others.



My top 2 picks are as follows...
  
Judas Priest - Blood Stained...

And Slayer- Human Disease...

Now for the last one and probably my top choice, taking into consideration that most of the soundtrack was created for the movie by Korn's Jonathan Davis. It is of course Queen of the Damned (2002). Now, I liked the movie, but wasn't blown away by it and I actually think that the soundtrack is better than the film itself!

The OST has a strong mix of new songs (at the time) and Nu-Metal hits. It features Wayne Static of Static-X, David Draiman of Disturbed, Chester Bennington of Linkin Park, Marilyn Manson, Jay Gordon of Orgy and Jonathan Davis performing the actual songs used directly in the film. They are are also featured on the DVD as music videos. The tracks are System, Slept So Long, Redeemer, Forsaken and Not Meant For Me.

Here's the full track listing:
1. Not Meant for Me - Wayne Static of Static-X**
2. Forsaken - David Draiman of Disturbed**
3. System - Chester Bennington of Linkin Park**
4. Change (In the House of Flies) - Deftones
5. Redeemer - Marilyn Manson**
6. Dead Cell - Papa Roach
7. Penetrate - Godhead
8. Slept So Long - Jay Gordon of Orgy**
9. Down with the Sickness - Disturbed
10.Cold - Static-X
11.Headstrong - Earshot
12.Body Crumbles - Dry Cell
13.Excess - Tricky
14.Before I'm Dead - Kidneythieves
15.Not Meant for Me - Jonathan Davis***
16.Forsaken - Jonathan Davis***
17.System - Jonathan Davis***
18.Redeemer - Jonathan Davis***

(**) Written by Jonathan Davis.
(***) Only featured on reissue.

Here's my top 2 picks.

First up is the video as seen in the film, sung by Jonathan Davis...

And to finish up, is a fan made video of (my second favourite band), Deftones - Change (In the House of Flies)...

Well, I hope you enjoyed the read and tunes! Look out for Part 2 soon...

Sources - Wiki, Amazon, YouTube, allmusic, IMDB. And of course a special thanks to the fans of Maven's Movie Vault of Horror on facebook.