Alan Howarth - The Lost Empire OST (1990)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:
John Carpenter & Alan Howarth - Halloween III OST (1989)

Alan Howarth served as John Carpenter's right hand man for the soundtracks to all of Carpenter's classic films -- They Live, The Thing, Big Trouble in Little China, etc. -- but didn't make a lot of soundtracks on his own until more recent years. And though The Lost Empire was, by all accounts, a complete POS, Howarth's soundtrack shows that he could definitely hold his own behind a synthesizer, and that he clearly had a large part in the scoring of the aforementioned films.

Nerd note: The movie came out in '83, but the soundtrack wasn't released until 1990, in the form of this release, which bundles it with music from another movie, Retribution.

Track listing:
1. The Lost Empire Main Titles
2. Punks at School
3. White Star
4. Cowboy Fight to Prison
5. Induction Center
6. Flight to Golgatha and Examination
7. Chariots of Night Patrol
8. The Gladiator
9. Seduced by Dinner
10. Arena Battle
11. Chamber of Horrors
12. Sin Do's Domain
13. Retribution Opening
14. The Gallery
15. Doctor Rasta
16. The Apartment
17. Garage
18. Revelation at Cemetery
19. Bus Ride to Minelli's
20. Slaughter House
21. Psychic Encounter
22. Street Rain

The return of the shape

John Carpenter & Alan Howarth - Halloween III: Season of the Witch OST (1989)

Halloween III got shat all over because Michael Myers isn't in it. HOWEVER, what the movie lacks in stabby icons, it makes up for in mindless drone killers in business suits, bewitched Halloween masks, skull cracking, face explosions, and a stolen piece of Stonehenge. Best of all is the mustachioed lead, a doctor who constantly allows himself to get sidetracked by his desire to drink booze and bang the young lady whose father's murder he is supposed to be investigating. There's one scene where, having arrived in a weird, semi-deserted town in which they strongly suspect her father first ran into trouble, she's trying to plan a course of action for the rest of the day and he's like, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. It's getting late. I need a drink." So they don't go investigate the creepy factory, cause he just shut that conversation down. Then later, when they're banging, they hear a horrific noise (clearly the sound of someone dying a terrible death next door), and she says, "What was that?" to which he replies, "I don't care," and keeps right on going.

Regardless of the movie's credentials, John Carpenter and Alan Howarth's score makes for pretty much the perfect horror movie soundtrack -- all droning, pulsing, driving, and shrieking synthesizers. I just saw a screening of this great terrible movie that was followed by a mind-blowing musical medley, performed by Howarth himself and accompanied by a psychedelic visual mashup of movie clips, that featured tunes from They Fucking Live, The Fucking Thing, Escape from Motherfucking New York, Big Trouble in Motherfucking Little China, and of course, multiple installations of Motherfucking Halloween, all of which Howarth worked on. Then, during the Q&A, he big-upped Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream as major influences. Dude's a master; I'm on his jock.

Track listing:
1. Main Title
2. Chariots of Pumpkins
3. Drive to Santa Mira
4. Starker and Marge
5. First Chase
6. Robots at the Factory
7. Halloween Montage
8. Hello Grandma
9. The Rock
10. Challis Escapes
11. South Corridor
12. Goodbye Ellie

The clock is ticking. It's almost time!