S2E55: Scares & Scores

Would scary movies be as scary without scary scores? Of course not! Our guest NICK PIKE has composed scores for tons of movies and TV shows but SCORING HORROR has always been a sweet spot. Nick wrote the theme for FREDDY’S NIGHTMARES: THE NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET TV SERIES, ten episodes of HBO’s TALES FROM THE CRYPT and lots of scores for STEPHEN KING adaptations, many for his good friend MICK GARRIS (another Crypt alum). Bring on the scares & scores!

Nick’s a great storyteller with music. He’s also a great storyteller with words – and his own story is pretty fascinating. A musical prodigy, Nick’s journey took him from England to South Africa to New York to Los Angeles. Along the way, he joined forces with South African playwright ATHOL FUGARD. In fact, Athol, says Nick, kept him in the music business at a moment when Nick was ready to chuck it all in.

His behind-the-scenes stories of breaking into Hollywood and then keeping his place as a highly respected and sought after composer are great fun. And we’ll sample a few of our favorites among Nick’s scores (on the projects we worked on together).

Why does a good score scare? Because good scores capture emotion like words can’t. We’ll also talk about the current state of musical scoring – which isn’t good. Licensed music is replacing more and more composers.

We go waaaaaaaaay back with Nick. You’ll feel the “old friend” vibe. Nick did Freddy’s Nightmares with us and Haunted Lives and Crypt and lots of other projects. This really is the best kind of family reunion. Hell, Nick’s even got a great JOEL SILVER STORY of his own! And who doesn’t love another great Joel story?

We talk about Nick’s work with MICHAEL JACKSON, BILL MALONE, and a great score Nick wrote for “WHAT TILL THE NEIGHBORS THINK?” an outside-the-box episode of THE OUTER LIMITS that I wrote and produced.

Above all, we’ll talk about how scares & scores come together and make scary movies even scarier.