June 22, 2017
Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and the new SUSPIRIA score
Director Luca Guadagnino’s remake of Dario Argento’s classic giallo SUSPIRIA (1977) is slated to be scored by Thom Yorke, an English musician and composer best known as the singer and principal songwriter of the alternative rock band Radiohead. The film’s director issued a statement to Variety last month, saying that having Yorke on board was “a dream come true.” He added: “Our goal is to make a movie that will be a disturbing and transforming experience: for this ambition, we could not find a better partner than Thom.”
In clips from an upcoming BBC Radio 6 interview quoted at spin.com, Yorke discussed writing the score, calling it “absolutely terrifying.” He said the new SUSPIRIA would be a “very different film” from the original, but clarified that, in keeping with the music from the 1977 movie, we shouldn’t be expecting Jonny-Greenwood-esque string arrangements from Yorke. “It’s hard because I’m way out of my comfort zone, and I can’t read music so it’s not like I’m writing for orchestra,” he explained. “I’m building it all myself.”
Not that he’ll be following in his footsteps, particularly, but Yorke also described how Vangelis’s music for BLADE RUNNER inspired him in terms of what can be done with electronic soundtracks: “Vangelis, it’s his hands that made that. Which encouraged me. Because that was the thing I was finding most daunting. Normally [scoring] a horror movie involves orchestras, these specific things. But Luca [Guadagnino], the director, and Walter [Fasano], the editor, are very much, like, find your own path with it. … I just have to find a way into it.”
SUSPIRIA recently wrapped filming and is currently in post-production, noted Variety in its May 10 report. The production’s Music Supervisor Robin Urdang (HOLLOWS GROVE, HORNS, PIRANHA 3D) played a key role in negotiating the deal to secure Yorke’s involvement
