Dark Star - Benson Arizona

"Dark Star" (1974) is one of my favorite John Carpenter movies, and I've been trying to find the soundtrack for a long time. In particular, it contains a song called "Benson Arizona" which was written by Bill Taylor (lyrics) and John Carpenter (music) and performed by John Yager (vocals), John Carpenter, Terry Winkless, Tom Wallace and Justice O'Neil (backup musicians) for this movie.

The record was published as Citadel CT 7022 (LP, 1980), Colosseum VSD-5327 (CD, 1992), and Varese Sarabande VSD 5327 (CD, 1992), all of which are out of print today, unfortunately.

Here's an mp3 (2:34, 3.0 MB, 160 kbps) which was digitally ripped from the DVD. Enjoy.

Doolittle: Let's have some music in here, Boiler.

Boiler: Sure thing.

Lyrics

A million suns shine down

But I see only one

When I think I'm over you

I find I've just begun

The years move faster than the days

There's no warmth in the light

How I miss those desert skies

Your cool touch in the night

CHORUS:

Benson, Arizona, blew warm wind through your hair

My body flies the galaxy, my heart longs to be there

Benson, Arizona, the same stars in the sky

But they seemed so much kinder when we watched them, you and I

Now the years pull us apart

I'm young and now you're old

But you're still in my heart

And the memory won't grow cold

I dream of times and spaces

I left far behind

Where we spent our last few days

Benson's on my mind

(CHORUS)

Thanks to Terry Simpson for sending in corrections for the lyrics!

Mail from John Yager (singer on this song)

On May 3rd 2006, I received a brief email with corrections to the lyrics, which was signed with Best Wishes, John Yager. I replied, and it turned out to really be from the John Yager:

Thanks - I am John. In 1973 or so, I was friends with Carpenter and

other USC Film School filmmakers. Carpenter heard me sing once, and

asked if I'd do the lead vocal for the Dark Star theme. The background

vocals were recorded on a sound stage at USC where the film was being

shot, next to the full-size space-ship interior. I also sang in the

background vocal, with the others, though this isn't credited. My lead

was recorded in an evening, at the apartment of a friend of Carpenter's,

with Tommy Wallace on pedal steel guitar, I think, and Carpenter said

the mix was exactly what he wanted. If you have any questions, I'd be

happy to answer them.

John

And John was kind enough to answer my questions and let me share his mail with you:

Hi Daniel-

It's fine with me if you post my answers. Gratifying to know that

people appreciated the song, and the film - it was a brilliant effort in

a number of ways.

I was never a professional musician, apart from being in a band in

college. I'm afraid "Benson" is the only thing I did that's

commercially available.

I agree about the comments about the country & western genre - the

thing that makes "Benson" so good is that it uses that idiom to convey

an intelligent, and very uncountrylike idea, and the contrast makes the

song unusually poignant.

I'm sure your interpretation of the song as revolving around

relativity and the space traveler remaining young is correct, but I

don't remember anyone discussing it - I think we all appreciated the

cleverness of the idea, but took it pretty much for granted.

Carpenter's a smart guy, a highly motivated, successful and talented

writer and filmmaker, as well as a musician, and the song was no more

than you'd expect from him.

As far as Benson itself, I have no idea why Carpenter chose it. I

assume he traveled through there at some point, but I don't know. Not

long after we recorded the song, I drove east across the country, and

chose the extreme southern routet, specifically to go through Benson,

which isn't far from Tombstone. It was August and over 100f when I was

there. Very barren. Somewhere I have a picture of me standing in front

of the Benson railway station. If I run across it, I'll scan it and

send it to you.

Best regards,

John

Dark Star - Benson Arizona

Lyrics

Mail from John Yager (singer on this song)

Related links