John Carpenter Unveils "Cathedral" Experience With New Graphic Novel and “Lord of the Underground” [VIDEO]

Written by: Sam Santiago

There are very few people in horror history who can casually announce a new project and instantly get the entire genre community paying attention, but John Carpenter has earned that right several times over. The man gave us Halloween, The Thing, They Live, Prince of Darkness, and enough legendary synth-drenched nightmare fuel to soundtrack half our lives. We were fortunate to catch Carpenter last year, and his live performance was groundbreaking, no, literally, the venue shook. 

Now Carpenter is diving headfirst into something completely new with Cathedral, a multimedia horror experience that combines a brand new graphic novel with what he’s describing as “kind of our first heavy metal album.” 

According to details recently revealed, Cathedral marks Carpenter’s very first original graphic novel and arrives August 4 through Storm King Comics, with the companion album following August 7 through Sacred Bones Records. Carpenter once again teams up with longtime collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, continuing the same creative partnership responsible for the Lost Themes albums and the recent Halloween trilogy soundtracks.

The trio also released the first single, “Lord of the Underground,” alongside a visualizer featuring artwork pulled directly from the graphic novel itself, and the track absolutely rips. The song leans far heavier than some fans may expect, sounding like Carpenter dragged doom metal through a nightmare soaked alleyway lit entirely by flickering neon and demonic hallucinations. Remember, Carpenter has gotten heavy in the past with Anthrax for the "Ghosts of Mars" soundtrack so this new album should feel right at home for those that loved that sound. 

The story centers around an abandoned cathedral in downtown Los Angeles that transforms from a forgotten building into the center of an escalating nightmare after the murder of a police officer draws attention back to the church. Lieutenant Christine Marks, along with detectives Paul Hernandez and Steve Mayfield, descends into the cathedral’s underground catacombs, where they uncover an ancient evil buried beneath the city for centuries.

If that premise sounds like classic Carpenter territory, that’s because it absolutely is. There are shades of Prince of Darkness, In the Mouth of Madness, and even bits of The Fog lurking all over this setup. Ancient evil, paranoia, crumbling locations hiding unspeakable horrors beneath them, this is the exact kind of atmospheric cosmic nightmare Carpenter has always excelled at building.

Daniel Davies explained how deeply connected the music became to the story itself during production:

“The story informed everything. John would describe a scene and say, ‘We need a heavy riff here.’ We didn’t set out to make a metal record, but it evolved that way.”

That evolution is apparently what pushed Cathedral into becoming one of the heaviest musical projects Carpenter has ever released. While the Lost Themes albums played like soundtracks to movies existing only inside your head, Cathedral actually functions as a complete narrative experience. Each song corresponds directly to a chapter in the graphic novel, with liner notes guiding listeners through the unfolding story as if they’re watching a full blown Carpenter film play out in real time.

Carpenter himself described the project by saying:

“It was so cinematic and vivid. I thought, ‘I have to score this.’ It’s kind of our first heavy metal album.”

The graphic novel itself was created alongside Carpenter’s wife and longtime producing partner Sandy King, writer Sean Sobczak, illustrators Federico De Luca and Luis Guaragna, colorist Sian Mandrake, and letterer Marshall Dillon. Fans already got an early glimpse of the story through Tales for a HalloweeNight Vol. 11, but Cathedral appears to be far more ambitious than anything Carpenter has attempted in comics before.

And while the graphic novel and album are designed to work together, Carpenter made it clear that the music needed to stand entirely on its own:

“That’s first and foremost. It’s all about making the music work. This is somewhat different sounding stuff that we've done, but it's done with the same desire in mind. In other words, put this thing on and imagine you're watching a movie. That’s what we want you to do.”

At 78 years old, John Carpenter is still out here creating new nightmares, experimenting with new mediums, and somehow continuing to sound cooler than most people half his age. Between the heavy riffs, supernatural horror setup, and the promise of a fully immersive audio visual descent into madness, Cathedral already feels like essential material for Carpenter fans.

And honestly, hearing John Carpenter casually describe something as “our first heavy metal album” is pretty much all the convincing we needed.