The blaster beam is a concept electric musical instrument consisting of a 12 to 18-foot (3.5 to 5.5 m) long metal beam strung with numerous tensed wires under which are mounted electric guitar pickups which can be moved to alter the sound produced. The instrument is played by striking or plucking the strings with fingers, sticks, pipes or even large objects such as artillery shell casings. The instrument produces a very distinctive bass tone, the sound of which is often described as 'dark' or 'sinister'.
13-411: The blaster beam was designed by John Lazelle in the early 1970s, and was first widely used by Francisco Lupica who built several out of iron. American child-actor-turned-musician Craig Huxley created his own refined version of the beam out of aluminum which was brought to fame in the soundtrack for Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) in which composer Jerry Goldsmith used the instrument to create
26-417: A collaboration between classical Indian musicians Zakir Hussain ( tabla , dholak , naal ), Aashish Khan ( sarod ), and Pranesh Khan (tabla, naal); and American rock and jazz musicians Neil Seidel (lead guitar), Steve Haehl (lead vocals, guitar), Steve Leach (bass), and Frank Lupica (drums). The stated intention at the time, according to Seidel, was to highlight the beauty of Indian music by showing it in
39-514: A rock context. The word "Shanti" is a Sanskrit term meaning " inner peace ", and, again according to Seidel, all the band members were adherents of Transcendental Meditation . Produced by Richard Bock , the band's self-titled album was recorded in San Francisco and was released by Atlantic Records in 1971. The album includes both psychedelic rock songs on which "the Indian instrumentation
52-521: Is an American, California -based musician. Frank Lupica went to play with the likes of the Sound Machine, Lee Michaels, West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, Travel Agency, Shanti, and the Steven Seagal Band, before goes solo too. Once part of the band Shanti , he moved into a solo career, releasing one album, Francesco's Cosmic Beam Experience . Lupica is the first musician to widely make use of
65-543: Is different from Wikidata Articles lacking in-text citations from December 2020 All articles lacking in-text citations Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people) Shanti (band) Shanti was a world music band who played a fusion of Indian and rock music in the United States in the early 1970s. The band formed in the San Francisco area in about 1970, as
78-564: Is minimized and largely reduced to decoration", and mostly longer tracks "that integrate Western and Eastern sounds in a more cohesive manner". The group was dropped by Atlantic after one album. They auditioned for Apple Records , but Ravi Shankar reportedly persuaded George Harrison not to sign them, and the band then split up. Zakir Hussain and Aashish Khan both maintained successful careers, with Hussain collaborating with both John McLaughlin and Mickey Hart on later projects. Bassist Steve Leach, later known as Steve Wold, re-emerged as
91-454: Is similar to the theoretical lowest frequencies of the blaster beam, but these frequencies might have been more prominent at the live concert.) On this occasion none of the show's listeners reported any arousal whatsoever. In 2016, composer Bear McCreary featured the Blaster Beam in his score to 10 Cloverfield Lane , performed by Craig Huxley . Francisco Lupica From Misplaced Pages,
104-558: The IMAX film Chronos , and in David Shire's soundtrack to 2010 (1984), which score was co-written by Huxley. Huxley also played the instrument on the Quincy Jones song, " Ai No Corrida ”. Huxley successfully patented his design of the beam in 1984. The instrument has since been used to create dark unnatural sounds in other movie soundtracks in the late 1970s and early 1980s, including
117-1387: The Cosmic Beam Experience, first in live shows, then composing and performing Cosmic Beam Experience Music, Sound Design and Additional Music for film scores such as Terrence Malick 's The Thin Red Line , The New World , Tree of Life (winner of The Palm dOR at Cannes Film Festival 2011), To the Wonder , Knight of Cups and Voyage of Time , Last Hours and Carbon , plus Martin Scorsese 's Silence , Jordan Vogt-Roberts 's Kong: Skull Island , and Andrew Wakefield 's VAXXED from Cover Up to Catastrophe . External links [ edit ] Francesco and his Cosmic Beam Interview from 1978 Francesco Lupica at IMDb Tomorrow Show performance Authority control databases : Artists [REDACTED] MusicBrainz 2 Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Francisco_Lupica&oldid=1242389955 " Categories : Living people American film score composers American male classical composers American male singers Musicians from California Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description
130-531: The early nineties when several women attending a music concert in New York's Central Park claimed to have been stimulated by the sound created by a blaster beam being used in the performance. This prompted Australian radio station 2SER-FM to conduct an experiment in which they played a continuous loop of a blaster beam performance and asked their female listeners to report any stimulation they experienced. (FM's frequency response typically starts at around 50 Hz which
143-551: The films The Black Hole , Forbidden World , Dreamscape , and Meteor , in the last of which it was used during shots of the giant looming meteorite as it approached Earth . It has also been used by new age artists including Kitaro , Stearns and Huxley. The blaster beam was also used for the seismic charge sound used by Jango Fett, in Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones . Some more unexpected attention came in
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#1732859607531156-421: The 💕 American, California-based musician [REDACTED] This article includes a list of references , related reading , or external links , but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations . Please help improve this article by introducing more precise citations. ( December 2020 ) ( Learn how and when to remove this message ) Francesco Lupica
169-451: The signature V'ger sound. Earlier that year, Huxley performed his custom-built blaster beam on Robert Prince 's score for the season three Wonder Woman episode "Spaced Out". The instrument was also used by composer James Horner for several of his early soundtracks, including Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982), Michael Stearns for his score to
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