james_nicoll

Freddy Mercury is dead, but Brian May is still around.

You beat me to it.

Oh, heck. We're talking about superheroes. Resurrecting Mercury wouldn't be that hard.

Oh, and BRIAN BLESSED would be singing baritone.

Mercury was my first thought too.

second would be TMBG

Third. Devo

Last would be a complete about face: DragonForce and CruxShadow team-up

- Krin

Ps. Would put Gorillaz in that list... But a cartoon band doing music for a cartoon? Bit recursively derivative.

How many alumni of Yes are available?

Pretty much all of them, I think...

Jim Steinman.

Sigur Ros.

Wagner.

Or X, where X:Wagner::John Williams:Holst.

How do you score "Kirby Dots"?

--Hawk

Pizzicato on bass volcano.

I think Hans Zimmer would do well, his use of dissonance fits Kirby to a tee.

I am going to say Lester Chambers (of the Chambers Brothers), but for economic rather than musical similarities.

Whoever did Fifth Element.

That would be Éric Serra, a long-time buddy of Luc Besson, and son of Claude Serra. And he didn't just do Fifth Element... he's done the music for nearly all of Besson's film, including the musically brilliant Subway. (And Goldeneye, oddly enough.)

I'm not sure he's the precisely right choice for Kirby, as he's a lot more ummmm urban in my head than would be right. But there's no doubt that he's got talent and he can do things that are "unearthly" and thematic pretty darned well.

Howard Shore.

Frank Zappa. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imAWVWi5PIU&feature=youtube_gdata_player)

Danny Elfman

Warren Ellis

Don't know much about comics, but the American composer Michael Daugherty did a Metropolis symphony, with movements Lex, Krypton, Mxyzptlk, Oh, Lois, and Red Cape Tango.

His only opera to date is Jackie O.

I love Daugherty's stuff. His "UFO" for Evelyn Glennie is a great piece of work.

I'm thinking, though, that for Jack Kirby nothing less than prog rock will suffice. If not Rick Wakeman, then Rush.

George Clinton and the P-Funk Allstars. The P-funk mythology is pure seventies Kirby.

Hmm, now you may have something there.

I was coming back to say the Sun Ra Arkestra ("We must all learn to travel the spacewaves if we want peace in this world"), but it might be too dissonant. P-Funk it is!