"The stunt co-ordinator said, 'Don't put your hand here - you'll blow it off.'" The story behind Ice Nine Kills' ultra-gory Terrifier 3 tie-in A Work Of Art

Ice Nine Kills A Work Of Art Promo
(Image credit: F Scott Schafer)

Wandering through the corridors of his West Hollywood home, Ice Nine Kills frontman Spencer Charnas enthuses about a topic dear to his heart: horror movies. But the Zoom video feed suddenly stops, and everything goes quiet. When it reconnects, Hammer is face-to-face with the ghastly, grinning visage of Art The Clown, the murderous ‘star’ of Damien Leone’s Terrifier franchise. 

“Sorry, I never could resist a good jump scare,” grins Spencer, as he picks the camera back up and sits down by a large Art model. In October, Ice Nine Kills unveiled a 15-minute video for A Work Of Art, the official song for Terrifier 3. Even by their own standards, it was bloody, featuring the band playing to a packed venue while Art – portrayed by Terrifier actor David Howard Thornton – wreaked havoc. Partway through, he delivered a baby, before strangling the mother with the umbilical cord.

“The birth was my idea,” Spencer says. “It was like, ‘What have we not really seen in a horror movie?’ I don’t remember Freddy Krueger delivering a baby! I originally wanted to kill it too, but Damien said that was going too far. That’s a real badge of honour – if Damien, who’s created one of the most sadistic characters of all time, tells me I’ve gone too far, I feel very, very proud.” 

Although the band have written plenty of songs about horror movies in the past, A Work Of Art marks Ice Nine Kills’ first official horror movie tie-in. To say it was a massive life goal for Spencer is an understatement.

"Growing up and loving horror, there were so many tie-ins between rock, metal and horror," he enthuses. "When you go to see a modern slasher these days though and there are so few metal bands associated with it. So it was cool to have that tie-in, it’s an honour. The only other thing we had was our poster pops up in the background of Scream 6, which I have to tip my hat to the Radio Silence team for because they made that happen."

Having become friends with Damien and producer Phil Falcone at horror conventions, Spencer already had connections with the crew behind the film. But he admits he had misgivings about writing a song about Terrifier

“We had just done a song about Pennywise [IT Is The End] and I was wondering if I had used up all the good clown puns,” he jokes. 

That changed when he was watching Ace Ventura: Pet Detective one day, and inspiration struck. “It was the scene where Ace goes to a Cannibal Corpse show,” Spencer says. “We were like, ‘Let’s put Art somewhere we’ve never seen him before – in a crowded room.’” 

Reaching out to director Damien and producer Phil, Spencer was delighted to find they weren’t just happy to give their blessing, they wanted to be involved. After storyboarding ideas with a creative team, including special effects wizards who had worked on the likes of Kill Bill and Scream, Ice Nine Kills shot the video for A Work Of Art on a Los Angeles soundstage in July. 

They even managed to draft in Terrifier actors Catherine Corcoran (who plays victim Dawn in the first movie) and Leah Voysey (the Clown Cafe Host in Terrifier 2) for special guest appearances, as well as System Of A Down bassist Shavo Odadjian, who helped write the track. 

“I knew I wanted the song to have that manic energy that Art The Clown and Terrifier have become synonymous with; comedy, speed and viciousness,” Spencer explains. “To me, System Of A Down embody that mix.” 

In A Work Of Art, bodies are slashed, hacked and shot apart. Spencer says the trickiest effect to accomplish was a fan being split in half with a battle-axe. 

“It was especially cool because Chris Nelson, who did that effect in Kill Bill, inspired us to do it, and we had him on the video to do it again!” he enthuses. The clip’s crescendo sees Art use a Gatling gun to wipe out the surviving audience members and band onstage. 

Previously, INK had used VFX to recreate gunshots, but this time they opted for squibs – tiny explosive devices that are detonated remotely. “They’re so powerful they break open your shirt,” Spencer reveals. “It actually really hurts! We had this co-ordinator who’d be like, ‘Don’t put your hands here because you’ll blow off your hand.’” “Everyone was a little bit nervous about it, for sure,” he continues. 

“But I’m so glad we did it that way, and they rigged it so a bunch of sparks fly out of the rig as it’s being shot, and you can actually see a spark land in my mouth and illuminate it! I don’t know if that’s dangerous, but it looks really cool.”


Before Terrifier 3’s première in New York, the music video was aired on the big screen in all its g(l)ory. “Damien leans over to me, like, ‘You knocked it out of the park, man, as I knew you would,’” Spencer says proudly. 

Terrifier 3 also exceeded all expectations, clawing its way to the top of the US box office and bagging upwards of $59 million, making it the highest-grossing unrated movie ever. 

“It’s a great underdog story,” Spencer says. “They’ve built this thing over time and got a cult following that’s eventually blown $500 million movie productions out of the water on a shoestring budget. It isn’t just a movie, it’s a cultural movement.” 

For all the success of Terrifier 3 and A Work Of Art, Spencer admits one of his favourite benefits has been in tying together the cinematic universes of Terrifier and Scream - in a roundabout way. "When we got asked about Scream 6, they asked us to send a poster, so I created a fake one saying we’d played at Abe’s Snakepit," Spencer explains. 

"That was a reference to Wes Craven; when he directed softcore porn in the 70s, Abe Snake was the name he’d use. When I told them what the reference was, they loved it so much they actually used the name for the bodega in that movie. So when we did the video for A Work Of Art, the venue there is Abe’s Snakepit too, so I’ve made the Scream and Terrifier universes connect in canon!”

As for Ice Nine Kills, who’ve enjoyed an influx of new fans in the wake of Terrifier’s success, Spencer reveals there are plans to release more new music in 2025. And – spoiler alert – there will be more gore. 

“We’ve got some tricks up our bloody sleeves, I’ll tell you that,” he says. “There’s been a lot of touring [for 2021’s The Silver Scream 2] – it felt like we’d released The Black Album or something! But we’ve got some very violent, exciting and perhaps unexpected turns to take in the Ice Nine Kills universe over the next couple of years.

Rich Hobson

Staff writer for Metal Hammer, Rich has never met a feature he didn't fancy, which is just as well when it comes to covering everything rock, punk and metal for both print and online, be it legendary events like Rock In Rio or Clash Of The Titans or seeking out exciting new bands like Nine Treasures, Jinjer and Sleep Token.