Dean Hurley

Lynch’s in-house studio engineer, co-producer, and collaborator

The buzzword David uses for everything is “experiment.” That’s at the root of his whole quest—it’s just about wanting to collide elements and see what comes out. In the studio, I’ve seen David say to a drummer, “I want you to play World War II in three parts: Start with being on the ship and then move towards the beaches of Normandy and then have a storm rush onto Normandy.” Then he’ll just say, “OK, go.”

We’ll play each other songs in the studio, and once in a blue moon he’ll get super excited about something. The last time was with Kanye West’s Yeezus. His favorite track was “Blood on the Leaves,” but the first thing I played him was “I’m in It,” and he just looked over at me and his eyes got really big. That’s his reaction when he gets excited about something: He gets that serious death stare and just goes, “Fuckin’ A, this is killer.”

Trent Reznor

Nine Inch Nails; composer/soundtrack producer for Lost Highway, set to feature in the new “Twin Peaks” series

Around the time I was starting to formulate Nine Inch Nails I went back to really examine the sound effects and music of Eraserhead, which had a huge impact on our sound and how it makes you feel a certain way. Listening to Eraserhead, I remember thinking to myself, Why do I feel so fucking edgy? The sound of the room noise was incredibly loud. These were lessons that as I learned applied to my own arranging and songwriting around the time I did The Downward Spiral.

I had a white noise generator that became pretty musical when you tuned it; you normally used to tune rooms, but it had a pitch in it and it was weirdly soothing. So I was messing around on that, and we ended up scoring a couple of scenes to Lost Highway based on those noises. In the studio, [Lynch] wrote shit down on a piece of paper—he scribbled something in a star-like pattern with an ink pen and said, “I would really like it to sound like that.” I thought, All right, he’s either really weird, or it’s some sort of test to see what happens, but it set the tone. He was very accommodating and I remember him saying, “Wow, that’s a beautiful sound” in that real loud, hard-of-hearing way he talks. It was like being inside a Lynch film in a strange way.

A few years after Lost Highway I finally got my shit together and got sober. When I think back, that was one of my regrets—I wasn’t at 100 percent during the time I spent with him on Lost Highway. I was struggling to keep my shit together, convincing myself that it was business as usual. Looking back I know that I could have been better. That’s also when I was around David Bowie, another one of my greatest heroes. But that’s how life unfolded for me. I’m not complaining.

Marek Zebrowski

Composer/pianist; Lynch’s collaborator on the 2007 album Polish Night Music

David has this heavy ability to take people out of their comfort zone. That’s his secret. I don’t know how he makes me do things, but he did. A lot of artists like to think about form and convention, but David wants to explore the intuitive side of art. He succeeds.

Zola Jesus

Singer-songwriter; performed at the David Lynch Foundation concert last year, recorded her album Taiga at Lynch’s studio, and Lynch has remixed her work

Eraserhead was my first experience of David Lynch, and the score really stuck with me. I was fascinated by how it created an incessant tension and uneasiness that felt both totally alien and as familiar as a construction site. I covered “In Heaven,” and it is a very special song to me. Eraserhead is forever in my marrow, and that song flows through me like blood.

Wayne Coyne

Flaming Lips; performer at 2015 David Lynch Foundation concert

For me it started with Eraserhead—the wind or the sound of whatever is rumbling outside. His movies have such an unsettling effect on you because of the sound effects and the soundscapes—it’s a strange way to use music in a film. We’ve seen that film as many times as anybody can watch a film.