Blaster Beam: The Sound of the V'ger

The blaster beam is a massive, industrial instrument stretching up to 18 feet long, strung with piano wires and fitted with electric pickups. John Lazelle conceived it, but Craig Huxley refined and patented it in 1984. Jerry Goldsmith used it to create V'ger's iconic, otherworldly voice in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, layering its dark, sustained tones with custom computer dialog tracks. It's one of cinema's most distinctive sounds, and there's much more to its strange story.

Key Takeaways

• The Blaster Beam is a massive aluminum instrument, 12–18 feet long, strung with piano wires and fitted with electromagnetic pickups.
• John Lazelle conceived the original design, but Craig Huxley refined and patented it in 1984, earning primary inventor credit.
• Jerry Goldsmith used the Blaster Beam to create V'ger's iconic alien voice in Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
• Its dark, sustained, low-frequency tones overwhelmed theater speakers, making V'ger feel genuinely incomprehensible and threatening to audiences.
• The instrument's cinematic legacy spans decades, appearing in Aliens, Back to the Future, Poltergeist, and modern blockbuster trailers.

What Is the Blaster Beam?

The blaster beam is a stringed electric instrument built around a 12 to 18-foot metal beam strung with tensed wires of brass, bronze, or steel. Its physical description sets it apart from conventional instruments — it's fundamentally an enormous metallic sounding board fitted with movable magnetic or piezoelectric pickups that capture string vibrations and amplify them electronically.

You'll find its performance technique equally unconventional. Rather than following standard playing methods, you can pluck the wires with your fingers, strike them with sticks, pipes, or metal bars, or draw a violin bow across them. You can even rub the beam with shell casings or wooden implements. These varied approaches produce the instrument's signature dark, sinister bass tones that make it immediately recognizable to anyone who's heard it.

The instrument was designed by John Lazelle in the early 1970s, with Francisco Lupica being the first to widely use it and build several versions out of iron before Craig Huxley later developed a refined aluminum version.

Huxley's blaster beam achieved its most iconic moment when Jerry Goldsmith used it to create the voice of V'ger in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, cementing the instrument's place in cinematic history. Much like the cultural heritage protection efforts that drive museums to preserve rare and irreplaceable artifacts, dedicated musicians and sound designers have worked to document and maintain the blaster beam's unique legacy for future generations.

What the Blaster Beam Actually Looks Like

Stretching anywhere from 12 to 18 feet in length, the blaster beam is built around a rectangular aluminum tube that forms its central spine.

Dozens of tensed steel wires and piano wires run across its entire length, creating a visual spectacle unlike any conventional instrument you've ever seen.

Beneath those wires, you'll spot magnetic and piezoelectric pickups positioned to capture every vibration, along with slidable sound exciters that can be repositioned along the beam.

The overall profile resembles a massive sci-fi prop rather than a musical instrument, which is fitting given its cinematic history.

Its raw, industrial aesthetic gives it an otherworldly presence that commands attention the moment it enters a room.

Nothing about it looks subtle or traditional — it's built to dominate space. The instrument is played by striking, rubbing, and plucking its wires using an eclectic range of tools, including fingers, sticks, pipes, and even large shell casings.

Who Really Invented the Blaster Beam?

Pinpointing who truly invented the blaster beam isn't as straightforward as most sources suggest. John Lazelle actually conceived the original design in the late 1960s to early 1970s, establishing the instrument's foundational principles. Francesco Lupica then built on that concept, constructing four steel-bar instruments he called the "Cosmic Beam" and performing with them publicly.

Craig Huxley entered the picture later, replacing steel bars with aluminum tubing and adding strings, magnets, and sound exciters to create his refined 18-foot version. He patented his design in 1984, and most sources credit him as the inventor. That credit, while understandable, overlooks a three-stage evolution: Lazelle's concept, Lupica's construction, and Huxley's refinement. All three contributed meaningfully, though Lazelle and Lupica remain far less recognized. His instrument would go on to define the alien soundscape of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, cementing its place in film score history. Notably, Craig Huxley had a prior connection to the Star Trek universe, having previously appeared as Peter Kirk in Star Trek: The Original Series before ever refining the instrument.

How the Blaster Beam Took Over Star Trek: The Motion Picture

• Mass and gravity — It filled theaters with frequencies no conventional instrument could sustain.
• Stretched tones — Bending pitches created an endless, unsettling sonic presence during V'ger's cloud approach.
• Dialogue override — It deliberately overwhelmed speech when the alien presence demanded it.
• Early conceptualization — Goldsmith integrated it into the film's philosophical spine from the start, not as an afterthought.

Much like the Islamic geometric patterns that were designed to expand infinitely and overwhelm the senses of those within grand spaces like the Alhambra, the Blaster Beam's sound was engineered to consume every corner of the theater with its presence.

You can't separate the Blaster Beam from V'ger — they became one.

How Jerry Goldsmith Built V'ger's Sound With the Blaster Beam

When Jerry Goldsmith chose the blaster beam as V'ger's voice, he wasn't just picking an unusual instrument — he was making a philosophical statement. His sonic storytelling relied on orchestral contrast: the blaster beam's dark, metallic timbre clashed directly against established orchestral notes, making V'ger feel genuinely alien rather than theatrically villainous.

You can hear this tension most clearly when the blaster beam cuts off the Klingon militaristic theme mid-battle, signaling that humanity's familiar frameworks simply don't apply to V'ger. Goldsmith layered Craig Huxley's custom "computer dialog" tracks into the film's climax, giving V'ger a voice unlike anything previously heard in the Star Trek franchise. The result wasn't just a soundtrack — it was an argument that the unknown deserves its own language.

The blaster beam itself is played using a metal tube and a stick, giving it the raw, industrial quality that made it so effective at conveying something beyond human comprehension.

Why It Sounds So Alien and Unsettling

- Much like how Hokusai used Prussian Blue's synthetic depth to evoke something beyond nature's familiarity, the Blaster Beam achieves its unsettling power through timbres that exist outside conventional sonic experience.

That combination makes it perfect for voicing something as incomprehensible as V'ger.

Every Major Film That Put the Blaster Beam to Work

Once an instrument exists that can voice the incomprehensible, filmmakers come looking for it. The Blaster Beam's sound design credentials read like a hall of fame of genre cinema.

Jerry Goldsmith built V'ger's terrifying presence around it in Star Trek: The Motion Picture. James Horner returned to it repeatedly — in Star Trek III, Aliens, and Battle Beyond the Stars. Alan Silvestri wove it through all three Back to the Future films. Danny Elfman and Elliot Goldenthal each claimed it for their own projects. Even Star Wars: Episode II deployed it for the seismic charge sound effect.

From Poltergeist to 10 Cloverfield Lane, its cultural impact spans decades and genres. You're fundamentally hearing the same instrument every time cinema needs to make the unknown feel genuinely threatening.

How Composers Learned to Use the Blaster Beam After Star Trek TMP

• James Horner used it in Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982)
• John Barry, Leonard Rosenman, and Laurence Rosenthal all incorporated it into their scores
• Michael Stearns applied it to the IMAX film *Chronos*
• Goldsmith himself contrasted the beam's alien tones against traditional orchestral notes

Each composer had to experiment before they could control it effectively. The instrument itself is built around a heavy aluminum beam strung with piano wires and fitted with electric guitar pickups, which gives it a rich, dark bass tone with powerful harmonics that lend themselves naturally to experimental scoring.

Where You Can Still Hear the Blaster Beam in Modern Film Scores

You don't need to dig through obscure recordings to find it.

These films prove the instrument still carries real creative value for composers and sound designers working across multiple genres today. Modern blockbuster trailers and scores frequently rely on sustained, low-frequency textures and bass-heavy sounds, with sub-bass rumble techniques now considered a standard part of the cinematic sonic palette popularized in part by films like Inception.