Because Ritual Howls' 2016 album Into the Water is one of those perfect albums, some of the individual songs that make up that perfection get taken for granted. This is one of those. Although, honestly it's hard to hear this in a way that doesn't lead directly into the next track on the album, 'Coils and Magnets'.
31 Days of Halloween:
1) Tales of Halloween: Sweet Tooth/The Wolf Man (1941)
2) From Beyond/Monsterland: Port Fourchon, Louisiana/Tales of Halloween: The Night Billy Raised Hell/Tales of Halloween: Trick
3) Mulholland Drive/Creepshow (1982): The Crate
4) Waxwork
5) Synchronic/Bad Hair
6) Dolls
7) Lovecraft Country Ep. 8/Tales of Halloween: The Weak and the Wicken/Tales of Halloween: The Grim Grinning Ghost
8) 976-Evil
9) Repo! The Genetic Opera
10) Firestarter/George A. Romero's Bruiser
11) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 1 & 2/Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
12) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 3, 4, and 5/House of 1000 Corpses
13) Masque of the Red Death/Creepshow (2019) Episode 7/Creepshow (1982)
14) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 6 and 7
Playlist:
Halloween Playlist
St. Germain - Tourist
Concrete Blonde - Bloodletting
The Smiths - The Queen is Dead
Prince - Sign O' The Times
Deftones - Ohm
Jucifer - L'autrichienne
Chris Connelly - Sleeping Partner
Blut Aus Nord - Hallucinogen
Type O Negative - World Coming Down
Card:
Getting the wheel turning again on several things that are in need of closure.
It's been nice to finally get the first album by my old band Darkness Brings the Cold digitally distributed. I recorded this album roughly fourteen years ago - I finished it shortly before moving to LALALand. There's more to come, as the singer/songwriter Dennis Hellmann and I recorded by ourselves before putting the band together, and then via email after I moved. The stuff before is great but a little rough around the edges at time, especially when other collaborators are involved (not the guys in the eventual band). The stuff after is great, and I have no qualms about releasing it as it stands now.
For the record, I have zero shame in liking this music so much because frankly, all I did was play the guitar, and on every album but this one, I never heard any of the songs until after they were finished and a full album. When we were working by email, sometimes that was months. There's still one we recorded ten years ago that I've never heard (massive production stall, and then some). Dennis wrote almost all the songs on bass with an Acid Pro backing track, then I came in and laid guitar. In the case of this particular album, Devil Swank, Vol. 1, former Tub Ring drummer Dave Tavares - a long-time friend well before this band - and the dearly departed Jeremy Musika helped Dennis and I re-arrange preexisting material for a four-piece band.
It's nice to finally get this stuff on streaming platforms so I can seamlessly interject it into my Halloween playlist.
31 Days of Halloween:
1) Tales of Halloween: Sweet Tooth/The Wolf Man (1941)
2) From Beyond/Monsterland: Port Fourchon, Louisiana/Tales of Halloween: The Night Billy Raised Hell/Tales of Halloween: Trick
3) Mulholland Drive/Creepshow (1982): The Crate
4) Waxwork
5) Synchronic/Bad Hair
6) Dolls
7) Lovecraft Country Ep. 8/Tales of Halloween: The Weak and the Wicken/Tales of Halloween: The Grim Grinning Ghost
8) 976-Evil
9) Repo! The Genetic Opera
10) Firestarter/George A. Romero's Bruiser
11) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 1 & 2/Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
12) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 3, 4, and 5/House of 1000 Corpses
13) Masque of the Red Death/Creepshow (2019) Episode 7/Creepshow (1982)
I know I post a lot from these folks, but their covers are always so damn awesome. This one really made me laugh this morning, not because it's funny or they're making fun, but because it just looks like they are having such a good time covering this classic Ozzy song which has kind of slipped into the seat cushions of my life. Thanks for the reminder guys - gonna fire up Diary of a Madman now.
1) Tales of Halloween: Sweet Tooth/The Wolf Man (1941)
2) From Beyond/Monsterland: Port Fourchon, Louisiana/Tales of Halloween: The Night Billy Raised Hell/Tales of Halloween: Trick
3) Mulholland Drive/Creepshow (1982): The Crate
4) Waxwork
5) Synchronic/Bad Hair
6) Dolls
7) Lovecraft Country Ep. 8/Tales of Halloween: The Weak and the Wicken/Tales of Halloween: The Grim Grinning Ghost
8) 976-Evil
9) Repo! The Genetic Opera
10) Firestarter/George A. Romero's Bruiser
11) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 1 & 2/Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
12) The Haunting of Bly Manor episodes 3, 4, and 5/House of 1000 Corpses
I'm really trying to mix up the 31 nights of viewing this year, however, there are a few films that are absolute must-watch entries every year. Rob Zombie's House of 1000 Corpses is one of those. Here's the opening scene, which next to the opening scene from Christopher McQuarrie's 2000 Way of the Gun, is my favorite intro to a movie ever:
See? The level of humor and unease mix so well in this scene, and that could not have been easy to do.
The Horror Vision:
Here's the newest episode of The Horror Vision - our 2 year anniversary episode no less. Also available on all streaming platforms.
I've been hip-deep in old Skinny Puppy records and it feels great. It's been a while since I've sunk this deep into theirt catalogue, and I've even begun making inroads into listening to some of their later records, beginning with 1996's The Process, a record I avoided when I was younger because of all the hulabaloo around its release. I have to say, other than the first song - which is the only track on the record that was recorded at their old Canadian studio - I'm not entirely convinced I should go any further. Last Rites always just seemed like a perfect place for their existence to stop.
31 Days of Halloween:
We did the first two episodes of Mike Flanagan's new The Haunting of Bly Manor yesterday for our main entry in 31 Days of Halloween. Really good. Flanagan's craft continues to evolve, his ability for total immersion in the worlds he creates among the best out there. Based on the works of Henry James, basically wrapping all of his ghost stories up into one narrative, I can't wait to see where this goes.
1) Tales of Halloween: Sweet Tooth/The Wolf Man (1941)
2) From Beyond/Monsterland: Port Fourchon, Louisiana/Tales of Halloween: The Night Billy Raised Hell/Tales of Halloween: Trick
3) Mulholland Drive/Creepshow (1982): The Crate
4) Waxwork
5) Synchronic/Bad Hair
6) Dolls
7) Lovecraft Country Ep. 8/Tales of Halloween: The Weak and the Wicken/Tales of Halloween: The Grim Grinning Ghost
8) 976-Evil
9) Repo! The Genetic Opera
10) Firestarter/George A. Romero's Bruiser
11) The Haunting of Bly Manor (episodes 1 & 2)/Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
Playlist:
Skinny Puppy - Last Rights
Skinny Puppy - Inquisition EP
Naked Raygun - Raygun... Naked Saygun
Bauhaus - Burning from the Inside
Bauhaus - The Sky's Gone Out
Van Halen - 1984
Skinny Puppy - Too Dark Park
Card:
This card suggests a reserve of quiet strength and a domestic outlook. This is interesting when I juxtapose those concepts with my own continued estrangement from the state in which I live. Over the last few months, I've begun to seriously long for transporting my life with K to a more reliable, affordable, and low key location. Small town life sounds amazing to me. I think some of this is just a natural reaction to all the insanity the last four years have produced, however, I am not foolish enough to think that if captain hairdo gets voted out things will change or get better. In fact, regardless of the outcome - in which I definitely hope captain hairdo is ousted - I think things are only going to get worse. This is where that reserve of quiet strength comes in handy, and I'm happy to be reminded of it now.
I knew nothing of David Borden until my good friend Chester sent me a link to the above track this morning. I must say, I went in blind, having only just woken up, and was immediately entranced. This led to a google-storm that finished at the Bandcamp page HERE where you can buy this wonderful re-issue of Music For Amplified Keyboard Instruments for only $8.25, lovingly released by Cleveland, Ohio's Spectrum Spools. This is the label also responsible for Belong's October Language, one of my favorite ambient or soundscape records in the last ten years
From the Bandcamp page: "If there was ever a missing link in American Minimalism, David Borden is that link. He not only composed, innovated and performed in the peak years of this imperative movement, but did so on his own terms, with a startling lack of recognition for his revelatory contributions to contemporary musical history."
Wake of a Nation EP out October 23rd, pre-order HERE.
31 Days of Halloween:
Last night's viewing was an unexpected one: Darren Lynn Bousman's Repo! The Genetic Opera. It'd been probably six years since I saw this one last - I remember because that was a communal viewing in a cemetery with a shadow Cast! At any rate, I had to dig my DVD out of storage, but it was well worth it. I love this flick so much, especially Anthony Stewart Head's character. Here's one of my favorite scenes:
1) Tales of Halloween: Sweet Tooth/The Wolf Man (1941)
2) From Beyond/Monsterland: Port Fourchon, Louisiana/Tales of Halloween: The Night Billy Raised Hell/Tales of Halloween: Trick
3) Mulholland Drive/Creepshow (1982): The Crate
4) Waxwork
5) Synchronic/Bad Hair
6) Dolls
7) Lovecraft Country Ep. 8/Tales of Halloween: The Weak and the Wicken/Tales of Halloween: The Grim Grinning Ghost
8) 976-Evil
9) Repo! The Genetic Opera
Oh! And I did attempt to watch 976-Evil II, but within 30 minutes deemed it unwatchable. I do not believe this is Mr. Wynorski's fault; quite the contrary. Within the film there is an evident barren feeling due to what I would imagine is a limited budget and a complete misuse of the funds they did have. The sets are often barren, as with the hotel room George "Buck" Flower's Turrell finds himself in after being taken into protective custody by the police. I don't know if I'm simply still adjusting to having a 4K television and how it highlights shortcomings in older productions, but the sparse contributions by the Art Department, and the ridiculous explosions (a toilet? Really? You spent production money on an exploding potty?), combined with the limited lighting, made me feel as though I was watching this one through the view screen on a camcorder.
Also, the gratuitous Spike-with-Machine-Gun scene was just lame.
Read:
After I finished re-reading Clive Barker's iconic The Hellbound Heart, I picked up the Kindle edition of The Toll, a novella written by Mark Miller, who works with Mr. Barker at his production company, Seraphim.
From the author: "Hellraiser: The Toll is a novella that bridges the events of The Hellbound Heart and The Scarlet Gospels. We thought it would be fun to see what kinds of hell Pinhead had been raising before we saw him in The Gospels. In Clive's novel, there's mention of a lot of mayhem Pinhead has been getting into in preparation for his hostile takeover of Hell. So there was lots of room to dive into what exactly that mayhem might look like. And in that conversation between Clive and me, it seemed to make sense that he'd visit Kirsty and that he'd also want her to be a witness for him, since their fates are tied together.
"It's a short book, but Kirsty goes through a lot along the way. And we also get to see who she's become since her time with the legendary hell priest. I'd written for the comic, which was an incredible experience. And having worked so closely on Gospels, and also with Clive all these years, when he gave me his blessing to take them into the world of prose, I hit the ground running and never looked back. A lot like Kirsty in the story. But you'll have to read it to find out exactly what that means."
I liked The Toll, but I didn't love it. It's cool to see a literary sequel to the Hellraiser film, as opposed to a sequel to The Hellbound Heart. There are definite differences between the two, primarily that in Hellbound, Kirsty is not the daughter of Julia's husband, and he is not named Larry. Instead, Julia's bough is Rory, and Kirsty is merely a friend. Barker's original novella is, of course, well worthy of its iconic status, however, being that he wrote and directed the film, the book has always seemed to me a first pass at what he eventually perfected on camera.
How often does that happen, eh?
At any rate, I liked catching up with Kirsty, and I loved the story's utilization of the defunct Devil's Island prison as a gateway to The Wastes. That said, the story seemed a bit rushed and under realized, and I could have done with a more fleshed out Pinhead (pun intended), not the mostly perfunctory one we receive instead.
Either way, Barker's The Scarlet Gospels looms on my horizon. First though, I once again find myself in the mood for a Halloween-timed re-read of Bret Easton Ellis' Lunar Park.
Playlist:
We're in full Autumnal musical territory now:
NIN - Pretty Hate Machine
Joy Division - Still
Bauhaus - In the Flat Field
The Final Cut - Consumed
Darkness Brings the Cold - Devil Swank, Vol. 1
Naked Raygun - Raygun... Naked Raygun
Skinny Puppy - Too Dark Park
Card:
The watery aspect of fire, or the ability (and experience) to know when to temper intellect with emotion. Also, clear insights and the fresh perspective of adopting the perspective of another and cutting your own head off long enough to truly experience that other perspective.
Damn. I just received word from Mr. Brown that Naked Raygun Bassist Pierre Kezdy has died at 58. Chicago local, Kezdy played on all the Raygun releases I heard in my high school group of friends when people's older brothers began to decimate albums down through their younger siblings' ranks. Holding You is the first Raygun song I ever remember hearing, and it's still my favorite. Something about that Sax. From the album, Raygun... Naked Raygun, which always struck me as hysterical when combined with the album art concept, a kind of James Bond-esque, cut-out, paper doll incoporating the band members' faces.
Very cool. These guys, along with Pegboy, The Effigies, and Big Black were the Chicago bands that formed my teenage views of one half of Chicago's musical scene/legacy (the other half of that being the Industrial scene).
