Halloween mixes abound during the Halloween season. Most of them are a pleasing mix of the familiar, the obscure and the downright left-of-field. One of my favourites for 2007 is Canuxploitation expert and occassional Horror Roundtable contributor Paul Corupe and his House of Shock. Paul is the go-to guy for vintage cult cinema over at Rue Morgue magazine, so it should come as no surprise that his Halloween mix is packed to the gills with oddball novelty tunes and forgotten classics. I’ll admit that I’m not much of an expert on music to begin with, but I swear I’ve never seen the vast majority of these songs. You know you’re in dangerous territory when the radio spots interspersed throughout are more familiar than the songs themselves. While you’re at it, make sure you download the CD cover for the mix.

For the past few years I’ve left one post at the same time every year at my very first blog in honour of International Read A Comic Book Naked Day. It’s possibly the most consistent, least updated blog on the internet. Runner-up could be Ghost Town, an mp3 blog that reappears every October to provide 31 days of music for ghouls and creeps. It’s only four days in and already The Dude has posted a wide variety of musical selections, including a memorial to “Boris” Pickett, a couple of unlikely hip-hop selections and an appreciation for the Wolfman. Dig it.

I’m giving away one copy of the soundtrack for Rob Zombie’s Halloween, featuring KISS and Alice Fucking Cooper, provided by the fine folks at Deep Focus. To win, simply name the Halloween films that correspond with the masks shown above. Answers should be left in the comments. The first person to name them all correctly, or the person with the most correct answers by next Monday, gets the soundtrack. Good Luck! Halloween hits theatres August 31st.

Kill the pig, pig, pig, pig
Kill him, kill him, kill him and make him bleed
Get the blood, blood, blood, blood
Kill the pig, make him bleed
Take the blood that’s all we need

- Out For Blood from Carrie, the Musical

I haven’t been keeping up with my favourite music blogs recently, and that’s too bad, because I nearly missed out something I’ve been seeking for awhile now. You Don’t Have To Visit This Blog has a bootleg compilation available of the Carrie Broadway adaptation from that most glorious of decades, the 1980’s. Thrill to the operatic jazzercise sounds of such songs as Out For Blood, The Destruction, and Shower Scene. YDHTVTB also provides plenty of info for those interested in the play’s shameful history. The audio was taken off the floor, so don’t expect pristine quality. Considering the rarity of these songs, I’ll take whatever I can get my hands on.

Recently, the proprieter of You Don’t Have To Visit This Blog has been considering an early retirement from blogging, so make sure you take a peek, dig around, and let him know his work is appreciated.

Drilltar! As Paul mentioned in the comments of an earlier post, vinyl and soundtrack sharity blogs have a short shelf life. The erratic nature of the downloads is the main reason I haven’t linked to any in the past few months. Well, it’s about time I got back into the swing of things, and what better way to reintroduce the world to the wonders of obscure music then through The Slumber Party Massacre. Parts 1 and 2, no less, from the super fine proprieter of The Manchester Morgue. Make sure you read all the way through for links to even more slasher soundtracks.

With all the current emphasis on the grindhouse aspects of the 70s, one thing from that era that seems to be shoved aside is the mainstream acceptance of various pseudo-sciences, from UFOs to Cryptozoology. I was too young to catch the full force of that trend, but it still trickled down through the years enough that me and my cousin devoured every book about unexplained phenomenon we could get our hands on. Years later, I can vividly remember many of the stories I learned from my self-education. There’s nothing like the possibility of strange and wondrous things wandering the world to fuel the imagination of a little kid.

One of the first and best shows to deal with the unexplained was In Searh Of… Cool Kooky Hip and Groovy has been kind enough to post an album of eclectic music from the show.

MFF is a hip-hop horror duo that have cobbled together over 200 samples taken strictly from DVDs of the Evil Dead trilogy to create the world’s grooviest mash-up. My favourite part of the whole thing? The track originally appeared on their album, Twitch of the Def Nerve. Word!

SEX MACHINE “bootleg” trailer

Bow chika wow wouw. Horror Roundtable Direct-To-DVD specialist Bill Cunningham has directed his considerable pulp prowess towards promoting a little film called Sex Machine. From the press release.

Sex Machine , which takes its name from a mysterious tattoo on the hero’s arm is the gripping story of a man who wakes up in the middle of a gangland hit to discover that his limbs are not his own. Frank is a tough-talking patchwork assassin, stitched together from the body parts of other failed assassins. When Frank learns that his ex-girlfriend is the next test subject, he opens both barrels on his “creators” and unleashes a gory bloodbath of revenge.

Add to that some mad science, strip clubs and a mystery man with a bandaged face, and how could you possibly go wrong?

Sean T. Collins delivers the monster music goodness once again, this time with the video for Menomena’s song Cough Coughing. The video showcases a trashquatch Santa Claus wreaking havoc through suburbia. The narrative matches the editing of the video so closely you’d think the song was created for the visuals, and not vice versa.

Sean T. Collins over at Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat has posted a great little video entitled Sheena Was A Parasite by a band called The Horrors. I have many weaknesses, and one of them is purposely low-grade filmmaking masking high-end special effects (for another example of what I’m talking about, check the news footage in Signs). Academy award-nominee Samantha Morton plays the title parasite, which is kind of shocking considering her adorable portrayal in Sweet and Lowdown. The video was banned on MTV, not because of the disturbing hentai implications but because of all the strobing. I blame Poekmon.

Michael I. Cohen of the film blog FLICKHEAD (it’s so much better capitalized) shares the kind of strange tale of obsession that most movie buffs can relate to. In his case, the nearly-decade long hunt for a song that accompanied a Kenneth Anger short.

“What impressed me about Rabbit’s Moon wasn’t the film itself — a seven-minute, black-and-white affair in which three clowns prance around in a moon-lit forest. No, what really caught my attention was the soundtrack — a demonic laugh kicked off a jaunty, organ-driven Beatlesque song that sounded like some half-forgotten top forty hit from the glam-rock era.”

The entire twisted tale, along with an mp3 of the song in question, can be found here.

Halloween brings with it so many wonderful treats that it’s going to be months after that date before I exhaust all the wonders I’ve collected. This year was especially great for aural delights, and one of my favourite mp3 blogs stepped it up with a trio of garage band goodness. Office Naps presents a trio of truly whacked out and rare novelty 45s for a cold Autumn night. All three selections are fascinating, but if you choose only one make sure you check out Strangler in the Night for it’s pure psychotronic giddiness. How could they allow these deviants the freedom to roam the streets with normal, God-fearin’ folk?

The Horror Blog’s New York correspondent, JA of My New Plaid Pants, has braved The Splatter Zone and returned to take apart the off-broadway production of Evil Dead - The Musical. I rip off more links from My New Plaid Pants than you can imagine, so if you get a chance I encourage you to take a peek.

Evil Dead - The Musical

I’ve been to Universal Studios three or four times in my life - what can I say, I’m a big Jurassic Park fan - but I’ve never gone to see Beetlejuice’s Rockin’ Graveyard Revue, a live show in which the “ghost with the most” rounds up all the classic Universal Monsters (a la this very site’s Monster Rally - only instead of of a brutal fight to the death, it involves song-and-dance routines set to what I expect to be some approximation of “rockin’” tunes) where they, I assume, entertain the kiddies in a spectacularly cheesy fashion, fangs not included.

But now, yes, the characters may’ve changed, the curse-quotient amplified up to 11, the sexual innuendo distinctly somewhere between a PG and a mild PG-13 (no boobies!), and something tells me the front rows at the Beetlejuice show, filled with toddlers and their weary parents, are never spritzed with red-dye-infused corn syrup, but all these distractions aside, I’m guessing that witnessing Evil Dead: The Musical is somewhere on par with what happenin’ at that Rockin’ Graveyard scene.

Now, I know the Evil Dead films are hardly Tennessee Williams we’re talking about here. The source material - the first and second films thrown into a blender, a light dusting of Army of Darkness sprinkled over the top – is a cult classic because of the deep, deep silliness with which director Sam Raimi and star Bruce Campbell approach the ridiculous story. But Raimi’s exaggerated tracking shots, Campbell’s Stooge-mimicry and genius at delivering a line, thrown together with an, at times, genuine creepiness, not to mention gallons upon galloons of every-color-of-the-rainbow gore, somehow added up to the perfect concoction – a sort of post-modern splatter comedy, where everything is making fun of itself while at the same time going straight for, yes, the jugular. They wanted to pick their teeth with your funny bone, if you will.

That sense of irreverence is taken to the Nth degree with the stage show, but sadly, because of the limitations of having to, you know, stand in front of a live audience and not actually be chopping the actors to bits but rather rely on rather shoddy improvisations of the violence – a beheading in shadow behind a screen, for instance – the gore, which nicely leveled out the silliness in the films, and made them something you knew you couldn’t watch with dear old Mum (Mum was an intestine-spewing demon in the basement, actually), is overtaken by the campiness and what’s left is, well, a demon in a sequined jacket doing dance moves ripped off from “Thriller”.

There was one genuinely creepy moment on stage – the infamous rape-by-tree-branches scene, of course – that I thought worked, but this show exists primarily for laughs, and it does get them, but it somewhat swallows the soul of the material in the process. Again, yes, not the Bible they’re reenacting here, but with the balance slipping way into camp-territory, the film’s charms dissipated into endless clouds of dry-ice smoke and bad puns. You got the feeling, with the films, that Raimi wanted distinctly to accost you, to make you want to barf mid-laugh; the only thing that felt accosted after the stage show were my eardrums.

But with all that said, there were laughs to be had. At first, actor Ryan Ward as Ash seemed too slight in frame to be playing our Bruce Campbell stand-in, but as the show went on and he began spouting the familiar lines (”Gimme some sugar, baby” gleefully included) and coating himself in fake blood he became far more convincing. By the time he’d slipped the chainsaw on his stump and spoke of his “boom stick” he’d won me over.

The women were, perhaps appropriately, completely indistinguishable from each other, except for actress Jenna Coker as Ash’s sister, Cheryl, who was the chief bearer of the bad puns and cheerleader-happy dance moves, which she did with an unfortunate relish that led to much of the ratcheting up of the camp-factor to a level somewhere in the vicinity of beyond bearable. Yes, the badness of the puns was commented upon and done on purpose, but she delivered them with such lick-her-lips glee that it slid rght back from aren’t-we-clever? into just plain badness again. And Brandon Wardell as Ash’s friend Scott did his best Stifler impersonation.

The music was fun - with such titles as “Do the Necronomicon” and “You Blew That B**** Away”, how could it not be? – but the surprising stand-out was Daryl Winslow as Jake (the hillbilly character from Evil Dead 2) singing “Good Old Reliable Jake” as some sort of Meatloaf-inspired power ballad. By the time he’d gotten to his next number, “Ode to an Accidental Stabbing”, he’d become my favorite person on stage.

So in the end what you get is a show that is trying too hard. It takes the already exaggerated tone of the films so far in one direction for laughs that the screams are pretty much snuffed out. The much-hyped “Splatter Zone” – the first few rows of the audience where you’re supposedly hosed down with so much gore they provide raincoats – appeared to, by the end, be more of a Trickle Zone. Somewhere between remembering their Michael Jackson dance-moves and, you know, not actually being decapitated, the actors had other concerns and I, well I just wished for a good eyeball down the throat.

For more information on the show, visit the Evil Dead - The Musical fansite.

The original Bat Out Of Hell album was the soundtrack to at least two or three summers during my misspent youth. I have no idea why or how this came about. Maybe it just spoke to me and my friends because we grew up tough in the Rose City, and flaming motorcycles, rock operas and getting laid were the only three things we could relate to. When we would all crash at my place on Saturday nights, one of my friends would refuse to awaken until well after noon. We would shove, kick and punch him, but he just wouldn’t wake up. Finally, we placed Bat Out Of Hell on the turntable and over the course of nearly ten minutes he arose to the beat of the title song. It remains one of the most beautiful things I have ever witnessed.

Moviehole is reporting that Meatloaf is attempting to get a Bat Out Of Hell movie made. I don’t know about anyone else, but if this gets made you’ll find me in the cinema in the Rose City on opening night with all the other dirtbags.

Link via Cinematical.

This is how kids get their kicks these days. Squatting in filthy rags, all hopped up on goofballs and ludes, pretending at freedom. That is, until Daddy’s money runs out and the world comes knocking. Then those lousy beatniks end up looking down the neck of a bottle, or the barrel of a gun. Just like we did when we were kids. Yeah, the gutter is one sure way to close the generation gap. And if I were to place the blame for this epidemic of delinquency anywhere it would be square on the shoulders of one Little Danny, proprieter of a happening little pad called Office Naps. He’s the pusher. The one playing all the tunes and calling all the shots. Do you know what your children are listening to? Whatever Little Danny wants them to…

Shock Music in Hi-Fi

Hello Horror Blog readers! Little Danny of Office Naps here. The Honorable Mr. Wintle graciously extended the invitation for a Halloween-related post, and, in response, I’ve included a vintage bit of odd-io for your delectation.

I suppose the common complaint about some of our favorite holidays is that, in the interest of selling holiday-related merch and placating the anxieties of our more righteous, religious sectors, these same holidays tend to be expurgated of their color, piquancy, and content. That is, if you’re disappointed by the way that Halloween is routinely represented by ridiculous, warmed-over pap like “The Monster Mash,” I’m here to say that I feel your pain, horror fans. Of course, you likely know better. You likely know, when seeking your Halloween audio fix, to turn to the very musical underpinning of your obsession: the horror soundtrack. Yes, from the eerie synthesizers of the Italian horror oeuvre to classic Hitchcock-style staccato strings, the horror soundtrack has always been - and will always be - where the most unapologetically terrifying sounds dwell.

Enter Shock Music in Hi-Fi. Released in 1958, it was the first of two similarly-themed volumes (the second entitled, naturally, Panic: The Son of Shock) by noted composer, arranger, and producer Creed Taylor. These weren’t soundtracks per se. They were, rather, albums comprised of miniature 3 minute tableaux, self-contained musical storylines which took their cues from horror cinema and exercises like The Twilight Zone , and which set about terrifying us with dark, jazzy arrangements, creepy sound effects, and titles like “The Crank,” “You’re Driving Me Crazy,” and “Time Runs Out.” Take “The Crank,” for instance. We hear a phone number being dialed, we hear the phone ringing, we hear a friendly male voice answer. And then we hear the click of disconnection. It’s hard to convey its distinctly banal variety of psychological terror, but, repeated with increasing frequency - and set against a rising crescendo of dissonant horns and strings - this routine was typical fare for Shock Music in Hi-Fi. And it served its purpose very effectively.

Hand picked for the Horror Blog, this selection, “Heartbeat,” is also exemplary. Here we’re reminded that nothing can be as weirdly ominous as the awareness of our own breathing and heartbeat at the threshold of a darkened room. And the awareness of… ahem, someone else in that darkened room.

As you’ll hear. Here, then, is to heavy breathing! Happy Halloween!

The Creed Taylor Orchestra, Heartbeat
from Shock Music In Hi-Fi (ABC-Paramount, 1958)