A graveyard smash
Hey, ho, it's Halloween, and you know what that means: scary songs straight from SoulReaper's vaults to pump up your holiday cheer! I obviously meant to get this up earlier, but technical difficulties cocked up the works. All is fixed now. You'll note that the usual suspects (trashy punks, funky Italians, etc.) have naturally returned, but this year I've tried to include a few fairly modern selections.
This has always been my favorite time of year, and no matter the state of the world, it always will be. I hope your Halloween is as happy as can be. If these 20 terrifying tunes aren't enough for you, take a trip back to the playlists from 2008 and 2007. Oh, and here are our 2009 jack o'lanterns... the cooler one (on the left) is Sassy Frass' handiwork.
1. Buddy Baker and Xavier Atencio, "Grim Grinning Ghosts" (A Musical History of Disneyland, 2005) - We begin with the jaunty theme song from Disneyland's Haunted Mansion, which is one of the most Halloweeny-sounding songs I know. For anyone who's ever ridden it, the theatrical howling should bring back rickety memories of family-friendly animatronic specters. I chopped the musical segment out of the track myself; the CD contains the classic dark ride's entire soundtrack.
2. They Might Be Giants, "The Edison Museum" (No!, 2002) - "Grim Grinning Ghosts" always reminds of TMBG, who have a number of ghoulish tracks in their catalog. This one from their first children's album (and previously on the download-only album Long Tall Weekend) sings the praises of "the tallest, widest and most famous haunted mansion in New Jersey." The vocals are by WFMU DJ Nicholas Hill.
3. "Weird Al" Yankovic, "Nature Trail to Hell" (In 3-D, 1984) - The subject of my last playlist returns to kick off our tribute to horror movie songs with this gem about a fictitious slasher film. Lyrically packed with the sort of advertising ballyhoo once used to hard-sell tedious stalk-and-chop snoozers, this is Al's "Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati." Now that the '80s slasher nostalgia wave is cresting, someone should actually make "Nature Trail to Hell."
4. Meco, "Werewolf (Loose in London)" (Impressions of An American Werewolf in London, 1981) - Yes, the man behind the disco version of the "Star Wars" theme did garish tributes to other movies, too. This ridiculous slab of sub-Meat Loaf bombast is terrible, but worth a laugh, especially if you think of it as an exploitative spinoff from the classic Landis joint. I must be honest, I actually got this track from The Best of Meco, which is all the Meco a sane person really needs.
5. Captain Zorro, "Phantasm" (Phantasm, 1979) - Speaking of disco, here's a rarity from the polyester era's dog days. I have no idea who Captain Zorro is, but their funky cover of the "Phantasm" music is actually pretty awesome if you don't think about The Tall Man shaking his bony old ass to it. The original theme by Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrave is one of the greatest '70s horror movie refrains, on par with the more celebrated likes of "Halloween" and "The Exorcist."
6. DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince, "Nightmare on My Street" (He's the DJ, I'm the Rapper, 1988) - A mere 9 years into the Willennium, here's one everybody knows. As little as I've enjoyed Will Smith in recent years, I can't pretend that I didn't listen to this tribute to Freddy Krueger all the time in junior high, or that it isn't a brilliant piece of pop rap. It was released the same year as "A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master," but unfortunately wasn't on the soundtrack.
7. S.O.D., "Freddy Krueger" (Speak English or Die, 1985) - A more underground response to Wes Craven's epochal slasher opus brings us into louder territory. Stormtroopers of Death was a side project of thrash metal titans Anthrax with a sarcastic spirit and fierce mosh riffs that made their debut album a staple of '80s hardcore/crossover. It came out before Freddy became a self-parody, so Scott Ian's fanboy lyrics here reflect the bastard son of a thousand maniacs' scarier early appearances.
8. The Vision Bleak, "Elizabeth Dane" (The Deathship Has a New Captain, 2004) - Former Empyrium mainman Ulf Schwadorf traded austere German folk metal for tacky goth metal in his ongoing Vision Bleak project. I've only heard the debut, which isn't great but contains a few groovy numbers in a Sisters of Mercy-meets-Moonspell vein. This instrumental contains dialogue by the late John Houseman lifted from John Carpenter's underrated "The Fog," while Ulf and pals bash out a rocked-up version of the director's eerie theme music.
9. The Rotted, "28 Days Later" (Get Dead or Die Trying, 2008) - Last year, to reflect a more rock n' roll attitude, British death/thrash favorites Gorerotted changed their name to The Rotted, acquiring former Cradle of Filth guitarist Gian Pyres for the debut with the new moniker. The disc's pretty good, but the final stroke of British pride leaves the strongest impression, a doom metal adaptation of John Murphy's menacing theme from Danny Boyle's post-apocalyptic pseudo-zombie drama.
10. Goblin, "L'Alba Dei Morti Viventi" (Zombi, 1978) - George A. Romero's "Dawn of the Dead," considered by many to be the best zombie movie ever made, was released as "Zombi" in producer Dario Argento's native Italy. Romero's one of my favorite filmmakers, but one of the dumbest things he ever did was replace most of Goblin's brilliant score with canned music for the American cut. This ghostly Pink Floydian cue is one of the few pieces that remained in all international versions.
11. Fabio Frizzi and Giorgio Tucci, "Main Title" (Zombi 2, 1979) - Italy's most famous "Dawn of the Dead" ripoff was the sequel-in-name-only "Zombi 2," known on these shores as "Zombie," or "that movie where the zombie fights a shark." The movie came out in 1979, but a soundtrack wasn't released until the '90s, when director Lucio Fulci's short run of astoundingly gruesome horror flicks was enjoying a resurgence after his death. The mellotron-fueled Frizzi/Tucci theme is one of the most beloved in Italian horror, as cheap, garish and grim as the flick it scores.
12. Keith Emerson, "Mater Tenebrarum" (Inferno, 1980) - For Dario Argento's divisive follow-up to "Suspiria," the director employed the scoring services of one of his favorite musicians, prog keyboardist Emerson. The man who put the "E" in ELP provided a mostly subdued, piano-based soundtrack that adds to the film's dreamlike languidity, but this cathedral rocker screaming the praises of the Three Mothers better exemplifies Argento's striking sensibility.
13. Danny Elfman, "The Church Battle" (Sleepy Hollow, 1999) - Considering the macabre slant of his working relationship with Tim Burton, it's surprising that composer Danny Elfman doesn't have more horror movies under his belt. We recently revisited their Hammer studios tribute "Sleepy Hollow," shocked that it's now a decade old. The story is more ludicrous to me now, but it's still a lot of bloody fun, and the music is appropriately sinister and calamitous.
14. GraveRobber and Chorus, "Genetic Repo Man" (Repo! The Genetic Opera, 2008) - While certainly flawed, the widely-panned goth musical "Repo!" is a unique piece of work. Its confounded marketers tried to push it as a modern "Rocky Horror," but it's less of a satire (despite its digs at plastic surgery) and more an outlandish and convoluted family drama with gore. This bombastic tune from early in the film, sung by co-writer Terrance Zdunich, sets up the main character's job.
15. Rob Zombie, "House of 1000 Corpses" (House of 1000 Corpses, 2001) - Speaking of fascinating messes, here's the groovy theme song to Rob Zombie's directorial debut, which is essentially "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" retold as a "Natural Born Killers"-style visual assault. I prefer the grittier sequel, "The Devil's Rejects," but "House" is an enjoyably random mishmash of ghoulish imagery. If Rob had continued the industrialized rockabilly stomp he explored here, I'd still buy his albums.
16. Los Straitjackets, "'The Munsters' Theme" (Halloween Hootenanny, 1998) - Through his short-lived Zombie-A-Go-Go label, Rob Zombie also gave the world one of the season's coolest rock albums, the trash rock compilation Halloween Hootenanny. Among its many fine exclusive tracks is this swinging "Munsters" adaptation by Los Straitjackets, the famed Mexican wrestling mask-clad surf rockers from Nashville. FYI, Hootenanny is still in print and goes for pretty cheap on Amazon.
17. The Ghastly Ones, "Hangman Hangten" (A-Haunting We Will Go-Go, 1997) - Also Hootenanny participants, California's Ghastly Ones (named after the great Andy Milligan movie) were one of few groups who actually put out an album through Zombie-A-Go-Go. This track is as good a sample as any, a jacked-up surfin' safari with an evocative title and creature feature sound effects. The Ghastly Ones maintain a low profile, but are still active and perform regionally.
18. The Cramps, "The Creature from the Black Leather Lagoon" (Stay Sick!, 1990) - Pour out a little of your pumpkin ale today for Lux Interior, the legendary cross-dressing trashoholic who passed away in February. As the frontman for The Cramps, he and his guitarist wife Poison Ivy Rorschach kept alive the flame of drive-in culture: rowdy rock, fast cars, sexual heat and low-budget monsters. This song has it all. We already miss you, Lux... happy Halloween, wherever you are.
19. The Aquabats!, "Monsters Wedding" (Vs. the Floating Eye of Death! and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 1, 1999) - As sugar-fueled costumed superheroes and spiritual descendants of Devo, the long-dormant Aquabats! have the right attitude of campy fun for Halloween, as well as a fair number of songs about the uncanny. This one from their third platter sees an apprehensive Bat Commander (aka Christian Jacobs, co-creator of Nick Jr.'s "Yo Gabba Gabba!") joined to a creepy chick in macabre matrimony.
20. Misfits, "Halloween" (Halloween, 1981) - We conclude with the patron saints of horror punk. As I've made clear in the past, I fully support the Misfits' 1990s comeback material, but this year I decided to feature something from the era when Glenn Danzig was the wiry, howling Evil Elvis, not the musclebound self-parody we occasionally tolerate today. This is their ode to the holiday, and it features the anthemic yet slightly eerie edge that characterized their classics.
Finally, for those of you who stuck around, here are 20 trailers for flicks that would be welcome at any Halloween party I'd attend. They span the glorious two decades following 1968, the year George A. Romero changed horror cinema.
1. "Dracula Has Risen from the Grave" (1968)
2. "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" (1971)
3. "Let's Scare Jessica to Death" (1971)
4. "Don't Look in the Basement" (1973)
5. "Return of the Evil Dead" (1973)
6. "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein" (1973)
7. "Shivers" (1975)
8. "Eaten Alive" (1977)
9. "Prophecy" (1979)
10. "Hell of the Living Dead" (1980)
11. "Deadly Blessing" (1981)
12. "Creepshow" (1982)
13. "Parasite" (1982)
14. "Sole Survivor" (1982)
15. "Pieces" (1982)
16. "The Deadly Spawn" (1983)
17. "The Stuff" (1985)
18. "TerrorVision" (1986)
19. "The Gate" (1987)
20. "Prince of Darkness" (1987)
This has always been my favorite time of year, and no matter the state of the world, it always will be. I hope your Halloween is as happy as can be. If these 20 terrifying tunes aren't enough for you, take a trip back to the playlists from 2008 and 2007. Oh, and here are our 2009 jack o'lanterns... the cooler one (on the left) is Sassy Frass' handiwork.
1. Buddy Baker and Xavier Atencio, "Grim Grinning Ghosts" (A Musical History of Disneyland, 2005) - We begin with the jaunty theme song from Disneyland's Haunted Mansion, which is one of the most Halloweeny-sounding songs I know. For anyone who's ever ridden it, the theatrical howling should bring back rickety memories of family-friendly animatronic specters. I chopped the musical segment out of the track myself; the CD contains the classic dark ride's entire soundtrack.2. They Might Be Giants, "The Edison Museum" (No!, 2002) - "Grim Grinning Ghosts" always reminds of TMBG, who have a number of ghoulish tracks in their catalog. This one from their first children's album (and previously on the download-only album Long Tall Weekend) sings the praises of "the tallest, widest and most famous haunted mansion in New Jersey." The vocals are by WFMU DJ Nicholas Hill.
3. "Weird Al" Yankovic, "Nature Trail to Hell" (In 3-D, 1984) - The subject of my last playlist returns to kick off our tribute to horror movie songs with this gem about a fictitious slasher film. Lyrically packed with the sort of advertising ballyhoo once used to hard-sell tedious stalk-and-chop snoozers, this is Al's "Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati." Now that the '80s slasher nostalgia wave is cresting, someone should actually make "Nature Trail to Hell."
4. Meco, "Werewolf (Loose in London)" (Impressions of An American Werewolf in London, 1981) - Yes, the man behind the disco version of the "Star Wars" theme did garish tributes to other movies, too. This ridiculous slab of sub-Meat Loaf bombast is terrible, but worth a laugh, especially if you think of it as an exploitative spinoff from the classic Landis joint. I must be honest, I actually got this track from The Best of Meco, which is all the Meco a sane person really needs.
5. Captain Zorro, "Phantasm" (Phantasm, 1979) - Speaking of disco, here's a rarity from the polyester era's dog days. I have no idea who Captain Zorro is, but their funky cover of the "Phantasm" music is actually pretty awesome if you don't think about The Tall Man shaking his bony old ass to it. The original theme by Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrave is one of the greatest '70s horror movie refrains, on par with the more celebrated likes of "Halloween" and "The Exorcist."
6. DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince, "Nightmare on My Street" (He's the DJ, I'm the Rapper, 1988) - A mere 9 years into the Willennium, here's one everybody knows. As little as I've enjoyed Will Smith in recent years, I can't pretend that I didn't listen to this tribute to Freddy Krueger all the time in junior high, or that it isn't a brilliant piece of pop rap. It was released the same year as "A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master," but unfortunately wasn't on the soundtrack.
7. S.O.D., "Freddy Krueger" (Speak English or Die, 1985) - A more underground response to Wes Craven's epochal slasher opus brings us into louder territory. Stormtroopers of Death was a side project of thrash metal titans Anthrax with a sarcastic spirit and fierce mosh riffs that made their debut album a staple of '80s hardcore/crossover. It came out before Freddy became a self-parody, so Scott Ian's fanboy lyrics here reflect the bastard son of a thousand maniacs' scarier early appearances.
8. The Vision Bleak, "Elizabeth Dane" (The Deathship Has a New Captain, 2004) - Former Empyrium mainman Ulf Schwadorf traded austere German folk metal for tacky goth metal in his ongoing Vision Bleak project. I've only heard the debut, which isn't great but contains a few groovy numbers in a Sisters of Mercy-meets-Moonspell vein. This instrumental contains dialogue by the late John Houseman lifted from John Carpenter's underrated "The Fog," while Ulf and pals bash out a rocked-up version of the director's eerie theme music.
9. The Rotted, "28 Days Later" (Get Dead or Die Trying, 2008) - Last year, to reflect a more rock n' roll attitude, British death/thrash favorites Gorerotted changed their name to The Rotted, acquiring former Cradle of Filth guitarist Gian Pyres for the debut with the new moniker. The disc's pretty good, but the final stroke of British pride leaves the strongest impression, a doom metal adaptation of John Murphy's menacing theme from Danny Boyle's post-apocalyptic pseudo-zombie drama.
10. Goblin, "L'Alba Dei Morti Viventi" (Zombi, 1978) - George A. Romero's "Dawn of the Dead," considered by many to be the best zombie movie ever made, was released as "Zombi" in producer Dario Argento's native Italy. Romero's one of my favorite filmmakers, but one of the dumbest things he ever did was replace most of Goblin's brilliant score with canned music for the American cut. This ghostly Pink Floydian cue is one of the few pieces that remained in all international versions.
11. Fabio Frizzi and Giorgio Tucci, "Main Title" (Zombi 2, 1979) - Italy's most famous "Dawn of the Dead" ripoff was the sequel-in-name-only "Zombi 2," known on these shores as "Zombie," or "that movie where the zombie fights a shark." The movie came out in 1979, but a soundtrack wasn't released until the '90s, when director Lucio Fulci's short run of astoundingly gruesome horror flicks was enjoying a resurgence after his death. The mellotron-fueled Frizzi/Tucci theme is one of the most beloved in Italian horror, as cheap, garish and grim as the flick it scores.
12. Keith Emerson, "Mater Tenebrarum" (Inferno, 1980) - For Dario Argento's divisive follow-up to "Suspiria," the director employed the scoring services of one of his favorite musicians, prog keyboardist Emerson. The man who put the "E" in ELP provided a mostly subdued, piano-based soundtrack that adds to the film's dreamlike languidity, but this cathedral rocker screaming the praises of the Three Mothers better exemplifies Argento's striking sensibility.
13. Danny Elfman, "The Church Battle" (Sleepy Hollow, 1999) - Considering the macabre slant of his working relationship with Tim Burton, it's surprising that composer Danny Elfman doesn't have more horror movies under his belt. We recently revisited their Hammer studios tribute "Sleepy Hollow," shocked that it's now a decade old. The story is more ludicrous to me now, but it's still a lot of bloody fun, and the music is appropriately sinister and calamitous.
14. GraveRobber and Chorus, "Genetic Repo Man" (Repo! The Genetic Opera, 2008) - While certainly flawed, the widely-panned goth musical "Repo!" is a unique piece of work. Its confounded marketers tried to push it as a modern "Rocky Horror," but it's less of a satire (despite its digs at plastic surgery) and more an outlandish and convoluted family drama with gore. This bombastic tune from early in the film, sung by co-writer Terrance Zdunich, sets up the main character's job.
15. Rob Zombie, "House of 1000 Corpses" (House of 1000 Corpses, 2001) - Speaking of fascinating messes, here's the groovy theme song to Rob Zombie's directorial debut, which is essentially "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" retold as a "Natural Born Killers"-style visual assault. I prefer the grittier sequel, "The Devil's Rejects," but "House" is an enjoyably random mishmash of ghoulish imagery. If Rob had continued the industrialized rockabilly stomp he explored here, I'd still buy his albums.
16. Los Straitjackets, "'The Munsters' Theme" (Halloween Hootenanny, 1998) - Through his short-lived Zombie-A-Go-Go label, Rob Zombie also gave the world one of the season's coolest rock albums, the trash rock compilation Halloween Hootenanny. Among its many fine exclusive tracks is this swinging "Munsters" adaptation by Los Straitjackets, the famed Mexican wrestling mask-clad surf rockers from Nashville. FYI, Hootenanny is still in print and goes for pretty cheap on Amazon.
17. The Ghastly Ones, "Hangman Hangten" (A-Haunting We Will Go-Go, 1997) - Also Hootenanny participants, California's Ghastly Ones (named after the great Andy Milligan movie) were one of few groups who actually put out an album through Zombie-A-Go-Go. This track is as good a sample as any, a jacked-up surfin' safari with an evocative title and creature feature sound effects. The Ghastly Ones maintain a low profile, but are still active and perform regionally.
18. The Cramps, "The Creature from the Black Leather Lagoon" (Stay Sick!, 1990) - Pour out a little of your pumpkin ale today for Lux Interior, the legendary cross-dressing trashoholic who passed away in February. As the frontman for The Cramps, he and his guitarist wife Poison Ivy Rorschach kept alive the flame of drive-in culture: rowdy rock, fast cars, sexual heat and low-budget monsters. This song has it all. We already miss you, Lux... happy Halloween, wherever you are.
19. The Aquabats!, "Monsters Wedding" (Vs. the Floating Eye of Death! and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 1, 1999) - As sugar-fueled costumed superheroes and spiritual descendants of Devo, the long-dormant Aquabats! have the right attitude of campy fun for Halloween, as well as a fair number of songs about the uncanny. This one from their third platter sees an apprehensive Bat Commander (aka Christian Jacobs, co-creator of Nick Jr.'s "Yo Gabba Gabba!") joined to a creepy chick in macabre matrimony.
20. Misfits, "Halloween" (Halloween, 1981) - We conclude with the patron saints of horror punk. As I've made clear in the past, I fully support the Misfits' 1990s comeback material, but this year I decided to feature something from the era when Glenn Danzig was the wiry, howling Evil Elvis, not the musclebound self-parody we occasionally tolerate today. This is their ode to the holiday, and it features the anthemic yet slightly eerie edge that characterized their classics.
Finally, for those of you who stuck around, here are 20 trailers for flicks that would be welcome at any Halloween party I'd attend. They span the glorious two decades following 1968, the year George A. Romero changed horror cinema.
1. "Dracula Has Risen from the Grave" (1968)
2. "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" (1971)
3. "Let's Scare Jessica to Death" (1971)
4. "Don't Look in the Basement" (1973)
5. "Return of the Evil Dead" (1973)
6. "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein" (1973)
7. "Shivers" (1975)
8. "Eaten Alive" (1977)
9. "Prophecy" (1979)
10. "Hell of the Living Dead" (1980)
11. "Deadly Blessing" (1981)
12. "Creepshow" (1982)
13. "Parasite" (1982)
14. "Sole Survivor" (1982)
15. "Pieces" (1982)
16. "The Deadly Spawn" (1983)
17. "The Stuff" (1985)
18. "TerrorVision" (1986)
19. "The Gate" (1987)
20. "Prince of Darkness" (1987)
posted by SoulReaper at 12:15 PM
0 comments
