I COMPILE You to Listen!

Three more comps of Halloween (or ALMOST) music from all kindsa places.

MA-10 - 2010 Spook-Tacular:

1 Halloween Sale Goodwill 0:59

2 Attack Of The Fifty Foot Woman The Tubes 4:25

3 It's a Nerdy Halloween Herbert Midgley 2:42

4 Frankie-Stein Robbie Robison 2:58

5 This Is Halloween    Panic! At the Disco 3:27

6 I Only Have Eyes for You Spike Jones 3:26

7 Horray For Horrorwood Frankenstein Drag Queens 2:18

8 It's Halloween Greg Conley 3:07

9 Zombie Dance The Cramps 1:51

10 Mummy Beach Hot Lava 2:59

11 Love Song For A Vampire Annie Lennox 4:12

12 Creature with the Atom Brain JezusFactory 2:40

13 Saturday Evening Ghost Frankie Stein and His Ghouls 2:01

14 Halloween Song Evangelicals 2:15

15 Mummy Walk Contrails 2:36

16 Main Theme Dracula Twins 1:32

17 Vincent Price Zombina & the Skeletones2:19

18 Monster Mash Misfits 2:34

19 Kids Halloween 10/30/2008 ASK U 1:14

20 Halloween Linda Book 2:52

21 Feed My Frankenstein    Alice Cooper      4:40

22 Dead Man's Curve Jan & Dean 2:25

23 Creature from Outer Space Big Eyed Beans from Venus 3:05

24 Bo Meets the Monster   Bo Diddley 3:03

25 TV  Theme Gigantor 0:52

26 Frankenstein Stomp Count Lorry & The Biters 2:01

27 The Skeleton In The Closet Louis Armstrong    3:08

28 Frankenstein Twist The Crystals 2:53

29 Frankenstein Meets The Beetles     Jekyll & Hyde 1:51

Someday I may tell the story of how these VERY EARLY and VERY ECLECTIC comps came to pass.

Until then, ponder our next slab of slime ...

***

MA-123 - The Haunted 1980s:

01 - Riboflavin-Flavored, Non-Carbonated, Polyunsaturated Blood - 45 Grave   1980  (2:53)

02 - Halloween - Distant Drums   1982  (3:36)

03 - Monster Island - The Dickies   1985  (1:56)

04 - Bates Motel - The Hitmen   1981  (3:19)

05 - Monster Rock - Screaming Lord Sutch   1982  (2:25)

06 - Jazz Butcher Meets Count Dracula - The Jazz Butcher   1983  (2:52)

07 - The Cabinet - Das Kabinette   1983  (3:57)

08 - Lycanthropia - Harry   1988  (5:00)

09 - Shaking of the Sheets - Steeleye Span   1989  (4:10)

10 - Horror Stories - Dance on Water   1984  (3:39)

11 - Final Scene - Greg Vandike   1980  (2:43)

12 - Like a Ghost - Ignatius Jones   1981  (3:22)

13 - The Masque - The Dark   1982  (3:42)

14 - Horror Movies - The Bollock Brothers   1983  (5:09)

15 - Dead Things - The Gorehounds   1987  (2:49)

16 - Halloween - The Wigs   1985  (2:28)

17 - The Vegas Vampire - Jim Parker   1983  (2:18)

18 - Count Duckula Theme - TV Soundtrack   1988  (1:09)

19 - Stuck in a Nightmare - Tooth & Nail   1988  (3:54)

20 - See You in the Boneyard - The Flesh Eaters   1981  (3:31)

21 - Scared of the Dark - Unit 5   1981  (4:00)

22 - I Kill with Warning - Rash of Stabbings   1983  (2:38)

23 - Something in My House - Dead or Alive   1987  (3:49)

24 - Slave Beyond the Grave - Johanna Went   1981  (2:51)

All of the above meditations, as you should have deduced, were released in the 1980s.

***

MA-234 - Almost Halloween:

01 - Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565 - Johann Sebastian Bach (8:27)

02 - Nightmare Fantasy Rag - A Night on Rag Mountain - William Albright (10:09)

03 - Piano Sonata #2 In B Flat Minor, Op. 35, B 128 - 3. Marche Funèbre - Frédéric Chopin (8:57)

04 - 3 Ghost Rags No. 1, Graceful Ghost Rag - William Bolcom (4:30)

05 - 3 Ghost Rags No. 2, The Poltergeist - William Bolcom (3:28)

06 - 3 Ghost Rags No. 3, Dream Shadows - William Bolcom (7:23)

07 - Carnival of the Animals - Zoological Fantasy XII. Fossils - Camille Saint-Saëns (1:22)

08 - Violin Sonata in G Minor, The Devil's Trill - Giuseppe Tartini - 1997  (18:49)

09 - A Rag-Time Nightmare - Tom Turpin (1:15)

10 - Ave Satani (from The Omen) - Jerry Goldsmith (2:32)

11 - Symphonie Fantastique, Op. 14 - 5. Songe D'une Nuit Du Sabbat - Hector Berlioz (10:21)

ALL CLASSICAL, ALL FUN!  

These classical pieces may remind you of Halloween, even if they weren’t specifically intended that way when composed or published.  When I hear them or see their titles, I get a small smile reminding me that Autumn (aka Halloween Time) can be a state of mind, not just a date range on a calendar.

You can listen to this one and call it a presage of Halloween, a foreshadowing if you will.  And if you’re like me, YOU WILL!  Listen to MA-234 and feel your mouth curling up, your musical horizons broaden, and a lift to them gloomy ole Halloween spirits.

See you Monday!

  

Did Part of the Bride Go to College?

You know, I had this planned for today's date long before the horrific events involving rape and diminished capacity became publicized at a fancy college up north.

I photocopied it from a book, but this is originally from The New York Review in 1967.  Brrr, I say, brrr!

Nurse your compassion for the Bride, and all threatened by overweening power, until Friday, when we'll go a little more lighthearted with three more comps of Halloween music.

  

I Won't Live in a World Without Weird!

Scary Books, Kiddies!

Worlds of Weird.  Edited by Stan Margulies.  Third Jove printing, 1978.  Copyright 1965.  Cover art by Virgil Finlay.

 Who’s that girl? Va-va-voom! Who’d’ve thought a batwoman could look so ... alluring?

Ahemm .... the contents are ...

• · “The Forgotten Creator of Weird Tales” · Sam Moskowitz
• · Roads · Seabury Quinn · Weird Tales Jan 1938
• · The Sapphire Goddess · Nictzin Dyalhis · Weird Tales Feb 1934
• · The Valley of the Worm [James Allison] · Robert E. Howard · Weird Tales Feb 1934
• · He That Hath Wings · Edmond Hamilton · Weird Tales Jul 1938
• · Mother of Toads · Clark Ashton Smith · Weird Tales Jul 1938
• · The Thing in the Cellar · David H. Keller, M.D. · Weird Tales Mar 1932
• · Giants in the Sky · Frank Belknap Long · Weird Tales Aug 1939

The first tale, “Roads,” is an unexpected narration of an important event. “He that Hath Wings” is, some might say, a parable about creativity.

Keller’s “The Thing in the Cellar” is a simple, and simply astounding, little tale. It means a lot to me both because, as precocious youngster, I felt ignored and mistreated. Secondly, the house of family friends, the O’Garas, had just an entrance-to-downstairs from their kitchen. After reading this story at about age ten, I could easily locate this scenario at their house, and when visiting for parents’ bridge night, I was definitely uneasy at times.

Typing from memory: “Didn’t you tell me there was nothing there? Down there? In the cellar?”

See you next time, kiddies!
  

FRIGHTFUL FRIDAYS THROUGHOUT OCTOBER!

 Welcome to the wondrous month of October across the Super Blog and the Record Round-Up!

Every Friday we'll share three -- count 'em, THREE!  Halloween comps from yours truly.  A whole bunch of them have never been presented before.  Plus a few old standbys who became orphans when my previous host since 2015 castrated itself.

First up is a compilation of songs you hear all the time on "party records" of Halloween music.  They are FALSE, I say!  They may be songs mentioning an odd thing, but for the sake of the Blob, they DO NOT have the delicious, intentional creepiness of a "true" Halloween song.

MA-231 - Not Halloween: 

01 - Frankenstein - The Edgar Winter Group - 1972  (4:44)

02 - Werewolves of London - Warren Zevon - 1978  (3:25)

03 - Season of the Witch - Donovan - 1966  (4:54)

04 - The Devil Went Down to Georgia - The Charlie Daniels Band - 1979  (3:35)

05 - Witchcraft - Frank Sinatra - 1957  (2:52)

06 - The Witch Queen of New Orleans - Redbone - 1971  (2:44)

07 - Clap for the Wolfman - The Guess Who - 1974  (3:24)

08 - Spooky - Classics IV - 1967  (2:43)

09 - (Don't Fear) The Reaper - Blue Oyster Cult - 1976  (5:06)

10 - Devil Woman - Cliff Richard - 1976  (3:31)

11 - Time Warp - Rocky Horror Cast - 1975  (3:16)

12 - Evil Ways - Santana - 1969  (3:57)

13 - Bat Out of Hell - Meat Loaf - 1977  (9:46)

14 - That Old Black Magic - Margaret Whiting - 1943  (2:41)

15 - In the Midnight Hour - Wilson Pickett - 1965  (2:36)

16 - Witchy Woman - Eagles - 1972  (4:11)

17 - Somebody's Watching Me - Rockwell - 1983  (3:33)

18 - Black Magic Woman - Fleetwood Mac - 1968  (2:51)

19 - Hungry Like the Wolf - Duran Duran - 1982  (3:39)

 We real Halloween connoisseurs are sick and tired of hearing these songs played at Halloween parties, or constituting the bulk of a so-labeled “Halloween” CD.  These songs may have scary or weird elements, but they ARE NOT about Halloween!

To express your agreement, download and burn this selection to disc … then shred the disc.

***

MA-07 - Howl-oween:

01. Welcome to My Nightmare - Alice Cooper (5:03)

02. Halloween - Sid Frank & James Dukas (0:58)

03. This Is Halloween - Marilyn Manson (3:04)

04. Rock 1 - It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (0:32)

05. Riders in the Sky - Dick Dale (2:07)

06. Halloween - Aqua (3:44)

07. Trick or Treat (1937) - Donald Duck (0:55)

08. Jonny Quest Underscore 1 - Hoyt Curtin (0:31)

09. The Purple People Eater - Sheb Wooley (2:13)

10. Ghouls Glide - Music for Monsters (1:51)

11. Boris the Spider - The Who (2:27)

12. The Raven - Buddy Morrow and His Orchestra   (3:30)

13. Frenzy #1 - CD Creepies (2:15)

14. Rock 2 - It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (0:19)

15. Have a Good Time on Halloween Night - Hap Palmer (1:46)

16. Trick or Treat - Nekromantix (4:10)

17. Jonny Quest Underscore 2 - Hoyt Curtin (0:51)

18. Halloween - Stephen Lynch (2:27)

19. Part One - Spooky Music for Spooky Occasions (1:43)

20. Here Comes the Boogeyman - Henry Hall (2:48)

21. Something Wicked This Way Comes (Main Title) - James Horner (2:00)

22. My Radiation Baby (My Teenage Fallout Queen) - George McKelvey (2:46)

23. Jonny Quest Underscore 3 - Hoyt Curtin (1:05)

24. Hell - Squirrel Nut Zippers (3:03)

25. Five Little Pumpkins - Ukisociety (0:39)

26. Rock 3 - It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (0:11)

27. The Munsters Theme - Jack Marshall (2:10)

28. Part Two - Spooky Music for Spooky Occasions (1:35)

29. Nobody Likes You When You're Dead - Zombina and the Skeletones (2:04)

30. The Twilight Zone '85 Main Title - Grateful Dead & Merl Saunders (0:44)

31. The Haunted House (1929) - Mickey Mouse (3:06)

32. Twilight Tone - Manhattan Transfer (5:51)

33. Skeleton Dance - Music for Monsters (1:18)

34. Space Ghost (Main Title) - Ted Nichols / Richard Olson / Bill Getty (0:54)

35. DOA - Bloodrock (8:21)

MA-07 was my VERY FIRST Halloween comp,  I hope you'll find something worthwhile in its callow youthfulness. 

***

MA-210 - Trick, Treat, Repeat: 

01 - excerpt - Crisis on Infinite Earths Part One - 2024  (0:15)

02 - Halloween Safety 01 - Centron Educational Films - 1977  (0:49)

03 - Rock 'N' Roll Halloween - Bobby Bare, Jr - 2009  (3:51)

04 - Nosferatu - Blue Öyster Cult - 1977  (5:16)

05 - The Spider and the Fly - The Wicked - 1979  (2:05)

06 - The Devil's Twist - Art Killmer and The Up-Town Four - 1964  (2:03)

07 - Incidental Music - The Mad Daddy Shock Theatre & The Great London Ghost Show - 1958  (1:38)

08 - The Moon Does Strange Things to Me - Free Delivery - 1974  (4:02)

09 - The Blob - Joe August - 1958  (2:10)

10 - Twilight Zone - Barry Raye - 1960  (2:35)

11 - The Merry Ghost from Chatham Square - Henri René Musette Orchestra - 1942  (2:34)

12 - Luther the Anthropoid (Ape Man) - The Jimmy Castor Bunch - 1972  (3:10)

13 - Janie Made a Monster - The Fabulous Five - 1959  (2:44)

14 - Have You Checked the Children? - Life in the Fridge Exists - 1980  (3:07)

15 - Surfer Smash - Johnn (Boris) Jones - 1963  (2:01)

16 - Dirty Little Secret - The Lowdowns - 1996  (2:39)

17 - My Son the Folk Monster - Larry Foster - 1962  (3:07)

18 - Funny Monsters - Deep Freeze Mice - 1983  (4:45)

19 - Doin' the Monster Mash - Leonard Jewell - 1963  (2:07)

20 - Trick or Treat - Chuck Berry - 1961  (1:32)

21 - The Creep - Billy & Mickey - 1961  (2:26)

22 - You Are My Girl - 3 Stooges - 1960  (2:27)

23 - Things That Go Bump in the Night - Allstars - 2002  (2:59)

24 - Danse Macabre - The Young Lovers - 1968  (1:39)

25 - Halloween Is Black as Night - Jackson C Frank - 1965  (2:45)

26 - Macabre! - Eureka!- Bones on a String - Fright Break - Michael Cudahy - 2007  (3:09)

27 - Weird Busters (Ray Parker Jr vs Oingo Boingo) - Burt Reynolds - 2021  (3:02)

28 - Halloween Safety 02 - Centron Educational Films - 1977  (0:28)

29 - Happy Halloween (Intro) - Dan Blakeslee - 2003  (0:26)

  

Now, THIS is music that bears a second ring at the doorbell! 

Track 1 is a clip from an otherwise mediocre WB animated release.

Track 24 is a fun bebop version of Saint-Saëns’ “Danse Macabre.”

Track 26 comprises four cues from Spine Tingler! The William Castle Story (2007), music by Michael “The Millionaire” Cudahy.

We hope your Halloween is safe as well as silly and scary!

See you on Monday!

New Fuel from, or for, Fools

Here's an in-depth (for a newspaper) disturbing bit o' news regarding obvious monkey business with evidence in the JFK murder.

This is from the February 16, 1992 OKC Oklahoman.

Those matte elements for making fake Oswald-in-the-backyard are very suspicious.  Some trickery like what's described in the article is, IMO, surely what produced those pix.  However, what bunch of stupid ne'er-do-well spies would leave the evidence behind?  And leave it at the home of the guy they were framing?

All of us cynical types have always suspected that the "three tramps" were probably spooks, or even real bums who were paid to wander around the railroad area, so as to draw attention and resources from the actual crime, its perpetrator(s) onsite, and its cleanup.

What do YOU think, fellow truthseekers?

PS see you on Thursday for the commencement of this year's BLOG-O-WEEN!

  

Book Unreview: HEADLIGHTS by CJ Leede

I had my doubts about this book from the first few pages.  Another emotionally damaged first-person narrator, yawn!  It might be a generational thing, but I am very tired of this device.

The narrator is a war veteran who has also been an FBI agent.  He’s one day away from returning to active duty when he is sought out by a former FBI colleague and beseeched to return to a never-solved investigation.

Read the book flap.  My disbelief started there.  Reading inside, I learned that the amnesic people wandered FOR MILES before being found with that human hair tied around their tongue.

Oh, come on!  That’s so patently improbable!  Think about it, dear reader.  Haven’t YOU ever found yourself with a hair caught in your mouth?  Maybe off a brush or your hand or a towel or something?  Tell me:  are you likely to go around for hours with that thing in your mouth driving you crazy?  NO! 

Much less somebody drugged or incoherent!  The first thing they would do upon regaining control of their body would be to get that irritating thing out of their mouth!

Another thing that rings my improbability bell is the oh-so-disturbed narrator, who is described on nearly every page as having interruptions in his reality and being unable to distinguish memories from present-day life.

This person—THIS person, I say—is going to be accepted into active military duty, or allowed to pack heat for the FBI?  Even AFTER evidence of such dislocation from reality is displayed to other characters?  UHH-UHH.

I paid this book the ultimate insult of not finishing it.  I only read as far as I did because it was the only book with me at the time.

See you Monday!

   

Book Review: Colin Wilson's THE OUTSIDER

             My first encounters with Wilson the writer came about in relation to good ole Aich Pee-Ell; Wilson’s "The Return of the Lloigor" was in an anthology of Cthulhu Mythos tales.

            After that, I encountered Wilson’s three novels The Philosopher’s Stone, The Space Vampires, and The Mind Parasites.  Especially the last, these books contained impassioned explications of the notion that mankind’s will, properly focused, could achieve staggering things, thing that might be considered supernatural by the poor average human.    

     Then I came across references to a non-fiction book by Wilson.  That book was called The Outsider, and it surveyed significant people who did indeed feel or act as “outsiders” of common behavior and practice.

            In the Outsider’s eyes, common man and women live enslaved to custom.  They’re limited in their intellectual and moral visions by the blinders of accepted behavior and too-strong ties to the material world.  Often the Outsider has a sudden revelation that “other people” are wandering through life like sleepwalkers, concerned only with the having and getting of things.

            Meanwhile, the Outsider sees numinous significance in nearly everything, and is frustrated by the tedious humanity around him.

            Outsiders have been artistic types like van Gogh or Blake, or others who come to a sudden break with reality (or appear to have always been able to see things askew).  Other examples are TE Lawrence, Nijinsky, or various prophets.  As Wilson writes:

            ---- If we tried to express the prophet’s purpose in its simplest graspable form, we could say that it was a desire to shout “Wake up!” in everybody’s ear. ----

            I’ve felt that way sometimes, haven’t you?

Usually the Outsider comes to a bad end, dashing himself against the “normal” practices of society or accepted behavior.  Often she or he becomes bitter or withdrawn, even choosing self-death as an end to the struggle.

            Occasionally the Outsider finds some gratification or success, like England’s religious visionary George Fox.  But often any acceptance is limited to a few followers or fellow free-thinkers. 

            I read a physical copy through ILL (interlibrary loan). 

            The particular volume I received was a rebound copy of the first edition.  According to the library stamp, the copy was acquired in November 1956.  Look in the right-hand corner.  It’s likewise interesting that when the book was entered into the OSU (Oklahoma State University) library, the school went by the name of Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College.

            I was intrigued to come across some proofing errors.  Once “beetle” is spelled “bettle;” five times, the name Steppenwolf is spelled “Steppanwolf.”  And on a few pages here and there, the indentations around block quotations don’t return to full text width.

            If you know how picky librarians can be, you might be as bemused as I was to see the copious underlining – above is an example, seen through mostly the front half of the book.

            And for you children unfamiliar with the concept of re-binding a book, look in the middle seam of these two pages.  Those are the threads holding the pages together.

            When a book get overworn, or a cover or page comes loose, and the book otherwise has some life in it, the library sent it to a place which removed the covers, sliced the glue and/or threads from the bound pages (thereby shrinking the inner margins), and re-bound the pages with generic cloth-covered cardboard.  On the new spine were the title and author, almost in a typewriter-style lettering, usually gold in color.

Since the earliest date on this checkout slip is “only” 1993, this slip is obvious the last in a long line!

Please dive into some eruditious reading soon, fellow book-gobblers!  Then share the goods and bads with your friends!  See you Monday.

Tune In!

Here is Part 8 of the publicity packet for the Superboy TV series' second season.  The radio folder!

The folder containing the radio scripts is above.

Now that's a solemn pronouncement of heroes!  Below are scans of the two reel-to-reel tape spools included in the whole Season Two package.  If only I had a player, I would dub to MP3 for you super cats!

See you Monday.