Michael Jackson - "Thriller"

This week, I was in charge of putting a Halloween playlist together for my son's Kindergarten Halloween party. And what was the obvious first choice? Thriller, of course!

It really has become the official song of Halloween. And honestly, I'm okay with that. It's a perfect melding of really catchy pop song, creepy fun and horror royalty. And honestly, every time I hear that breakdown before Vincent Price's epic monologue, I smile. It's so, so good.
I also went back and revisited the iconic 1983 video that was made for the song. Directed by John Landis, incredible special effects by none other than Rick Baker, and co-staring a former Playboy model in Ola Ray, Thriller took the music video and turned it on its ear. It was one of the first videos to turn the standard song-length video format into a full 15 minute feature. And the quality is still amazing by today's standards!

When this video was originally released in 1983, my aunt had an early VHS deck and she recorded the "The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller" documentary. I can't tell you how many times we watched it! It was woven into the fabric of Halloween memories growing up and trick-or-treating as a kid.

My son, who is now 5, got his first taste of Thriller this week. He absolutely loves the song. I may wait another year before the creepy zombie video is shown, but the song has now been passed on to the the next generation of Halloween memories. And I couldn't be happier!!

Darkness falls across the land

The midnight hour is close at hand

Creatures crawl in search of blood

To terrorize y’all’s neighborhood

And whosoever shall be found

Without the soul for getting down

Must stand and face the hounds of hell

And rot inside a corpse’s shell

The foulest stench is in the air

The funk of forty thousand years

And grizzly ghouls from every tomb

Are closing in to seal your doom

And though you fight to stay alive

Your body starts to shiver

For no mere mortal can resist

The evil of the thriller...

"Halloween Eerie Sounds" Cassette

It's time for our last Freebie Friday of 2017! One last, great novelty soundtrack to bring back all those fun seasonal memories from Halloweens long since past.

I have been doing the Freebie Fridays segments for a few years now, and one thing that I have quickly discovered is that the novelty Halloween cassette industry was a completely lawless wasteland during it's heyday of the 80s and 90s. Cheap cassettes with similar titles and labels filled store shelves. My collection of these cassettes has grown yearly and even I can't keep them all straight...

And so is the case of this week's offering, Planet Halloween's "Halloween Eerie Sounds." I acquired this cassette recently in a bulk buy, and it was the last one to be played and posted. The cartoony label with the standard jack-o-lanterns, bats, wrought iron fencing and tombstone held great promise for some serious nostalgic fun. And then I dropped it into the player and pressed play...

Ten seconds in and I knew I had been had. That instantly recognizable heart beat followed by the old witch's screams. I had heard it before. Repeatedly. The standard soundtrack, repackaged for the umpteenth time with a different label art and only slightly different name.

Dammit.

Halloween Eerie Sounds. The same as Halloween Sounds of Horror. Which is also the same as Halloween Spook Sounds. And which is only a slightly different mix to Horrible Sounds of Halloween. Were you able to keep up?

The standard soundtrack must have been licensed out to a whole slew of different companies, all of which released it with their own "Halloween Horrible Horror Spooky Eerie Haunted" names and label art.

It's a letdown to get a new cassette, only to find that it is just another variant of the old standby soundtrack.

Regardless, the 16-minute soundtrack itself isn't all too bad, with some nice echoing screams, barking wolf dogs and unidentifiable grinding sounds. And there's still that heartbeat that runs below the other sounds throughout the track.

It's still a worthwhile pickup if you don't already have it in one of the versions above or you are an absolute completist.

DOWNLOAD "HALLOWEEN EERIE SOUNDS" HERE.

  

Tomorrow.

The wait is finally over! It's time to travel back to the upside down...

  

A Quick Weather Update

As I've come to expect, the forecast for Halloween night continues to change every hour. We're still looking good for the big night here at the Cemetery, but that forecast for rain on the 1st has me a bit nervous. I'm REALLY hoping it doesn't creep up any closer...

Please, O Great Candy Corn Gods. Grant us all a night that is bountiful in dryness and chill...

  

Pär Boström - The Shipwreck Device

I'm not sure exactly sure what Pär Boström of dark ambient projects Kammarheit and Cities Last Broadcast has created here, but I definitely know that I want one, too!

Such wonderfully eerie sounds emanating from this device! Could you imagine composing your own haunt soundtrack with this!?!?

Setup Begins

For those that don't know, Highbury Cemetery is a one-night-only yard display. Every year on October 31, we get up early, set up the entire display, run the trick-or-treat show, shoot video and photos, and then immediately tear it all down.

Crazy? Yes, absolutely, but I have always thought that it makes the display more special in that it becomes a one-time show. A quick, magically creepy sliver of time. Blink and you miss it for another year. It is a huge undertaking, but with planning and staging, the task remains manageable.

And since we continue to expand every year, we have to rely on little "cheats" to get a head start on setup. One such cheat is getting the walk-in crypt set up before Halloween night. The crypt takes up my entire front porch, but can be safely and secretly completed behind a locked door, ensuring that most people, outside of my mailman, have no idea that the set up has begun.

Last weekend, we were able to pull the giant crypt wall pieces into the porch to get a rough setup started. With a few tweaks and paint additions, the new version set up perfectly in the space, with room to navigate easier than last year (this is year two for this monstrous project).

At this point of the planning stage, everything is still in separate pieces and areas. It's a bit overwhelming in that it seems like there is still so much to do and nothing is remotely ready to go. Of course, it's all in my head and we're right on schedule, but it still doesn't feel like it. That is, until a simple light switch was thrown...

To most, it doesn't look like much, but to me it's a solid first step towards a finished display. The crypt walls were roughly in place, so the next step was to add a bit of lighting. A single blue bulb was added, and when I hit the switch, something clicked. It finally looked "creepy." That cold blue light dimly illuminated those walls and I felt giddy. The base of the build was there and it somehow got me excited to keep going. The shadows created outside of the barely visible blue highlights added so much depth and atmosphere! It was a bit surprising that such a small step was so important and motivating.

One of the notes from last year's haunt display was to adjust the too-bright lighting of the crypt, and with this simple, single bulb, the issue has been completely addressed. This will be the dull base color that will allow the spotlights and the crypt stained glass window to really pop.

So after a few minutes of sitting inside the crypt to admire the lighting, I snapped back to reality and attacked the rest of my to-do list with renewed energy. Only six more days to go and I CAN NOT WAIT for the show to start!


And with another check of the weather forecast, it looks a bit more promising than yesterday.

What really stands out is that glorious "0% chance" of precipitation, but being that this is Ohio I already know that with six days left until the big night, this forecast can change 50 more times. I am staying cautiously optimistic in that Mother Nature has mercy on us on Halloween night and decides to keep it dry, cool and spooky!