HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Happy Halloween to all from Highbury Cemetery! May the Candy Corn gods look down upon you in favor on this day and grant you the opportunities to celebrate the high holiday in the manner you see fit. 

Another year's worth of planning, building, and most importantly celebrating, the season comes down to this. So go forth and revel in All Hallows Eve. Our Holiday. Carry on the traditions that make the season so great, for we are the anointed that keep the spirits alive, nurture them, and pass them on to future generations. We are Halloween.

  

A Most Prestigious Award!

In 20 years of home haunting, I have never received anything like this! The presentation stopped me in my tracks and put a HUGE smile on my face, even if it was covered behind a ghoulish mask.

Last night was our neighborhood's trick-or-treat (I'll have a full recap on the evening's events later on). And while it started off a bit slow, it soon picked up and things got moving. A large group of neighbors came to check out the haunt, and that's when it happened...

One of the younger boys, who I believe is in first grade, came forward and presented us with THIS!

A golden skeleton trophy for being his "favorite scary Halloween house in the neighborhood!" I COULDN'T BELIEVE IT! It is literally the kindest gift that I have ever gotten and is an incredible acknowledgement of what we do! I was so surprised and happy to get this. We then spent the next 10 minutes thanking him, talking with the entire family, and taking tons of photos with the entire group (which consisted of about 12 people in total).

This is definitely going to be displayed in a prominent place here at the Cemetery and will serve as a true reminder of why we go through all of the hard work each October. It was the perfect, completely unexpected, but completed appreciated start to another successful trick-or-treat night!

Sunday Sneak Peek

So it's now early on my trick-or-treat Sunday afternoon, and it hasn't stopped raining all day... I knew this was coming, so I set up the full show last night in order to get my photos and video done. And I'm so glad I did! Perfect weather last night lent itself to a nice, quiet evening of shooting.  

The Candy Corn offerings have been made and fingers crossed it stops raining for just a few hours tonight...

Here is just one image from last night's photo session to tease before tonight's soggy trick-or-treat. Regardless of the weather, it's go time for Highbury Cemetery. Wish us luck!

  

Saturday Sneak Peek

Well, 2023 doesn't seem to be shaping to be one of our better haunt seasons, as we will be continually dealing with wind, rain, and falling temperatures all the way through Halloween.

But, we have dealt with this before and I'm still going to set everything up. We're supposed to get a few breaks today, so I have decided to run the full show tonight to get video and photos, then put the delicate pieces away and cover up most of the other pieces before tonight's rains move back in.

We'll see what we can put out for tomorrow's trick-or-treat, but it's not looking too promising. I'm still making my final pleas to the Candy Corn gods, but we'll see what we get.

In the meantime, here are a few shots from this afternoon's setup.

Enjoy!

  

"Horrific Halloween Spooktacular! Scary Scores & Sounds!!" Record

Halloween!

Iciest night of the year (colder than Christmas!), when "undead" totter on legs unsteady from graves unready to keep their eternal sleep. "All hallows eve," when ghosts soar through moonlit skies, beasties feast on some poor prize, and other things go "bump!" in the night! (good lord deliver us!!)

Here you will hear the fear that you fear, geared for the weird, to vampires endeared (can you withstand the frantic antics of closet skeletons, belfry bats, demon cats, wolves and rats, ape men and wolf men and mad men and monsters galore?)!! Monsters galore and more! The score! Forever gore fills the score, spills the gore on the score to the core of monster lore! Eerie-played by ghostly maid on an organ made for Death's Arcade!!! (Hail the haunted organ! Purge the dirge!) Yes, Halloween! In "undead" vernacular, the devil's spectacular... A Halloween spooktacular!!! Come, if you care... come if you dare!!!

We have come to the final Friday of October, which means the last Freebie Friday for another year. But please do not be sad, because I'm finishing the season off with an absolute classic!

When I hear the words "spooky sounds," a few classic releases come to mind. The ones that have insanely cool illustrated covers with monsters, skeletons, haunted houses, jack-o-lanterns, and ghosts. The ones that have a continuous flow of the standard creepy sound effects essential to any great release. Howling winds, howling wolves, cackling witches, cracking thunder, mad laboratories and the monsters that they create, wailing organs, tolling bells, cats, bats, and bloodcurdling screams. And Verne Langdon's Horrific Halloween Spooktacular! Scary Scores & Sounds has it all!

Side one is a straight collection of standard spooky sounds, flowing smoothly between each, making a nice, even 15 minute track. Howling wolves, a tolling bell, and thunder are always a classic segway into any good "spooky sounds" record! The guy getting whipped is an interesting sound clip, as well...

Side two is equally as good, with a creepy gothic organ track as the main sound throughout. It differentiates itself from the first side nicely, giving you two completely different tracks to choose from!

And I haven't even mentioned Ron Cobb's insanely cool cover art. The one-eyed green zombie face looks like it's emerging from the darkened pages of an old EC Comics cover. A real eye-grabber (see what I did there?), that looks great in any record collection!

This one is definitely a must-have in your spooky sounds stockpile, as it absolutely nails the old nostalgic Halloween vibe. Enjoy!

Download Horrific Halloween Spooktacular! Scary Scores & Sounds!! here.

  

Charnel House - "As Above, So Below (The Reprise)"

With our time quickly dwindling down on another festive Halloween season, I wanted to drop one more surprise. The past three weeks have been a total blur with the amount of activity going on, but I was able to make time to get one last project completed before the big night.

As Above, So Below (The Reprise) is another new track from Charnel House, my haunt ambient audio project. This track is actually a reworking of an early track that was released, but I was never quite completely happy with. I went back and added more discordant, harsher sounds to give it a darker feel, and I'm much happier with the results.

The season of light and warmth begins its slow transformation, and the cold creep of darkness and decay takes hold. The balance of all things continues cyclically. The blaze of Autumn’s ashen tones envelopes the land as withered remains become one within the burial chamber...

This new track, like all of my Charnel House releases, are absolutely 100% FREE to download and use in your haunt display or other Halloween project! My gift back to the Halloween community. Enjoy!

Download As Above, So Below (The Reprise) here.

And visit my Charnel House page, where you can sample and download my earlier releases! At some point, I will have the page updated with all the newer releases. At some point...