Halloween Music

The success of the original Halloween launched six sequels, a ravenous decade's worth of imitators, and Hollywood careers for star Jamie Lee Curtis and director John Carpenter. But its budget was a micro one, and director Carpenter managed to save a few bucks by hiring the same composer he'd worked with since his days as a student and struggling indie--himself. Borrowing the staccato rhythmic devices of Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells cum Exorcist score, Carpenter overlaid them with a few simple Grand Guignol-esque synth chords and created nothing less than a surprisingly enduring horror classic. Carpenter also gleaned a few hints from Italian prog-rock horror-score kings Goblin, imbuing his simple, synthesizer-based cues with an almost subconscious sense of dread, tension, and impending doom. If the music has become something of a modern cliché, that's only a testament to its continued ability to strike terror in the hearts of listeners.

Enter Darklore Manor, where creatures of the night lurk in shadows and ghostly sounds echo through unhallowed halls. Nox Arcana invites you to embark on a musical journey throughout a legendary haunted mansion with a dark and sinister history. This gothic soundscape contains 21 tracks of haunting melodies, eerie voices, Latin chants, and foreboding orchestrations to create a perfect dark and moody atmosphere.

Delve into the Necronomicon, a dark symphony based upon H.P. Lovecraft's forbidden tome of unspeakable horrors. This epic concept album is a spellbinding tribute to the Cthulhu Mythos, featuring a mixture of exotic, dark fantasy themes with 21 tracks of ominous orchestrations, Gothic choirs, Egyptian and Middle-Eastern melodies, eerie voices and otherworldly chants. This musical grimoir is a powerful and sinister soundtrack to evoke your darkest nightmare.

Gold assembled a handful of knowns and unknowns to make special cameos on this melodic and fun collection of original and classic Halloween tunes with a pop-rock bent. Among the haunted are David Cassidy, Karla Bonoff, Linda Ronstadt, Stephen Bishop, Nicolette Larson, and Gold's children and wife. From the Beatlesesque touches of "It Must Be Halloween" (parts seemingly lifted from "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite") to Boris Karloff's "Monster Mash" and "The Addams Family" theme song, Gold and company offer up treats that kids and their parents will like, including the "Ghostbusters" theme.

Unleash your darkest nightmares as you enter the world of the Vampyre. Echoing from ancient crypts, these haunting symphonies call forth the horror, mystery, and passion of the night that awaits you . . .

You just need one look at Rob Zombie to know that the guy knows a thing or two about Halloween. He really proves his mettle--and his metal, for that matter--on this loud, garish, downright fun collection of rip-roaring devil's music. There's actually very little to be afraid of, to tell the truth--unless, that is, you have a phobia about the kind of goofy good times laid down by Zombie and pals like Rocket from the Crypt, Satan's Pilgrims, and the wrestling-masked power-surf combo Los Straitjackets (who turn in a hypercharged "Munsters Theme"). The garishly groovy package, which features some of Zombie's most over-the-top cartoon illustrations, is rife with haunting hoedowns like the Dead Elvi's "The Creature Stole My Surfboard."

This is another of those not-so- rare cases where the score for a film is better than the actual movie itself. This may well be, along with "Halloween 4", the very best of the "Halloween" sequel scores. Newcomer to film work Danny Lux succeeds, and does so admirably; while there is much excellent music to be found here ('The Tunnel', 'The Mirror', 'Michael Is In The Shadows', 'The End Is Near', 'The Morgue', 'Michael Begins Terror' and 'Michael Chases Sara' are particular standouts), the score is best known for the composer's brilliant reworking of John Carpenter's classic 'Halloween Theme'. This is an outstanding work, and a great purchase for fans of horror scores.

This is not just a Halloween party compilation album. This is a must have for anyone who digs on surf, rockabilly, garage bands or just plain wacky music.

Scary surf riffs, creepy rockabilly, hardcore punk, grim garage bands, and hellish hot rod tunes make for one killer album, regardless of the season.

The music is a mix of classical instumental surf and cult horror, and the result is a diobolic monster of absolute beauty. The girl at the end says it all: "Geepers creepers, those Ghastly Ones sure know how to make a go-go ghoul shimmy shiver."

Most holidays exclude somebody--on grounds of religious beliefs, political persuasion, or refusal to eat our fine feathered friends--but not good old Halloween, which has a little something for everyone. The same can be said of this 15-track collection, which spans modern music's sonic and sensory spectrums. It encompasses the noisy and danceable, nasty and nice. Most of the set is given over to party-ready tunes like the B-52's' "Devil in My Car" and the Ramones' "Pet Sematary," but its darker corners offer up a few eerie moments--such as MX-80 Sound's rendition of the horror classic "Theme from Halloween" and Sonic Youth's "Halloween." The disc closes on an appropriately creepy note thanks to horror master Roky Erickson, who spins a cautionary yarn called "Creature with the Atom Brain" that's guaranteed to cause more nightmares than a Milk Dud overdose.

Fright Night: Music that Goes Bump in the Night" takes the high road and obviously opens up the playlist to anything magical and mystical. Just look at the first three tracks: "Night on Bald Mountain," "Danse Macabre," and "In the Hall of the Mountain King." Those will put you in the mood for terrifying trick or treaters right there.

Whether you're trying to create your own personal haunted house or just creep out selected family members, this extensive compendium offers pretty much every spooky sound imaginable. Witches, wolfmen, and windstorms cackle madly through some tracks, while eerie music--pipe organ and theremin, mostly--provides moody accompaniment to your own ghostly tales. And for those of you who like to throw in a little "trick" of your own before offering treats to the neighborhood kids, cue up one of the disc's dozen or so scary door greetings (we're partial to the grave "We're Digging Up Your Treats" option). Although it clocks in at just 45 minutes, Scary Sound Effects will offer many hours of fun, year after year.

Thanks to some clever categories (and perhaps a bit of track programming on your CD player), Son of Scary Sound Effects is a truly multipurpose Halloween soundtrack. The longer, ghostly sounds of tracks from "Spooky Spaces" (four in all) are perfect for scaring trick-or-treaters. Fifteen campy-but-cute "Phrightful Phone Messages" will convince you to change that answering machine message into something timely (and spooky), and "Creatures for Your Computer" can spice up your PC's blips and beeps into something scary. In all, there are 48 sound effects to choose from on this disc. And while none of them are that scary, for families getting into the spirit of Halloween, amateur haunted housers, or folks who just want some music while they give out candy to costumed little ones, this CD is for you.

Martha Stewart's sonic spookathon bodes well for her new alliance with Rhino Records. The 40-minute, single-track CD steals the Halloween thunder from tired, hokey hits such as "The Monster Mash" and leaves you scratching your head over why such a masterful menagerie of menacing sounds didn't hit the market sooner. Trick-or-treaters of timid stock will want to steer clear of doorsteps fraught with Stewart's frightful cacophony. From the unmistakable scrape of knives being sharpened to the rattling clang of rusty chains, what's here is perfect for goose bumps. A laugh so sinister that it could only issue from the larynx of a lunatic comes near a witchy cackle, howling winds, thumping human heartbeats, and the hair-raising rustling of branches.

Here's a Halloween treat of historic proportions. Where else can you get Nelson Olmstead's manic voice tripping through Poe's "Pit and the Pendulum"? Or, better still, Boris Karloff reciting "The Vampire Sleeps" with just enough chill in his voice to tingle the spine? Relying on four Poe tales--all but "Shadow" read by Olmstead--Scary Stories is great for fright night, and ideal for bellowing out a window for the neighbors.

On October 7th, KOCH Records will unleash upon the world a soundtrack for the Halloween season, by an ensemble known as VAN HELSING'S CURSE. The debut album, Oculus Infernum, stitches together chilling classical passages (by way of an 18-piece orchestra), a prophetic choir, and menacing rock music in a veritable Frankenstein's monster of musical styles. The metaphoric skin for the album is a complete tale of terror revolving around the cyclical struggle between the forces of good & evil. Specifically, a dark, amorphous entity descends upon the earth and embarks on an unhindered killing spree. An orphaned boy seeks to end this "reign of terror" and confides in a direct descendant of vampire hunter Dr. Abraham Van Helsing (from Bram Stoker's Dracula novel) in order to dispatch the entity. www.kochentertainment.com