SECRET FUN BLOG

TREASURE CHEST OF THE SPOOKY

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Fri, 24 Oct 2025 02:03:00 +0000

I won’t start this by saying, “it’s that time of year again,” because whenever I come across Halloween content during the off-season and they say “it’s that time of year again” I feel a wisp of sorrow. Anyway, I’d like to share some media discoveries that could help spookify any time of year. As someone who regularly mines the caverns of the internet in search of Halloween-enhancing content, sometimes I worry that there’s little more to discover. Thankfully, these finds have proven me wrong.

Halloween in Edison, NJ (1984)

Frank of Ghoulish Terrors Magazine sent this to me with a description saying they "actually found this footage on a VHS tape retrieved/bought at an estate sale, years ago." This sounded like the setup for a fun modern throwback, but the moment I hit play, its authenticity cried out. A mysterious found videocassette is already the stuff of legends, but in this case, the contents are even more impressive. It’s essentially a short film about a quartet of monsters in search of a victim. They only pause along the way for the sake of growling, infighting, feasting, spell-casting and the destruction of small objects.

I’m deeply impressed with this production on so many levels. First, it’s a youthful fantasy scenario realized– the type of dream I might have concocted while standing in the Halloween aisle. Sure, costumes are meant for parties, trick or treating, and perhaps even uniforms for haunted house workers. But what might a costume’s ultimate purpose be? The answer is demonstrated in this video– camaraderie and art.

The makers of this featurette had access to resources that were seemingly unattainable in my youth. They had the spending power to get head-to-toe outfits, including accessories like rubber hands. They also had single-use perishables like smoke bombs. The budget even accommodated a full bag of destructible groceries. Most importantly, they shared a common vision, and possessed the technical tools and know-how to capture it all on videotape. I’m amazed at how well each shot is framed, and how steady the camera stays.

The artistic decisions are just about perfect. The scant dialogue and loose narrative eliminate distractions, allowing wistful viewers to get lost in their world and in their time. Each character is a timeless classic, and the characterization of each villain stays true to our longstanding expectations. The Frankenstein grunts and flails, the witch cackles and casts, and the ghoul growls. Speaking of audio, they use the classic Horrible Sounds of Halloween cassette as a realtime soundtrack. (The sound effects on that album were stolen from Sounds to Make You Shiver, but that one is tough to find on cassette, and I’m betting they used the more portable format.)

The wooded setting is also universal. The set design follows youthful Halloween logic in that the monsters’ lair is a cabin in the woods covered with dime store decor, complete with a smoky cauldron. On top of all that, it’s an unintentional period piece, especially at the end when we’re treated to a classic car show and an interior done up in the New Jersey vernacular. Finally, the story culminates in the triumph of good over evil. The antagonists are beat at their own game with opposing human stick-wielders.

This is a rare snapshot of American Halloween in the 1980s boiled down to its essence. I can't say I've ever seen another slice of Halloween as pure as this one.

Halloween Night II by Kendall J. Redburn

I happened across this 1991 Mac game on archive.org and I can’t understand how this bit of gaming history isn’t constantly referenced and celebrated throughout geek culture. It’s a trick-or-treat simulator from the perspective of the candy giver, except that all the visitors are real monsters, including a few that appear to be of the cosmic horror persuasion. The surprisingly intense artwork and sound design create an atmosphere that is both fun and genuinely chilling. As a kid, my household had an early Mac that was necessitated by my dad’s educational pursuits. Thanks to a clearance bin, we had one game called Airborne, and it dominated my mind and artistic life for a season. I can’t imagine how different my youth (and my life!) would have been, had I discovered this wondrous piece of software.

YOU CAN ACTUALLY PLAY IT HERE!

Charles Dickens' Ghost Stories from the Pickwick Papers (1987)

I’m going to scale way back on these write-ups so that I can go ahead and post this piece, but this animated TV movie is way more artful and atmospheric than I was expecting. A great, spooky-time watch.

Night of the Headless Horseman (1999)

This animated Fox special manages to squeeze some real chills and atmosphere out of the relatively early computer animation, something I've been warming up to recently. My main criteria for Halloween entertainment is that if feels like Halloween, and this one does from start to finish.

Amazing World of Ghosts (1978) with commercials from 1986

I’ve talked about this movie in another Halloween write-up, but yes, this version is seasoned with late night commercials! The beginning is cut off, but that’s even better because this would be the PERFECT show to discover during a restless night in 1986. I’ve had this on repeat for months now. Its power to soothe my spirit is unmatched.

WKBW Halloween Archives-Radio Broadcasts from Buffalo, NY 1968-1973

LISTEN HERE

This collection of radio broadcasts taps into the same vibe as Amazing World of Ghosts, especially the episode on Vampires. It's full of sensationalized, unchecked information, aided by the audio enhancements of the era. Like the above documentary, I can enjoy this as standalone entertainment, but if I want to maximize my pleasure, I envision the surrounding circumstances from when it aired— deep in the 1970s up in the exotic (to me) northeastern United States. It would have been the perfect program to find on the transistor radio after turning off the porch light, and flipping the TV to a black and white horror movie, volume turned down.

This Halloween Night walking tour of Ontario is amazing.

Witching Season Halloween Atmospheres

These vignettes seem to be inspired by the legendary opening credits of Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers. The do a good job scratching that spooky itch.

Pure Halloween on Spotify

Lastly, here is a playlist that I personally hand-picked, chock full of genuinely eerie music. It avoids the common Halloween staples and goes light on the film scores. There’s a healthy dose of Dungeon Synth in there, and plenty of brooding symphonic stuff. Turn it on while you’re running errands at dusk and watch the world turn creepy in a good way.

"MAGIC FUN SHOP" PHOTO BOOK

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Mon, 16 Jun 2025 01:41:00 +0000

Secret Fun Spot readers might enjoy this new photo book about the Magic Fun Shop— and not just because both names sound alike. Photographer Adam Wallacavage immortalized the defunct Philadelphia landmark with a collection of photos he took between 1995 and 2005. But they may as well have been taken in 1975 because the place was timeless. Sadly, I never made it to the Magic Fun Shop, but if feels entirely familiar. Every old school, big city novelty shop I've ever visited share the same earmarks, like mint green pegboard, hand-labeled boxes of essential gags, and stray, faded packaging from the mid-twentieth century. They came from the age when magic, jokes, and costumes got equal billing, unlike today's "Party" shops, which still struggle to survive.

About 75% of the 90 pages feature dangling rubber masks that are fun to see, especially when distorted by clothespins and years of gravity. But I'm most excited by the pages that offer glimpses of the ancient behind-the-counter prank packaging. Even when the place was still in business, the leftover stock served as a dazzling historical exhibit.

The book is available on the Secret Headquarters site. SHQ also happen to be one of the best comic shops I've ever visited. Full disclosure: I too am working on a project with them, but even if that were not the case, I'd still be all over this book.

THE MADACY HALLOWEEN CASSETTE SERIES

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 07:04:00 +0000

Welcome back to Secret Fun Spot, your source for the latest news in Halloween audio cassettes from thirty-five years ago. This year I completed a set of five Halloween titles from a Canadian label called Madacy. Or so I thought! As I was finishing up this review, looking for audio links, I made an earth-shattering discovery. There are multiple versions of some (possibly all) of these tapes! The realization essentially ruined everything I’d written about them. Re-writing, and revising has been overcomplicated and confusing. The review as it stands still feels half baked and lacking the hilarity and hijinks that I like to include, but if I don’t post it soon I could miss this year’s Halloween season.

I've been especially interested in this set because I bought the one called Horror at the Graveyard for my previous Halloween tape reviews and it may be my single favorite Halloween recording of all-time. When I figured out that it was part of a series, I couldn’t wait to hear the others. My curiosity intensified when I saw a video from a Youtuber named Zaranyzerak where he reads reviews of various Halloween cassettes that he wrote when he was a kid. Two of his highest-ranked picks are from this Madacy series. I put them in my ebay search alerts a couple of years ago, and finally, a string of affordable auctions let me assemble the five titles. I was already excited to be the first-ever human to review these as a whole, and that was before my stunning revelation about the different versions. So even though I only own half of the recordings I will proceed with my partial review.

Madacy was a Canadian record publisher that operated from 1968 to 2009 and distributed a wide variety of musical genres. They catered to bargain seekers, often utilizing public domain material. Their annual releases were sparse until the 1990s when their output ramped up. That’s when they (probably) released their first Halloween tapes. The five earliest Halloween titles feature unified cover art and typography along with the a warning not to listen in the dark. They also share the same group of voice actors. As with most Halloween audio, the artists, writers, and performers are not credited. The copyright dates of all the albums are equally mysterious. Discogs lists Sounds of Halloween as a 1990 release. While I have trust issues with some Discogs Halloween audio dates, that does gel with the Youtube video I mentioned earlier because he bought his copies in October of 1991.

These five titles were each released with two different item numbers. The first sequence runs from #H-13 to #H-17, and the second one goes from #HA-20 to #HA-24. The ‘HA’ series features a white oval around the item number. My grand revelation revealed that the ‘HA’s are re-recordings of the content on the ‘H’ series. So with the help of online audio, I will attempt to do a tape-by-tape breakdown covering both recorded versions of each title. I’m going to list them in what I’m guessing to be chronological order.

*Halloween Tricks and Treats (H-13 version)

I bought a factory-sealed copy of this one, but I discovered that the cassette inside is labeled The Haunted House (H-14) which is another tape in this set. I thought they just put the wrong tape in the case until I realized that my legitimate copy of The Haunted House has completely different audio. I was unsure if a “true” copy of Halloween Tricks and Treat (H-13) even existed until I came across this archival list of Halloween audio that shows that there is indeed one. Inconsistencies like this one are making it difficult for me to achieve my singular goal of creating the greatest document on Madacy Halloween tapes in all of humankind’s collective knowledge.

My The Haunted House that was in the Halloween Tricks and Treats (H-13) case has a story spanning both sides of the tape where a serious-sounding narrator tells of his experience in a mysterious haunted house that appeared out of nowhere on Halloween night. The tale is driven by the expected haunted sounds of laughter, footsteps, bats, creaking, eerie music, and such. It turns out that everything was just a bad dream. Or was it? It seems likely that random sound effects were gathered and then strung together with narration after the fact.

*The Haunted House (H-14 version)

To complicate things even more, this tape has The Haunted House (H-14) printed on one side, and Halloween Tricks & Treats (H-14) on the other! It too contains a story that takes up both sides. It’s about a group of kids who decide to explore the mysterious Dalton house that’s rumored to be haunted. It plays out in the Scooby-Doo tradition where a series of supernatural scares happen, followed by a natural explanation. The tale is told by a female narrator and the voices of the kids sound suspiciously like the same lady.

Sounds of Halloween (H-15 version)

The French cover version is Sons d’Halloween (HF-10).

I’ve only heard the H-22 version of this one (see below) so I’ll update this entry if I ever come across this version.

*The House that Died (H-16 version)

This one has a story on one side and sound effects on the other. It’s about a woman who inherits her uncle's mansion and attempts to walk through it with dreams of restoring the place. The house itself turns against her, cutting her tour short. Unlike The Haunted House, there are supernatural forces at work, and even the weather is affected. Some eerie moments could easily freak out a kid, like when the house whispers at her, but even scarier is her discovery that the renovations will be more expensive than expected.

Horror at the Graveyard (H-17 version)

The only evidence I can find that this version exists is that list of Halloween audio on this site. I’m ridiculously curious about what’s on it. The version that I own is listed below.

_________

Now we have reached what I call The Great Madacy Re-Recording. It would seem that the initial releases sold well enough to merit another retail wave, but for reasons unknown, the recordings have been updated with heavily processed, reverberating vocals, all provided by the same man. They also feature a new, original synth score. Different variations of the musical theme can be heard on the different stories, which I think is a nice addition. Aside from the new item numbers there is no outward indication that the products were “new and improved” which is a baffling choice. Unless it was some legal move to deny payment to the original voice actors, or something like that. Or could it be that it was a genuine effort to deliver a more sophisticated product? I certainly think the re-recordings are better. The cheesy, stylized storytelling is what puts them in a class of their own.

Halloween Tricks and Treats (HA-20 version)

Link to Youtube

The mysterious Dalton House from The Haunted House (H-14) is back, along with the young explorers, except in this re-recorded version, each kid has a different style of audio processing to differentiate their voices. They all share the same severe reverb that the spooky narrator has, which makes zero sense, plus it makes the dialogue difficult to understand. But these flaws only make me love it more.

The Haunted House (HA-21 version)

I see pictures of this version online, but until I find a cheap one, I can only speculate on the contents.

*Sounds of Halloween (HA-22 version)

This is a better-than-average montage of music and sound effects that encompasses both sides. It’s the only album in this series that is entirely made up of soundscapes. There are so many subsequent versions of this one that Madacy released through the years that I’m too overwhelmed to thoroughly tackle its legacy here. This is the only version I’ve heard, so I don’t know if it was re-recorded.

The House that Died (HA-23 version)

Thanks to the Youtube upload we know that this re-recording replaced the female narrator from the original with my favorite narrator, Mr. Reverb. More of that guy is exactly what I was hoping for when I started buying these. Being able to compare and contrast his performance to his predecessor is the type of experience that we geeks live for.

Horror at the Graveyard (HA-24 version)

Link to audio on Youtube

This is the one that kicked off my entire obsession. It’s the gold standard of Halloween audio. Told in first person, a man finds himself in a sinister cemetery where he is plagued by evil spirits. It’s less a story, and more of a loose sequence of events designed to showcase a variety of sound effects. For me, the droning storytelling accompanied by the thin synthesized score captures the essence of Halloween in the analog age. The final line of dialogue and the musical crescendo that follows never fails to delight me.

I enjoy fantasizing about the project origins of this line; the business meetings, and the creative process. Were these products purely driven by market data, or did someone wish to express their spooky side? Were they handled like just another Madacy album, no more or less special than their last Engelbert Humperdinck release? Or was there was a desire to explore the possibilities of compact cassette technology, in an effort to give kids fuel for their frightful fancies? I can’t decide if I prefer to romanticize the whole thing, or if it’s more fun to think of a bunch of work-a-day employees forced to whip up disposable ghost junk for the kiddies.

But there it is. Everything I know about these things at this point in time, presented to the internet at the request of nobody. Alas, I’m only halfway there; a thought that is both exciting and a bit exhausting. Perhaps we’ll have more to discuss next Halloween.

CONSUMING HALLOWEEN

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sat, 05 Oct 2024 04:40:00 +0000

As usual, I started celebrating Halloween pretty early this year, and when I say celebrate I mean hunting for Halloween stuff to mark the new season. I’m no longer alone in this. Data shows that peak Halloween buying has moved up by several weeks in recent years. There was a day this July that I visited four different stores which all had fully stocked Halloween sections. (If you’re wondering: Dollar Tree, Party City, Cracker Barrel, and Joanne’s Fabric.) ”Summerween” didn’t feel right to me at first, but my brain is adapting. The early product reveals add another chapter to the whole experience, and I’ll take it, because it spreads out the fun.

There are four tiers of Halloween consumerism for me: general retail, thrifting, the curated secondary market, and online shopping. The latter offers the best treasures while the earlier ones give the best experiences. This year, I’ve already taken part in all of these, and I will share some of my spoils with you here.

General Retail

I love the annual invasion of monsters in nearly every retail outlet. I go out of my way to explore shops all over my region. Hardware stores become well-lit spook houses, and routine grocery shopping suddenly involves a walk through a gallery of horrors. I don’t typically load up on new Halloween items, save for cheap dollar store offerings. I prefer old stuff. But Target got me this year with their new line of 80s-infused decor. They tapped into punk, Richard Simmons, shutter shades, clear telephones and a color palette straight from the carpet of a video arcade. But my favorite is a mayoral looking jack-o-lantern-headed blowmold. He’s one of several recurring characters like a green-skulled skeleton, and the mohawk skull. I appreciate the idea of Halloween mascots, even if they’re corporate. I mean, Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer was created for Montgomery Ward stores, so why not?

My Target purchases defied my usual taste for vintage things. But with each passing year I wonder how long I’ll continue to find things from thirty, or even fifty years ago. I’m ever thankful that holiday decorations tend to stick around longer than other home goods. They become part of tradition and turn into family heirlooms. There are dedicated Halloween storage bins in garages and basements across the county. That’s likely why this year didn’t disappoint in that area.

Thrifting

Thrift stores are such a unique experience; a proverbial marathon of drudging through discarded, depressing objects in hopes of finding the proverbial gems. It’s a numbers game. I make near-daily walkthroughs only to buy something about one in every fifty visits. But when it hits, it can truly be a proverbial jackpot. This year hasn’t yielded any proverbial white whales yet. It’s as though I’m the embodiment of a proverbial proverb. Anyway, one of my local thrift stores had an inordinate stockpile of Halloween stuff that they’ve been rolling out for weeks, so there have been enough little finds to liven up my season. The best was probably a Telco battery operated Creature from the Black Lagoon for four bucks that I lifted off the clerk’s cart before it was shelved. There’s no picture here because I gave it to a spooky-loving friend. (I already own two.)

Among my favorite finds is this Con-tact paper from 1991. I relate to the original owner in that I’m not sure what to do with it, but I bought it anyway.

I’m particularly fond of this treat bucket from 1986 labeled Myrle’s Original that I got for fifty cents. It was covered in flecks of green paint and other gunk, but to my surprise it cleaned up great, so now it feels well-earned.

It’s the sort of thing that begs me to consider its entire history, from production design to the day I bought it. I imagine someone at a drafting table in the mid ‘80s, poring over a book of clip art. They pause upon seeing a skeleton in a tuxedo. (And who originated that?) Tux-skeleton became the star of the bucket, while the spider and web were necessary to fill the space. The choice of typeface is perfect. I wonder if this container was ever used during trick-or-treating. Its utilitarian value likely ensured its survival in someone's garage all these decades. It sure came in handy when they wanted to paint something green.

Then in this year of two thousand twenty-four, why was it finally time to let it go? The owner’s age? A move? Or just a thorough spring cleaning? Then it was my turn to become its keeper. I restored it, and now I get to honor and preserve it on the same internet that’s used by all the world’s governments and religions. After I typed all that, I spent a half hour on archive.org trying to find the clip art book where the skeleton came from, but no luck. Myrle’s (whatever that is) used the same skeleton in 1998 bearing a different message, and in color!

The Curated Secondary Market

The region where I live has a wide selection of flea markets and antique shops, but this area doesn’t have the history, the economy, or the taste of places like, the northeast for example. The standard Pennsylvania junk shop is museum-quality in my eyes. Many of my local flea markets are only slightly better than thrift stores. Many of the products are just marked-up thrift store finds. But that doesn’t stop me from frequenting them. This next item did come from a northeastern flea market, and I actually got it two years ago on a trip to VHS Fest, but I shamefully forgot to put out for Halloween until now. That slanted, dripping typography has such a sense of gleeful urgency. I can barely handle it! And I think the ghost has a tongue!

There is a category of Halloween items that I’ve long admired, but only recently got into. It’s the 1980s and 90s battery operated imports that I usually saw in drug stores and oddball shops back in the day. They are decidedly off-brand, though I suppose Halloween doesn’t really have too many big name brands. They often have poorly translated English, and the packaging usually shows a picture of the product in a monochromatic void.

I never bought these when they were new because I assumed they were poorly made and short-lived, plus they could be relatively expensive. But I can no longer deny that they are truly wonderful. My appreciation has snowballed over time. So a couple years ago I picked up this Vincent the talking skull, and a “Wizard” candy container at a cool second hand toy shop. Both of them still work great, contradicting my theory about their quality.

The very name of this product seems to be mistranslated, and the instructions are poetic.

“…IT WOULD HAVE THE HAT OPENED

SLOWLY WITH HORROR

LAUGHT & GRINNING

LIGHTING EYES

ALL ACTIONS STOP PLAYING

UPON THE HAT BE COVERED”

I recently noticed the “Wizard” in a Walgreens commercial from 1992.

(I admit theirs seems to have different eye makeup, so maybe both a witch and wizard exist.)

Sheesh, that group shot of them floating in the foggy forest is the definition of Halloween magic.

Finding those two in the wild was an anomaly so this year I turned to eBay after seeing a post from Trash Witch that clued me into the existence of the Pumpkin Monster! I found an auction for significantly less than the rest of the listings, and bought it.

How I love the fact that the three figures all seem to be copied from other Halloween decorations of the time. (I may be reaching on the witch, but she's from the same Eureka line as the skeleton and she's got those same little symbols on her hat.)

EDIT: I also found the purple vest, green bow skeleton in the form of a ceramic light.

Ebay

Sure, we all know about eBay, but let’s take a moment to appreciate this.

I discovered an obscure Halloween item while sitting on my couch in the middle of the night as I half-watched some horror movie. It’s possible it wasn’t even sold within a hundred mile radius of my small town. But I was able to instantly go shopping at a dream store that isn’t bound by time or place. There I located a pumpkin monster of my own that still functions. It’s like I reached across the decades to grab it off the shelf of some arcane drug store. This type of transaction has only been available to humanity for a couple of decades.

Fueled by that experience and my frothy greed, I searched for more lesser known Halloween stuff in this vein. I found the Boo Bunch creepy walkers from 1993. Once Heddy the pumpkin guy arrived, I noticed that he was branded specifically for K-mart and my heart turned into a warm puddle.

There is one other way to obtain amazing Halloween goods that is superior to them all. Occasionally friends have gifted me some wonderful items. Like this Living Skull key chain that my friend Eddie Guevera gave me years ago. It falls squarely into this ‘no brand’ type of stuff. I adore it and its blood-splattered grid. “When put it in your palm it will murmur with terrible sound & gleam in eyes.” Oh, that is the stuff.

Now that all of these items are hung, shelved, displayed, lit-up and full of batteries, I believe I’m prepared to venture into the heart of October. Stay tuned!

BLOGGING ON MY WEB LOG ABOUT THE HALLOWEEN OF 2023

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 22:31:00 +0000

It’s all coming back to me. I type about stuff that I like, and hopefully it will result in a handful of people finding some extra amusement during their lunch break. What’s in it for me? I, along with future generations, will have access to documentation of this year’s Halloween. At least until Google inevitably kills off Blogger.

For a variety of reasons it was difficult to invest much time towards spooky fun during the last couple of Halloween seasons. For a different variety of reasons this year presented more opportunities for me to engage. So that’s what I’ve been doing, in as much as reality has permitted. I’ve also decided to return to form and write about the many ways that I’ve been experiencing this Halloween season.

Some years are defined by a new, sought-after Halloween product release. A few years ago there was the twelve-foot skeleton. Last year everyone was assembling the three Boo Buckets. This year, one item was able to overshadow even the new Carmella Creeper monster cereal. At least for me it did. In early August I saw a tweet from Sammy Hain that showcased a piece of wall decor that simply says “Halloween is Skeleton.”

I laughed out loud in a rare, literal LOL moment. These are some of my favorite words, and yet I’d never seen them arranged in this baffling and hilarious new way. My questions were answered a couple of replies later when Graves Make RosesBloom pointed out a product from a previous year that said, “Halloween is Skelefun” that featured a more appropriate image.

The misfire of a decoration shot to the top of my want list. I recognized the logo on the nearby stuffed pumpkin's tag from the Dollar General store, so the next morning before work I raced to the nearest location. Their Halloween stuff was only half unpacked but I saw a printed schematic taped to the shelf. No space was reserved for “Halloween is Skeleton.” There are two more Dollar General stores in my town (which says a lot about my town) but neither of those had the prize either.

A second look at the Twitter thread revealed that the decoration came from a place called Popshelf. I would later learn that this is the “upscale” version of Dollar General, and it’s pretty new. I followed a link to their site and I happily added the piece of decor to my virtual shopping cart, yet soon I realized that ‘in-store pick-up’ was the only option for anything on the site. Useless! Except for the fact that it shows the product availability at stores near me. They were plentiful, but unfortunately the “near me” was an hour and a half away. My afternoon plans changed in an instant, fueled by fear that this item would be recalled.

After my lengthy drive, on which I pondered why I’m like this, I found the Popshelf store. I trotted through the automatic doors and honed in on the Halloween section. It was soon evident that Halloween was NOT skeleton in that place. I asked an employee if they had it and she directed me right back to the shelves I had just scoured. I mentioned the “in stock” message on the web site, and sheepishly asked if I could talk to someone else who might be in the know.

A few minutes later a manager emerged. I showed her the jpeg image and laughed nervously as I tried to explain my new obsession out loud for the first time. Then to add some gravity I found myself admitting that I’d just driven ninety miles for this one and only purpose. I can’t even imagine the weirdo vibes I was giving off, but to my shock, she agreed that it was funny, and seemed to understand my fondness.

I know the concept of locating a missing product “in the back” is practically an urban myth, but I asked anyway. Suddenly more shock as she said to me, “Would you like to go in the back and look around for yourself?” This statement defied all logic. For retail workers (and I have been one of them) the back is a privilege, a bastion, and a sanctuary. It’s one of the few things that separates them from the masses, and I had an invitation.

I rambled on about how honored I was as I crossed the threshold. My delight faded when I saw a maze of tightly-wrapped Tetris-like boxes, on dozens of pallets, all at least eight feet high. The man arranging them said there was no way that we could locate a specific anything. I knew he was right. I went ahead and explained my absurd desire. Lo and behold, he too was sympathetic! He chuckled and his hopeless demeanor shifted. He started moving pallets around while describing the type of box it would be in, but I foresaw a lengthy search ahead. And while he seemed game, I didn’t feel right putting a halt to the afternoon’s business, regardless of how Skeleton Halloween may be. I think it’s due to my experiences growing up with some people who habitually abused the the kindness of store employees. I let him off the hook and asked if they would call me if they found it. As I wrote down my number (next to which I drew a large illustration of the product) I lacked any faith that they would follow through. I was already envisioning myself traveling to the next closest location on some upcoming weekend.

The next day “Popshelf” appeared on my phone screen. Without hesitation I repeated my journey, reveling in the absurdity of it all while trying to ignore the sheer wastefulness of the endeavor. Yet on the other hand, the physical pursuit is a big part of the fun. The hunter/gatherer lobe of my brain was more than content to see the lengthy quest to completion. Plus I knew that I was carving a new Halloween memory into my pumpkin head.

When I barged into the store, the guy spotted me instantly and yelled “Man, we already sold out of them!” During a long, breathless pause I decided that he was joking. And he was. They were happy to deliver the goods, and I picked up a couple extras for some other Halloween-loving friends who also understand pure greatness. I was also pleased to know that at the very least I had given the Popshelf staff something interesting to talk about over the last twenty-four hours. All of this is exactly why Halloween is indeed Skeleton.

As the season approached I ebayed a few more additions to my vintage Halloween cassette collection. I’d never seen T.A. Hamilton’s Terror Treats (1988) for sale before, probably because it was only available through the magicians’ black market. Though it warns that it’s “FOR HAUNTED ATTRACTION USE ONLY” somehow this copy found its way into the private sector. Presumably, the disgraced party responsible for this has been ousted from the haunted attraction guild.

I think the recording is better than most dollar store tapes, but some bold claims on the package set me up for disappointment. It says it’s the “single most diabolical Haunted House Soundtrack ever created,” “designed by experts in the field of Audio, Theatre and Illusion,” and contains “psychological stimulants and subliminal enhancements to produce desired effects.” Best I can tell that’s referring to some low oscillating tones throughout.

Spooky Halloween Sounds (1990) is my least favorite spooky tape approach, which is to say it strings together a series of isolated sound vignettes with pauses in between. It would be fine for an editing library, but it's not a great way to “Turn your home into a Haunted House!” I recognize some of the sound effects from other tapes, but I haven’t the will to do any cross-referencing.

The best of the bunch is Halloween Tricks and Treats from the Madacy label. It’s a sister release to the beloved Horror at the Graveyard. My all time favorite narrator has another spooky story to tell, and I would listen to him read a multivitamin label. You can hear it here.

In the realm of vintage horror paperbacks, I had some fun finds over the summer. I managed to locate both Dark Gods and The Ceremonies by T.E.D. Klein in two different states within just a couple of weeks. He was once the editor for Twilight Zone Magazine which seems to have trained him in the art of originality and avoiding cliches of the genre. He spends a great deal of time fleshing out the worlds and characters before he introduces the horror. I saw a tweet by Matt Cardin that had this to say about The Ceremonies…

“Did you know that Klein's classic 1984 novel not only tells a gripping horror story but gives the reader what amounts to a mini-course in the history of weird, Gothic, and supernatural horror literature? In making Jeremy, the novel's protagonist, a graduate student and college instructor who is preparing to write his dissertation on Gothic and weird literature, Klein creates a narrative vehicle for conveying insightful reflections on many classic texts, presented as entries in Jeremy’s journal. These include the likes of: • The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole • The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) by Ann Radcliffe • The Monk (1796) by Matthew Lewis • Melmoth the Wanderer (1820) by Charles Maturin • Carmilla (1872) and "Green Tea" (1872) by J. Sheridan Le Fanu • Dracula (1897) by Bram Stoker • Northanger Abbey (1817) by Jane Austen • "The White People" (1904) by Arthur Machen • "Ancient Sorceries" (1908) by Algernon Blackwood • Supernatural Horror in Literature (1927) by H. P. Lovecraft These same works—especially "The White People"—also form a thematic background to the cosmic horror at the center of Klein’s novel. This clever approach makes The Ceremonies a must-read not only for its own literary and entertainment value but as an instructional and inspirational text for both students and writers of supernatural horror fiction.”

This is why I’m currently reading that one.

I also found several titles by Clive Barker at my local thrift store, which is about as unusual as finding a cloven baker, or a clove burger on the shelf. Then I stumbled upon a new-to-me used book store in the area that has somehow escaped my google map searches for years. I picked up some cool stuff there too, especially during a buy-one-get-one-free sale. I finally reclaimed the first printing of The Shining paperback, a book I had foolishly donated to some lucky thrift store years ago.

A spooky project I’m working on sent me down a research rabbit hole of 1970s unexplained-type documentaries. I've seen many of these and I'm extremely fond of the In Search Of television series, but I was entirely unaware of The Amazing World of Ghosts (1978) written and directed by Wheeler Dixon. It’s a scattershot masterpiece of stock footage, library music, and truly unhinged speculation. The narration by Sydney Paul is both earnest and soothing all at once. The show puts me in a wonderful headspace, scratching an itch I didn’t know I had.

At times there is a welcome contrast between the grim subject matter and the upbeat, seemingly random production music. It’s as if to say that ghosts and UFOs should be celebrated, and not feared because the possibility of their existence is exciting; not scary. It reminds me of one of my favorite recordings, the street audio from the defunct World of Illusions attraction in Gatlinburg, TN. If Amazing World of Ghosts leaves you wanting more, there’s an extremely similar “sequel” called World of Mystery (1979)

In September I finally completed The Last of Us Part II. It’s a great game that is made even greater with the inclusion of this Halloween shop environment.

Thanks to a tip from Trevor Henderson I started listening to Nightfall which is a horror radio drama that was aired between 1980 and 1983 by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. For the most part the writing and production value is great, and there are some truly chilling episodes. The stories are surprisingly potent considering that they were on the public airwaves. These have been my go-to for every dog walk and day trip, so I’ve now heard nearly every episode.

If there's time, I enjoy creating something Halloween-related during the spooky season. This year my friend, an artist named Rumwolf, invited me to show some of my work at a Halloween event at a nearby art gallery. This motivated me to create this new painting of a dime store display of Halloween stuff, a subject firmly wedged up my oeuvre. The rubber skeletons pictured are the first ones I ever owned. When I was a kid I won them at ski-ball at an amusement park.

I displayed it with some older pieces and made a little sidewalk installation. The trick or treater represents my childhood fear of having to wear a winter coat over my Halloween costume.

For the last ten or so years I’ve frequented a nearby Halloween festival with various friends and family members. This year we decided to take things to the next level by driving to St. Louis to visit Creepyworld, a haunted park that boasts over 13 spooky attractions.

The line just to enter the park was surprisingly long. It eventually rounded a corner to reveal a sea of people ahead of us, standing in the same line. This seemed to be the norm judging by the "Freakshow" production that was in place to entertain the queue. I grew concerned that we wouldn’t get to see all the spook houses during our dwindling time frame. The line finally filtered directly into the first haunted house which had a mental hospital theme. The actors, props, and environments made for a solid haunt, and as I approached the end I was eager to see what else was in store. The exit emptied directly into another line that led directly into the next walk-through. Thankfully it was much shorter. After exiting the next haunted house, the line continued into the next one, and the next! The entire park was one continuous line!

While this was a bombshell for me, it wasn’t all bad. Mainly because if you’re in that line before they close shop, you are guaranteed to see every single thing in the entire park. But I’m still perplexed. It seems like the sort of idea you’d come up with at an elementary school sleepover. “What if there was an amusement park, and it only has haunted houses, and it’s all just one giant line.” Creepyworld has been going on for twenty-five years, so I’m sure they’ve learned a lot. Still I was surprised at the lack of opportunities to buy snacks, or souvenirs, or just wander around, or go to the bathroom, or even sit down. We opted for the additional hayride package, and getting to sit was worth the price of admission. I was also surprised that there was no pre-entry mention of this whole system. (Unless somehow we missed it.) Well, consider yourself warned.

We stopped by Half-Price Books on the way out of town, and I must give a huge shout-out of gratitude to my friend Kyle for pointing out a book that I had walked right by. Haunted Houses by Larry Kettelkamp was in my elementary school library and frightened me like no other! It has photographs of ghosts. So why do people continue to debate the issue? This is a major relic of my spooky existence.

The last time I threw a Halloween party I was in my mid-twenties, and it ended with a house fire. At this stage in life my entire assembly of local friends could only constitute a “gathering” at best (which is not a bad thing.) However, this year some of my former students who share my aesthetic wanted to have an old fashioned Halloween party at my place. This gave me an excuse to deck things out more than usual, and we had a great time. One of the highlights for me was getting everyone in a darkened room and putting on my Dr. Druid’s Haunted Seance album. The first side is all about unifying the group for the spiritual task ahead, so he goes through a bunch of goofy old parlor tricks that make it appear that everyone is all-knowing and powerful. The crowd totally got it. Then I played a chilling story called Mr. Fox by The Folktellers, followed by The Haunting, a short record from 1971 (which was sold through comic book ads) that’s designed to be played in the dark for a group of kids. It creates the illusion that a blood banshee is moving around the room devouring little boys. It was magical to hear these recordings played and appreciated by people in the year two thousand and twenty-three.

Other random tidbits:

As usual, throughout the summer I started piecemealing physical media to be enjoyed in October. This year I was drawn to movies that involve haunted attractions, be it dark rides or walk-throughs. These include titles like The Funhouse, and Ghoulies II for their dark ride content and haunt-centric films like The Houses October Built, Haunt, and Hellfest. I can overlook countless cinematic shortcomings if a movie feels like Halloween

One of the movies with the strongest Halloween feels is the WNUF Halloween Special. I ordered a new version of the blu ray slip cover. This is the first time I've ever ordered a slip cover for a film I already own. What a weird phenomenon, but that art is too cool. It’s even sillier since the existing slip cover is one of my all-time favorites.

I thrifted this Boogymen DVD, which is something I’ve been aware of for decades but had never watched. It’s exactly what I expected.

I bought one of these little skeletons at Target because they are gorgeous.

There is an odd trend this year of products breaking from the traditional Halloween color scheme with a palette that leans towards Easter. I'm not a fan of most of it, but here's another one that I liked enough to get.

Well, that’s my report so far, and there’s still some time before the big night. Sadly, I’ll be teaching a two and a half hour software class to college freshmen that evening, so it’s a good thing I’ve already been able to do so much celebrating.

Happy Halloween!

THE SECRET FUN SPOT IS DEAD. LONG LIVE SECRET FUN SPOT!

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Tue, 29 Jun 2021 00:09:00 +0000

Imagine being a painter and one day all that you've ever painted suddenly disappears. The canvases are still there but the paint has turned invisible. In a way, that's what happened to me after I deviated from traditional artistic materials and chose a new kind of "paint" called Adobe Flash.

In the year 2000 I worked for a subsidiary of Hallmark making newfangled greeting cards that could be sent and received instantaneously. And the pictures moved! And they were interactive! And they were free! We called them e-cards. All those innovative features were made possible by the program Flash.

When I was off the clock I used my knowledge of this powerful new medium to improve the rest of the internet by enhancing my website SecretFunSpot.com with image galleries of things like vintage bike decals, old Halloween photos, and a couple animated shorts. This was before "web 2.0" where everyone started contributing their own photos and memories via sites like Flickr. So for a long time if you wanted to see an image of Kenner's Hugo, Man of a Thousand Faces, my site was one of like, two places to see it on the world wide web. Thanks to Flash, you could virtually disguise him right on your screen!

Then the iphone came out. In a calculated move to dethrone the format, it didn't support Adobe Flash. This kicked off a decline that eventually resulted in the total demise of Flash in early 2021. Suddenly, the Secret Fun Spot became extra secret when all the content was shrouded in error messages. (My seven hundred plus e-cards had already vanished years ago.)

Truth is, I understand the problem with one company having total control of a format. Though it's amazing that Adobe created something so advanced that practically the entire web became dependent on them. I'd say that's still the case with much of the design and publishing world's reliance on the Creative Suite. The current monopoly isn't a good thing. We have to pay their monthly subscription to maintain our livelihood. (Yes, there are alternative programs, but Adobe is still pretty universal.)
Now that we're living in the future, it's so strange that artists and designers must be cautious of overnight obsolescence. With a flip of a switch a ton of the world's most recent creations became practically inaccessible. (Oh, how I miss orisinal.com.) Meanwhile the pyramids of Giza are over there scoffing. And seriously, how long will things like JPEGs last?

But I'm not here to lament Flash, or even the end of Secret Fun Spot. (I stopped updating it nearly twenty years ago.) Today as I finally cancel my web hosting, I'm reflecting on the ways that silly site literally changed my life. It exemplifies how creating projects for the love of it can connect you with others, and turn into work that will feed your family. The bulk of my creative life including my books, writing gigs, art commissions, gallery shows, and film projects can be traced to the Fun Spot in some form. The culmination of these projects and personal relationships have amounted to countless life-enriching experiences. All of that helped me get into my current visual arts faculty position at a university. At last my work is no longer in danger of iphone compatibility issues or going out of print.

The Secret Fun Spot reached over 2.5 million "sessions" since its inception in 1998. Over the years I've received hundreds of emails from people who were thrilled and touched by the journey it took them on. J.J. Abrams even mentioned it in an interview in Rolling Stone magazine! (May 15, 2008):

So now I'm going to redirect the Secretfunspot.com domain to this site. (Not that this site is seeing much attention from me these days, but still.) So I offer a hearty thank you to those of you who ever paid a visit to the Secret Fun Spot, and especially those of you who ended up sticking around with me. It's been fun and that's no secret! (ingenious!)

I'll leave you with a memorial image gallery of some of the image galleries. Don't try clicking the buttons because you shouldn't poke at dead things.

THE DO’S AND DON’TS OF SELF-TITLED RECORD ALBUMS

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Thu, 10 Jun 2021 03:42:00 +0000

This article originally appeared on Monkey Goggles, a sadly defunct project from the gang at Archie McPhee. Of all the things I've ever written, this is one of my favorites. So here it is, back on the internet where it belongs.

The Do’s and Don’ts of Self-Titled Record Albums

We humans have only been able to record our music for a hundred-something years, but in that short time we’ve arrived at some standard practices. For instance, recording artists sell bundles of 10 to 15 songs at a time, and these collections are called albums. Cover artwork and a title are carefully selected and assigned to each album; in many cases this happens well before the record is leaked online.

Likewise, certain conventions have emerged in the realm of album titles. Titles are usually a short phrase or a single word that corresponds with the theme or tone of the music. They can be poetic and profound, consider: Rubber Soul, Loveless, Urban Hymns or Nevermind. Some records are named after a song that appears on the LP; examples include Pet Sounds and Thriller. Others are simply named after music in general, such as Madonna’s album Music as well as Music, the first CD from the band 311.

Many artists have chosen to name albums after themselves; these are known as self-titled or eponymous records. R.E.M. actually called their 1988 singles compilation Eponymous, which was pretty cool. (Though it should be noted that The Alarm did this five years earlier, which deducts some of that coolness.)

At its best, the self-titled record is an act of elegant simplicity; at its worst, it becomes a baffling ordeal. Let’s explore the possible scenarios of self-titling with hopes that future bands might avoid pitfalls such as Santana Syndrome or Weezeritus.

THE SELF-TITLED DEBUT: DO

If you’re ever going to self-title, then your first album is the perfect time to do it. It makes an efficient, dignified statement: This is us and this is our music. The eponymous debut album is a respectable move that will place an artist alongside some of the most influential musicians in history. The seemingly endless list of acts who have carried on this rich tradition includes Wilson Phillips, The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, David Bowie, The Doors, Rush, Black Sabbath, Van Halen, Kraftwerk, Queen, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Aerosmith, The Clash, The Smiths, The Eagles, The Cars, Duran Duran, Journey, The Ramones, The Stooges, Violent Femmes, Madonna and “Weird Al” Yankovic to name just a handful. (Sorry, I really cracked myself up starting that list off with Wilson Phillips.)

The only act who has ever made a mistake in releasing a self-titled debut is Hoobastank. That name should have been avoided entirely.

SELF-TITLED DEBUTS BY SELF-TITLED BANDS: DON’T

Groups like Huey Lewis and the News and the The Allman Brothers already took the easy road when they named their band, so a first album title with a little pizzazz would have been nice. (Granted, Huey gets some credit for making up a stage name; he was born Hugh Anthony Cregg III.)

As lame as it is to self-title everything, the efficiency is undeniable. There was a time when Jon Bon Jovi could answer the questions who are you, what’s the name of your band and what’s the name of your album by simply flashing his driver’s license.

THE SELF-TITLED ALBUM THAT’S LATE IN THE CAREER: USUALLY A DON’T

Why wait until the third, eighth, or twelfth album to go eponymous? Sometimes it’s meant to indicate reinvention, like when Heart transitioned to a more pop oriented sound on their album Heart. Other times it proclaims the end of artistic integrity, as is the case of Metallica’s fifth album Metallica.

Bands deserve a pass if there is a legitimate reason behind the decision. Take The Beatles, the ninth LP by The Beatles. The record was to be named A Doll’s House until a British group called Family released the similarly titled Music in a Doll’s House. Despite this effort, many listeners still struggle to tell the two bands apart.

Smash Mouth held an online contest inviting their fans to name their third album. Their followers managed to come up with the winning appellation: Smash Mouth. The disgrace was completed by the fact that more people named the album than actually bought it.

The stupidest possible time to self-title is on the second album. (Unless it’s the first release in the States, i.e. Elton John.) It gives the impression that all creativity has been depleted by round two. Prince did it, and so did Collective Soul. What a bunch of goobers.

This practice doesn’t necessarily mean that a band has declared creative bankruptcy; The Velvet Underground, ABBA, and The Carpenters all did it on third albums which weren’t too shabby. But there’s really no method to this practice. Kid Rock went eponymous on his fourth release, Echo & The Bunnymen on their fifth, and The Cult waited until their sixth. Wilco’s seventh album is called Wilco (the album). The Cure held out until album 12 for some reason, and The Beach Boys self-titled their 22nd and final studio album as if to announce that they had officially hit the bottom of the artistic barrel.

MULTIPLE SELF-TITLED ALBUMS: DON’T. PLEASE… JUST DON’T.

A shocking number of recording artists have decided to put out more than one, and in many cases several, self-titled albums. Fleetwood Mac, Diana Ross, Duran Duran, Cher and Cheap Trick are all guilty. Whether their intentions were rooted in profound artistic statement or just plain apathy, it causes grief among the fans. It makes it confusing to discuss an artist’s career and it can even make it tricky to buy their albums. The worst offenders are Seal and Weezer, each with three self-titleds apiece, and then there’s Peter Gabriel, who didn’t bother naming his first four records.

A word of warning to any artist considering mid-career and/or multiple eponymy: fans just won’t put up with that crap. Listeners refuse to go to the trouble of calling a CD “Metallica’s self-titled fifth album” and rightfully so. They avoid this rigmarole by collectively assigning their own title, like “The Black Album.” Trouble is, the public will look to the most obvious visual cues available for inspiration, and the results are predictably dull. An album’s color, for example, is a no-brainer. It started with The White Album and continued with unsanctioned names like They Might Be Giants’ Pink album, Collective Soul’s Blue album and Weezer’s Blue, Green, and Red albums.

If colors aren’t an option, then fans will go with a prominent object on the cover. When Pearl Jam didn’t come up with anything better than Pearl Jam for their eighth effort, the fans looked to the inexplicable chopped avocado featured on the cover. Voila! The Avocado album. The Cult wanted to get back to basics with a self-titled sixth album — title overruled! The Black Sheep record was also renamed for its cover art. And in what is perhaps the only clever instance of this phenomenon, the self-titled Alice In Chains was nicknamed Tripod based on a three-legged dog on its jacket.

Fans used the same technique to deal with the Peter Gabriel debacle. The cover photo on his debut shows Peter in a car. It became Car. Peter’s fingers appear to leave scratch marks on his second album cover. This became Scratch. Can you guess what they named the one where half of Mr. Gabriel’s face is melting? Mr. Melty Face? No, just Melt.

By album number four, the powers that be were through screwing around and released the record with a sticker on its cover that said Security. Gabriel seemed to take the hint and started naming his records. His lack of album-naming practice was evident in the fact that his subsequent three records were respectively named So, Us, and Up.

Some artists like Chicago, Scott Walker, and Led Zeppelin put out multiple self-titled LPs, but they had the courtesy to number them. Seal forced his appreciators to do this, and he further convoluted the situation by giving his third record a proper name. So his unofficial discography goes: Seal I, Seal II, Human Being, Seal IV and so on. It sounds like a horror movie franchise.

Fan-named titles have also spawned from year of release (Cheap Trick ’97) and song names (Genesis, the Mama album). The point is, if you don’t name your album then everyone else will, and you’re not going to like it.

MULTIPLE SELF-TITLED ALBUMS BY A SELF-TITLED ARTIST: DO NOT!

It’s true: Santana released Santana in 1969 and Santana in 1971 (which was the band’s third album, no less), proving that Carlos Santana is the laziest rock star in history.

THE HUNT FOR 'SIDE A'

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Tue, 20 Oct 2020 03:54:00 +0000

The photo above is the result of a three-year-long hunt that began when I was reviewing a series of vintage Halloween cassette tapes in 2017. The Chamber of Horrors by TONY (USA) has carved its spooky face into the Jack-O'-lantern of Halloween history thanks to its unique, 'descent into madness' approach to sound effects. (See my original review.) But the common release of the recording is literally only half the story.

Chamber of Horrors was originally the B-side to a more elaborate production called The Haunting: A Horror Story. The rarity of this edition, and the obscured "Side A" and "Side B" markings (see photo below) suggest that it was discontinued and reissued with the Chamber of Horrors sound effects repeated on both sides. Was it it simply too terrifying for young Halloween consumers, as some have suggested?

The second edition containing the same effects loops on both sides

The elusive variant with its perfect ghost and haunted house artwork became the object of my obsession. My hunt didn't involve trips into the wilderness, or even the act of leaving the chair where I currently sit. However, it was an ebay adventure in perseverance and timing. I laid 'email search alert' traps, but the delay from inbox to web site amounted in two painfully lost auctions. I resorted to compulsively live searching whenever I found time. This went on for two years. It was ultimately a late night ebay visit where I, armed with a litany of generic search terms, found it in a nondescript lot, and finally "buy-it-now'd" my way to the grail. The joyous victory was intensely magnified by this year's harrowing months of uncertainty.

Now I share my delight with you. After years of being conspicuously absent from Youtube, I have uploaded the precious Side A. Please enjoy it and use it to help make yours the happiest possible Halloween!

THE RETURN OF THE GIANT HALLOWEEN MASKS

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Thu, 31 Oct 2019 01:09:00 +0000

In 2003 my all-time favorite graphic design team, the Charles Spencer Anderson design co., created the phenomenal marketing materials (as well as some products) for Target's Halloween campaign. This was the crossover of the century for me— CSA versus Halloween! To make matters better, they used vintage Ben Cooper masks as source material, and enlarged them to be taller than I was as a trick or treater! In fact, I wore the identical Frankenstein mask in 1981.

In 2007 I wrote this blog post about the campaign, where I shared some photos that I took back when photography was forbidden in stores, and when I was still using film. I also lamented my failed attempt to acquire the masks after the season. (Customer service claimed they were to be donated to a local school after use.)

Well, the internet heard my wish, and over the past twelve years I've received a continual trickle of emails about the masks. They came in three categories: those asking me to assess the value of their masks (my lone blog post made me the leading authority on the internet), those offering to sell me their masks (these were the most common), and even a few emails from kind people offering to just give me the masks. I perked up at the latter, but soon discovered that shipping five foot faces can cost hundreds of dollars. A personal pick-up option was offered once, but they were located more than a day's drive away, again amounting to a major chunk of money and time.

About a year ago I received another generous free offer from a woman named Kat. Kat actually worked on the Target marketing team and helped make the campaign a reality! Her set of masks were a job perk, and she'd been using them as Halloween decorations for years. But the time to "pay them forward" had come, and my writing convinced her that I'd provide them with a good home.
I could immediately tell that Kat lives her life with vigorous heart and soul. She initially gave me a list of rules to agree to, should I accept the gift. The first rule was that I too must pass them on freely when my time with them is over.

I loved her approach, but I explained the issues I'd encountered before. Kat persisted. Every couple months she told me about another possible shipping method she was researching. Whenever one thing didn't pan out she would move on to the next. This went on for nearly a year. Eventually she offered to drive someplace near me to make a hand off, even though places near me are far from her.

In July my family took a three hour jaunt to Kansas City to meet Kat. She ended up driving about eight hours (one way) to meet us there in order to give us some free ginormous masks!! Kat invited a good friend of hers to go along on her road trip, and she made the perfect suggestion to meet at the Nelson-Atkins museum of art. We met, and she's exactly the kind of person who would make a sixteen hour round trip to give someone giant masks. For the record, I was bestowed with the princess, the fireman, and yes, Frankenstein's monster.

We talked for about an hour before the museum kicked us out at closing time. We have many shared passions and our careers overlap. Before we parted Kat offered to give me her ongoing advice and perspective in relation to my role as a creative, and an educator, and that's even more valuable than giant costumes. Thanks Kat for being the best possible type of human being! Happy Halloween!

THE HALLOWEEN O' 2019

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Mon, 28 Oct 2019 02:51:00 +0000

Once again, I assembled a list of Halloween activities and then followed my list. Here is what that looked like this year...

1. Decorate for Halloween
Here's my latest innovation...

2. Make Halloween mood table
This year's theme: Mcfarlane Monsters

3. Change phone wallpaper
This is from a 1970s blacklight poster

4. Seek out new Halloween decorations and spooky toys
This year I made a startling discovery that rocked the Twitterverse.
"Attention Spooky folks: these decorations from Dollar Tree are essentially the Silver Shamrock masks from Halloween III!"

5. Read one of my vintage horror paperbacks
I ended up listening to the first book of Blackwater by Michael McDowell.

6. Play a spooky video game

7. Watch pre-selected pile of Halloween entertainment
I found the bulk of these over the past year at thrift stores and flea markets. (Though a few are perennial watches.) My greatest score was the entire In Search Of series for $7. Over the past two months I've made it through all of these. Well, not all the In Search Of episodes.)

8. Subscribe to Shudder and watch stuff

9. Make a fire in the backyard fire pit

10. Create a horror playlist. Listen while walking/driving around.
I really just copied a couple peoples' existing lists, and then customized them to my liking.

11. Seek out some of the seasonal stuff that like-minded people are tweeting about
This year it was the Mountain Dew mystery flavor (i.e. Candy Corn), the blow mold decorations from Michaels, and the Universal Monster Bend-ems from Walgreens.

12. Write a blog post

13. and 14. Go on an October day trip/Go Halloween shopping in another town
I've been able to do a lot of this, thankfully. I make it a point to travel roads I've never traveled if possible, and go through towns I've never visited. Naturally I picked up lots of goodies.

15. Spend Halloween with my family
And this will happen Thursday.

For me, the scariest thing about Halloween is the thought of letting the season slip by without doing whatever I can to enjoy it. This year I have nothing to fear.
Happy Halloween!

HALLOWEEN 2018

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 01:21:00 +0000

Greetings internet traveler! I just want to commemorate this Halloween season with a rundown of how things have played out this year. It's been a different type of season for me because this is the first Halloween in nine years that I've had a full time, day-to-day job as opposed to a precarious freelance lifestyle. This has created the classic time vs. money conundrum. Last year I was able to review a different vintage Halloween cassette every single day in October, while this year work-related time constraints kept me from crossing off several major items from my annual list of Halloween goals. (I discovered a couple years ago that lists can help keep the Halloween magic from slipping through my fingers.) Here's how it went...

1. Decorate house for Halloween

Done

2. ~~Go on October trip to Toronto~~

3. ~~Go to Chicago toy show~~

Both were not prudent given my work situation

4. Go to a Halloween event

See below

5. See a horror movie in the theater
Saw Halloween (2018)

6. ~~Make my Halloween mood table~~

No, but my house evokes a strong Halloween mood this year

7. Drive to a nearby town and go Halloween shopping

Went to several

8. Play a Halloween themed video game
I started playing Fortnite to bond with my son earlier this year. Then I kept playing. This October it became Halloween themed

9. ~~Read an 80s horror paperback~~

Didn't make the time

10. Watch my pre-selected Halloween movie pile
Got through almost all of it. It included things like: WNUF Halloween Special, Trick 'r Treat, Hereditary, Channel Zero: Candlestick Cove, Ghost Stories, Ghost Story, Return of the Living Dead, Mandy, The Town that Dreaded Sundown, Phantasm III and more

11. Have friends over to watch scary things

Yes, two friends came over on two different nights and watched IT (2017), and Carrie respectively

12. Create something with a Halloween theme

See Below

13. Make a Halloween blog post

Work in progress

14. Celebrate Halloween with my family

Still to come

It was a work-related errand that kicked off my "pre-Halloween" back in September. I wandered into Lowe's on a Wednesday morning and lit up when I saw a fresh display spooks sitting on hay bales. I picked up my very first life-size plastic skeleton, the kind that GLOWS IN THE DARK. The Lowe's manager lady gave a triumphant shout across the store and declared that I had bought the first Halloween item of the year. Other customers chuckled when I laid him on the floor in front of the cash register. In the parking lot yet another lady made a joke as I was putting him into the passenger seat of the truck. With expert timing I retorted, "Now I have someone to talk to." and a group of shoppers all laughed. It felt like I was in a movie where the happy-go-lucky character has the perfect skeleton buying experience while the opening credits pop on and off the screen.

A week later the skeleton was accompanied by a plastic light-up Jack-o-lantern. I found it at the Tulsa flea market and it has all sorts of sentimental value for me. First, my uncle stored his Matchbox cars and plastic toys in a treat bucket of this very same design. So I would dump out this pumpkin head during nearly every childhood visit to my grandmother's house. It also still has its $1.47 Woolco price tag stuck to it...

And best of all, the man who sold it to me said it was a classroom decoration for years. It has a masking taped label on the bottom that says "[Something] Boys & Girls, Salina, KS" I think Woolos (Wootos?) may be a teacher's name, and it's dated Oct. 26, 1975.

I was about to pay for it when I saw this on the floor under the table...

It's the Kay Lande and Wade Denning Halloween classroom record! It includes the song "Halloween" that we sang in grade school Music class, and was the official theme song for the holiday in my mind. The digital version of this has been my go-to every year since I discovered it on the legendary Scar Stuff blog. It's a great, not-too-scary album that I could play for my son when he was very little.

It's quite possible that this record was stored alongside the jack-o-lantern, only to emerge once a year into a room of lucky children. Those pumpkin eyes probably saw costumed kids dancing to the record on chilly Kansas mornings year after year. Sigh.

September also found me on the ebay, searching for collectible reminders of forgotten Halloween memories. This cloaked skeleton figure popped up...

It's not a toy, or a decoration per se, but more of a craft item for the doll collecting set. I closed the tab and moved on. Yet, obviously I own it now, so what happened? Well, it popped up in another one of my search results and I started thinking about it. It's from 1987, and it reminds me of the sort of thing that might have caught my attention when I was a kid on shopping days when my mom would drag me from store to store. Her stores catered to moms of course, so sometimes anything distantly toy-like was all there was to focus on during the endless visits. Halloween expanded the possibilities. It could be something like a stuffed black cat, or a felt monster, or a witch cake decoration. But I liked this concept of Halloween fun for moms and grandmas.

It still has a tag on it that mentions the Virginian sisters who made it. That caused me to imagine their whole brainstorming session behind the skeleton man. Two sisters sitting in Virginia in 1987 (or '86 if they had a lot of lead time) discussing their upcoming collectible Halloween dolls. This delights me. Then I wondered what I was doing on that day. I also wonder who bought it, and why it reeks of cigarette smoke and perfume.

I was also struck by his little flannel shirt sleeves. This clearly isn't a grim reaper, but an adult wearing a handmade costume of his own design. The bones look hastily painted on the smock, and I can't tell who's craftsmanship that reflects, the doll maker or the doll's. This flannel-and-jeans wearing guy was probably working the 1987 jaycee's haunted house. This portrayal of a homemade haunter also stuck with me. All of these thoughts motivated me to bid, and when I finally did, I grew terrified that I'd lose the auction. (Turns out I had no competition.)

A couple weeks later I got a call from good ol' Mike Becker of Funko fame. He said he was planning a Halloween fundraiser called Monster Mask-O-Raid, and he was seeking vintage Halloween photos, as well as artwork for the show. Thanks to my new job I have access to screen printing equipment, which is an art form that has eluded me all my life. In a moment of revelation, I decided to combine my desire to screen print with this art opportunity, and the spark of inspiration was none other than the flannel shirt-wearing grim reaper.

I spent a couple weeks brainstorming, sketching, and finalizing my design which turned into a series of die cut-style Halloween decorations featuring the skeleton man and his decorated neighborhood.
The night before my shipping deadline I bribed a college student with a pizza dinner in exchange for supervising me as I attempted to ink my first designs. (I had already called in other favors earlier in the week to get assistance with printing the transparent film and burning the screens.) The first batch was a success! My goal was to make a series of 25 sets of three.

After my pizza-fed student teacher left I started having trouble with the black ink. My sets dwindled as the ink bled and dried in all the wrong places. Feeling defeated, I decided to stop before I ruined all my orange prints. Then it dawned on me that if I could salvage just one of each design I could submit a single complete set of three. That's what I did, and here's how they turned out...

The mask on the kid is based on a real mask that I saw on one of my old blog posts about a Traveler's Novelty Catalog. (Bottom left)

Just like this Halloween season itself, I didn't live up to my own grand plan, but I'm still very happy with the outcome.

One thing that did turn out right was number four on my list...

4. Go to a Halloween event

There's a cave in Missouri that's been showing spooky movies inside it around Halloween. (In previous years they've put on a spook house in the cave, which also sounds neat.) Their sign is good too...

The exterior is pretty well decorated which gave us a jolt of Halloween magic...

I took my son to see Beetlejuice, which was his first time to see it. When it was over he looked around and said, "Oh, yeah, I forgot we were in a cave." It was a uniquely surreal experience. Water from the ceiling dripped on me several times. Maybe next year I'll see a horror show there. They screen The Descent (2005) on Halloween night.

Yesterday was another Halloween-ish time spent at a corn maze and pumpkin patch...

Those were my most notable events this month. The weather was super hot in early October, then it turned crazy cold and rainy a couple weeks ago. There were quite a few nice and gloomy days. These offered plenty of smile-inducing moments like picking up my pizza order at the gas station and seeing this guy hanging in the window. (Yes, I eat gas station pizza. Casey's tastes like a childhood pizza party.)

I also got my most popular ever Twitter post with this video and the caption:
"The Halloween decoration I hung outside my own window has legitimately terrified me three times now."
which is very true...

There was also a lot of shopping. Flea markets...

And Target, where you can find an official Mego Frankenstein action figure in the year 2018!..

Last year the big challenge was finding the plastic Skeleton Army that was being sold in some Dollar General stores. My twitter feed was full of boastful people lording them over me. I went to a half dozen locations before I was finally able to track them down in the next town over. This year they followed with a Mummy Army and I was poised for another hunt, but apparently the success of the skeletons convinced them to put the mummies in nearly every location.

But most of my shopping was online. Like this amazing skeleton from Boss Fight Studio that I found thanks to a tip from a twitter pal, The Pathologist...

And this British import of the mini Stretch X-Ray! Thanks to a tip from another Twitter pal.

And yet another Twitter pal, Andy Nyman, sent me this superb dime store "Lochness Monster," also from the UK!

There's also these (which came from a store, now that I think about it.)

I couldn't resist the amazingly ridiculous, ridiculously amazing Savage World horror figures from Funko...

And light-up Halloween III pins from Camera Viscera...

But my favorite of all Halloween products this year is this perfect Beistle skeleton blanket from Creepy Company.

Welp, it's late and I should post this so I can get back to work. I'll leave you with some pics of graveyards and moons from this season. Happy Halloween!

THE LOST ROAD TRIPS: PART III- NYC VIA TENNESSEE AND WILDWOOD, NJ

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Fri, 10 Aug 2018 01:08:00 +0000

“The air was soft, the stars so fine, the promise of every cobbled alley so great, that I thought I was in a dream.”
― Jack Kerouac, On the Road: The Original Scroll

Starting a blog posts with a literary quote is a first for me, but I've been thinking about the connection between dreams and road trips. It's simple: I often dream about road trips, and road trips often feel like dreams. Certain destinations seem to have built a permanent spot in my dream world. There are also several imaginary locations that I revisit again and again.

It makes sense, considering the impact that travel has on our psyche. We interrupt the flow of our daily lives to carve out a journey that offers a constant stream of new stimuli, sometimes visiting places that stop at nothing to amuse and delight. When I'm on a trip I'm well aware that the day I'm living will likely be imprinted in my head until death. Trips are my mental benchmarks that help me sort out the years. It's no wonder that the places we visit almost take on a spiritual significance. (Neil Gaiman's book "American Gods" demonstrates this by making tourist attractions, House on the Rock and Rock City Gardens, literal meeting places for the gods.)

Somehow my 2016 excursion to New York was more dreamlike than most. The whole premise of the trip was a dream come true. I was invited to the NY Comics & Picture-Story Symposium to give a presentation on comic book ads and novelties. It's a modest monthly event that takes place at Parsons New School and is hosted by one of my favorite graphic novelists, Ben Katchor. (Ben's work usually centers around the fictitious history of objects, industrial design, and urban rituals. Sometimes he incorporates the old novelties that I'm so fond of. In fact, one of his books is called "Cheap Novelties: The Pleasure of Urban Decay." Nothing else can put me in the same headspace as Katchor's work.) The event was the perfect excuse for a road trip, so I brought my friend Chris along and we set out to make it as epic as possible.

Since epic was the goal, our first stop was Graceland.

I had never been before. Strange, I know, considering my taste for tourist traps, and that Graceland is located on a frequently traveled route. But the timing had never been right, and reports from other people had dampened my interest. For years all I'd heard is that it's smaller than you'd expect, you can't go upstairs, and it's expensive. These statements are not unfair. I had to remind myself that Graceland's cultural significance made up for the fact that I could have spent an entire day at a theme park for roughly the same price.

The size wasn't a shock thanks to the many warnings, but what did surprise me was its sheer coolness. To me, the common notion of a dream house is usually less than dreamy. Mansions can feel cold and impersonal, but I found Graceland to be extremely cozy and inviting.

For those unfamiliar, the tour groups assemble at a visitor center across the highway from Graceland proper. The line for the bus corralled us in front of a printed backdrop of the Graceland gates. A photographer snapped souvenir photos that would be available for purchase at the end of the tour. Chris and I placed our bets as to how much those puppies would run. I guessed low. Turns out they were thirty-five bucks apiece. That's for a photo in front of an illustration that was taken across the street from the real thing. Our tour ended at closing time so the backdrop was empty and we snapped our own free photos; an act fueled by the rebellious spirit of Rock N' Roll.

There are plenty of complete Graceland photo tours on the web, so I've narrowed this down to my favorite rooms. First is the kitchen.

I'm so ready for all-over wood surfaces to make a comeback. I don't care if it's the real thing or flimsy paneling. The idea that rooms need to be "opened up" with light colors is a plague on our society. (I wouldn't mind the return of avocado appliances either.) Elvis's kitchen put me at ease. Nothing else could make him seem so human.

Even with all its '70s deco glitz, the TV room still has a basement-ness that keeps it humble. It seems surprisingly attainable now. The space is eighty percent sectional furniture and mirrors, and these days the triple screens are almost quaint.

In what was likely an effort to keep up with today's sophisticated consumer, each guest was issued an ipad to hang around their necks. The device had the ability to sense your location, and serve up a 360 degree interactive tour of your surroundings. I get the value in being able to touch on certain objects and learn more information, but it means that you're often staring at a Quicktime virtual view of the same room you're actually standing in.

The Jungle Room was the pinnacle of lush lounging. The next-level feature was a mini waterfall where you might expect to find a fireplace. This is yet another trend that I would welcome on a mass scale.

I noticed that someone had left a compact disc on a chair in the roped-off room. There's no way it was an accident. Could it have been an offering put there by a budding musician who sought a blessing from The King? When I walked back through the disc was gone. Possible explanations are: (A) the staff was very vigilant, (B) Elvis received his sacrifice, or (C) it's an Illuminati drop point.

There we go. Finally, some of my lighthearted commentary. I'm not sure why this post has started out so pensive and then price conscious. Anyway...

Truth is, the Elvis factor was pretty much secondary for me. I was so in awe of the environment that I had to remind myself that a modern legend had been cooped up in there, and even died right upstairs. But I'd pay theme park prices to see most any extravagant time capsule homes with shag carpet and green steel tanker desks.

By the way, I asked the attendant if she'd seen any ghosts walking around. Her reply was "no," but that's because she'd only worked there for two weeks.

You are correct if you guessed that we stood before the grave obnoxiously quoting the scene from This Is Spinal Tap, and harmonized a barbershop raga version of "Heartbreak Hotel."

Elvis's house closed, but the stores didn't. You could divide the souvenir shops into three tiers. The gift shop in the Graceland complex offered the officially ordained shopping experience. It's full of the highest order of Elvis gear at premium prices. Right next door in the Graceland Crossing shopping center was Souvenirs of Elvis Presley Boulevard. I was disappointed by it's carefully controlled inventory. It's like they had a couple dozen focus group-approved designs that were applied to the standard types of merchandise.

Thankfully, I spotted Boulevard Souvenirs, not to be confused with— wait, actually being confused with Souvenirs of Elvis Presley Boulevard may have been their entire plan.

Boulevard Souvenirs was everything I look for in a souvenir shop: cramped, haphazard, and longstanding. There was plenty of stock that first arrived when Clinton was president.

The shop was full of items produced by risk-takers, items too unorthodox to be considered by the upper echelon of the Elvis estate. Seeking official endorsement would be a waste of everyone's time. I bought a foamcore stand-up Graceland that fell apart in my hands, and a poorly designed bumper sticker dated 1994. I've spent a couple hours in search of that goofy sticker hoping to scan it for this article. In the process I did find an old photo that I put on a friend's Facebook page, and that inadvertently connected me to another old friend who I hadn't talked to in a quarter century. So it was worth it.

Day two took us to the twin cities of Tennessee tourism, Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. I've written about this wonderful part of the world before. Both towns experienced a boom in tourism when the Great Smoky Mountains National Park was established in 1930s. Gatlinburg was first to develop as a tourist spot, and is more pedestrian friendly...

While Pigeon Forge has bigger attractions that are less concentrated...

We spent the bulk of our time in Gatlinburg. It's nestled in a valley beneath tree-covered hillsides which, to me, sets it apart from other tourist meccas like the Wisconsin Dells, Orlando, or Branson. I'm also sentimental about it because it's the first place I've ever been where multiple haunted walk-throughs were plopped right in the middle of a shopping district. To my joy, many businesses on the Gatlinburg strip had gone unchanged since my first visit as a teenager. So I made it a goal to take photos of things that looked more or less like they did thirty years prior.

Why stop there? Maybe some subtle Photoshopping can help bring out the 1985 in them...

This one even has payphones and a neon animal print...

I love visiting places where the economy can support more than one freestanding marshal arts supply shop...

I just noticed that there's a mask from the movie Scream showcased the front window. This means that the Ghostface mask was a vital piece of their marketing strategy, selected for its potential to lure people inside. I appreciate that so much.

I've been sitting here thinking about this, and it occurred to me to check the Google Maps street view just to see if it's also visible there. (Admit it, you were thinking the same thing.) Turns out, the Google view is four years older than my photo, but look, there it is! And it's on some sort of canvas!

Now I'm looking up Ghostface mask trivia. Four years before the movie Scream, the original Ghostface design was part of a 1992 line called "Fantastic Faces" by Fun World, the same company responsible for one of the worst Halloween cassettes of all time. The mask was originally called “The Peanut-Eyed Ghost.” There's a dispute over who created the initial design between former employee Brigitte Sleiertin-Linden and her former boss, Alan Geller. (Geller also claims he thought Scream was a student film when he licensed it. This contradicts Wes Craven's recollection of lengthy negotiations. I believe Brigitte.)

Anyway.

One of my favorite things on earth is Gatlinburg's one and only World of Illusions. I've written about it before, but it's been ten years and my feelings have changed. It straddles the line between monumental rip-off and national treasure. Sixty-eight percent of its Trip Advisor reviews are rated "Terrible." But the following one star review is exactly why I'd give it five stars... "It looks like it was built 50 years ago and not touched since then."

There are plenty of "4D" screen-driven attractions these days. Isn't there room for three dimensional figures that move with the assistance of loud, oily motors? If anything, it serves as a historic record of how special effects and magic tricks used to be done: with special lighting, mirrors, and wires. But its greatest mystery is how it has endured the decades. It has to be one of the last of its kind, and I fear its demise.

To entice foot traffic World of Illusions deceptively fills their spacious lobby with "hot" characters of the day i.e. Harry Potter, Spider-Man, Padawan Anakin, Frodo (formerly Mini-Me), even a makeshift Neo and Trinity from The Matrix. It's like a history of summer blockbusters. However, on the inside the latest property is probably Star Trek: The Next Generation.

The concept of combining a wax museum with magic trickery sounds great, but World of Illusion's greatest weakness is the shockingly short duration (with an arguably disproportionate admission price.) Compared to other local museums like Ripley's, or Guinness World Records, the number of (working) exhibits are minuscule. The first time I completed it, I thought I had walked out a fire exit by mistake. There's not even a final gift shop, you're jettisoned into a service ally. I'm guessing it takes about seven minutes for the average visitor to take it all in, and that's if they study the toy magic tricks and printed illusions on the walls, including the "magic eye" poster they probably bought at a nearby shop in the '90s. We camped inside for nearly an hour, soaking up ever detail and documenting everything. I roamed from entrance-to-exit again and again, thrilled to exist inside that dark hallway.

The exhibits were behind glass and some were so dim it was difficult to see. It felt like struggling to make out images in dreams. To my delight, at least half of the exhibits were spooky in nature. There's Frankenstein, a werewolf, and at least two vampires, one of which was part of a "Dracula to bat" room...

The "new Vampire/Werewolf Illusion" advertised out front was unfortunately, an update to the classic "Girl to Gorilla" sideshow act...

There was also a grim reaper wearing a re-purposed Batman suit!

But that's not even the best thing about it. When the face turned human, it was revealed to be Charles Bronson! That's not a joke, or a coincidence, it's a former figure from one of the town's defunct wax museums. I repeat, they had Charles Bronson as a grim reaper in a Batman suit!

But that's not the only formerly-unemployed wax figure. They tried to pass Alan Alda off as a Doctor Frankenstein! Didn't even take off the dog tags! Was this the product of a masterful sense of humor, or did the management think that customers would be too moronic to notice?

Photo borrowed from a Flickr user named "touristtrap"

The monsters aren't nearly as creepy as Superman using his powers to secretly see Louis Lane's unmentionables.

It would seem that once E.T.'s hot streak was over, he was painted green and incorporated into a Star Trek exhibit. And people complain about the eight dollar admission?!

Once again, Elvis Presley was there to entertain us in the form of a singing bust. A looped medley of "Hound Dog" and "Heartbreak Hotel" echoed relentlessly from a damaged recording. Speaking of Audio, one of the most amazing things about the place is the recorded "barker" that they pipe out onto the sidewalk. It's clearly a product of the 1970s, and I applaud them for ignoring the inaccuracies and just pressing "play" every day.

If you crave a further look at the World of Illusion, here's a recent video tour that's pretty good.

Late afternoon arrived too soon, and we still needed to get a lot closer to the coast in order to stay on schedule. We agreed to explore one more wood-covered block before heading back to the car.

My dreams recurrently involve finding neat little shops in mysterious towns. World of Illusions had already put me in a dream state, but for a moment I truly questioned whether I was awake as I saw an out-of-reach store called Doc's Magic Castle. Stores in my dreamworld are often inconveniently located, showing up on precarious hills, or other impossible places. I frequently arrive at closing time, or during a blackout. (These frustrations don't match the waking realization that none if it ever existed.)

We navigated a three story mall that never abandoned the beloved diagonal wood trend of the 70s era. Passing a nearly empty arcade on my way up supported my dream theory.

We found the facade of the magic shop, and to my thrill Doc's Magic Castle looked like a castle. However— the front gates were locked, and the lights were out. Of course it was closed, just like a dream.

Then a mysterious voice from inside said, "Give me a moment and I'll open that for you." It wasn't a magic trick, the clerk was getting ready to open! The place sprang to life quickly and a few other customers followed us in. Doc's was a neat magic shop with an extra layer of Gatlinburg aesthetic, like a dragon that could breath smoke. We eavesdropped on a boy with a heavy Tennessee accent who apparently performed street magic for tips. Leaving that scene was tough, but we had miles to tend to.

Back on the road, it wasn't long before darkness fell and sprinkles of rain followed. The moment was right for me to break out my now-ancient MP3 player, pre-loaded with content for a variety of situations. For general fair-weather travel, I had a K-Tel collection of Truckin' songs. For the long stretches of nothing I had entire four-hour episodes of "Rick Dee's Weekly Top 40" from the 1980s. For the rainy, eerie climb over the Kentucky Appalachians I had a real gem set aside.

In 2003 WFMU launched the 365 Days Project where an audio oddity was posted every day for a year. The overall experience changed me as a human, but one of my favorite discoveries was a found cassette recording of a portion of a radio show called "Is Paul Dead?" ( a link to the audio is on the web page.) It's a lengthy exploration of the legend of Paul McCartney's death coverup. The host goes well beyond the common "clues," and delves into wildly imaginative leaps of logic to support the conspiracy. The content is fascinating enough, but the tone and production value brings it to a chill-inducing level. The music places the recording sometime during the late '70s. The host's earnest delivery, and the music bed that includes the Close Encounters soundtrack and Tomita's "Bermuda Triangle" album give it the same vibe as those documentaries on unexplained phenomenon that were popular in the decade. When you pop it on you think, "This might be fun for a couple minutes," and a half hour later you're disappointed that it's over. It's one of my all-time favorite pieces of art.

Day three was reserved for the New Jersey coast. One yet-to-be-visited place that had been on my radar for a long time was the Wildwood boardwalk, former home of the legendary Dracula's Castle dark ride which burned down in 2002.

I had heard that things don't open until May, but it was the last week of April, so what's one week? It turns out that one week was the difference between open hotels, and no open hotels, between a town and a ghost town. Here's the scene we found...

It was cool in a Scooby-Doo kind of way, but it took some getting used to.

Places that were open included: a couple t-shirt shops doing prep work for the following week, a toy shop, an arcade full of crane games, and two pizza joints. As Chris and I tried to determine the best pizzeria, workers from each place walked out of their empty buildings to woo us. We were each handed menus, and told about VIP discounts, free refills and other amenities. The decision was paralyzing. I don't remember what finally coaxed us inside one of them, but I feel bad that we dealt such a blow to the other place.

I decided to find the Caribbean hotel where I'd tried to make a reservation. It was mid-century gorgeous.

But somehow, in all my years of nostalgia-obsessed intenetting, I never learned that the entire town is a sanctuary for 50s and 60s hotel design! It was mind-blowing, block after block of "doo wop" architecture (also known as Googie, or Populuxe style). The area is known as the Wildwoods Shore Resort Historic District where the structures are saved and restored by the The Wildwood Doo Wop Preservation League.

How had we stumbled across a place like this? Again, it felt like— one big dream!

As we traveled closer to our painfully contemporary hotel, there was time for a final stop to see Lucy the Elephant in Margate City, New Jersey. This had been on my roadside bucket list for decades because it appears in nearly every book and documentary about wacky roadside architecture. Built in 1881, it's one of the oldest of its kind. It was visited by tourists back when road trips required horses.

We made it to New York City with several hours to suck up some sights. Everyone was taking photos of the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty, but I took this picture, just in case nobody thought to photograph the inside of a Times Square souvenir shop that day.

Elvis himself appropriately made a final appearance in the form of a costumed impersonator posing for tips. I didn't know he was there until I heard him angrily accusing us of taking unpaid photos of him. Chris defended us and a minor verbal spat broke out. As he walked away he flipped us off and told us to, "Eat a dick."

It was perfect! I mean, come on, that's not just dream-like, that's the kind of stuff you'd write into a novel. That's a full blown literary theme! We went from visiting hearth and home of the real Elvis Presley, to a run down robot of him in Gatlinburg, to a bitter New Yorker insulting us personally. Clearly, the trip had reached a turning point.

I gave my talk and had a blast. As a college instructor I'd forgotten what it was like to have an audience that's interested, enthusiastic, and there on their own volition.

On our last full day on the road I wanted to check in on one of my favorite little tourist spots, Cave City, Kentucky. The biggest (man made) attraction there, Guntown Mountain, was teetering on the brink of collapse the last time I'd been through. We discovered the place had shut down after changing the name to "Funtown Mountain" and some failed renovation efforts. Consequently, what I once described as "the perfect souvenir shop"(in this old post) was boarded up. The mood turned bleak, and as if on cue, dark storm clouds began to roll in. (Thankfully, as of this summer the place is operating again under the name Froggett's Guntown Mountain.)

Rather than return to the interstate I wanted to investigate the defunct Mammoth Cave Wax Museum that went up for auction in 2012.

It opened in the 70s and had a mini golf course, an ice cream shop, a tank of fake sharks, and an alpine village called Pixie World. There was also a sizable apartment for the management to live on site. I used to fantasize about buying it. The owners were hoping they could pass the torch along to someone else, but I heard the contents were sold to various buyers, ensuring its demise. Sheesh, maybe following up the Guntown Mountain discovery with another grim stop wasn't a great idea. Elvis's grave was cheerier than this.

Speaking of which, yet again Elvis had a poetic connection to our journey. His statue had been in there for decades. Just as he had left the building, it seemed like he had left us to face our daily lives once again.

Photo from 2011 by Flickr user jacobkrejci

(Here's a video tour of the Wax Museum grounds that's made even better by some abandoned Halloween decorations.)

The horizon was flickering with wild lightning when we saw a sign for a rock shop and mystery house four miles away.

Was it worth an eight mile round trip knowing it would be closed, and the storm was about to rage? Of course it was. As we pulled into the driveway the storm let loose.

The fun was over prematurely, like waking up from a good dream before you're ready. Everything around us was closed, dark, soaked, or out of business— except for the combination Long John Silver's and A&W! The lobby was a welcome dry refuge, heavy with a familiar deep-fried aroma. They cooked me up a batch of chicken planks (as I still call them) and a side of complimentary krums. We sat in the otherwise empty dining room devouring our trays of batter-dipped comfort as the storm gave the windows a thrashing.

With precision timing, the after-dinner skies grew merciful. Chris surveyed the patio, looking like an Edward Hopper painting.

The ride to our next bed was smooth and clear. Once again we were living the dream.

THE LOST ROAD TRIPS: PART II- NEW JERSEY VIA OHIO

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 00:47:00 +0000

A few years ago I traveled to New Jersey with my friend Scott for two reasons. The first was to take part in the Toyman toy show in St. Louis where Scott was a vendor. The second was the chance to possibly appear on a TV show. I signed a thing saying I wouldn't discuss details about the show appearance online, so I'll continue to not discuss it. Technically there's nothing to discuss because the segment never aired. They never said why, but I assume it's because I somehow ruined it, even though I was just standing in the background.

Toyman is the best toy show I've ever been to. I haven't done the major ones like the Chicago Toy Show, but I've been to dozens of cons and fests all over the nation, and I loved how focused this one was. There were no panel discussions to distract you from that sweet vendor floor, and for the most part the content was vintage, as opposed to new products based on vintage properties which dominate most pop culture events. Toyman happens eight times a year so it fosters a strong community of vendors, most of whom posses superhuman table-curating powers.

The only downside is going when you're on a tight budget. The freelance life is said to be "feast or famine," and I wasn't feasting at the time. I spent less than thirty bucks, but my biggest triumph was a trade. I found some little MPC monsters for less than a dollar each, and when I showed them to my favorite toy vendor, he informed me that they were a super rare vending-size variant. I swapped two for a "Warrior Beast" Skullman (with repro cape, but original knife), and a purple version of a "Dragonriders of the Styx" shirtless demon.

The second, much longer leg of the trip took us through Ohio. Alarms went off in my brain reminding me about a store, somewhere in the state, that several internet friends have gone out of their way to email me about. A google search brought up Foy's Halloween stores in Fairborn, Ohio. It was on the way, AND in the perfect spot for an overnight stay!

It was late on a Sunday night when we pulled into town. The GPS led us to a spacious Main Street that was covered in neon— and skeletons! It felt like something out of an urban myth, a downtown that's decorated for Halloween year round. We were the only living beings in sight which added to the dreaminess of the moment. Instantly recharged, we hopped out to take some pics...

When morning finally arrived, the thought of that street being open got me out of bed quicker than usual. Daylight revealed a wonderland...

The Foy's empire is comprised of six different storefronts spread across two blocks. The main concentration includes an authentic dime store, a diner, a Halloween shop, a kids' costume shop, and a haunted house supply store! The grown-ups costume shop is isolated from the rest, but that's okay because it's right next to a row of book, collectible, and toy shops.

That street is almost exactly what I'd describe in a "what if" conversation...
"What business would I open, if I could open anything? That's easy, a classic dime store full of toys, magic tricks, pranks, and candy. Wait..no! I'd sell spooky stuff too, year round! Wait, why just the one store? I'd take up the whole block, and it would have a Halloween shop... and a haunted house shop... and a diner..."

According to this article the head of the operation is Mike Foy, a third generation business owner. The five and dime was first to open in 1929, by his grandpa. Mike seems to be responsible for spooking up the enterprise.

The mind-blowing visit was clouded with a longing that still lingers. Since we were there on a Monday morning in the off-season, out of all the places I listed only the dime store and the costume shop were open. They were great (the dime store was phenomenal), but these photos make me feel like a ghost with unfinished business. Somehow, I must return to haunt this street again.

But here's some of what I did see.
The costume shop was packed with all the familiar bagged costumes and loads of accessories. What made it stand out were the displays around the parameter of the ceiling...

The variety shop is the heart of the enterprise.

The signage was a symphonic medley of metal, vinyl, neon tubing, and hand-painted wood.

I walked in and my eyes climbed a central tower of magnificent objects. The base was a display of bulk candy beneath a bay of security monitors, topped with the biggest advertisement for Don Post masks I've ever seen.

I immediately thought of the movie Halloween III, and then moments later the masks from the film were staring back at me, right next to an astounding selection of Michael Myers heads.
Imagine popping in to grab a Myers mask before a party and being confronted with this decision. It's like hash brown styles at Waffle House. Do you want your mask: chopped, smooth, bleeding, chunky, or covered in hair?

(The one on the top row with the milk jug lid showing deserves its own film franchise.)

I didn't pay attention to the price range, but some look like they could cause you to miss a car payment, while the model in the top right could have been used as packing material for the rest.

Tough choice? How about one of our dozen Jasons?
We apologize for only offering eight different Freddy Kruegers. But this is just the general store. Check out our Halloween shop for the real selection.

This was all behind a glass display that ran the length of the building. The content segued seamlessly from costumes to ninja weapons to magic tricks and so on. It's hard to see, but there's a full spinner rack of pranks stuck right on top. There were also plenty of over-the-counter novelties like alien putty and whoopee cushions.

The magic items are behind a sliding glass door. (Just as they should be!) The assortment covers all different manufacturers and decades. The handmade starburst sign with the word "magic" gives me chills. That Phony Burger behind it is from the 1960s...

Near the front door, morning-fresh popcorn warmed under an electric bulb. A container of cold fruit flavored juice was available at the legacy price of twenty-five cents. This was my breakfast.

Another bank of candy concealed a more practical aisle of tourist-wear and office supplies. The concentration of merchandise had a soothing effect on me, like swaddling on a colicky baby.

Beneath the selection of souvenirs was a shelf where you could force your hand into various containers of rubber trinkets and squish them all at once.

Not enough places sell rubber bats by the piece for fifty cents.
I was profoundly impressed that they offered so many subtle variations of skeletons. My skeleton collection grew that day.

A mini shrine to the founder was taped on a massive case of bulk jelly beans.
If my loved ones are reading this, I'd be more than honored to receive the same treatment in lieu of a traditional grave.

Another day on the road took us to Red Bank, New Jersey, where Scott had set up a big toy purchase from "popculturist guru" Rob Bruce (seen pointing at me below.)

We didn't visit his main stockpile of toys, but we did get to see his hallowed office! With his blessing, here are some photos (a bit blurry due to the pounding of my pulse.)

Rob's fascination at the time was limited edition art toys and vintage bootlegs (i.e. the spider-men seen below), an inevitable choice for anyone who has possessed every mass produced toy in existence.

Rob took us to his usual lunching spot which had the healthiest food I've ever shared a room with. He talked about the envy-inducing collector culture in the northeast, and he told us about the time he got to go on tour with the Ramones.

At his recommendation we traveled to a shop in Asbury Park called Groovy Graveyard.

The shop was more proof that the northeastern United States has a perfect storm of the elements needed to create a collectors' wonderland:
-A high population
Generations of stuff-buying families who have stayed in the region.
-A concentration of resources
Disposable income, frivolous spenders, questionable purchases by both the normal and the weirdos.
-People with diverse tastes
People from different backgrounds, cultures, educations and belief systems who bought Jazz, Punk, Hip Hop, and obscure film scores. Independent, Horror, and Documentary films once watched by historians, geeks, and cinephiles. Now they're done with it, and it's our job to preserve and archive it all.
-Basements
These are not a given where I live. I've heard that it has something to do with the frostline up north, or it's too damp here, or the ground is too hard. Whatever the reason, much of the country lacks what is both a storage space, and a breeding ground for cultural study, and comic reading, and roll playing games, and hiding from social situations.

Asbury Park will always have a layer of magic on it for me because it was home to the beloved S.S. Adams Prank and Magic company. Strangers have sent me emails over the years updating me on the state of the building (and its transition into condominiums). This was my chance to check up on it and pay my final respects. There was little remaining evidence that this was the world's premier novelty company for nearly a century.

I've been enticed by the Silverball Museum and arcade for years because it's often mentioned on a live-streaming podcast called "The Best Show with Tom Scharpling." My day in Asbury Park was my big chance to finally experience it. It was exactly as great as I expected it to be. Aisles of beautiful and functioning pinball machines awaited. Getting photos of them without players took precision timing...

The next day we visited Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash comic shop.

It functions as both a store and a studio for the show "Comic Book Men" on AMC. So there's more elbow room than many comic shops, and as you can see the lighting is heavy duty. (The thing on the left is a prop from the Kevin Smith movie "Tusk.")

Most of the products were new comic books, but they did have a display case of View Askewniverse memorabilia. Speaking of which, we did run into Brian O'Halloran who played Dante in Clerks (1994). On the way there I had thought, "Hey, what if we ran into someone from a Kevin Smith movie?" followed immediately by "That's ridiculous, what am I thinking? Why would they even be there?" and yet, there he was.

There was also a moment when one of the "Comic Book Men," Bryan Johnson, and I were the only two people in a room. Brian dropped a Gatorade and it rolled toward me, but stopped about eight feet from where I was sitting. Part of me thought that maybe I should pick it up and hand back to him, but again, it felt like a long way. I was frozen with this dilemma while he chased down the bottle muttering "For f***'s sake." as I sat and watched awkwardly. We never said a word to each other.

Here are a few more places I saw in the Garden State...

On the way home there was an excellent tribute to the Pennsylvania Turnpike at one of the rest stops. (Pennsylvania has the best rest stops.) The glassed-in shelf was full of vintage souvenirs...

We stayed with a friend in Nashville who showed us the sights.We went to the tourist row of shops and bars. Many people wore boots, but I suspect very few were cowboys or cowgirls.

The Ernest Tubb Record shop was full of history, but their music supplies were low. (Those white things in the mostly empty racks on the right was their CD selection.) They were ripe for the vinyl comeback and I hope they've embraced it since my visit.

I got to take a peek at Hatch Show Print design shop, which is a graphic designers' destination in itself...

We went to yet another store that's supported by a reality TV show. Antique Archaeology is where some of the loot from "American Pickers" ends up.

The selection is amazing, but it's not a place for bargain shopping.

This concludes my eastern tour of "rooms full of stuff." More lost road trips to come!

THE LOST ROAD TRIPS: PART I

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 03:05:00 +0000

People often tell me that they miss my travelogues. To be more accurate, one person told me that they miss my travelogues, however, that person is a magician. (Hi Frank.) A magician's request carries tremendous weight in my personal economy of things, so here goes.

In the last few years I've been on several all-American road trips that I have failed to share with the internet. Ideally, I would drop all the photos into a Kodak slide carousel, invite you all into my darkened living room, and let you enjoy a slice of pie as I cycle through photos to the sound of Esquivel records. A series of blog posts will never come close to that, but you can still eat pie if you want.

Only one of my outings was a pure vacation where I got to choose the destination and route. The rest were unrefusable opportunities or ride-alongs which limited my roadside kicks to places that happened to be on the way. When there's a bigger goal, a schedule to stick to, and the route is at the mercy of a carload of independent wills, each successful stop is an unexpected triumph. When Fate is your bus driver, that lack of control can be offset by a near-overdose of serendipity when things do turn out great.

For my first post, I'd like to make an addendum to the massive write-up of my 2015 visit to the Archie McPhee headquarters. It was so massive that I didn't try to squeeze in the sights we saw along the highway. The first one was a doozy, Casa Bonita in Denver, Colorado.

I've been meaning to pay tribute to the Casa Bonita franchise since the earliest days of this blog, but the subject is overwhelming. When I was a kid the Tulsa location was like a local taste of Disneyland. The interior resembled a Mexican village on a starry night complete with a maze-like cave and a huge video arcade. I'd heard legends of the flagship Denver location for years, with its cliff divers and magic shows, but this was my first visit. I'm only going to include a couple token photos here to leave open the possibility for a dedicated post in the future. But I will say that it was immensely bigger and better than I had dreamed. I couldn't have been more excited to discover that this location had spooky stuff too, like a walk-through monster cave!

There is an elite class of roadside attraction that uses dozens, if not hundreds of billboards to tantalize drivers down the off-ramp. "Rock City Gardens" in Chattanooga and "South of the Border" in Dillon, South Carolina are my favorite examples. The multitude of signs I encountered for a place called Little America resembled a collection of stock photography, but the "billboard onslaught technique" always works on me.

I immediately got the sense that this place was a major highlight during the golden age of American road-tripping, and Wikipedia confirmed it. Little America opened in 1952 and soon became a fixture of the Lincoln highway, the nation's first transcontinental road. It doesn't need to boast any novel amusements because in the unforgiving Wyoming countryside all it takes to become a traveler's oasis are the basics: fuel, food, lodging, coffee, "spotless restrooms," cocktails, and a service garage, most of these available 24 hours a day. Its sixty-five gas pumps made it the world's largest service station for a time. Such a comfy, ample, supply depot can make a driver reluctant to return to the lonely road. It feels like leaving the Prancing Pony to wander the barrens of Middle Earth.

(Here's some foreshadowing...)

The complex has two competing themes. The name and the presence of penguins refers to a base in Antarctica reminding visitors that this dose of civilization is highly secluded. According to a legend on an old advertising flyer, the founder, S.M. Covey, made a vow to build this place into a "haven and a refuge" after he was once stranded in a blizzard on this very site. He deemed its construction "a promise kept...a dream come true."

Covey had a real penguin shipped across the sea to serve as a living mascot. The bird died in transit, and the stuffed carcass is still on display in the lobby— a reliquary to a corporate martyr. I couldn't get a photo of "Emperor the Penguin" because it was in the process of being cleaned. So at least they clean it.

Penguin statues are scattered among the other visual motif, Georgian style architecture of early America. The mix of zany and historic gives the place a unique vacationland appeal.

Speaking of unique appeal, I knew nothing about the history of the place, but I got the sense that it wasn't itself anymore. Like the sign out front, it seemed somehow incomplete. Sure enough, online photos show that a cartoon penguin was part of the original design. Unfortunately, they look to be in the final stages of shedding their mid-century whimsy. The newest signs attempt to class up the joint.

Their billboards went from this to this...

(60s billboard photo by John Margolies, new sign photo via)

Trying to play it straight goes against the very DNA of the establishment. Little America was designed from the ground up to cater to the boom of new families adventuring in their new family sedans. The shapes and colors of comic strips spilled into the real world to summon fun-seeking tribes. Regardless of the signs, this place will always be more like a theme park than a Colonial Williamsburg.

The overcast day of my visit emphasized the way the color and flavor has been drained. And now, so help me, I'm looking at vintage postcards for this place. I ache for a lost world...

All I want is this: It's 1966, and I'm a traveling novelty salesman. I coast into the Little America parking lot as smoke pours from under the hood of my Nash Rambler. I'm stranded for a week until a new part arrives, leaving me no choice but to survive on their amenities, and wander the grounds chatting up fellow tourists. During the week I break my personal record for rubber skeleton sales.

When you're traveling hundreds of miles through featureless plains, a couple of simple stone monoliths are enough to get everyone excited enough to stop. The Ames Monument was part of Union Pacific's effort to improve their reputation after a financial scandal in 1867. It's a tribute to two brothers who financed the first transcontinental railroad during a time when many proclaimed the duo to be "kings of fraud."

I'm learning all of this now because I couldn't be bothered to read the three plaques at the foot of the pyramid. I was just happy to find an empty lot where we could stretch our legs and let the powerful winds hold up the weight of our leaning bodies.

About twenty miles down the road there was a more self-explanatory attraction, The Wyoming Abraham Lincoln monument which has been at this location since 1969.

The visitors center looked disheveled. I like that.

This view from the Lincoln monument looks like something that would be framed on a wood-paneled wall in the corporate headquarters of a trucking company...

These back to back attractions were followed by an empty expanse that made me wish I had an electric car. Wyoming could do a better job with their monument dispersing.

A couple hours later I was relieved to find a gas station, but to call it that is an understatement. This was a Travel Plaza of great significance, The Sinclair station in Sinclair, Wyoming that's positioned in front of the Sinclair Oil Refinery. This gave me the opportunity to pump my favorite brand of gas (based solely on the corporate mascot) while staring at the place where it was concocted.

Considering that the refinery is close enough for them to drop off the gas during their coffee breaks it would stand to reason that the fuel would be cheaper. Not so.

On the way back from my Archie McPhee adventure I was more relaxed. I was thrilled with my visit, and in no hurry to return to real life. Following a tip from a friend we stopped at Multnomah Falls, Oregon.

The humid, cool air was refreshing, and the hovering scent of firewood from the visitor center made a blanket of cozy. The moss covered surfaces were like cushions for your eyes. It's no secret that I'm crazy about the junk food equivalent of roadside attractions, but I can absolutely appreciate such a nutritious place.

For lunch we stopped at Spooky's Pizza in The Dalles, Oregon. I still don't know what the mascot is, or why it's called Spooky's but I love both of those things. I'd like to think he's a ghost in a bow tie, but I'm often prone to thinking that things are ghosts. All their web site says is that it opened in '66, closed in the 80s, and reopened in '99. (That's '66 upside down!)

Like Pizza Hut, there is synergy between the signage and the rooftop. But they've topped the hut with multiple pinnacles and clerestory windows that match a functioning chimney.

The chimney looks to be attached to this massive fireplace. The Pizza Hut of my youth also had a massive fireplace. This taught me that pizza tastes better when you're near hot black iron. (Another example is in this old Pizza Parlour review, from back when 22 comments on a post was normal.)

This painting was a clue that there may have been more to the Spooky's experience...

Customized vending machines are the sign of a next level pizza joint.

A number of the yelp reviews that I read mentioned fond childhood experiences at the restaurant. Spooky's obviously embraces their history. Contrary to Little America, I'll bet that seeing old photos of this place wouldn't make me feel like I'd entirely missed out on something wonderful.

We stayed the night in Denver, and after my family settled in for the evening I went in search of the secondary market. There are times when I get powerful cravings to be surrounded by old media. Thus far, the trip hadn't offered much of that, so I hit the thrift store circuit. Once they'd all closed I got turned around in a complex of strip malls. A single store was still lit up. I made a moth-like approach and discovered Black & Read Books, Music, and News! It was exactly what I was itching for.

I opened one of the front doors and had to step around stacks of newly arrived boxes of VHS tapes. The store had the energizing aroma of paper goods slowly deteriorating. The vast inventory was organized with aging signs hand-written in Sharpie. I held monster manuals, board games, laserdiscs, and Heavy Metal magazines. It was open late, and the prices were very good. After buzzing for a couple hours, I left with mostly movie soundtracks on vinyl. There are still several more titles I wish I'd picked up. I returned the next morning to confirm that it wasn't just a dream...

The last leg of the trip took me by a place I have tried but failed to visit in the past. The home of the world's largest prairie dog. I missed it by about a year, but I think I'm okay with that. Online reviews are not kind. They have titles like, "Heavy with shame for seeing this." The problem was that the accompanying "zoo" seemed terribly mismanaged. Here's what remained...

The tantalizing fence was there to make sure that you paid your $10 entry fee...

The fake giant prairie dog was long gone when I got there, but Google images does not forget...

Here are some other sights from the road...

That's a skeleton on the grill in April. Respect.

Buford, WY, with a population of one (which is now called PhinDeli Town Buford.)

A year-round Haunted House in Utah. More respect.

The gas station where I learned that pumping your own gas was (at the time) illegal in Oregon...

Thankfully, there's no law against ninjutsu supplies and skeleton art...

The windiest observation deck that is adamant about covering up vandalism...

The Mall in Hays, Kansas bucked all the new trends in outdoor signs for decades, and now they are better for it.

The same mall ignored all the graphic designers' doublespeak about the need for a unified logo, and they absolutely made the right decision.

UPDATE: I found a postcard that indicates the above was the original logo, and the orange striped version is the update. And look, the interior was so warm and inviting. The stripes were once on the mall exterior too! Why, as a society, have we given up on color?

More lost road trips are on the way!

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #31: The Hallmark Halloween Tapes

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Tue, 31 Oct 2017 05:53:00 +0000

Hallmark put out four different Halloween cassettes between 1986 and '89 during the peak of the Halloween cassette trend. The tapes were part of their annual Halloween promotions. For example, if you spent five dollars, you could get a tape for $1.95 (Which really wasn't less than most Halloween cassettes at the time.) The first three releases share a great deal of content (see specifics below) while the '89 release was an all new recording. I have many questions about these tapes, and perhaps the answers rest deep in the Hallmark archives, but for now I'll happily rely on pure speculation.

Title: The Haunting Sounds of Halloween
Manufacturer: Hallmark
Year: 1986
Also popular from Hallmark that year: Black cat and witch Merry Miniatures

Total Runtime: around 60 Min
Repeats on both sides: Yes
Stories: No
Music: Cinematic music, some synth, and some pipe organ music
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: "Aren't you a little big to be trick or treating?" and other lines of dialogue
Review: Hallmark has always presented a grandma-friendly version of Halloween that complimented the discount store blood and disfigured monster masks. It often found its way onto teachers' desks and store clerk smocks, and I always welcomed the sight of it. Naturally, their Halloween cassettes follow the same whimsical aesthetic.

Rather than a harrowing soundscape, the Hallmark effects come at you methodically, and with a bit too much dead air in between each noise for my taste. The mood stays tongue-in-cheek as a handful of actors speak comical lines. Most are written to work with a trick or treat porch scenario like: "My, what an ugly costume." and, "Didn't the other kids tell you not to come here?" The effects in between are death-free; instead they focus on things like door hinges and cats.

The Haunting Sounds of Halloween is the rarest of the four Hallmark releases. It was seemingly replaced the same year it came out with The Sounds of Halloween (see below). The assortment of sound effects are almost identical and presented in the same order. The difference is that Haunting Sounds repeatedly plays John Williams' theme to the 1979 version of "Dracula." There's also a synth track that I can't identify (and neither can the Shazam app) which doesn't necessarily sound scary. It reminds me of the beginning of an '80s movie. My sense of wild speculation tells me that the tape was pulled and replaced due to a lack of legal clearance on the music. (The credits only list Paul Whitehead after Music Production.) Was it supposed to be placeholder music, or was this intentional thievery, or just a misunderstanding? The answer to all of those questions is "yes."

Legal or not, The Haunting Sounds of Halloween is well produced and creates an amusing, spooky atmosphere without traumatizing youngsters.
Rating: 4 of 5

Title: The Sounds of Halloween
Manufacturer: Hallmark
Year: 1986
Total Runtime: 37 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: No
Music: "Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor," and a bunch of Halloween friendly pop covers.
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: See previous review
Review: As mentioned above, the sound effects side of this recording is virtually the same as The Haunting Sounds of Halloween, but without the music (except for good ol' "Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor.") There are also added flourishes to existing sounds (like reverb) and a few added extras, like a monster roar after some dialogue, as well as some general shuffling around. Unfortunately, the edits take a significant bite out of the runtime.

In what may be an effort to make up for this loss, side two is now full of Halloween party staples: "Ghostbusters," "Monster Mash," "Thriller," "Purple People Eater" and another dose of Bach. This was probably convenient in the mixtape era, but the downside is that the cover songs are a hollow shell of the original recordings. But that can be entertaining in its own way. The Vincent Price stand-in is delightfully droll, and completely loses track of the rhythm. They made the wise decision not to use a Michael Jackson impersonator, and opted for a female vocalist instead. Paul Whitehead is once again the music producer so it's nice to know he didn't lose his job after the first album.

Sounds of Halloween suffered a loss after the previous release, but there's some new fun to be had. It's kind of a yin yang situation.
Rating: 3 of 5

Here's the closet that I can find to streaming audio...

Title: Howl-o-ween Sounds
Manufacturer: Hallmark
Year: 1987
Also popular from Hallmark that year: Lapel Pins

Total Runtime: 45 Min
Repeats on both sides: Yes
Stories: No
Music: "Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor"
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: See previous releases
Review: Howl-o-ween Sounds is easily the worst of the bunch because it includes the neutered effects of The Haunting Sounds of Halloween repeated on both sides. So there's no music at all except of course "Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor " which is a basic human right at this point.

They released it a second time with a different cover, possibly to fill their Halloween tape void in 1988.

Howl-o-ween Sounds wouldn't be so bad if we didn't know what we were missing—but we do.

Rating: 2 of 5

Title: Spooky Sounds
Manufacturer: Hallmark
Year: 1989
Also popular from Hallmark that year: Woodland Merry Miniatures

Total Runtime: 60 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: No
Music: Incidental music and a collection of spooky pop tracks
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: New wacky dialogue
Review: Three years after their foray into Halloween audio Hallmark must have realized that they had gotten all the mileage they could from The Sounds of Halloween. In 1989 they put together an all new album that follows their well established format of non-threatening sounds paired with kooky dialogue. Some of it is featured in this entertaining video...

They also went back to the half effects/half music model and filled side two with a set of newly recorded cover tunes that include: "The Munsters," "Monster Mash," "The Addams Family," "Ghostbusters," "Twilight Zone," "Dark Shadows," and an original called "Haunting Melody."

With a fresh new tape under their belt they also released a fresh new promotion...

Spooky Sounds is a strong effort that proves that experience, and an ability to learn from one's mistakes can lead to new heights.
Rating: 4 of 5

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #30: Alfred Hitchcock Ghost Stories

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Mon, 30 Oct 2017 23:34:00 +0000

Title: Alfred Hitchcock Ghost Stories
(AKA Alfred Hitchcock Presents Ghost Stories for Young People)
Manufacturer: Wonderland Golden Records
Year: Cassette 1988, original recording 1962
Total Runtime: 44 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: Six different ones
Music: "The Funeral March of a Marionette" written by Charles Gounod (The Theme to "Alfred Hitchcock Presents") also some incidental music
Narration: All narration by John Allen
Distinct Audio: N/A
Review: This less-than-official-looking version of Alfred Hitchcock Presents Ghost Stories for Young People seems to be a legitimate reissue of the 1962 album which was also produced by Wonderland Golden Records. The decision to revisit the title in 1988 may have been due to the newfound popularity of cheap Halloween tapes, or it may have been an attempt to profit from the mid-80s version of the "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" TV series.

Alfred himself provides a 'wrap around' for the six stories. They are expertly narrated by John Allen, and enhanced with an effective soundtrack. The tales come from all different sources, and some may be familiar to those already interested in the genre. "The Haunted and the Haunters" seems to be a loose interpretation of Edward Bulwer-Lytton's 1859 short story of the same name. Its tone is a bit more dire than the rest, which are rarely frightening. "Johnny Takes A Dare (The More The Merrier)" is very similar to "Wait 'Til Martin Comes Home" as it appears on Scary Spooky Stories (1973).

"The Helpful Hitchhiker" is the same urban legend that inspired Red Sovine's "Phantom 309," and the Large Marge scene in "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985)." "The Open Window" by Saki was first published in 1914, and a different recording of it appears on Troll Records' Thrillers and Chillers (1973). "Jimmy Takes Vanishing Lessons" was first published as a Childrens book in 1950.

Though the source material isn't always the strongest, it's fun to light up a room with the spooky sounds of yesteryear. It's also three hundred times better if you listen to it with a kid.

Rating: 4 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #29: Chiller by the Cincinnati Pops

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sun, 29 Oct 2017 23:58:00 +0000

Title: Chiller by the Cincinnati Pops conducted by Erich Kunzel
Manufacturer: Telarc
Year: 1989
Total Runtime: 59 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: No
Music: Mostly music with a few sound effects vignettes
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: The "dangerous" sound effects. See below
Review: Back in high school, discussions about audio fidelity came up often because most of my friends were finally making the leap to compact discs, one Christmas and birthday at a time. My friend's audiophile dad taught us about the SPARS code, a three letter sequence printed on the discs that told you "how digital" an album was. So "AAD," the least desirable in our eyes, meant that an album was recorded in Analog, mixed in Analog, and Digitized for CD. Of course the ultimate was pure "DDD" because nothing sounds better than digital, right? ...Right?

I raced home and examined my collection of about ten CDs. (Thank you Columbia House music club.) Not a single triple D in the bunch. What was the point of even buying CDs?! (Aside from sound quality, durability, instant access to individual tracks, and so on.) This feature suddenly rose to the top of my list of things to look for in a compact disc, ranking slightly above the recording artist and album. What a classic case of ruining something I vastly enjoyed just because the grass seemed greener elsewhere. It's more ridiculous when you consider that my "sound system" came from JCPenny and had three inch speakers.

At the time I didn't understand how rare DDD recordings were. The only one I'd ever heard was my friend's copy of Nothing Like the Sun by Sting. Occasionally I'd find one in the record store, but nothing I wanted to spend two weeks of allowance on. That changed one evening in the Soundtrack CD section of Sound Warehouse. (I'm ashamed to admit how self-satisfied I became when I finally had "the right" to shop in the CD department.) I grabbed a CD with a beautifully illustrated haunted house on the cover. I perked up when I saw things like "Night on Bald Mountain," "Twilight Zone," and "Poltergeist" on the track listing. Then my eyes zeroed in on the SPARS code (bottom left)...

Triple D PURE DIGITAL! The cherry on top was a mysterious "Digital Sound Effects" warning for certain tracks. In the parking lot I tore open the booklet and read that these three tracks should not be played at high volume at the risk of damaging you speakers because the sweet digital fidelity is so powerful! I couldn't get home quick enough.

The first time I played Chiller I cautiously kept the volume dial around the "one" mark. I could hear a burst of lightning. I re-listened a few more times inching up the volume with each play. It's true, the warning tracks are incredibly loud, though I don't think my portable boom box was in any danger. But on a large system that thunderclap could give everyone in the room a heart attack.

On the other hand, I wasn't used to music that could get so quiet. There's such a dynamic range that the soft parts are nearly inaudible on low volume. But this has a great affect on songs like "Funeral March of a Marionette" when the first burst of percussion can give you a true jump scare.

I realize all of this has nothing to do with the cassette. I got the tape in a lot of unopened Halloween audio, and I don't plan on breaking the seal because I still have that delicious digi-clean DDD compact disc.

I didn't recognize a lot of the music titles when I bought it, but upon listening they were instantly familiar thanks to TV shows and movies. I discovered that "Danse Macabre" is the basis for the Halloween song I learned in school. I love about three fourths of this album. Chillers only loses me when some of the selections veer out of spooky territory. (Now I'm eager to check out the sequel they made in 2002 that isn't afraid to wallow in less Classical pop culture.)

Chiller is more than just a well recorded album. It's a collection of seminal Horror music in the hands of experts. Also, the letters on the cover glow-in-the-dark!
Rating: DDD

I can't find a streaming link, but it's on Pandora and itunes.

(Here's a detailed track by track review that I enjoyed.)

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #28: Halloween Horrors

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sat, 28 Oct 2017 22:42:00 +0000

Title: Halloween Horrors
Manufacturer: A&M Records
Year: 1977
Total Runtime: 30 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: Side one is a single story
Music: No
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: "My baby! Have you seen my baby?"
Review: It seems that A&M Records took note of a sales trend that started with the massively successful Disney's Chilling, Thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House (1968) and continued with albums like Sounds to Make You Shiver (1974) and Ghostly Sounds (1975). Their response was Halloween Horrors. This seems to be the only Halloween album released by a major record label (if you don't count Disney). It's also the only one I know of that uses the genuine Dolby "B" noise reduction system. Printing a blurry Dolby logo on the back of the sleeve doesn't count; sorry Night in a Graveyard and Haunted House.

It's also likely that Halloween Horrors had one of the all-time biggest Halloween album budgets (which isn't saying much). This would explain why their search for voice talent was not limited to people who happened to be sitting in the office that day. They employed actors Michael Bell, and Peter Cullen who are probably best known for their work on G.I. Joe and Transformers cartoons of the '80s. The spectacular cover illustration comes from Gary Meyer who also did movie posters for "Jaws 3," The Deep,""The Exterminator 2,""Jason and the Argonauts," and more. His artwork is best experienced on the vinyl edition. Not only is the cassette insert tiny, it omits the wonderful back cover that is seen and discussed here on Branded in the 80s.

Side one features a fifteen minute "Story of Halloween Horror" that follows a young man visiting his newly inherited haunted estate. He recounts several legends surrounding the house during his drive over, and his visit confirms the tragic history.

I first heard this at a dinner party when I was in fifth grade. Shortly after meeting the two brothers of the household they dragged me into their bedroom and insisted that I ignore their room full of exciting new toys, and give my full attention to their mysterious cassette tape. As the story progressed I was afraid that I was hearing something that I shouldn't have been. I wondered if their parents even knew what they'd gotten their hands on. During the climactic ghostly encounter the distress in the young man's voice and the distorted cries of the apparition struck me at my core. My parents had no idea why I was acting strangely for the rest of the night.

Side two features "The Sounds of Halloween and other useful effects." These certainly proved useful for the countless record companies who strip-mined the record for some easy cash. For people like me who are tired of hearing all the thieves and imitators it's a treat to tap into the source material.

Halloween Horrors set the standard for Halloween records and it remains a true classic.

Rating: 5 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #27: Chillers by the Folktellers

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sat, 28 Oct 2017 00:42:00 +0000

Title: Chillers, by The Folktellers
Manufacturer: Mama-T Artists
Year: 1983
Total Runtime: 39 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: Yes, seven of them
Music: No
Narration: N/A
Distinct Audio: N/A
Review: Connie Regan and Barbara Freeman are the storytelling duo known as the Folktellers. Chillers captures their 1983 Halloween night performance for a live audience. The receptive crowd is treated to seven eerie tales and poems that consist of both original and borrowed material.

This type of event reminds me of the sort of thing that would take place at our small town fine arts center. Something the English teacher would talk up for weeks, and even give you extra credit for attending. I can imagine my young self going to please my teachers, getting thrilled during the show, and leaving the auditorium to discover that the world is colder and more dangerous than I remembered.

The Chillers packaging feels educational. A gold sticker marks its status as an American Library Association notable record, and the cover illustration on heavy, textured paper somehow reminds me of art class. Maybe that's why it's surprising when the stories strike such a dark, and genuinely eerie tone.

Please indulge me here, but this album unlocks a floodgate of memories, and reminds me of the role that school played in making Halloween special. It started when I was a first grader going about my business when my teacher, so casual and unannounced, stuck a life-size Dracula on the wall. It didn't seem possible. It seemed like something she could get in trouble for.

As a kid you have so little control of your daily routine, and all of the sudden you find that your curriculum is sprinkled with spooky events that you didn't even have to ask for. Bats, ghosts, and pumpkins magically appear in the halls. The library display is full of books you didn't know they had: Alfred Hitchcock short stories, books on monster makeup, Halloween craft ideas and more. The school book orders suddenly rival the Christmas Wishbook.

In music class we were required to learn the Halloween song and Ghost of John. We were graded on our ability to be a creepy kids chorus! Our parents' tax dollars went towards teaching us to make proper skeletons and Jack-o-lanterns in art class. Everyone got marched to the library for a surprise screening of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," just thrown into a Wednesday afternoon!

October 31st wasn't even close to a normal school day. After blowing off the morning, the costumes went on and we were systematically paraded through other classrooms to be admired. Exotic students from older grades were brought to our hall for the mutual show-off session. Everything culminated with a personal desktop full of orange and black sweets. The plastic cupcake toppers were worthy decorations in their own right. Three decades later I still have some of them.

After a satisfying night of trick or treating we returned to school for... the Halloween carnival. The building was hard to recognize with all the streamers and balloons and costumed crowds. Classrooms were midway games, the cafeteria was a festive town square cloaked in the scent of popcorn. The sixth grade locker corridor that we passed through every day had become a walkthrough haunted house! Behind massive sheets of black vinyl were hidden student council members, bloodied up and waiting to scream at us. The fact that it all happened in the school setting made it incredibly surreal. Only Halloween had this much transformative power.

Sorry, where was I now? Ah, yes, the record.
A week ago we played through Chillers as we sat around my backyard fire pit under the October moon. It was ideal. The Folktellers, true to their name, use their charming accents and seasoned storytelling to tap into the fireside tradition. Their rural nightmares could have happened last year or last century. It's Halloween listening at it's best.

(By the way, the copy of Chillers that I bought on ebay was listed as "written on by previous owners." In fact, it's signed by both Connie and Barbara— the Folktellers themselves!)

Rating: 5 of 5

I can't find a source for easy streaming, but the album is out there if you know where to look.

Connie Regan still performs, and two of these tracks can be found on a CD called Chilling Ghost Stories: Haunting Tales for Adults & Teens, available on her web store...
http://storywindow.com/store/

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #26: Elvira Fright Sound Tape

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Fri, 27 Oct 2017 02:16:00 +0000

Title: Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, Fright Sound Tape
Manufacturer: Imagineering Inc.
Year: 1987
Total Runtime: 60 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: No
Music: No
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: Creepy muffled funeral eulogy
Review: Elvira's Fright Sound Tape marks an historic team-up between two Halloween institutions in their prime. Imagineering founder, Larry Liff invented hinged vampire teeth, and produced Halloween products with some of the all-time greatest package design that feature the wonderful art of Gordon Viges (whose son once left a comment on this very blog!)

Of course Elvira needs no introduction. Thanks to her we have the only Halloween recording with a celebrity endorsement. She followed the product from inception to completion, hand-picking the individual sound effects, and providing constant input during the engineering process. Not really. But she did record a one minute introduction.

According to an article on Dinosaur Dracula, a store called McCrory's was selling the Elvira tape in 1988 for $2.99 while Topstone's Horror Sounds of the Night was a dollar less. This could be due to Elvira's licensing fee. Or maybe it's because Topstone could charge less since all of their content was stolen.

Fright Sound Tape comes from a line of Elvira products that also included costume accessories and makeup. Most of it looks like existing products that were rebranded with the awesome exception of Elvira's official snake earrings.

So does the tape live up to its iconic heritage? Side one has a good variety of effects that are inherently spooky; antagonists and victims as opposed to stock thunder and slamming doors. Wind is overused but it ties everything together. It's like sitting on your porch on the windiest night of the year, and all this crazy, monstrous stuff just keeps happening for a solid half hour.

The second half hour, side two, has a very different vibe. I wouldn't be surprised if it came from another source entirely. It's dominated by a man with a distinctive laugh who occasionally says "Come here." and, "Come to the Haunted House." He gets tiresome, but there's something about his maniacal yet casual tone that draws me in. It's like he wants to kill me, but he's a little too sleepy.

Unlike side one, I recognized a lot of the effects: cats, monsters, and the "Lonesome Ghosts" scream (that I discussed in this review). What ruins side two for me are the unrelenting bursts of reverberating noise. It sounds like bits of reel-to-reel recordings that are sped up and processed to death. It's definitely unique, but it makes me miss the constant wind from side one, and I rarely miss wind.

All in all, I think the tape is better than average, but it doesn't reflect the remarkable entities behind it. Although, as a horror hostess, Elvira can't be held accountable for the content. Her job is to present the world with the spooky fun stuff, and it's our job to have spooky fun with it.

Rating: Side one- 4 of 5, Side two- 2 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #25: Halloween Horror Tape

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Thu, 26 Oct 2017 04:18:00 +0000

Title: Halloween Horror Tape
Manufacturer: Traveler Trading Co.
Year: 1987
Total Runtime: 60 Min
Repeats on both sides: ?
Stories: ?
Music: ?
Narration: ?
Distinct Audio: ?
Review: As you can see, I have this tape in its wonderful packaging. I refuse to open it, and I can't find the audio online. So if you have it, then please let me know how it is.
Rating: ?

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #24: A Spooky Night in Disney's Haunted Mansion

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Wed, 25 Oct 2017 03:02:00 +0000

Title: A Spooky Night in Disney's Haunted Mansion
Manufacturer: Walt Disney Records
Year: 1998
Total Runtime: 25 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: One long story
Music: "Grim Grinning Ghosts" can be heard during the story
Narration: Yes
Distinct Audio: N/A
Review: A Spooky Night in Disney's Haunted Mansion is an adaptation of the Haunted Mansion ride as seen through the eyes of two original characters, Mike and Karen (played by Ron Howard and Robie Lester). Originally released in 1969 on LP as The Story and Song from The Haunted Mansion, Disney made the odd decision to reissue this remastered version exclusively on cassette in 1998, though the format was already passe. The CD didn't come out for another eleven years.

No matter which version, this album is a dream come true for Haunted Mansion fans, especially those disappointed that Disney's Chilling, Thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House (1964) has no connection to the ride. Paul Frees' original narration from the dark ride has been split into two parts on the album: the Narrator performed by the legendary Thurl Ravenscroft, and the Ghost Host voiced by Pete Reneday. I miss Frees, but I can't pretend that Reneday's Ghost Host isn't more genuinely chilling than the original. He's got a cold, morose quality that caused me to switch off the album when I was a kid hearing it for the first time. (Only to return to the self-torture soon after.)

I listened to an abridged version of the story (on a Donald Duck record called Trick or Treat) for many years before I grew the courage to experience the attraction. My intimate knowledge of the record only enhanced my first ride. It was like visiting an exotic land after studying it for a lifetime.

I can't objectively talk about A Spooky Night in Disney's Haunted Mansion. To me it is a warm, swirling stew of childhood, history, and horror.

Rating: 5 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #23: Chamber of Horrors "NEW"

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Tue, 24 Oct 2017 01:37:00 +0000

Title: Chamber of Horrors "NEW"
Manufacturer: Tony (U.S.A.) Inc.
Year: 1990
Total Runtime: 25 Min
Repeats on both sides: Not exactly, but a loop repeats multiple times on both sides
Stories: No
Music: Ongoing synth music
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: Attempted jump scare using a yell
Review: I've established that the 1988 release of Chamber of Horrors is insane. I like to imagine that sometime in 1989 one of the higher-ups at Tony Incorporated finally heard the tape and shouted, "THIS IS WHAT WE'VE BEEN SELLING?!!"

He immediately discovered that nobody else in the office had ever listened to it either. A recall was ruled out after a quick cost analysis. With no other options, the decision to produce a new tape was finalized.
Once an emergency assembly had gathered, the board demanded to meet with the man responsible for the 1988 edition. The product development manager stood before his colleagues, shouting on the phone,
"What do you mean he's not here?! When will he be back?
...
Defeated, he announced to the room,
"They said he was fired last year because he failed his drug test."
______

The 1990 version of Chamber of Horrors is a commendable effort that effectively paves over the past sins of the company. The effects sound fresh, the production value is good, and there's decent aural variety. A lot of attention was given to the music. What I assume to be an original score, gives Chamber of Horrors (1990) a distinctive voice in the Halloween tape pantheon. Most importantly, its existence demonstrates a message that we need to hear today: rational thinking, truth and love can triumph over chaos, and the mistakes of the past.

Rating: 4 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE #22: Sounds of Halloween

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sun, 22 Oct 2017 22:08:00 +0000

Title: Sounds of Halloween
Manufacturer: Madacy Entertainment
Year: 1994
Total Runtime: 1 Hour
Repeats on both sides: Yes
Stories: No
Music: Opening theme (the same library music from the 1950s that appears on Night in a Graveyard) and some other ambient music throughout
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: Backward music and effects
Review: All this reviewing makes me think about music critics. The blight of their job is all the unoriginal material they have to sift through. But imagine if they had to review albums that are literally two or three existing records spliced together. Okay, you could argue that this happens all the time with so much sampling going on, and mashup artists like Avalanches, Danger Mouse, and Girl Talk. Then imagine reviewing five different albums with five different titles that are all exactly the same recording. Sounds of Halloween is a mix of two or three records slapped together, and it's been released under at least five different titles.

About half of the effects can be heard on Night in a Graveyard, and the rest sounds like Scary Sounds of Halloween. Who knows if Sounds of Halloween stole the material straight off of those records, or if they stole from the same records that those stole from.

The audio has been repackaged numerous times according to the Scary Sounds of Halloween blog.
These are all the same album...

Speaking of unoriginal content, I've yet to talk about the "Lonesome Ghosts" scream sequence that shows up on about forty percent of all my Halloween albums. The ghostly yawn can be heard at the beginning of Disney's 1937 animated short, and it was featured on the track Screams and Groans from Chilling, Thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House preceded by some shrieks. Knowing Disney's reputation for legally protecting their content, it's surprising that the sound has been used so much. Further proof that nobody pays attention to what's actually on Halloween records.

Sounds of Halloween is still making Halloween memories thanks to a YouTube video (see below) that's received nearly a million views since 2011. It's unavoidable. It's like the standard government issue of Halloween records.

It obviously gets the job done year after year, but in my eyes Sounds of Halloween has no honor.

Rating: 2 of 5

HALLOWEEN TAPE REVIEW #21: Horror & Terror

noreply@blogger.com (Kirk D.) — Sun, 22 Oct 2017 03:44:00 +0000

Title: Horror & Terror: Frightening Sounds Part I
Manufacturer: K-Tel
Year: 1995
Total Runtime: About 50 Min
Repeats on both sides: No
Stories: No
Music: A few musical bits with names like "Warped Chords" and "Melted Melancholy"
Narration: No
Distinct Audio: The opening track (see below)
Review: Coincidentally, right before I sat down to review this tape I saw this bit of trivia: "Terror is usually described as the feeling of dread and anticipation that precedes the horrifying experience. By contrast, horror is the feeling of revulsion that usually occurs after something frightening is seen, heard, or otherwise experienced." via Wikipedia. Thing is, I would have probably made fun of the name for being redundant. I was also going to assume that there was no 'Part II," and it turns out that it does exist. I have grossly underestimated this tape.

The first effect, 'Demon Drill,' is interesting because the sound of the drill has been remixed and put to a beat. It actually sounds like a segment of a Nine Inch Nails track. Unfortunately, this unexpected burst of creativity is gone by track two. The rest of the album is a collection of unrelated sounds that makes it seem like a production FX library. Maybe half of the content qualifies as spooky. It's very generic with the exception of a few pieces of music, a couple soundscapes, and a brief assortment of farts.

My favorite thing about it is the simple, yet artful cover. I hope you enjoy looking at it because I can't find the audio online.

Rating: 2 of 5