"BACK TO THE TREE!"
The newly-released Criterion dvd of the classic 1942 spooky romantic comedy "I MARRIED A WITCH" brings back some fond memories. We'll get to that in a moment. No doubt you're at least somewhat familiar with the Rene Clair frothy fairy tale starring Veronica Lake, Fredric March, a mischievous Cecil Kellaway, a young Susan Hayward and an avuncular Robert Benchley. "I MARRIED A WITCH", along with the later fifties gem "BELL, BOOK & CANDLE" are well-known "inspirations" for the TV series "BEWITCHED", of which I'm sure you're well-aware. The film is indeed a "comic confection" which is quite sweet owing to the sparkling performance of Lake (with the peekaboo hairdo which became all the rage) paired with the deliberately stodgy performance of March which produces quite a bit of sultry romantic heat. All this despite the fact that the two actors apparently loathed each other! This is what gives the film it's strong sexual tension. Veronica Lake's single object is to seduce Fredric March who constantly resists her advances. All this packaged into a gentle, sweetly-realized film done in such a style which I frankly think is impossible for anyone to pull off in the modern, cynical, overly-ironic era. The film manages to do this without being the least bit saccharine; in fact, it's quite cold-blooded in some of it's comedy situations i.e. the burning alive of witches is tossed off by the victims as a mere trifle.
March's pilgrim ancestor Wooley successfully accuses Lake and her father Kellaway of witchcraft and watches them burned at the stake (in the erroneous stereotyped fashion which never actually occurred in America, it must be said). An oak tree is planted over there ashes to imprison their satanic spirits for all eternity. However, Lake curses Wooley and all his descendants to always marry the wrong woman and to be unhappy in love. Flash forward to the early 1940's where modern-day gubernatorial candidate Wallace Wooley (March, natch) is giving a pre-election party in his mansion; Wooley is also getting married to the overbearing Estelle (Susan Hayward) the following day. A lightning bolt strikes the tree and releases the smoky spirts of Lake and Kellaway who float over to Wooley's mansion to cause more mayhem.
Kellaway spirits his smoke-form into a rum bottle and drunkenly agrees to give Lake a new body; which can only be created through fire (as it had been destroyed). He burns down the conveniently-named Pilgrim Hotel and Wooley runs in to save a woman from the fire who turns out to be Veronica Lake. Lake weaves her romantic wiles on Wooley all night long in some rather sexier, comic scenes which were quite stronger than one expects for the time period of early 1940s Hollywood. She connives to create a love philter to cause the resistant March to fall in love with her but, after getting conked on the noggin by a falling portrait, ends up drinking the potion herself and falling madly in love with HIM! Patented Hollywood screwball romantic comedy! The angered Kellaway spends the rest of the film trying to break this up and punish his daughter; he first takes away Lake's magic powers and then tells her that at midnight she will go "back to the tree" to be imprisoned until the present race of men is extinguished. How this all turns out you'll have to watch for yourself.
But now I'd like to return to that earlier statement about the film conjuring up fond memories for me. For years I used to go over to the house of my friend Peg (who died in 2009 at the age of 76) every Monday where she'd cook her famous Italian dishes and we'd often watch movies. I used to bring over a stack of videotapes (this was in the 90's before DVDs, all know-nothing tots reading this), inside a huge Barnes & Noble paper shopping bag with handles they used to use in those days. We'd pick a movie to watch and have a fun afternoon. She would often bring up films she had seen years and years ago and, of course, I usually owned them and would bring them for her to watch. She didn't really use her living room but instead had her TV downstairs in a sort of TV room/den/second living room which had a fire place and two long couches set in a L-shape - this was where we always watched movies. In fact, usually after lunch when it was time to go watch a movie, she'd refer to going back to her seat downstairs as going "back to the tree"! One of many of her old favourite movies was of course "I MARRIED A WITCH" so she'd laugh and yell "BACK TO THE TREE" every time she'd be on her way to her TV-watching spot. I brought "I MARRIED A WITCH" over several times during the years before her death when she'd say, "Hey, why don't you bring that next week". So watching the new Criterion dvd of the film gave me a nice, warm, nostalgic feeling since I haven't seen it since the last time I watched it with her. Peg was like a second mother to me as well as a dear friend and I only wish she was still around to watch it with me. However, it's one of many films which I can fondly remember watching with her and, each time I see them again, I can reminisce for a little while about those wonderful Monday visits.
So, now for me it's "BACK TO THE TREE!!!" - as I re-watch "I MARRIED A WITCH".
BIG FINISH LOVES STORIES. That's their catchphrase, after all. And they quite rightly moved forward the release date for their own 50th anniversary celebration of DOCTOR WHO so as not to compete with "THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR" in November. Together with the recent recovery of the lost Patrick Troughton stories "THE ENEMY OF THE WORLD" and (almost all of) "THE WEB OF FEAR", Big Finish's "THE LIGHT AT THE END" really kicks off the official 50th anniversary celebrations for me.
Big Finish brings together ALL of the still-living "classic era" Doctors (as well as the three no-longer-living ones . . . more on that in a moment) into a two disc adventure along with scads of former companions, one ordinary bloke and one arch enemy. Big Finish may love stories but these multi-Doctor adventures have usually been a little underwhelming if still a lot of fun. The classic TV series attempts in "THE THREE DOCTORS", "THE FIVE DOCTORS" and even "THE TWO DOCTORS" have been something of a dog's breakfast even though they have a lot going for them. Oddly enough, Big Finish seems to have gotten the knack down better than their TV competitors with "THE FOUR DOCTORS" of several years ago being a rather good attempt and "THE LIGHT AT THE END" this go 'round being even more entertaining.
So we've established that (at least in recent years) Big Finish knows how to do multi-Doctor stories. And as a story, any adventure featuring 8 Doctors in it provides vast problems of simply giving them all equal time and something compelling to do while weaving it all together into a coherent plot. Big Finish's head honcho Nicholas Briggs has given it the old college try and he's actually come up with a very satisfying adventure for the Doctor's 50th; although necessarily the actually plot of the story must take second place to the collection of great moments that this adventure is simply chock-full of! Geoffrey Beevers played the Master in the telly story "THE KEEPER OF TRAKEN" in the Tom Baker era (which incidentally first introduced Nyssa) and has now done several for Big Finish and his performance as the Doctor's arch-enemy is always superb; especially given the circumstance of the recent loss of his wife Caroline John (Pertwee companion Liz Shaw). Beevers' voice still sounds exactly the same and I can picture in my mind's eye his crispy Master menacing Tom Baker on telly while here menacing all incarnations of the Doctor's very existence by blackmailing the Time Lord "dirty tricks" organization the C.I.A. into giving him a secret weapon known as "the conceptual bomb". Now, it's been noted how similar this idea of erasing the Doctor from all existence is to the Greater Intelligence's plans to do the same thing in "THE NAME OF THE DOCTOR" but does the plotting in such a story as this really mean that much? It's just an excuse, of course, to bring all these classic actors together into a story and have one hell of a 50th birthday party, innit? Therefore I'll give not much more info about the plot other than to say it revolves around an ordinary bloke named Bob Dovie (John Dorney) and a certain London address on November 23rd, 1963. All the Doctors at various points notice a flashing red light on their Tardis consoles which has never been there before which indicates something is interfering with the telepathic circuits, time is folding in on itself and somebody (guess who) is breaking the first law of Time!
But enough of that plot thingy and on to the REAL reason we're listening to "THE LIGHT AT THE END" . . . and that is to hear Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann all together with classic companions Louise Jameson (Leela), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Sophie Aldred (Ace), India Fisher (Charley) as well as (rather too brief) cameos by Carole Ann Ford (Susan), William Russell (Ian), Peter Purves (Steven), Maureen O'Brien (Vicki), Jean Marsh (Sara Kingdom), Anneke Wills (Polly), Frazer Hines (Jamie), Wendy Padbury (Zoe), Katy Manning (Jo Grant), Janet Fielding (Tegan) and Mark Strickson (Turlough). Each of these classic companions get only one or two lines of dialogue and, even though the logistics of giving them all larger roles to play would've been a nightmare, one wishes they were heard a bit more. Also, no other classic villains appear (i.e. Daleks, Cybermen, Ice Warriors, Yeti or even the Candy Man) despite the vocal appearance of Nicholas Briggs (veteran of Dalek voices) as the rather underwhelming villains called "The Vess". The voices of the now-deceased Doctors William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee are provided by William Russell, Frazer Hines and Tim Treloar respectively. While Hines' Troughton impression is rather good, Russell's Hartnell is only slightly successful and Treloar's Pertwee is frankly unlike the third Doctor as far as I could tell; in fact I often had trouble trying to figure out exactly which of the first three Doctor's I was supposed to be listening to given the audio distortion which is also placed over the performances. This is, of course, only a minor niggle in the proceedings due to the sad fact that the first three Doctors are no longer with us and therefore their inclusion is problematic at best. Big Finish had the gumption to actually voice the first three Doctors in the best way available and actually the results are quite serviceable due to their brief appearance in the narrative. The best of an impossible situation.
Of course the interaction between all these beloved DOCTOR WHO actors is the paramount purpose of "THE LIGHT AT THE END" and it doesn't disappoint. The teaming together of McGann's 8th Doctor with Tom Baker's 4th is particularly fun and the two actors really work well together; as do each Doctor's ineraction with Fisher's Charley and Jameson's Leela. Another big part of the fun is shuffling characters who wouldn't normally interact such as the wonderful juxtaposition of Aldred's Ace with Colin Baker's 6th Doctor. Frankly, listening to the two discs of "THE LIGHT AT THE END" is pure bliss for any fan of the classic series. Lovely lovely lovely! "THE LIGHT AT THE END" comes in a special numbered limited edition which I naturally couldn't resist so I sent to England for it; it wasn't cheap but frankly Big Finish doesn't make much on their product and, for the exemplary work they do in keeping our favourite Time Lord's audio adventures coming at such a high rate of quality featuring our most-loved WHO actors, they deserve our financial support! The special edition comes in "book form" inside a beautiful slipcase featuring as cover art the first photo in this post. Inside we have 5 cds which insert inside pockets in the book's "pages" exactly like last year's Universal Monsters Blu-Ray box set; and while I'm definitely not a fan of sliding my cd's inside a cardboard sleeve which inevitably scratches same, the design is quite handsome. The book portion features a "report" by the Celestial Intelligence Agency on the events featured in "THE LIGHT AT THE END" as well as countless photos of all the actors involved (sometimes in costume as their characters!). After the two discs containing the story itself, we have disc three featuring "THE MAKING OF" which is quite interesting and features interviews with all the cast. Disc 4 is entitled "THIS IS BIG FINISH" and was admittedly something of a disappointment to me as I expected something different, probably. I somehow got the impression that this would be an audio documentary on the history of Big Finish's DOCTOR WHO audio adventures but actually is more of a reiteration of the previous "MAKING OF" disc combined with upcoming projects; in fact some of the exact same audio clips from interviews on "THE MAKING OF" disc are repeated here. Now, there's nothing wrong with that; it's just that I had one thing in my mind and got another. Not their fault but something of a missed opportunity as I'd sure like to hear an overview audio documentary on Big Finish's DOCTOR WHO history similar to the one we got as a special feature on one of the recent DOCTOR WHO special edition dvds. Ah well. It did contain some rather earth-shaking (or do I mean "earth-shocking") news that Big Finish has somehow managed to corral Matthew Waterhouse to do some upcoming audio adventures as Adric! Now, Big Finish is rather famous for taking the probably least-liked TV Doctor Colin Baker and making him the BEST Doctor on the audio adventures; something most fans (and myself included) never would've believed had we not heard it for ourselves. They pulled off another astounding coup by making Paul McGann probably the second best Doctor in his series of audio adventures! Now, if anybody can make Matthew Waterhouse's Adric compelling, it would be Big Finish. So I'm actually quite interested to hear how that all pans out.
But for me the best "extra" in "THE LIGHT AT THE END" special editon is the inclusion of the previously unavailable audio adventure that was only given away in an issue of DOCTOR WHO magazine: DOCTOR WHO: THE COMPANION CHRONICLES - THE REVENANTS starring William Russell as Ian Chesterton. This audio adventure is slightly different as it's more in a "storybook" form with William Russell narrating as well as voicing Ian, the Doctor AND Barbara! Only one other actor appears in the adventure: Sharon Small as Janet/Jeannie. This is a one-disc two-part audio adventure which apparently takes place in DOCTOR WHO chronology right after "THE DALEK INVASION OF EARTH" in which the Doctor left Susan behind. Here the story opens with the Tardis landing in 1956 Orkney; Ian and Barbara exit the Tardis onto the windswept moors and the Doctor apparently takes off without them! As Ian and Barbara become lost in the peat bogs and almost perish by sinking in the mire, a local woman saves them and warns them of the demonic mud-zombies named "the Marsh-Wains"! This story is deliciously creepy with superb sound-work by Toby Hrycek-Robinson and written with scary delight by Ian Potter. The inclusion of "THE REVENANTS" alone makes the purchase of the special edition of "THE LIGHT AT THE END" justified! So, as a multi-Doctor adventure and a 50th anniversary celebration, "THE LIGHT AT THE END" succeeds on almost all counts!
FIRST, I'D LIKE TO THANK EVERYONE WHO VISITED FOR THE COUNTDOWN TO HALLOWEEN. Even though I was only doing a "Countdown Lite" version due to my overwhelming schedule, I still got a lot of nice comments and I appreciate it. But the Countdown caused me to be remiss in declaring the wonderful, wonderful announcement in October that the BBC had in fact recovered previously lost episodes of Patrick Troughton's era of DOCTOR WHO!
There was some truth to all those rumours about African discoveries after all. The complete story of "ENEMY OF THE WORLD" and the almost complete story of "THE WEB OF FEAR" were discovered in Ethiopia.
Sadly, episode 3 of "THE WEB OF FEAR" still remains missing; especially sad because it features the very first appearance of Nicholas Courtney as the Brigadier (before his promotion, of course). I hear tell that the newly-discovered lost episodes are available on iTunes but they will also be released in England in November (ENEMY) and February (WEB) on DVD. No news yet as to when they will be available on DVD in the States.
IT'S WARM. IT'S OVERCAST. IT'S EVEN FOGGY. HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM THE FRONT YARD.
SORRY IT'S BEEN A WHILE SINCE THE LAST HALLOWEENIE TELLY PROGRAMME. Life has a way of getting in the way . . . which is why it's so much more fun being undead! Today I thought I'd revisit that "last gasp" (until recently) of the studio that dripped blood: THE HAMMER HOUSE OF HORROR.
Today's episode features those fun and frolicking furry fiends: werewolves! I can remember around 1980 or 81 this series was syndicated on one of our local UHF channels probably at 11pm. I would sometimes be able to sneak a peek at it that late and I have memories of seeing particular episodes. Unfortunately I don't recall having seen this one until it was released on DVD about a decade ago but it's certainly very "Hammer Horror", all right!
Lovely married couple Tom and Sarah Martin are driving down an English country road when their car suddenly goes out of control as if by some supernatural means; the couple careen to a halt near a deserted stretch of woodland. Following a path and hearing the laughter of children, they come upon a great old house in the woods presided over by the matronly Mrs. Ardoy and her bevy of angelic-looking children -- who don't seem to be interested in eating dinner and are eagerly looking forward to nightfall.
The opening shot of the episode's pre-credit sequence surely grabs your attention when a sweet blond child hovering over a dead animal suddenly turns to camera with a blood-smeared grimace! The Martins are nicely played by Christopher Cazenove (known from my childhood as Lord Haselmere on THE DUCHESS OF DUKE STREET) and Celia Gregory and the legendary Diana Dors is splendid (as usual) in the role of the cryptic Mrs. Ardoy. There's werewolvery aplenty on view for your Halloween enjoyment!
WELL, WE'VE MADE IT AT LAST! The final inductee into the 2013 Batty Halloween Hall of Fame. And while there is no official ranking for the order in which I've inducted each song, this last one is surely one of the greatest. Again, it's from me childhood when I used to regularly get a copy of DYNAMITE MAGAZINE from my school's Scholastic Books catalog. One of my favourite features from that magazine once included an Evatone Soundsheet (love love LOVE them!) inside the mag which happens to be the 31st inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame . . .
COUNT MORBIDA'S CHAMBER OF HORRORS by DYNAMITE MAGAZINE
The insidious Count Morbida featured in the back of every issue of Dynamite in a two-page comic book spread of "puzzle pages"; he would attempt to trip up the young readers by providing them with brain teasers. This soundsheet was bound into one particular issue (I believe it was the Halloween issue, natch) and I've treasured it ever since. For those out of the know, an Evatone Soundsheet was the original "floppy disc", you might say: a thin, flexible sheet of plastic with grooves on it and you could play it on your record player (albeit usually with a coin or two placed on top so the soundsheet wouldn't slip because it was so light). Evatone was the company that made these "records" would be bound into a magazine; often they would be an advertisement (I have quite a few advertising various Time-Life record collections from "The Swing Era" to "Great Men of Music" featuring classical composers.
Here is what the soundsheet would look like in the magazine itself; you merely tore it out and placed it on your turntable - you had the option, if you wanted, to cut it into the round shape of a record. As a kid, I was fascinated with Evatone Soundsheets and had standing orders for everyone I knew to grab them for me if they ever came across them in a magazine; I didn't care what was on it - I just collected them! I have them all to this day and there are even several advertising Evatone's service itself as an advertising aid. The entire soundsheet you can hear in the box on the right hand column (along with every inductee). It features Count Morbida and his main squeeze Horribella trying once again to ensnare wayward kiddies with his puzzles and brain teasers. A perfect way to wrap up this Countdown to Halloween!
For those of you with short term memory loss (or your brain has been lifted from your skull by Ygor and spirited away in a sack), here's the complete list of the 31 inductees into the Batty Halloween Hall of Fame:
- IT'S HALLOWEEN by The Shaggs
- PLEASE MR. GRAVEDIGGER by David Bowie
- TIMOTHY by The Buoys
- MONSTER MASH by Bobby "Boris" Pickett
- DINNER WITH DRAC PT. 1 by Zacherley
- BORIS THE SPIDER by The Who
- THE WOBBLIN' GOBLIN by Rosemary Clooney
- THE FLYING SAUCER PT. 1 & 2 by Buchanan and Goodman
- BLACK SABBATH by Black Sabbath
- THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN by Kay Starr
- HALLOWEEN by Heywood Banks
- MYSTERIOUS MOSE by Harry Reser & the Radio All-Stars
- GRIM GRINNING GHOSTS by Thurl Ravenscroft
- I WANT MY BABY BACK by Jimmy Cross
- SCIENCE FICTION/DOUBLE FEATURE by Richard O'Brien
- THE BLOB by The Five Blobs
- CHICKEN HEART by Bill Cosby
- WITH HER HEAD TUCKED UNDERNEATH HER ARM by Stanley Holloway
- SAMAIN NIGHT by Loreena McKennitt
- WHITE ZOMBIE by The Joel Shaw Orchestra
- SONG FROM SPIDER BABY by Lon Chaney Jr. and Ronald Stein
- THE CREATURE by Buchanan and Ancell
- HALLOWEEN by The Misfits
- THE SCARECROW by Mike Waterson
- GHOSTLY SOUNDS INTRO/NIGHT FALLS by Gershon Kingsley and Peter Waldron
- LAST NIGHT I HAD A DREAM by Randy Newman
- THE ROCKIN' GHOST by The Modernaires
- DIRTY CREATURE by Split Enz
- JUMBEE by Paul Roland
- TOCCATA & FUGUE FOR ORGAN IN D MINOR, BMV 565: I. TOCCATA by Johann Sebastian Bach
- COUNT MORBIDA'S CHAMBER OF HORRORS by Dynamite Magazine
NOW IT'S TIME TO GO CLASSICAL UP IN HYAH! One of the old masters provides us with a piece of music whose first three notes evokes the spirit of Halloween and horror movies alike! The 30th inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame is . . .
TOCCATA AND FUGUE FOR ORGAN IN D MINOR, BMV 565: I. TOCCATA by JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
In my mind, this piece is absolutely linked with "THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA". After all, almost 100% of the time when a spooky organ is played in a Phantom movie or any other horror film or TV show, this is the music that is played. Of course it is! What other piece would a monster choose?!?!?
I'M A HAPPY BOY! Why? Because my best doddy got me a set of Universal Monsters Hot Wheels cars!
Now, who's gonna convince me NOT to open the boxes and play with 'em?!?!?!
IT'S VOODOO ZOMBIE FUN TIME! That's right, boils and ghouls! Step right up to hear from the spooky showman of song who seems to specialize in music about the macabre. My 29th inductee into the Batty Halloween Hall of Fame is . . .
JUMBEE by PAUL ROLAND
There are, (super)naturally a lot of songs which could've made it into the hall of fame because Paul Roland sings such an awful lot of songs about murderers and monsters. However, this song has got to be my favourite of his catalog because it's the spookiest-sounding of them. The slow, plodding sound of the music sounds to me like the slow, plodding zombies working in the fields at night. Super-evocative and I can picture the scene in my mind's eye!
THIS NEXT SONG IS FROM ONE OF MY TOP 10 OR 20 ALBUMS OF ALL-TIME. It's by one of my favourite rock groups of all-time. And it's spooky, too! Fittingly for the 28th inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame . . .
DIRTY CREATURE by SPLIT ENZ
Great video (which should be available to watch on youtube) for a great song from a classic album: "TIME AND TIDE" from 1982. Here we have a scary underwater creature lurking beneath the waters of "a big black lake". Shades of "THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON"! But not only that. Around the same time period in the early-80's there was ANOTHER song about a creature lurking beneath the waters of a dark, Scottish loch which also became a hit song: The Police's "SYNCHRONICITY II". And I love both songs. But the Enz surely get pride of place here in the Hall of Fame this time. Listen to this song (and all the others) over on the box to the right.
MY NEXT HONOUREE IS A SONG I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT BY A GROUP I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT. Hey, mystery should be plentiful around Halloween, right? So here we go. The 27th inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame is . . .
THE ROCKIN' GHOST by THE MODERNAIRES
I've found this song scattered across many different Halloween compilations all over the interwebs - most prominently, perhaps, on the famous "GHOULS WITH ATTITUDE" collection which exists only in the mists of cyberspace. However, over the years I've come to find it indispensable for my Halloweenie listening experience. There's just something about the sound of the song which is so fifties - what with the flutes and the "Lettermen-like" male chorus which presumably is a group of collegiate guys from Transylvania U. That mid-20th century vibe of Halloween in the days of TV's Shock Theater and FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND magazine is irresistible!
ONCE AGAIN WE HAVE ANOTHER SONG I FIRST HEARD ON THAT EPOCH-MAKING DR. DEMENTO HALLOWEEN SHOW IN 1978. This one is by a famous member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame who is also a Grammy and Oscar winner! Now he can add one more honour to his credit as the 26th inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame is . . .
LAST NIGHT I HAD A DREAM by RANDY NEWMAN
We venture into the land of nightmares with this song that begins with Randy's mysterioso piano chords as he describes a disturbing yet comical (with Randy Newman would you expect anything ELSE?!?!?) dream he had the night before. My favourite line of the song, of course, is this one: "I saw a vampire/I saw a ghost/everybody scared me/you scared me the most!"
ON MONDAY, THE 14TH OF JULY 1969, VINCENT PRICE WAS THE GUEST ON THE VENERABLE BBC RADIO PROGRAMME "DESERT ISLAND DISCS".
Sadly . . . criminally . . . the episode no longer exists other than a four-and-a-half minute clip. As part of our ongoing Countdown to Halloween (and because Vinnie has been absent for most of it), I thought I'd let you know what records Vinnie would take with him when the BBC marooned him on a desert island. If you're not familiar with the 70+ year old BBC Radio programme, DESERT ISLAND DISCS is an institution which invites a guest on the show to talk about their life as well as to choose 8 discs which they would choose to have with them if they were marooned on a desert island with a hand-cranked record player. In 1969, Vincent Price chose the following 8 discs:
- Claude Debussy: L'isle Joyeuse. Soloist: Walter Gieseking
- Robert Schumann: Frauenliebe und -Leben. Soloists: Kathleen Ferrier, John Newmark
- Ludwig van Beethoven: Zärtliche Liebe (Tender Love) (Ich liebe dich). Soloists: Kirsten Flagstad, Edwin Macarthur
- Franklin D. Roosevelt: Human Rights (Speech)
- William Shakespeare: Fear No More the Heat O' the Sun (from Cymbeline). Artist: Sir John Gielgud
- America the Beautiful. Artist: Vincent Price.
- Nature Boy. Artist: Nat King Cole.
- T.S. Eliot: The Cocktail Party. Artist: Sir Alec Guinness
"NIGHT FALLS". That's how this inductee begins. And certainly that's the perfect way to start something Halloweenie! I've had this record since I was a kid and it features the legendary 70's children's record artwork of the aforementioned George Peed on the cover. You may recognize it. For the 25th inductee into my Batty Halloween Hall of Fame is . . .
GHOSTLY SOUNDS INTRO/NIGHT FALLS by GERSHON KINGSLEY & PETER WALDRON.
The album "GHOSTLY SOUNDS" featured one long story on each side of the LP: the eponymous track on side one and "The Ghosts from Outer Space" on side two. This track is the introduction to the first side of the record and has always been required Halloween listening to get me into the spirit of things. The album starts with the spooky electronic noodling of Gershon Kingsley and then the authoritative voice of Peter Waldron begins to speak; immediately promising that this Halloween stuff is serious business, kids! Now the funny thing is that Kingsley, I later learned during my infatuation with space-age bachelor pad lounge music, is rather famous in that genre as a pioneer in electronic music and the moog synthesizer in particular. Kingsley famously partnered with Jean Jacques Perrey for the classic album "THE IN SOUND FROM WAY OUT" and also scored a major hit with the single "POPCORN" and the album "MUSIC TO MOOG BY". How on earth Peter Pan Records managed to get Gershon Kingsley on their kiddie Halloween record is beyond me. I have no idea who Peter Waldron was but his voice makes the perfect narrator to the spooky goings-on; and somehow the October season never really began for me until I heard him announce on this record "It's Halloween".
SPEAKING OF SCOOBY-DOO. . . Next we have the third season Halloween episode of SOUTH PARK from 1999 guest-starring the band Korn.
While never one of my favourite SOUTH PARK Halloween episodes, there is some funny stuff here. Notably, the SCOOBY-DOO parody is done by people who obviously have a great deal of affection for the classic cartoon. South Park's local radio station KOZY is sponsoring a "Halloween Haunt" where Korn will make a live appearance. Unfortunately, the local priest wages a one-man war against the "satanic" holiday and "satanic" band. On the way into town, Korn drives their "Mystery Machine-like" van off the road after seeing some pirate ghosts. Meanwhile, the boys decide to get revenge on the fifth graders who've scared them by digging up Kyle's recently-deceased grandmother and using her corpse to frighten them. Unfortunately, when the boys hide the corpse behind some boxes on a pier, a stray dog eats the corpse and they cannot find it the next day: Halloween. All is made right again when Korn unmasks the culprit behind the pirate ghost mystery, the dog barfs up the corpse and Cartman discovers a blow-up Antonio Banderas doll he thinks is his Christmas present! Awww, Niblet!
