The 90’s

The era of my teenage Halloween adventures, captured in the audio torrent that was the 90’s.

Audio

Why Was I Born (Freddy’s Dead)

TRACK #384

Why Was I  Born (Freddy’s Dead) by Iggy Pop

Alright, so we’re running outta Freddy songs here. Not really, but songs I feel like adding to this playlist anyway. After almost 400 tunes, we’ve covered all the heavy hitters from The Elm Street series and then some. But there’s one film we’ve yet to touch on, and that’s the much-maligned, Freddy’s Dead.

This is the instillment which purported to, in no uncertain terms, kill its main character and end the series. And that’s a particularly tricky proposition when that character was dead from the beginning and the franchise is still making money.

Though in fairness, Freddy’s post “dead” appearances are fairly well justified and certainly number less than his “pre-dead” escapades. The fact that Jason had more outings after his “Final Chapter” than before is the stuff of Hollywood irony.

But that’s neither here nor there when it comes to the film’s soundtrack, which, like the movie itself, is probably not what anybody actually wanted.

For one thing, there’s an uncomfortable amount of Goo Goo Dolls on this album for some reason. While certainly gaining a fair amount of popularity in the mid 90’s, I’m not sure they had the notoriety, or even the sound, to warrant 3 inclusions on a horror soundtrack in 1991. They’re not a band I wanna hear in a Freddy movie period, much less 3 times. More to the point, they’re not a band I even wanna hear, Freddy or not. Adding Freddy, and 2 other songs, is just offensive.

The 80’s were a hazy and slowly dissipating dream by that point, and the 90’s were unfortunately on full display with the Freddy’s Dead soundtrack.

This is particularly disappointing considering that the Prince of Darkness himself, Mr. Alice Cooper, turns up in a cameo as Freddy’s Dad. They couldn’t get him to throw together a Title Track for this fucker? Hell, even lend a preexisting song to the proceedings? Nope, apparently not. And I’m sure you can guess that Music Supervisor David Chackler is nowhere to be found on this roster.

Yet, rising above the din of whatever-the-fuckery, like some emaciated spectre of 70’s swagger, is Iggy Pop.

They didn’t quite have the tenacity to let Iggy loose on a full-blown Title Track, however. Seems by 1991, folks were a little gun-shy (or perhaps a bit too hip) to indulge in the time-honored tradition of full synergistic Title Trackage . No, they pulled their punches with, what I will call, a Parenthetical Title Track. C’mon, grow some fuckin’ balls gang.

But while this may not be a full-on, true-blue Title Track, it’s a Title Track from the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise and it would be unbecoming of The Shindig to ignore it completely and with intention. Besides, it’s ain’t that bad. It’s not the best track on the playlist, no. It’s not the best Title Track either. In fact it’s probably not even a good one, but if you ask me, it’s not that bad.

Now, if you ask our old pals over at the Golden Raspberry Committee, Iggy served up one of the 3 worst original songs of that year.

Thankfully (depending on your prospective that is) Hammer also unleashed his Addams Groove upon the world in 1991, preventing Iggy from taking the top spot. I’m sure he was grateful.

I think it’s important to note that the 3rd song up for consideration that year was Vanilla Ice’s own Reverse Parenthetical Title Track, Cool As Ice (Everybody Get Loose.) So Iggy Pop, lead singer of The Stooges and Rock ‘N Roll legend, is now associated with 2 of the biggest running gags of 90’s pop-rap nonsense. My condolences Iggy.

This also affirms that 2 of the “worst” songs of 1991 are now featured on this playlist. A dubious honor. And that 3rd song is a goddamn Title Track from a guy already represented on this playlist?! Yeesh. I’m not sure what that suggests about this thing I’ve been wasting my time with for last 12 years, so I’ll let you come to your own conclusions.

Since the worst song category only lasted for about 20 years, and we’ve added probably our last nominee/winner, I’d like to take a moment here to draw attention to a few other awesome songs deemed “unlistenable” by this group of unelected buzzkills.

Yor’s World by Guido and Maurizio De Angelis (who I guess is also known as Oliver Onions. What?) This one hurts fellas.

The Last Dragon by Dwight David Really? And a Track Track to boot? You gotta be kidding me.

Smooth Talker from Body Talk by Michael and David Sembello. For shame. At least it wasn’t that movie’s Title Track.

Drinkenstein by Sylvester Stallone and Dolly Parton from Rhinestone. This one actually took the title in ‘84. I get it I suppose, but seriously? This shit is great, and has been sitting in the bullpen for consideration on this playlist for many, many years.

Going back-to-back Stallone on it, you have Peace in Our Time, a great song by Frank Stallone from Rambo 2. This was also a winner in its respective year.

Then you got Howard the Duck sung by the lovely Lea Thompson in 1986. Now this is a solid Title Track. Thankfully it didn’t “win” but a disrespectful nomination for sure.

You Can Be a Garbage Pail Kid from 1987. Ya know, we might actually add this song as Expanded Title Track at some point.

Big Guns by AC/DC from 1993’s Last Action Hero. Really? C’mon! Again though, it’s thankful that the film’s Title Track escaped unscathed.

But enough of all that hemmin’ and hawin.’ Ya’ll know how I feel about this Golden Raspberry dildos, so let’s just get to it.

Here it is, playing as a sweet song over the end credits to Freddy’s convoluted, bizarre and mostly unsatisfying demise, it’s Iggy Pop’s Parenthetical Title Track Why Was I Born (Freddy’s Dead).


PS: Oh, since we talk about this on the “next” episode of Shindig Radio, an episode that was recorded before this song was posted, we discuss whether it should be included on the playlist. I think Mikey essentially makes the argument I’m making here that it’s a Nightmare on Elm Street and it’s a Title Track and c’mon, are you serious? Of course you need to add it. Needless to say, I agree with him. And apparently I have, because my first draft of this post was dated from 2019! Ha! Takes a while to get around to some of these. And even then, sometimes i’ll bump songs from year to year.

Audio

Heavy Metal Halloween

TRACK #381

Heavy Metal Halloween by Great White Lyin’ Snake

Hard ‘Til Halloween. Hashtag it. It can be a thing. People can take that in any direction they want, too. Let’s put some creative shit on that tag. I don’t wanna see a bunch of boners either. A few is fine, it’s unavoidable. But let’s not have another #erectfest incident, ok? Cool.

So yeah, Heavy Metal Halloween. It’s a phrase we’ved use a lot around Halloween Shindig. Hell, our Halloween episode of Shindig Radio in 2019 was literally called A Heavy Metal Halloween.

That episode featured songs exclusively called Halloween performed exclusively by 80’s Metal bands. In fact, our last track was very much one of them. There was enough of those bastards to populate an entire episode, and we still found even more after the fact! There’s a couple in the Bullpen even, if you’ll believe that. Hell, there’s another on coming in like 10 days. It’s crazy.

So, I was pumped to stumble across this song literally called Heavy Metal Halloween. I wish it had been featured on that episode, but hey, we can’t have it all. But we can have it ring the bell for our Hard ‘Til Halloween countdown.

There is some solace in the fact that I found this after 2019 though, and that’s that despite being called Heavy Metal Halloween, this song isn’t exactly the most Metally, nor Heaviest, song we’ve ever featured. And it’s certainly not played by an aging 80’s metal band from Europe either. I think these guys are from Rhode Island in the 90’s, so it’s really just as well that it wasn’t featured.

It is performed by Great Whyte Lyin’ Snake, which, if you’re a keen-eared Metal fan, will song like a fun portmanteau of Great White, White Lion and White Snake.

The band seems to be the jokey product of performers from a variety of punk bands including Sleigher, Vague Perception, Beer and Suckface.

Oddly, the song hails from their album Great Whyte Christmas, which features a lot of fun and silly tracks including the Misfits Last Caress turned into Last Christmas. It honestly sounds a bit like Deck My Balls to me and if I didn’t know any better I’d accuse Mikey and the Crypt Keeper Five of lifting this entire concept wholesale from The Snake. This is such a weird and rare little album though, I seriously doubt that’s the case.

I might end up posting the whole thing up on YouTube, as I had to grab a hard copy to ad this song, but I’m not sure. Until then, let’s kick out this block and get Hard ‘Til Halloween with Great Whyte Lyin’ Snake’s Heavy Metal Halloween!

 

Audio

Scary Scary Movies

TRACK #349:

Scary Scary Movies by Ossie D. and Stevie G.

Cause what would the Shindig be if we only offered up one referential tune called “Scary Movies” from a referential horror movie about Horror Movies themselves?

I guess technically this one is called Scary Scary Movies, but that’s close enough for me, especially since it’s a Referentially Inclusive Monster Rap to boot.

From our old Prom Night pal Paul Zaza comes this tune, the sweet song from 1991’s horrorthon gone wrong, Popcorn.

Now, if you’re a keen eared viewer, a giant fan of Popcorn or you just happen to own this soundtrack, you’ll note that there actually is a song featured in the movie called Scary Movies. It’s briefly played and in front of the theater too, right before the horrorthon starts.

To be fair, it’s pretty much the same song, only it’s not a fun rap, and you know how we roll on The Shindig.

We’re using the term “rap” here pretty loosely, as you’ll hear, cause this thing ain’t droppin bars. In fact, it’s kinda difficult to listen to, but that’s never stopped us before and it probably never will when a certain set a circumstance arrives.

And all of those boxes are being ticked by this one;

From a horror movie? Check
About horror movies? Check
Fits the current block like a glove? Check
A monster rap? Goddamn right
A sweet song? Oh yeah

So here is where you’ll find it, no matter how it may sound.

Now, IMDb claims the song was written by Paul Zaza (the film’s composer) Yvonne Murray (another performer on the soundtrack) and Alan Ormsby (the film’s writer and original director.) Curiously though, the soundtrack credits only Paul Zaza and no one else. However, the film itself credits Alan Ormsby as its sole writer, with Ossie D. and Stevie G. as the song’s performers. Ossie and Stevie were a duo of prolific Reggae artists from Jamaica. They may very well be the band playing out front of the theater as well. If they were, which I suspect, they are uncredited for their performance.

Now, if that seems a little weird it’s probably because Popcorn was shot almost entirely on location in Kingston, Jamaica, and I’m sure they scooped up some locals to lend some tunes.

If you’ve never seen Popcorn (which isn’t so crazy, as this early 90’s slasher has somewhat fallen through the cracks) I highly recommend giving it a go. Certainly do not judge it by this song alone. If you’re a genre fan, the film department’s William Castle inspired horrorthon of in-theatre gags like Fright Form Waivers, Aroma-Rama and the Shock Clock countdown, is a definite treat.

Then there’s all prop building, life-casting, mask masking and movie theatre hokery that brings the horrorthon to life. Add to that the absolutely incredible crowd that shows up to the theatre. It’s a bevy of Don Post and Distortions mask and homemade costumes. It’s a blast and makes for great Halloween viewing.

Genre staples Jill Scholen, Dee Wallace, and Kelly Jo Minter are joined by the likes of Mr. Hand, Crispin Glover’s dad, and One Crazy Summer’s Clay Stork (in an inspired turned as the face-swapping Toby) all conspire to make this early 90’s offering a fun time.

It wouldn’t make a bad double feature with last night’s Return to Horror High either. So, pick up that one, grab some popcorn and kick back this October with the very Halloweeny Popcorn and enjoy some scary scary movies.

You know the kind I mean!

 

Audio

Hey Satan

TRACK #317:

Hey Satan by Fearless Leader

Of all the categories on Halloween Shindig, the one that never seems to get much representation is The Devilish Track. I’m not even sure how many there are in total. Hang on a sec.

Jesus, there’s only 13 of these things? Really? I need to double check that number right quick, maybe I didn’t label a few.

Nope. 13 seems legit. Man, I knew it was low but geez, that’s only like 4% of the playlist.

At any rate, those are some pretty rookie numbers in this racket, so we’re gonna add a little padding to that percentage here (honestly only a measly 1% though) with a couple Satany tunes for all ya’ll to groove on.

Aptly leading off the charge is the song Hey Satan, from the San Fernando Valley’s own Clown Lord’s of the Garage-Bizarre, the splatter-glam festooned, Fearless Leader.

Known for the generalized insanity of their live stage shows (which often included the cramming of spam into various orifices) Fearless Leader were something of hometown heroes around these parts,…to a certain section of weirdos anyway.

Their album ¡#$;!, which features the bands name written in such a way as to maybe cause one to raise an eyebrow, actually got them banned in Germany. Worry not though, as it’s simply a KISS reference and not some secret Gestapo salute.

What’s more? These guys actually made a fuckin movie. Yep, and it’s pretty great. 1992’s Graveyard Rot is a bona fide piece of feature-length Rock-N-Roll music video horror-trash SOV madness, and comes highly recommended…to a certain section of weirdos anyhow. You know who you are.

Click to Watch!

This particular copy featured here may or may not have sold for $500 buck. Seriously? Even asking that much is ridiculous. Get real VHS community. You needn’t shell out that kinda dough though, cause you can just click that picture to watch the movie on Vimeo thanks to the fantastic Hamilton’s Trash Cinema. Big ups!

Sarge, Alien Rock, Oral B. Goode and Spammy Haggard set upon a little road trip to shoot a new music video for this very song. In the process they run afoul some hostile local rednecks and inadvertently raise a long dead Rock-N-Roll singer.

It’s silly, no-budget, band-just-having-a-good time-with a camcorder fun that features (as you might imagine) lots of Fearless Leader tunes.

However, if you’ve never seen Graveyard Rot, this song might still sound familiar if you’ve ever treated yourself to Everything Is Terrible’s The Great Satan.

If you haven’t, I recommend doing that as soon as possible, because it’s fucking bonkers, and Hey Satan sets the whole thing off and running perfectly. Click this to get a little taste.

If you’re not aware of the found footage fiends over at Everything is Terrible, I also recommend familiarizing yourself with them as a whole post-haste.

The Great Satan specifically, is a mind-melting media-mashup of all things Morningstar, spliced at breakneck speed for maximum what-the-fuckery. We’re talking batshit Christian scare-programming, z-grade yard sale movie clips and bizarro homegrown freakouts.

A good-time Satany garage rocker, technically featured in 2 separate, definitely worth your time, movies? Hey, that’s Shindig material all day long.

Hey Satan, Fearless Leader wants to party, but don’t worry, they brought their own sandwiches!

 

 

Audio

Rapture

TRACK #308:

Rapture by Morbid Angel

When it comes to moments that embody the 3 principle of The Shindig – Halloween, Horror and Music – nothing quite combines them all like Angela’s dance from the original Night of the Demons. Set as it is on Halloween and to Bauhaus’ Stigmata Martyr, you can read me drool over his classic moment here.

So when Brain Trenchard-Smith and company we’re asked to take a trip back to Hull House and to, hey, why don’t you

bring Amelia Kinkade along with you while you’re at it – fans assuredly wondered if Angela would dance again.

The answer was “yes.” And an empathic “yes” at that, as they upped the ante in a few way, as a sequel is wont to do.

First and foremost, they gave Angela a larger crowd. Secondly, they put her up on a table in front of a banner that says “Happy Halloween.” Thirdly, they gave her a dance partner in the form of beautiful, genre staple, Zoe Trilling. And lastly, they slapped a Morbid Angel song on that motherfucker.

This dance however, is a microcosm of the film itself, at least in relation to the original Night of the Demons. Bigger doesn’t always mean better.

As a result, this dance (this scene…this movie) is less elegant, less important, less interesting, less sexy, less creepy and above all, less memorable.

But that won’t stop Morbid Angel from making the playlist. No way. Cause when you’re the backing track to any Angela dance sequence, you’re in.

Well, I shouldn’t say that, cause that song from Part 3 is absolutely atrocious and will never grace this playlist. I’m not even sure what the producers where thinking with that one. Was that the only song they could actually get the rights to play? Was it on some generic, royalty free CD they had lying around the editing bay? Had they never seen the other 2 Night of the Demons films? It’s almost laughable how at odds it is with the other 2 Angela tracks.

Then, there’s still the matter of the dance from the remake to consider, which despite my hesitance, has a couple compelling things going for it:

  1. It still happens on Halloween.
  2. Though played by Shannon Elizabeth, it’s still technically Angela and
  3. It’s set to a Type O Negative song. A song which is already under yearly consideration for being a Halloween song in its own right.

However, despite all of that, and the fact that I’ve already included 45 Grave’s Title Track Night of the Demons from the very same film, I still don’t think Type O is making the cut. At least not this year. Sorry gang.

Morbid Angel on the other hand? Well, pick em up!

Here comes Rapture.

Trick or treat, suckers!

 

Audio

Have Yourself a Scary Little Christmas (1994)

Well, it just wouldn’t be Christmas around here without a little ghoul-tide cheer from Father Cryptmas himself, The Crypt Keeper.

From 1994, the height of Cryptmania, comes this absolute gem of holiday horror, and one of my favorite Christmas albums of all time.

Not only are these spoof’s clever and humorous, but John Kassir is so 100% onboard for this shit, that it just effortlessly works .

If you don’t like Christmas music, I certainly doubt this album will change your mind. If you don’t like the ghoulishness of Halloween infecting your Christmas spirit, then definitely give this a pass.

But if you do like Christmas music, and you do a like a little gore decking your halls, then by golly, have a very scary little Christmas…this year.

 

Audio

Children of the Night

TRACK #282:

Children of the Night by Buddy Miles

With that bit of seasonal tabling setting out of the way, let’s move onto a straight up banger from Buddy Miles.

Buddy has quite storied musical career. He began early, playing in his dad’s band The Bebops. Then, as a teenager no less, he performed with acts such as Wilson Pickett and the Delfonics. Eventually Buddy teamed up with Mike Bloomfield to form Electric Flag and later became a founding member of Jimi Hendrix’s Band of Gypsys. Solid repertoire.

What’s more? Buddy is actually the lead singer of The California Raisins. Yep, Will Vinton’s iconically 80’s claymation spokes-band. That’s this guy. Well, I guess.

See, all of this info leads me to believe that Children of the Night, which sounds almost nothing like anything Buddy had been involved with up to that point, is sung by a totally different Buddy Miles altogether.

But apparently, no. After a bit of cross referencing, it seems that they are in fact the same Buddy Miles. Not shocking, given Buddy’s numerous musical projects, but if some new info came to light disputing that claim, I think I’d believe it.

But I’ll only I say “think” because Buddy here, whichever Buddy it may be, is straight belting it. And OG Buddy Miles can fuckin’ belt it. So yeah, maybe this really is that Buddy Miles, cause this tune is a stone cold jam.

You can find it playing during Cheryl’s dance at The Club 69 in Larry Cohen and William Lustig’s more than worthy follow-up, Maniac Cop 2.

Now, I never went to any in a strip clubs in 1990. At least none that I remember anyway, so I can’t confirm if this is the sort of thing they would have been playing. It certainly isn’t anything close to something I’ve heard in a strip club, but maybe that’s how they got down 30 years ago. I dunno. Or maybe I’m just goin to the wrong damn strip clubs, cause if I went to one that was bumpin tracks from the Maniac Cop 2 soundtrack, I’d pull up a stool and open a fuckin’ tab, real quick.

So let’s do just that, and maybe even hit the buffet, as we join Buddy and his new fiends, the Children of the Night, for a little October striptease.

 

Audio

Lost In Time

TRACK #253:

Lost In Time by LA Posse

If you told me you thought Waxwork 2: Lost In Time was a bunch of foolishness, I’d have to concede that yes, it is quite silly. At times even annoyingly so.

However, I would then have to counter with “Ok, yeah, but it’s also pretty awesome.”

If, as a horror fan, you are not enamored (at least somewhat) but it’s loving horror parodies, I might have to revoke your nerd card.

From the awesome Aliens send-up with its fantastic creature FX from Bob Keen’s Image Animation, to the Bruce Campbell-anchored William Castle-meets-Evil Dead Haunted House spoof, it’s a treat for any horror fan.

Yeah, maybe the Mideavel segment overstays it’s welcome a little, but even that has some awesome imagery spread throughout. And director Anthony Hickock still manages to find time to spoof Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Nosferatu, Dawn of the Dead and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. C’mon now. It’s just fun.

They even nick the end of Back to the Future 2 for some reason. Kinda weird really, but no less fun.

And what’s more? Oh yeah, they wrap it all up with a Monster Rap Sweet Song. Bonus.

This By-Line Title Track from Muffla and Big Dad of the L.A. Posse might not be the finest example of the sub-genre (admittedly, it’s a little  on the dull side of hype) but it’s better than some of the other turkeys on this list and it definitely comes correct with an extremely detailed plot synopsis.

Mark ain’t a mark

Cause Mark got heart

But Mark won’t stop

Cause Mark is a part

Of the mystery

Back and forth through history

Gold plated.

So hang out with Billy from Gremlins, Bruce Campbell, that one dude from Die Hard, Rex Manning, Deanna Troi, perpetual on-screen bum Buck Flowers (for a second anyway) and all your favorite monsters, and get Lost In Time…

Ya know, like a bug in a jar.

 

Audio

Addams Family (Whoomp!)

TRACK #252:

Addams Family (Whoomp!) by Tag Team

We’re gonna keep the Golden Raspberry theme goin here for a sec with a song I’ve actively avoided adding to the playlist since 2013, when we had a whole block of Addams Family tunes.

Much like Hammer’s Too Legit with A Little Bit of Peppa (For My Chicken), Miami-Bass duo Tag Team repackage their preexisting hit Whoomp! (There It Is) for the 1993 sequel Addams Family Values.

Despite the general consensus that this song is a complete pile of auditory bullshit, I rather like Addams Family (Whoomp!), as can be cross referenced on Shindig Radio Ep. 4: Monster Raps Pt. 2.

I think the verses are clever, well spit and highly referential. It even refers to itself as the movie’s theme song. That’s a solid play for a song of this nature. And quite frankly, it should have come loaded with a full-on fucking spoiler alert, cause it details the entire plot of this film. It’s a movie theme to the max.

And I get it, maybe it seems lazy just taking your own song and moving some words around and calling it a day. But honestly, its just a sound maneuver to keep the money train on the tracks from a pair of “alleged” rip-off artists who didn’t have a hell of a lot going on outside of Whoomp!

Yeah, you read that right. I referred to them rip-off artists, come at me. Since no one actually seems to have Tag Team’s back except me, I shouldn’t experience any sort of backlash from such a bold assertion. However, I will indulge a small detour here to clarify my statement for those unfamiliar with the sordid backstory concerning Tag Team‘s original #2 peaking hit, Whoomp (There It Is.)

The year was 1993. The month? March. Jacksonville’s Miami Bass trio 95 South just released their hit, Whoot! There It Is! Things are looking good for 95 South. The world is their oyster.

That is until May of 1993, when a curious tune titled, Whoomp! There It Is!, from the Atlanta Georgia duo Tag Team hit the charts like an overhand right from Riddick Bowe.

95 South, goes “Da fuck? What is this bullshit? This song sounds exactly our song. I mean, exactly. Listen to that chorus!”

Tag Team’s DC Brain Supreme claims the phrase was popular in Atlanta strip clubs and they just grabbed it up and put on in wax, suggesting any similarity in the cadence of the chorus being dictated by the phrase itself.

Carlos Spencer of 95 South, however, tells the story just a little bit differently.

He says they recorded their track at Atlanta’s Digital Edge Studio. Shortly after that, they gave the track to a local DJ to see if he would spin it at the club. That DJ? You guessed it. DC Brain Supreme.

And the plot thickens. Seems DC Brain Supreme knew the cats over at Digital Edge, where they were using a newfangled computer program to make records. It was called Pro Tools, maybe you’ve heard of it.

It’s Spencer’s assertion that DC and Steve Roll’n just went in there and laid their own vocals over the track 95 South had already produced.

Snap.

Either way, it seems Tag Team changed the song just enough. They used some different samples and eschewed the raunchier, sex-based lyrics for a more commercial, party-like tone.

And just like that, 95 South’s track is buried under the rubble of a more intelligible, less sexualized and altogether more mainstream-friendly crossover hit.

Despite Spencer’s claims however, there was never much outward animosity between the 2 groups. They even appeared together in July of that year on The Arsenio Hall Show, where they battled it out for “There It is” supremacy.

For 95 cents a pop, viewers at home could call-in and vote on which group they liked more. That night, it was 95 South that walked away with the crown. Very judicial.

The Billboard Hot 100 Chart tells a different tale however, with Tag Team’s Whoomp! reaching number #2 and staying in the top 10 for an unprecedented 24 non-consecutive weeks. It would become the longest running Top 10 song of all time, a place it held until 1997, when Toni Braxton’s Unbreak My Heart went to 25. Snap again. To date, Whoomp! has sold over 3.5 million copies.

Whoot! There It Is? Well, it never got passed #11. That’s still pretty pretty good, but one can’t help but wonder what that number might look like if Whoomp! didn’t come in hot, stealing all it’s thunder, and potentially confusing consumers, who may have even preferred Whoot! and unwitting purchased Whoomp!

It’s not all sour grapes for the “Bass Mechanics” CC Lemonhead and Jay Ski though, the duo responsible from producing Whoot!. They had 2 other hits with separate groups, hits that you may even be familiar with . One was with the 69 Boyz track called the Tootsie Roll. The other was The Quad City DJ’s C’Mon N Ride It (The Train.) And that’s not to mention their crowning achievement, the 1996 Title Track Space Jam. Eat that shit, Tag Team.

But of course, Tag Team edges out 95 South here in one small, but very important way; they segued pop dominance into Monster Rap gold. No small potatoes around these parts.

So with that being said, Halloween Shindig presents The Golden Raspberry’s Worst Song from a Film 1993 and Mikey Rotella’s pick for worst Monster Rap of all time, it’s Tag Team’s Addams Family (Whoomp!)

This song’s for the movie and the dance floor!

 

Audio

Scream

TRACK #226:

Scream by Ice MC

All right. So I think we can all agree He’s Coming Back is a pretty bad Monster Rap.

I mean, it’s a Good Monster Rap, in that it’s a prime example of what these songs are all about and how that usually just goes terribly awry. But it is not a Good Monster Rap. Dig?

So, in an effort to redeem the Monster Rap genre (if that’s even feasible or worthy of attempt) we present to you Scream by Ice MC.

If you’re not familiar with Ice MC, please do not feel the least bit bad. This is no deficiency on your part.

Mostly likely this is because you’re either:

  1. An American.
  2. Not listening to Raggamuffin rap and/or
  3. A regular person doing regular things and not wasting what short time we have on this planet associating with shit like Scream by Ice MC. And I don’t blame you. I sometimes wish I was just that sort of person doing just those sorts things, whatever they may be.

In fact, I was that person until last week. Well, I was those first 2 types of people, anyway. Still an American too. Still not listening to any Ragamuffin rap, either. However, I do know what it is now and I have heard this song and I am quite presently wasting all kinds of precious time with it. But I digress.

I was definitely not familiar with this song until last week. That’s when Shindig super enthusiast and research beast Devin Connors hipped me to this track. And within about 30 seconds I knew he’d discovered gold.

What Ice MC has created here is a more approachable and less Faygo-drenched associative Monster Rap than a similarly themed example from another ice-based rapper.

Ice MC sets his sights and weird British accent to referencing several horror movies amidst the heavy electronic back beat and sample-stuffed rhythms of the Raggamuffin sound; a subset of Dancehall and Reggae music where sampling forms the backbone of the melody.

What unfolds is something somewhat unique in the Monster Rap game; A song strangely catchy, somewhat legitimately fun and yet laughably ridiculous. Boardering on bad while flirting with good, this song rests in a limbo not entirely either.

Run DMC’s Ghostbusters is too crafted to be thought silly. The Chucky Song too white and corporate to be considered real. Or something like last night’s He’s Coming Back, which is a bit too tedious to be genuinely enjoyed.

Scream appears more akin to something like Lovebug Starski’s Amityville or DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince’s Nightmare on My Street: completely independent, straight outta left field, eminently listenable and Shindig as fuck.

So thank you Devin for this wonderful new addition, though mine may be the only thanks you’ll receive.

A few side notes:

  1. Yes, that’s Aliens’ Ripley he refers to as Sgt. Weaver.
  2. No, I’m not sure why he does that.
  3. No, I also don’t know what the hell pumpkin on the telly he’s referring to from Halloween. I assume the credits
  4. I won’t spoil the elephant in the middle of this song, but it’s great, and you’ll know it when you hear it. Enjoy.
  5. And yes, he does say that. Several times.

 

 

Audio

He’s Coming Back

TRACK #225:

He’s Coming Back by Chris LeVrar

While attempting to pull some samples from Repossessed for its Title Track, I naturally stumbled across this end credit oddity, which can only be called a gem when you host a playlist like the one I’ve constructed here.

A highly referential Monster Rap Sweet Song? Oh, this is going on the playlist for sure, I don’t care how bad it is.

That this is my knee jerk reaction is a bit of a shame, because this song is bad. And I mean it’s bad, so I apologize for that.

So bad in fact, that you happen to be looking at the proud recipient of 1990’s Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Song from a Motion Picture.

I hope you all can understand and appreciate it’s inclusion. My compulsive need to include inclusive (and referential) Monster Raps Sweet Songs prevents me from treating this thing objectively, or considering your overall enjoyment of this playlist. But my hope is you can at least see why, when stumbling upon something of this nature, it has to be included.

Well, either way I apologize.

In fairness, the verses aren’t so bad. It’s really the chorus here that’s dragging this whole track down. But lyrically, you’re getting a heaping helping of allusions to the film, plenty of bizarro lines and a rhyme structure that is off-center, to say the least.

Not helping matters is it’s length. It’s crazy to me to think Repossessed had enough credits to sustain a 4 minute song. For real? That many heads on Repossessed? They must roll at an unnaturally slow pace, cause I don’t know what the hell all those people were doing.

I will say, I wish I had rediscovered this thing earlier so we could have had the chance to really dig into this one on our Monster Raps episodes. Oh well. Perhaps we’ll amass enough new Monster Raps to warrant a Part 3. Fingers crossed.

In closing, I do hope that somewhere, someone listening to this playlist actually likes this song. Or at the very least, appreciates the necessity of it’s inclusion, because I’m fairly sure they’ll be the only one.

 

Audio

Repossessed

TRACK #224:

Repossessed by Cindy Valentine

While certainly not what I’d call a good movie or even all that funny, you can do a lot worse than 1990’s Horror Spoof Repossessed. Namely Transylvania 6-5000. But I digress.

The best thing going for this silly slice of parody is Linda Blair. Landing the star of the original film you’re spoofing is a big play in this racket, and here she does a fine job lampooning herself, tongue firmly in cheek. It’s neat just to see her there in the blue dress taking a poke at herself and it goes some distance to endearing this movie to a certain audience.

I’m also a sucker for Leslie Nielsen, though I have to admit, his accent takes me out of this one a little. This is not one of his crowning comedic works, but it certainly beats Spy Hard or 2001: A Space Travesty.

A lot of the jokes here don’t land well, but there are a number of smaller gags that I think work and produce some genuine laughs. This, however, is not the gold standard of horror parodies, by any means. Hell, it ain’t even a copper standard.

Making all of this a little easier to ingest though is its upbeat Title Track from Teen Witch’s own Cindy Valentine. A second (hell, maybe even 3rd or 4th) tier 80’s pop singer you may or may not be familiar with. I vaguely recognized a couple of her bigger hits (from where exactly, I could not say) but if you had no recollection of ever hearing any of her assembly line genri-pop, that would be perfectly understandishable.

I’ve yet to hear a Cindy Valentine song I didn’t like and that very much includes Never Gonna Be The Same Again from Teen Witch. But in fairness, I haven’t listened to the breadth of her catalog. I’m sure there’s some turkeys in there, even by my admittedly dubious standards.

But here it is, my personal pick from the crop of Bad and Ugly Title Tracks of Episode 8, it’s Cindy Valentine with Reposssessed!

 

Audio

Rapula

TRACK #202:

Rapula by Dean Cameron

We’re gonna gonna keep the Monster Rap train rolling here for a bit with a Monster Rap performed by an actual Monster, Rockula.

This (essentially) 80’s Monster Comedy gets a little extra love from The Shindig for:

  • A.) Starring Francis “Chainsaw” Gremp, Dean Cameron.
  • B.) Taking place on Halloween and
  • C.) Featuring lots of music for use on the playlist.

Our next selection, perhaps the most sweaty of Rockula’s catalog, is his attempt to do what everyone was doing in at the in 1989…bust a rhyme.

It’s not as bad as you might think. It’s certainly not great, but it’s all in jest and there’s some funny lyrics, which is more than I can say for,…well it’s coming up at #203.

So, before you curse us for posting perhaps the worst Monster Rap in existence, give it a track or two before making any snap decisions.

Kick it!

 

Audio

Halloween Night

TRACK #189:

Halloween Night by Halloween

Several years ago when Halloween made their Shindig debut on Halloween with their song Halloween, we immediately bestowed upon them All-Star status. This was very premature, because at that point, it was their only contribution.

I knew then that they would have multiple appearances. I have an auxiliary playlist called The Shindig Bullpen for all the planned additions that have yet to make their way onto the blog. They’re all there, but the move was still premature.

Tonight’s track, however, finally makes Halloween The Shindig All-Stars they were born to be.

Since they already had a song called Halloween, I’m sure they were pretty disappointed. Now, they probably could have gone the Danzig route and just made a song called Halloween II, but Halloween opted to tag the word “Night” on there, and call it a day. It’s a solid move.

And since we were just dealing with Dr. Crowley and his Anti-Halloween Machine, we thought we’d check in with Angela Harris, who’s own Anti-Halloween machine, a religious group called HARVEST, is responsible for all the mayhem in 2014’s nostalgia stuffed The WNUF Halloween Special.

Her alarmist petitions seem particularly in contrast to Halloween’s somewhat reassuring song, where they tell you everything’s all right, Halloween’s just a fun night out at the Heavy Metal Horror Show. Nothing to worry about here.

Mrs. Harris, well, she doesn’t exactly concur.

Here’s Halloween, once again singing about Halloween and taking their rightful place on the Shindig All-Star team, with Halloween Night.

 

Audio

Dead by Dawn

TRACK #167:

Dead By Dawn by Deicide

How does one follow up The Ultimate Experience in Grueling Horror?

Well, if you’re Sam Raimi, you revisit the same basic concept and style, crank that shit the fuck up and call it “The Sequel to the Ultimate Experience in Grueling Horror.”

Fair enough.

You also create one of my favorite horror experiences of all time.

So, how does one follow up The Ultimate Experience in Grueling Metal?

Well, if you’re Halloween Shindig, you take a page outta Sam Raimi’s book (of the dead), use another death metal song, this time about Evil Dead 2, follow the same basic concept and style, and crank that shit the fuck up!

And with that spirit firmly in mind, Halloween Shindig presents Deicide’s Dead By Dawn, or The Sequel to the Ultimate Experience in Grueling Metal!

Audio

Poison Heart

TRACK #158

Poison Heart by The Ramones

Odds are you’re not reading this. It’s not exactly rush hour over here at The Shindig. I’m the site administrator. I see the numbers and I wouldn’t call them encouraging.

If you do happen to be reading this though, odds are you don’t really like Pet Sematary 2. That’s just simple math. The number of people who actually like that movie divided by the number of daily visitors this site gets makes it practically fucking impossible for you to be a fan.

You may use such tempered words as “tolerable,” “serviceable,” or perhaps even “forgettable,” to describe your feelings toward it, but I’ll wager “good” probably won’t be among the ones you choose.

Cause let’s face it, it just wasn’t that great of an idea, at least not artistically. Financially, sure, in that they turned 8 million dollars into 17 million at the box office alone. I doubt anyone involved considered that a failure in any monetary sense.

As a movie to just watch (either then or 25 years after the fact) it just doesn’t do enough of anything particularly well to be all that entertaining or to justify its own existence beyond being a sound financial investment.

There are 3 positive things I can say about Pet Sematary 2 however.

  1. It’s a Halloween movie, complete with costumes and trick-or-treating, a Halloween party at the Pet Sematary and a satisfying autumnal-leafy-vibe.
  2. Clancy Brown is well cast and fun to watch. He’s fittingly menacing as the main antagonist and he definitely does all the heavy lifting here.
  3. Someone thought it would be cool if they had The Ramones provided the end credit track again.

And it was. I hope that person got at least a nice piece of that 17 million domestic gross.

Lead-in by the Friday 2-styled, sequel-requisite “tell the story of the previous installment as a spooky campfire story” move,  here’s The Ramones returning to the old Micmac cemetery with Poison Heart.

 

PS: that voice you’re hearing is from young actor Jared Rushton, whom some of you may remember as Tom Hanks’ buddy in Big. However, astute Halloweeners may recognize an even younger Jared from Lady In White, where he locked Frankie Scarlatti in the cloak room on Halloween. Yep, Jared is a 2-time Halloween prick and honorary Shindig All-Star. Good work Jared, your agent was pretty keen. Send him a fruit basket.

Audio

Trick Or Treat

TRACK #125:

Trick or Treat by King Diamond

It’s time once again Weeners for the King of Halloween himself, Mr. King Diamond.

Sure, this song isn’t really about Halloween or even Trick or Treating for that matter, but the King is playing a game called Trick or Treat and damn it if that’s not good enough for the Ole Shindig.

Ever the theatrical, King Diamond’s catalog consists mostly of concept albums, as the majority tell very detailed and horrific stories. Why no one has turned one of these into a movie yet is beyond me. There’s a couple of real good ones.

In particular, the gem from which our next tracks hails, 1996’s The Graveyard.

The Graveyard tells the story of an unnamed King Diamond character who is wrongfully committed to a sanitarium by Mayor McKenzie. Seems King used to work for the him and one night happened upon the The Mayor molesting his own daughter. Yikes.

So the Mayor cooked up a story and tossed King Diamond into the meat grinder.

After years in Blackhill Sanitarium losing his mind, King kills a nurse, escapes and takes refuge in The Graveyard, where he begins to plots his revenge. He also murders some other people and becomes obsessed with the idea of a person’s soul living inside its decapitated head forever, but mostly it’s the revenge he’s interested in.

And that’s where we join our story…

King has kidnapped the Mayor’s daughter Lucy and buried her alive in one of seven graves. Mayor McKenzie has 3 tries to discover which grave is holding Lucy or he will murder them both…

::my best John Kassir impression::

…in a little game the King is calling…Treat Or Treat…yeeehahahahaaaaa.

 

Audio

This Is Halloween

TRACK #120:

This Is Halloween by Danny Elfman

If you’ve been following The Shindig for any reasonable amount of time then you may have noticed I hardly ever mention A Nightmare Before Christmas. In fact, aside from that post-Halloween gif I reblogged last year, I’ve never mentioned it before. There’s a couple of good reason for this.

One of them is that there is certainly no shortage of love shown to Tim Burton and Henry Selick’s 1993 stop motion classic around the web, especially within the Halloween circles this blog runs. I’ll wager you could recreate the film pretty handedly from just the gifs on Tumblr alone. Everyone knows it, everyone loves it. No sense in beating a dead horse, the way I see it.

More directly though, it has never been a movie I typically associate with Halloween. Sure, Jack The Pumpkin King, Halloweentown and all of that, but for me the film has always been a decidedly Christmas affair. Fuck, the word Christmas appears in its title. That’s an automatic disqualification from any Halloween movie list as far as The Shindig is concerned.

However, as everyone is well aware, the first 10 minutes or so before Jack happens into Christmastown are about as Halloweeny as as it gets, aided in no small part by this fantastic song from Halloween Hero and Shindig All-Star Danny Elfman.

It’s one of the most Halloweeny songs ever committed to film or record period and any Halloween playlist would be remiss not to include it. And whenever that claim comes down the pipe, The Shindig abides.

Everyone hail to the pumpkin song!

 

Audio

Halloween

TRACK #110:

Halloween by Halloween

What better way to celebrate Halloween than with a song called Halloween by a band called Halloween? Sounds like a triple threat to me.

But who the hell is Halloween? It’s a great question, one I found myself asking just a few weeks ago.

Known to the Motor City as Detroit’s Heavy Metal Horror Show, Halloween didn’t find a whole lot of notoriety outside of their niche in early 80’s metal. Hampered by line-up changes, delayed album releases and shelved efforts, Halloween just never seemed to gain any traction.

However, they’ve had numerous reunions over the years, re-releases and they even still play Halloween shows to this day. Hell, you could probably go see them right now in Detroit. They played last year, and I think they’re doing it again this year as well.

All I know is that we just found these guys and overnight they became Shindig All-Stars. How a band called Halloween somehow slipped through the cracks we may never know, but like all hidden Halloween gems, these treats don’t escape our tricking grasp for long. And with songs like Halloween Night, Trick Or Treat and Tales From The Crypt you can be sure you haven’t heard the last of Halloween.

So, let’s welcome the boys of Detroit’s Heavy Metal Horror Show into the fold with a ceremonious Hallo’s Eve initiation, aided in part by that creepy old druid lady from Halloween 6, and Tommy Doyle of course, overacted to perfection by a very young Paul Rudd.

Halloween, take your rightful place amongst your brethren, with all the other hallowed horrors of our Halloween halls.

And with that…on Halloween, here’s Halloween performing…Halloween.

 

Audio

Leatherface

TRACK #101:

Leatherface by Lääz Rockit

There’s no shortage of music for 80’s horror icons, no matter how popular or obscure. From Matt Cordell to Horace Pinker, no psycho is too small for a Title Track. Hell, even Bud the C.H.U.D. has his own song, and he ain’t even a real C.H.U.D.

However, when it comes to The Big 5, there’s a lot of representation from some pretty heavy hitters.

And though Freddy may have Dokken (and The Fat Boys), and Jason may hang out with Alice Cooper, and Pinhead might be backed up by Motörhead and Michael Myers may just have greatest theme in horror history, Leatherface gets the baddest song of the bunch, in my opinion. It may be from rock’s forgotten sons Lääz Rockit, but this song is tough as shit.

The whole Leatherface soundtrack is pretty rock solid, but this Title Track is everything you want for everyone’s favorite chainsaw-wielding, cross-dressing, skin-wearing, Texas-fried lunatic; some kick-ass shredding, some disgruntled vocals and some highly referential lyrical content. Handled.

I’ve lead the track in with Tobe Hopper’s iconic introduction (as read by Night Court’s John Larroquette’s) because let’s face it, that intro from part 3 sucks balls.

From another mostly forgettable retread in the under-capitalized Texas Chainsaw franchise, it’s Lääz Rockit, headin’ for the crossroad with Leatherface.

Here’s your invitation.