A Normaltown Halloween 2014 Mix (How AJ Bowen Won Halloween This Year)

I know what you're thinking. We're in the middle of the Halloween season. I'm primarily known as the "horror" guy. (I was even introduced last night to a stranger as the "king of horror," much to my embarrassment and mild amusement.) So where the hell is my Halloween themed mix?!? This should be a no brainer, right? I love music. I love horror. I should be able to put the two together with no problem, right? Believe or not, this has always been a difficult task for me. AJ Bowen once gave me a Halloween inspired mix CD shortly after wrapping on THE HOUSE OF THE DEVIL, which I still have & which thankfully introduced me to some amazing bands. So I started brainstorming.

Now, I've done plenty of articles on ICONS that touch upon my love of horror music. For example, MY TOP 10 HORROR THEMES, and then 10 MORE HORROR MOVIE THEMES FOR YOUR HALLOWEEN and finally my TOP 5 SDTKS OF 2013. Those for the most part specifically focus on horror "scores." I haven't quite perfected the art of making a good Halloween mix that combines a few horror themes here, a few horror themed rock songs there, and so on. But I figured I'd probably use "Dream Warriors" by Dokken (an obvious but rockin' choice), and maybe Siouxsie & The Banshees "Face To Face," even though it's from BATMAN RETURNS and hence is probably more appropriate for Christmas since that's a Christmas-themed movie. Sean once used "Wolf Like Me" by TV On The Radio, so that's a solid choice. I'd probably sprinkle a bunch of John Carpenter themes all through out. And the music from the impossible-to-beat FRIDAY THE 13TH Nintendo video game. OK, I've got a foundation here.

Then I got together with AJ the other night and he handed me a freshly burned CD mix that read "A Normaltown Halloween 2014." The next morning, I picked up a handful of magazines I'd been meaning to catch up on and threw on this new mix as I read. And guess what? Everyone can go home now. AJ has won Halloween for 2014.


The good news is his mix making abilities are still top notch and this is the best mix I've gotten in ages. The bad news is I can't top it so I won't even try. Good news again? I now have a full year to think up my own Halloween mix. It's a great mix of Halloween inspired songs, movie score themes, and recognizable songs from Halloween themed movies. He freakin' put on "No Shelter," the song that plays during the Halloween dance in THE KARATE KID for Crom's sake! (Reminding me once more that THE KARATE KID is in fact a Halloween movie.) How can I possibly beat this?! I can't. Instead I'll share it with all of you. Without further ado:

A Normaltown Halloween 2014:

1. Halloween TV Commercial by Tommy Lee Wallace & Alan Howarth (From HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH
2. The Innkeepers by Jeff Grace (From THE INNKEEPERS)
3. Psycho Killer by Talking Heads (From BEHIND THE MASK: THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON)
4. Transformation by Miles Goodman (From TEEN WOLF)
5. Headless Horseman by Kay Starr
6. Dexter Main Theme by Rolfe Kent (From DEXTER)
7. Halloween (She's So Mean) by Rob Zombie & The Ghastly Ones
8. Michael Kills Judith by John Carpenter (From HALLOWEEN)
9. No Shelter by Broken Edge (From THE KARATE KID)
10. The Twilight Zone Theme by Jerry Goldsmith (From THE TWILIGHT ZONE)
11. Cry Little Sister by G Tom Mac (From THE LOST BOYS)
12. Main Title by John Carpenter/Alan Howarth (From HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH)
13. Natural Trail To Hell by Weird Al Yankovic (From the album IN 3D)
14. Cemetery Polka by Tom Waits
15. He's Back (The Man Behind The Mask) by Alice Cooper (From FRIDAY THE 13TH VI: JASON LIVES)
16. Halloween by Siouxsie & The Banshees
17. Haunted by Rob (From MANIAC)
18. Killer Klowns by The Dickies (From KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE)
19. Monster Mash by Bobby "Boris" Pickett & The Crypt-Kickers
20. Li'l Red Riding Hood by Sam The Sham & The Pharaohs

I seriously love this mix. I already ripped it and saved it as an iTunes playlist and plan on listening to it straight through the rest of the month. The only thing I personally would've added (or swapped) is the HALLOWEEN III main theme. It's a good ambient track, but I've always loved the theme titled "Chariot Of Pumpkins." (Below) It could be my favorite John Carpenter piece of music and I listen to it more and more as we barrel towards Halloween day.



Got any Halloween themed playlists of your own? Would love to see 'em!

90's Rockers (When "Shuffle" Decides Your Playlist)

 A few days back, I had the sudden urge to create a playlist of some of my favorite "rockers" from the 90's. After all, that time period was when I was at my most impressionable as a music fan, and while some mixes you're aiming to have a eclectic range of emotions, full of peaks and falls, sometimes you just wanna rock the F out. From start to finish. From first track to last.

So that was my goal and I wanted to keep it to a very specific time period, primarily mid to late 90's. "Public Witness Program" from Fugazi's "In On A Kill Taker" for example always gets me going. (And is arguably the band's most catchy, commercial sounding song, despite their consistent stance of being anti-commercial.) I started culling tracks from another blog entry I started working on about some of the most influential records on me personally. If I have Fugazi on there, got to have a little Jawbox too. Well then that also means I've got to grab a Smile track. Couldn't forget Pond, one of Sub Pop's best hidden secrets to this day. And then some of the later bands like Errortype: 11 and Rival Schools (I know, I'm mildly cheating the 90's thing with them. They formed in 99, the track I chose is 2001, but I'm letting that slide because it's awesome.) And yeah, the Soundgarden track is from '89, but let's face it, we all heard it in the 90's!

But here was my initial dilemma. When it comes to the perfect mix, order means everything. You have to have the right flow, the right sequence to place these tracks in for maximum effect. And this is usually a time consuming process that takes multiple attempts and several tests. It's a rarity to get your perfect playlist in the first try. Possible, just not probable. But I just couldn't crack this one. I think initially it was because every single song was a rocker. If I had a mellow track, I could use it to break to flow, manipulate the mood, etc. So after a handful of failed attempts to find the right order, I jumped in my car, picked this playlist and hit the "shuffle" option. Maybe I'd hear a combo of 2 or 3 tracks in a row that worked well enough and that'd inspire me.

And would you believe it, the following playlist was exactly the order that the random play option picked! It just worked perfectly as soon as I stopped thinking about it and left it up to fate to decide what order to put it in. Ever do that? Put your trust and faith solely in the "shuffle" play option? It's glorious when it works. So, here's my 90's Rockers Mix, complete with You Tube links so you can check out the tunes for yourself if you don't already know 'em.

1. Jackpot Plus! by Jawbox from "For Your Own Special Sweetheart" (You Tube Link)
2. Glass Sparkles In Their Hair by Pond from "The Practice Of Joy Before Death" (You Tube Link)
3. Staring At The Sun by Smile from "Maquee" (You Tube Link)
4. Public Witness Program by Fugazi from "In On A Kill Taker" (You Tube Link)
5. Papercut by Sense Field from "Killed For Less" (You Tube Link)
6. Take A Bow by Errortype: 11 from "Some Six" (You Tube Link)
7. Energy Dome by Snapcase from "Designs For Automotion" (You Tube Link)
8. Stars by Hum from "You'd Prefer An Astronaut" (You Tube Link)
9. Used For Glue by Rival Schools from "United By Fate" (You Tube Link)
10. Hands All Over by Soundgarden from "Louder Than Love" (You Tube Link)
11. Round by Sunny Day Real Estate from "Diary" (You Tube Link)
12. Hang Out by Thurston Moore from "Psychic Hearts" (You Tube Link)
13. Hit Liquor by Shudder To Think from "Pony Express Record" (You Tube Link)
14. Possum Kingdom by Toadies from "Rubberneck" (You Tube Link)
15. The Mouth Of Babes by Smashing Pumpkins from the "Zero EP" (You Tube Link)

And I'm sticking by that! Sure I could probably mess with it a bit more, and who knows? It clocks in at about 56 minutes which means I have plenty of space to add more tracks to it. (I'm sure I will update this at some point with Sprinkler and Six Finger Satellite and Handsome.) But I like that this all came together by chance. Life is simpler when we leave it up to chance sometimes. These songs all remind me of a much simpler time when I didn't worry so much about every freakin' single thing.

Here's what I mean - last weekend, I went apple picking with my friends Axelle and Neil and we were supposed to meet some of their neighbors there. We got there and the irony being that none of us could get decent cell phone reception, something that no horror fan would ever buy in a modern horror film... and yet it actually does happen! Anyways, Axelle was trying hard to keep calling to coordinate with her neighbor friend while Neil and I waited under a shaded tree. He said to me, "Remember before cell phones? We'd all just show up where we're supposed to, walk around and somehow we always managed to find each other."



That reminded me essentially of the entire time period that I discovered every song above. In my band days, whenever we were driving to do a gig in Pennsylvania or some part of New Jersey, we had no cell phones or GPS. We were oblivious to the task and yet somehow, magically, we'd always find our way to the venue or place we were supposed to play. Part of what made that unknown ride safer was the comfort of the music we listened to on the way there. That's what all of these above songs reminds me of. Driving on random parkways in States I was unfamiliar with, with my best friends hoping that we'd show up to some venue or bar we'd never been at and that someone, anyone would be waiting to watch us perform.

So even though this mix was originally intended to be a "rocker" to get me pumped, it in actuality just reminds me of a simpler time.

Where we left everything up to fate.

And just like the way I determined the order, I left it up to fate.