Blood on Black Wax

Jeff Szpirglas, Aaron Lupton

Description

Heavy cross-promotion with the expanded re-release of the 1984 Publishing titleAd Nauseam: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1970s and 1980s (both expanded titles will be released on the same day). Interviews, social media ads, and appearances (post vaccine) are planned for 2021 and throughout the holidays (beginning with Halloween). Authors reside in Canada, so there are opportunities for press in both the US and Canada.

This new, expanded edition of Blood on Black Wax contains 32 additional pages (and soundtrack titles) from the last printing, along with enhanced limited edition packaging (i.e., foil cover elements + gilded foil page edges).

Blood on Black Wax: Horror Soundtracks on Vinyl is the successful predecessor to last year's Planet Wax: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Soundtracks on Vinyl.

Vinyl LPs are not only popular again (i.e., it's currently the highest-selling music format, surpassing CDs), but soundtracks in particular are top sellers, and nearly every horror movie has been re-released on vinyl in the last ten years.

Blood on Black Wax contains over 250 full-color LP covers, along with fascinating backstories and interviews. For vinyl collectors, or more generally fans of horror films, this is a nostalgic trip back into the films and their related music from the 1970s through the present. Films include the popular series A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Halloween, Child’s Play, The Exorcist, Scream, It, and many stand-alone classics including The Shining, Carrie, Rosemary's Baby, Children of the Corn, Get Out, and The Babadook.

Authors Aaron Lupton, Jeff Szpirglas, and 1984 Publishing will once again schedule personal appearances in 2021 and 2022 (post-Covid vaccine), in conjunction with trade and pop-culture oriented shows.

Please note that the expanded edition will release on the same day as the expanded edition of the complimentary 1984 title Ad Nauseam: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1970s and 1980s (ISBN 9781948221184), so cross-promotion/sales opportunities are possible.

FOREWORD

When breaking down what makes a horror movie work (or not), it is easy to bypass one of its most important elements. The script, the atmospheric lighting and lens choice, the cast, the visual and makeup effects, and the editorial approach all are important ingredients when leading the audience down the dark path to their deepest fears. But a singularly crucial piece of the puzzle is usually the last one to be locked in: the musical score.

Music can make or break a film; it can make a good movie – of any genre – great. Or it can make a mediocre or crummy film better. Or, it can just sit there in a puddle of its own lifeless blood. Film music is its pulse, and when the right film and composer meet, magic happens. Movies are visceral, experiential. Music may be mathematical on charts, but, from its beginnings with the heartbeats of the tribes around the campfire to the fantastic digital samples and electronic aural creations that never existed in nature, it amplifies our emotions, and digs in deep to primal places that words and pictures cannot easily access.

Even when they were silent, movies always had a soundtrack. In the pre-Vitaphone days, score sheets were distributed with the films to the cinemas, and the music was performed live – on giant Wurlitzer pipe organs in the most elegant theaters, or an out-of-tune Steinway upright in the more modest locations. They were, for the most part, consistent in that regard.

Tension is built as much through sound as through image, and in some ways even more. Just as the storytelling tools of cinema have evolved over the years to become a language of their own, so too has the metamorphosis of film music led us to expect – or not – the traps being laid by the score.

Some aspects of those are obvious: the loud discordant chord crashing onto the jump scare, the long held note warning us of something awful to come. Those are simple staples of the shocker, to the point of being self-parodying. But the soundscapes woven by the composer may also create an unsettling dread, a rich, deep, emotional experience that follows us home from the theater to haunt us a bit longer. Music has always been crucial for me, and it has allowed me to cover numerous cinematic sins I might have committed without anyone noticing.

John Carpenter once told me that it’s easy to make somebody jump, to shock the audience. All he has to do is run black leader through a projector silently, then hit a white frame and a loud noise, and the work is done. But that’s merely a simple jump. And it’s ironic that Carpenter was the first filmmaker I ever saw recording a musical score for a movie, and neither of us realized that he was changing the course of horror film music at the time. I was interviewing him in a tiny recording studio in Hollywood in 1978, and he was alone, hunkered over a synthesizer, scoring Halloween.

The most important part of a film score is to do its work in concert with the movie it accompanies; it doesn’t need to stand alone on a soundtrack album, though it’s nice when it does. But sometimes, something magic comes from a soundtrack that won’t sound great on your car stereo. Consider, for example, the “score” that Tobe Hooper and Wayne Bell did for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre back in 1974. It is a soundscape, conducted noises and disturbing audio accompaniment to one of the most powerful and frightening films of all times. And Tobe made it very clear that he never played an instrument, though he did an amazing job on those skins and blades and bones.

Groundbreaking scores that help a movie to terrify are plentiful, from Bernard Herrmann’s black-and-white string chillers in Psycho to Jerry Goldsmith’s melodic-and-atonal sound bed for Alien. Carpenter’s Halloween showed you could make great music without great cost (or an orchestra) – a point driven home by Claudio Simonetti and his band Goblin, in his scores for Dario Argento and many others.

I was a singer in a progressive rock band before I began writing and making films and television, but I always loved the full, organic sound of an orchestra for my films. I had the experience of a full orchestra on my first directing job, a Disney TV movie called Fuzzbucket, as well as on my one directorial effort for the TV show Amazing Stories, called “Life on Death Row.” There is nothing more exciting than being on a studio recording stage with a studio orchestra! The power of it can be overwhelming.

When I finally was able to direct my first feature, the timeless classic Critters 2: The Main Course (Me? Sarcastic?), it was important to have an orchestra, despite our very slender budget. We were creating Norman Rockwell’s America, after all, in a Spielbergian world, and a 1988 synthesizer would not cut it. In our first collaboration, Nicholas Pike pulled together a non-union 40-piece orchestra and made magic. I’m told that Spielberg’s editor Michael Kahn used that score as temporary music on Steven’s films for many years to come.

Another side of the film music coin is scoring by songs. In the miniseries I directed of Stephen King’s The Stand, for example, the opening pre-credit sequence is memorably set to Blue Öyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper,” and I can’t hear that song without thinking of that scene...[continues]

Mick Garris
Director / Writer / Producer

1) Foreword (Mick Garris)
2) Introductions (Aaron Lupton + Jeff Szpirglas)
3) Classic Monsters
4) Intergalactic Encounters
5) Creature Features
6) Supernatural Horror
7) Murder Maestros
8) Italian Terror
9) Rock 'N' Roll Nightmares
10) Different Beasts
11) Index

Sujets

• Musique
• Histoire de la musique
• Genres
• LPs
• MUSIC
• Años 1990
• Años 1970
• Años 90
• Años 80
• Años 70
• Película fotográfica
• Años 1980
• Record Store Day
• Multiple signal classification
• Revolutions per minute
• Prom Night
• Criticism
• Collecting
• 90s
• 80s
• 70s
• 1980s
• 1970s
• Performing arts
• Horror
• Lists of composers
• 1990s
• Le Bal de l'horreur
• Scores
• Hurlements 2
• Score
• Record
• Composer
• History
• Mick Garris
• LP
• RPM
• ART
• Film
• Cinéma
• Cinema

Informations

• Publié par: 1984 Publishing
• Date de parution: 03 mai 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781948221214
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 13 Mo

Extrait

DEDICATIONS

AARON
“For Cooper. Destined to be a horror fan like his dad. One day all of these records will be yours.”

JEFF
“For Danielle, Ruby, and Léo, who tirelessly put up with an endless stream of horror movies and soundtracks, all in the name of `work´ on the book.”

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD
INTRODUCTIONS
1 : SUPERNATURAL HORRORS
2 : SAVAGE SCIENCE FICTION
3 : CREATURE FEATURES
4 : MURDER MAESTROS
5 : ROCK ‘N’ ROLL NIGHTMARES
6 : ITALIAN TERROR
7 : DIFFERENT BEASTS
AFTERWORD
THANKS

FOREWORD
When breaking down what makes a horror movie work (or not), it is easy to bypass one of its most important elements. The script, the atmospheric lighting and lens choice, the cast, the visual and makeup effects, and the editorial approach all are important ingredients when leading the audience down the dark path to their deepest fears. But a singularly crucial piece of the puzzle is usually the last one to be locked in: the musical score.
Music can make or break a film; it can make a good movie – of any genre – great. Or it can make a mediocre or crummy film better. Or, it can just sit there in a puddle of its own lifeless blood.
Film music is its pulse, and when the right film and composer meet, magic happens. Movies are visceral, experiential. Music may be mathematical on charts, but, from its beginnings with the heartbeats of the tribes around the campfire to the fantastic digital samples and electronic aural creations that never existed in nature, it amplifies our emotions, and digs in deep to primal places that words and pictures cannot easily access.
Even when they were silent, movies always had a soundtrack. In the pre-Vitaphone days, score sheets were distributed with the films to the cinemas, and the music was performed live – on giant Wurlitzer pipe organs in the most elegant theaters, or an out-of-tune Steinway upright in the more modest locations. They were, for the most part, consistent in that regard.
Tension is built as much through sound as through image, and in some ways even more. Just as the storytelling tools of cinema have evolved over the years to become a language of their own, so too has the metamorphosis of film music led us to expect – or not – the traps being laid by the score.
Some aspects of those are obvious: the loud discordant chord crashing onto the jump scare, the long held note warning us of something awful to come. Those are simple staples of the shocker, to the point of being self-parodying. But the soundscapes woven by the composer may also create an unsettling dread, a rich, deep, emotional experience that follows us home from the theater to haunt us a bit longer. Music has always been crucial for me, and it has allowed me to cover numerous cinematic sins I might have committed without anyone noticing.
John Carpenter once told me that it’s easy to make somebody jump, to shock the audience. All he has to do is run black leader through a projector silently, then hit a white frame and a loud noise, and the work is done. But that’s merely a simple jump. And it’s ironic that Carpenter was the first filmmaker I ever saw recording a musical score for a movie, and neither of us realized that he was changing the course of horror film music at the time. I was interviewing him in a tiny recording studio in Hollywood in 1978, and he was alone, hunkered over a synthesizer, scoring Halloween .
The most important part of a film score is to do its work in concert with the movie it accompanies; it doesn’t need to stand alone on a soundtrack album, though it’s nice when it does. But sometimes, something magic comes from a soundtrack that won’t sound great on your car stereo. Consider, for example, the “score” that Tobe Hooper and Wayne Bell did for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre back in 1974. It is a soundscape, conducted noises and disturbing audio accompaniment to one of the most powerful and frightening films of all times. And Tobe made it very clear that he never played an instrument, though he did an amazing job on those skins and blades and bones.
Groundbreaking scores that help a movie to terrify are plentiful, from Bernard Herrmann’s black-and-white string chillers in Psycho to Jerry Goldsmith’s melodic-and-atonal sound bed for Alien . Carpenter’s Halloween showed you could make great music without great cost (or an orchestra) – a point driven home by Claudio Simonetti and his band Goblin, in his scores for Dario Argento and many others.
I was a singer in a progressive rock band before I began writing and making films and television, but I always loved the full, organic sound of an orchestra for my films. I had the experience of a full orchestra on my first directing job, a Disney TV movie called Fuzzbucket , as well as on my one directorial effort for the TV show Amazing Stories , called “Life on Death Row.” There is nothing more exciting than being on a studio recording stage with a studio orchestra! The power of it can be overwhelming.
When I finally was able to direct my first feature, the timeless classic Critters 2: The Main Course (Me? Sarcastic?), it was important to have an orchestra, despite our very slender budget. We were creating Norman Rockwell’s America, after all, in a Spielbergian world, and a 1988 synthesizer would not cut it. In our first collaboration, Nicholas Pike pulled togethera non-union 40-piece orchestra and made magic. I’m told that Spielberg’s editor Michael Kahn used that score as temporary music on Steven’s films for many years to come.
Another side of the film music coin is scoring by songs. In the miniseries I directed of Stephen King’s The Stand , for example, the opening pre-credit sequence is memorably set to Blue Öyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper,” and I can’t hear that song without thinking of that scene. In the same miniseries, King had scripted The Beach Boys’ “Fun, Fun, Fun” for the scene where Molly Ringwald’s character buries her father. It was a lovely piece of counterpoint, but I wanted to try a different direction. I put in what I feel is one of the most beautiful pop songs ever, “Don’t Dream It’s Over” by Crowded House, and the sense of visual melancholy becomes complete and painful in a way it wouldn’t have been without such a powerful piece of music.
To me, there are no rules about scoring when it comes to orchestration or construction of a film’s music. But you know when it works. It’s much more difficult to get the budget for a full orchestral score – leave that to the big studio projects – but on the other hand, the sampled sounds now available are so fantastic that even seasoned musicians are hard pressed to tell: was it real or was it a guy on a computer?
I love film and all its tools. It is the great composite of all art forms: writing, performance, art direction and creation, photography (including lighting and composition), all set to instill in movies meant to terrify a dread, a fear, something more than a bump in the night, a cat out of a closet, a hand on the shoulder. And when a great score is put into place, it is a symphony of the senses, a collaboration that gives us the chills that I for one heartily embrace.

MICK GARRIS
Director / Writer / Producer
INTRODUCTIONS

SIDE A
I was approached with the initial idea for this book by Jeff Szpirglas, a writer I knew from my post as music editor for Rue Morgue magazine. I didn’t know Jeff that well, but I came to understand that we shared the same unrelenting passion for horror movie soundtracks – a topic that always came up when we ran into each other at parties. His original idea was a book that reviewed the top 200 or so horror soundtracks, and though I was naturally intrigued, I felt it could, and should, be something more.
One of my major goals with Rue Morgue ’s music section, the “Audio Drome,” is to bring excitement to horror film music, to write about soundtracks in way that makes them as fun to read about as the movies themselves. I think this is also the genius behind the current vinyl craze market for horror soundtracks; companies like Death Waltz and Waxwork found a way to make these scores cool in an unprecedented way, creating a completely new market that extends even beyond the people who collect horror movies. Admittedly, the popularity of recent reissues such as Re-Animator , Creepshow , and Friday the 13th probably has more to do with the artwork and packaging than the actual music, but I’d like to think the labels ultimately still found a way to get a new audience into Richard Band and John Harrison, who never would have sought out their music otherwise. Hopefully, more people now appreciate horror scores for the unique and creative works they are.
So my idea became, what if we made a book that was just as much about the visuals – both cover art and the vinyl itself – as it was about the music? Kind of like those album cover books that have been popping up since the ‘60s. There have been books like this that covered soundtracks, including The Album Cover Art of Soundtracks by Frank Jastfelder and Stefan Kassel, but never one that dealt specifically with horror soundtracks, and certainly never a book that discussed the unique music from these movies with the level of passion that Jeff and I could bring to it.
Coming up with a list of scores to cover wasn’t a problem. Most of of the key ones you would expect in a book like this are there – John Williams’ Jaws , Jerry Goldsmith’s The Omen , and Goblin’s Suspiria – because they were released when vinyl was the format for physical music media, and have since been reissued by Mondo and the like. But since we’re here, we made an effort to include some hidden gems that are rarely discussed, including Susan Justin’s deliriously brilliant Forbidden World and Ennio Morricone’s criminally underrated Orca .
Coming up with categories for the scores proved far more difficult. Some of these chapters simply represent sub-ge