Still Figurin' Out Who I Think I Am

This one's about the Halloween party soundtrack.

"Invalid Item" 

"We're close enough to Halloween to start making a Halloween playlist, right? "

What's up y'all? I realize this post is late, but you'll have that...I was all set yesterday, with my playlist all ready to go earlier than normal, because I wanted to catch "Invalid Item"  (you can still watch Elle - on hiatus 's contestant run...I give her a ton of credit for trying, because those questions were hard) but then I managed to lose all sense of motivation I had earlier in the day. And that kinda sucks, because I feel like I was gaining momentum as the "Invalid Item"  carried on...I'd been doing, in my opinion, some solid blogging on consecutive days (you won't hear me say that often). Hopefully I can get this down quickly, check out today's prompt, watch some football (go Bills!), and then swing through today's prompt as well.

I'm not much for Halloween parties. I've only dressed up a few times in my adult life. I'm a firm believer in the "all or nothing", go-big-or-go-home style of doing things, and that doesn't mesh well with most of the rest of my lazy, don't-give-a-shit attitude. Staying home and drinking beer > going out and drinking beer...cheaper, less potential for idiot contact, and way less work (unless you count putting any type of clothing on as work).

Kurt Cobain in his Leonard Cohen afterworld...
and yes, that was 100% my real hair.

But just because I'm not into the adult version of Mr. Dressup  , that doesn't mean I don't know how to curate a Halloween party soundtrack. As much as I'd love to go with some themed good-time monster mash classics, you know I can't just play what you'd normally hear everywhere else...my selection randomness is the reason my parties would be phenomenal (well that, and my propensity for becoming unhinged if hard liquor is involved) should I ever get back into the party-throwing scene. However, just for the homie ~Minja~ , I'll drop a Beastie Boys   track here because October 31st is Mike D's date of birth...but otherwise, for my tracklisting, I went mostly for the creepout factor. A wacked-out haunted house vibe, I guess. There's also thirteen songs...mainly because I couldn't settle on ten, and thirteen's unlucky if you're superstitious . Let us begin...

1) "Hexagram" by Deftones   Fast, heavy at times, with seatbelt-jerking-you-back-in-a-car-crash breakdowns...and Chino's blood-curdling wail. If you tried that scream at home, you'd blow out your eardrums and your vocal cords. Try it in a haunted house though and you might stand a chance of being heard.

2) "I'm A Monster" by Ours   Most monsters in mythology were once good people who were done wrong, usually by someone else's painful misdeeds, or a scientific fuck-up, or, most unfortunately, the death of a person close to them that they couldn't prevent. They channel that hurt into causing others immeasurable distress, because it feels like to them that's all they know. The falsetto here provides an almost contrasting, human quality to the narrator's words.

3) "Psychotic Girl" by The Black Keys   An updated take on muddy blues rock isn't scary or creepy, but psychotic girls can be. I've never been more afraid of anyone as I've been in the moment that I've realized I've done a woman wrong and that she'll stop at nothing to inflict physical pain on me to make up for the anguish she's feeling inside. Gentlemen, consider yourselves warned. Bonus: I could almost see some ratty, aged carny plucking this out on a banjo in front of a cheap thrills-type of quote-unquote haunted house.

4) "Stagger Lee" by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds   Cave could sing the phone book and still make it sound menacing. An album titled Murder Ballads  ...it conjures up images of, well, murder. And in this particular case, it's not your average random act of violence.

5) "Tarantulove" by Hawksley Workman   Some folks are creeped out by spiders; tarantulas can be terrifying. I've grown fearlful of love at times, because it feels like it has eight giant furry arms and legs that are trying to suffocate and kill me eight different ways. This song was my very first introduction to Hawksley, and when played live with slightly more distorted vocals (as if they were sung to you by a stranger calling you on the telephone) you're not sure if his lurching guitar-walk is a genuine modern Canadian blues strut or if you should start running in fear of what's coming.

6) "Bone House" by The Dead Weather   Ya know that b-movie that you bought for $3.99 off the drug store's random dvd rack that's supposed to be a horror film but you're positive it's not scary because it's so cheap and the picture on the front looks fake, but then you watch it and it creeps you the fuck out for days? Personally, I don't know what that feels like because I'm pretty emotionless and dead inside, but if that film had a soundtrack, The Dead Weather would be on it prominently...not because they're scary, but if this song caught you at the wrong time it might make you a little more wary of your surroundings.

7) "Ghost Dance Deluxe" by Felt   I had to slide some hip hop into the mix...and this song has a little bit of an ominous tone at the beginning, even if the lyrics veer into some corny ol' Will Smith   territory.

8) "Freddie's Dead" by Curtis Mayfield   I love the low brass notes...they balance out Mayfield's falsetto nicely, and might be the toughest, funkiest bass there is. Old-school badassery, y'all.

9) "I'm Afraid Of Americans" by David Bowie (with Trent Reznor)"   Personally, I wouldn't say this song instilled a fear in me of Americans so much as it did a distrust and a healthy dislike for most of them (and I'm one of them; just as bad at times too). You know what they say...anxiety starts at home .

10) "Bloody Murderer" by Cursive   A brief carnival ride ending, I'm sure, in an awkward and untimely fate. Cursive's so great in these situations.

11) "Catacombs" by At The Drive In   When I was growing up there was some charity that partnered with some artistic group of some sort, and every year they did something called "The Haunted Catacombs", which was a series of rooms that represented something scary and psychologically troubling, if I remember correctly. At least, that's what my memory wants me to think whenever I hear the word catacomb. It was one of those things that wasn't scary in retrospect, but for like five minutes afterwards you're wondering if you shit your pants   because you're so full of fear that you can't feel your legs after some hidden zombie thing has wrapped an entire palm around your thick calf.

12) "Alone Down There" by Modest Mouse   I don't generally think of Modest Mouse as being "creepy horror flick music", but there's an eerie, fuck-with-your-head quality to this brief song. Maybe it's the light-heavy-light delivery, or the fact that it kinda reminds me of my grandmother's basement when I was a really little kid...those old stone basements with lots of little rooms off the main stretch that ran from the back of the house to the front that were begging to be explored but I was too chickenshit to go it alone.

13) "Climbing Up The Walls" by Radiohead   Put on a pair of headphones, turn off all the lights so that you're in complete pitch-black darkness, and play this at a volume that's loud- slightly more uncomfortable than how you'd normally listen to anything- and tell me there isn't a certain freakiness about it. The lyrics alone tell a grim story, summed up by a narrator who's "got the smell of a local man who's got the loneliest feeling". That's the kind of stuff Sunday night network television movies were made of when you were too young to stay up that late.

Ok...I get it, that this may not be the end-all, be-all, scariest, creepiest run of Halloween party tuneage. Maybe if I were putting together the soundtrack of a kinda lame slasher flick though...maybe then this list might work. Ahhh, well, it's enjoyable for my tastes at least.

That said, I'm gonna edit and post this, check out today's prompt, and then duck outta here for a little bit to watch some football. Hopefully I'll be able to get a list down while that's happening, and I'll have the ambition to write another entry later on so I can at least say I'm caught up on one project . Peace, I'm afraid I can't help it, and GOODNIGHT NOW!!