Oneiroid Psychosis - DREAMS (With Pollutions When Virile) (2002)

The music of Oneiroid Psychosis so perfectly flits between dangerously cheesy and genuinely creepy (generally, it tends toward the cheesy side) that it pretty much only makes sense to listen to it on Halloween. Ominous pianos, eery keyboards, vaguely heavy guitars, and ghoulish vocals croaking out lyrics like "The faint presence of fear / Softly whispers in my ear." An absolute must-have for dorks like me whose lives basically revolve around making the perfect Halloween mixtape. Spoooooky!

Track listing:
1. "killed today a young girl; it was fine and hot"
2. Winter Day
3. Discharge
4. Cursed
5. Withering and Wishing
6. Disturbance
7. Fragments
8. In Nature and Black

An unsteady hand
Grasps tightly
Hangs loosely

Helm - Impossible Symmetry (2012)

Masterful third album from London musican Luke Younger, aka Helm. Massive drones, deep rhythmic pulses, fragmented industrial sounds, whirring synthesizers, screeching feedback, and more make up these dense, unsettling yet hypnotic compositions.

Track listing:
1. Miniatures
2. Liskojen yo
3. Arcane Matters
4. Stained Glass Electric
5. Above All and Beyond

May these moments under the moon be eternal

Celeste - Morte(s) Nee(s) (2010)

Alrighty then. Here's Celeste's third album, Morte(s) Nee(s) -- seven tracks of midpaced, wall-of-sound blackened hardcore at its absolute pinnacle. And wouldn't you know it, they're from France. I just found out that their new album, Animale(s), comes out next month (pre-orders start on Friday.) Obviously, it will be fucking awesome, so if you haven't already heard Morte(s) Nee(s), get it now, as it's about to be used as a reference point all over the place; for instance, bitter older fans will say their new album is "still really good, but lacks the intensity of Morte(s) Nee(s)."

Also, it looks like leading overwrought review site Pitchfork Media is making moves to enhance their brand by pantomiming enthusiasm for Celeste's new material, which the writer obnoxiously refers to as "warfare against the idea of self." Hark! If you listen closely, you can hear that writer deeply inhaling the scent of his own butthole, and thousands of faithful Pitchfork readers arguing about whether Animale(s) or In Solitude's Sister is the best metal album of 2013.

In other news, fuck Pitchfork.

Track listing:
1. Ces belles de rêve aux verres embués
2. Les mains brisées comme leurs souvenirs
3. Il y a biens des porcs que ça ferait bander de t'étouffer
4. En troupeau des louves en trompe l'oeil des agneaux
5. (S)
6. Un miroir pur qui te rend misérable
7. De sorte que plus jamais un instant ne soit magique

I didn't get enough sleep

Nahar - La Fascination du Pire (2009)

Get Nahar's excellent new album, The Strange Inconvenience, here.

Very French black metal. This means, of course, that's it's dissonant, mysterious, and strangely elegant. Fans of Blut Aus Nord, take notice.

Track listing:
1. In Red Light Perdition
2. Face of Extinction
3. Where Others Have Drowned
4. Millenium's Echo
5. Desert of Redemption
6. The March of No Reason
7. Untitled

Purifying negativity

Lou Reed - The Blue Mask (1982)

In honor of Mr. Reed's passing, here's his excellent 1982 dad rock album. The world is far less cool without him.

Track listing:
1. My House
2. Women
3. Underneath the Bottle
4. The Gun
5. The Blue Mask
6. Average Guy
7. The Heroine
8. Waves of Fear
9. The Day John Kennedy Died
10. Heavenly Arms

R.I.P. 1942-2013

Dio - Dream Evil (1987)

While we're on the subject of slightly less prominent but still totally badass albums by heavy metal icons, here's Dream Evil, which is short on 'definitive' moments, but long on quality. I really shouldn't have to describe the sound; if you're one of the unlucky few who somehow never got to know this beautiful, dearly departed man's creative output, then just imagine "heavy metal," and whatever comes to mind should be pretty accurate. For maximum anthem-readiness, almost every chorus is just the name of the song repeated a few times times ("Sunset Supermaaaan! Sunset Superman! Sunset Supermaaaaan!") Also, "Sunset Superman" is about a heroic, sun-oriented character who fights and defeats a personified nighttime evil -- remind you of anything?

Track listing:
1. Night People
2. Dream Evil
3. Sunset Superman
4. All the Fools Sailed Away
5. Naked in the Rain
6. Overlove
7. I Could Have Been a Dreamer
8. Faces in the Window
9. When a Woman Cries

We are evil
And we are all divine

Cultus Sanguine - Shadows' Blood (1997)

Interesting Italian doom-black metal hybrid. It's not really "blackened doom" or "doom-y black metal." I might describe Shadows' Blood, the first of two Cultus Sanguine LPs, as sounding as though it consists entirely of the slower parts of a symphonic black metal song. Pipe organs, simplistic leads, and vocals that switch back and forth from a pained moan to more traditional black metal howls.

Track listing:
1. The Calling Illusion
2. Il Songue
3. Shadows' Blood
4. We Have No Mother
5. The Graves Forgot My Name
6. Lady of Lies
7. On These Nocturnal Wings
8. Le Tombe
9. Silent Tunes of Falling Blood
10. Among Shadows

Cover death cover suicide
This blood covers even dreams
Lay on earth as a sigh
A red mark of no return

Funerary Call - Nightside Emanations (2012)

"Nor is it to be thought, that man is either the oldest or the last of earth's masters, or that the common bulk of life and substance walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces we know, but between them, They walk serene and primal, undimensioned and to us unseen. Yog-Sothoth knows the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. He knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through again. He knows where They have trod earth's fields, and where They still tread them, and why no one can behold Them as They tread. By Their smell can men sometimes know Them near, but of Their semblance can no man know, saving only in the features of those They have begotten on mankind; and of those are there many sorts, differing in likeness from man's truest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They walk unseen and foul in lonely places where the Words have spoken and the Rites howled through at their Seasons. The wind gibbers with Their voices, and the earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest and crush the city, yet may not forest or city behold the hand that smites. Kadath in the cold waste hath known Them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who hath seen the deep frozen city or the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly. Iä! Shub-Niggurath! As a foulness shall ye know Them. Their hand is at your throats, yet ye see Them not; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the key to the gate, whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where They ruled once; They shall soon rule where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer. They wait patient and potent, for here shall They rule again."

Track listing:
1. Wands of Fire
2. Nightside Emanations
3. Thee I Invoke
4. Seven Candles Burning
5. The Calling
6. Upon the Heath

Beckoning at the black

Miranda Sex Garden - Iris (1992) + Sunshine (1993)

Miranda Sex Garden was an eclectic English group who fused musical and sonic elements of English folk music (their first LP consists entirely of ethereal, a cappella takes on traditionals), gothic rock, and shoegaze. While there's a good deal of variation from song to song, the wall-of-sound production and powerful pipes of lead vocalist of Katharine Blake keep things pretty cohesive. The Iris EP marks the first time that they incorporated rock instruments into their sound, and it's possibly my favorite entry in their discography. Released the following year, Sunshine consists of the explosive, kaleidoscopic title track, a short a cappella diddy, a live version of a song from the Iris EP, and a kinda silly, 'spooky,' organ-led instrumental.

Track listing:
-Iris-
1. Lovely Joan
2. Falling
3. Fear
4. Blue Light
5. Iris
-Sunshine-
1. Sunshine
2. Muff Diving Size Queen
3. Fear (live)
4. Willie Biddle in His Watery Grave

Shadows on my way

King Diamond - The Eye (1990)

Fourth concept album, and fifth overall, from King Diamond. According to Wikipedia, the story, which deals with the French Inquisition's "persecution of alleged witches and sexual abuse against nuns," is surprisingly historically accurate (except for the whole magical eye necklace that's capable of murder thing - apparently he made that part up.) Musically, as can be expected, we're talking classic heavy metal as fronted by the man whose demonic falsetto made the phrase "it's time for tea" sound foreboding. It's one of his best, for sure.

Track listing:
1. Eye of the Witch
2. The Trial (Chambre Ardente)
3. Burn
4. Two Little Girls
5. Into the Convent
6. Father Picard
7. Behind These Walls
8. The Meetings
9. Insanity
10. 1642 Imprisonment
11. The Curse

The power I get from the chain is mine
Only I can use it

Karjalan Sissit - Karjalasta Kajahtaa (2004)

Fantastic martial industrial/power electronics/dark ambient from Swedish artist Karjalan Sissit. Cavernous samples, nocturnal hums, and haunting strings give way to thunderous drums, blasts of distortion, and tortured screams.

Track listing:
1. Heili Karjalasta
2. Sika Setä
3. Kunnia Isänmaa
4. Elämän Kovat Koulut
5. ESS
6. ...Soon the Stroke Strikes
7. Jesus Ställde In
8. Haulikolla Hommat Järjestykseen
9. Tulipunaruusut
10. Kapitulieren? Nein!
11. Avioero
12. Juokse Sinä Humma

Stabby

Tenebrae in Perpetuum - L'Eterno Maligno Silenzio (2009)

Occult Italian black metal. The guitars, drums, and vocals are all soaked in reverb, creating a gigantic, immersive, dramatic sound. And speaking of dramatic, get ready for the clean, semi-operatic vocals: they're so legit, it took me a while to figure out that they're not sampled. L'Eterno Maligno Silenzio is the third and unfortunately final album from this phenomenal band.

Track listing:
1. Percepire La Luce Attraverso Il Sepolcro
2. L'Eterno Maligno Silenzio
3. Dissoluzione In Preghiera
4. Incubo Rosso Cupo
5. Il Morto Cthulhu Aspetta Sognando
6. Dei Corpi Silenti
7. Rapitemi, Anime Della Natura
8. Oltre I Confini Umani

Eternal darkness

The Rita & Wilt - Werewolf in the Black Space (2008)

Harsh noise agony. Werewolf in the Black Space compiles material from a few limited run collaborative releases by Canadian noise terrorist The Rita and Chicagoan dark ambient duo Wilt. Extremely chill; throw this on the next time you wanna kick back, toke some ganj, and chillax, baby!!

Track listing:
1. Dead Wife of Hitchcock
2. Dead Wife Stalks the Grounds Part 1
3. Dead Wife Stalks the Grounds Part 2
4. Land of Slitting Throats
5. Night of the Werewolf
6. The Greatest Death

They're gonna come and hurt you both
Hurt you bad

The Caretaker - Selected Memories from the Haunted Ballroom (1999)

The Caretaker, aka English musician Leyland Kirby, is an experimental/dark ambient/noise project inspired by the ballroom scene in The Shining (hence, the "Caretaker" moniker, the album title Selected Memories from the Haunted Ballroom, yup yup.) Essentially, Kirby takes samples from old, scratchy big band jazz records, stretches and EQs the shit out of them, buries them in reverb and delay, and overlays bits of harsh static and glitchy electronics, creating a distinct sense of queazy, decayed joy -- a ghost of happiness generating sounds of unsettling beauty from an almost completely forgotten past.

Track listing:
1. The Haunted Ballroom
2. By the Seaside
3. One Thousand Memories
4. Haunting Me
5. A Summer Romance
6. Den of Iniquity
7. Dream Waltz
8. A Handful of Stars
9. Request Dance
10. In the Dark
11. Reckless Night
12. Thronged with Ghosts
13. From Out of Nowhere
14. Friends Past Reunited
15. You and the Night
16. Moonlight Serenade
17. Disillusioned
18. The Revolving Bandstand
19. Garden of Weeds
20. "Excuse Me" for Ladies
21. In Days of Old
22. September 1939
23. Thanks
24. The Haunted Ballroom
25. Untitled

Midnight, the stars, and you

Ruth White - Flowers of Evil (1969)

Electronic music pioneer Ruth White reads/moans/half-sings a translation of Charles Baudelaire's classic Les Fleurs du Mal over sparse, dissonant, primitive electronic compositions. Although I have yet to confirm this, I am pretty sure that playing this album under the correct conditions (midnight, no lights, various other factors) will awaken a curse that will, eventually, lead to the listener committing some type of high-profile suicide.

Track listing:
1. The Clock
2. Evening Harmony
3. Lovers Wine
4. Owls
5. Mists and Rains
6. The Irremediable
7. The Cat
8. Spleen
9. The Litanies of Satan

When the low heavy sky weighs like a lid on the spirit aching for the light
And when embracing the horizon it pours on us a black day which is sadder than any night
When the earth is turned into a gripping dungeon in which hope like a bat flutters blindly and bruises its timid wings and tender head against the walls and rotted ceilings
When the rain stretching down its long streaks of water imitates the bars of an enormous prison
And a silent throng of loathsome spiders come and weave their webs inside our brains
And suddenly, the bells swing angrily and hurl their hideous uproar into the sky like a band of wandering spirits who wail relentlessly
And long hearses without drums or music move in a slow procession through my soul
And defeated hope bursts into tears
And the fierce tyrant, Anguish, sets his black banner on my bowed head

John Harrison - Creepshow OST (1982)

If you haven't seen Creepshow, I recommend putting everything else on hold until you have. Good fucking god, what a great movie. See Ed Harris get crushed by a tombstone! Marvel at Stephen King's transformation into a suicidal half man-half plant! Watch Leslie Nielsen, in the most skin-crawling roll of his career, drown Ted Dansen, then get stalked by aqua zombies! Seriously, one of the best. For the rest of us, here's John Harrison's soundtrack, which, as you surely know, is the perfect horror movie soundtrack. Creepy keyboards, menacing pianos, eery sound effects, and as sinister a take on "Camptown Races" as you're likely to hear this side of hell.

BONUS FUN: An awesome Flickr user uploaded the entire Creepshow comic book, which I remember scaring the living shit out of me when I was in Elementary school, for your viewing pleasure; check it!

Track listing:
1. Prologue - Welcome to Creepshow
2. Father's Day
3. The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill
4. Something to Tide You Over
5. The Crate
6. They're Creeping Up on You
7. Epilogue
8. Until the Next Time (End Title)

Where's my cake?

Regurgitate - Effortless Regurgitation... The Torture Sessions (1999)

63 tracks and just under 56 minutes of classic, sloppy, poorly recorded, stomach-churning Swedish goregrind. One thing that I appreciate about this band is that, unlike some of their shittier peers, Regurgitate dole out the punishment to both men and women -- one one hand, there's "Vulva Fermentation" and "Total Dismemberment of a Female Corpse," and on the other, we have "Testicular Trauma" and "Torsion of the Testicle." How PC of them.

The Torture Sessions is, in essence, a reissue of Regurgitate's first LP, Effortless Regurgitation of Bright Red Blood, with a demo and two EPs tacked on. Not to be 'that guy,' but I like the demo (tracks 38-54) the best. Normally, I'd probably skip the track listing, but in the spirit of the season, I'll try to plant as many disturbing, violent images in your head as possible.

Track listing:
1. Intro: The Act of Intestinal Regurgitation
2. Disgorging Foetus
3. Confluent Macular Drug Eruption
4. Bullous Impetigo
5. Fleshfeast
6. Anorectal Ulceration
7. Vulva Fermentation
8. Multicystic Kidney
9. Mucupurulent Offal Grinder
10. Total Dismemberment of a Female Corpse
11. Carnal Cacophony
12. Vomit Breath
13. Complete Rectal Prolapse
14. Testicular Trauma
15. Genital Cancer
16. Malignant Tumor
17. Diffuse Systemic Sclerosis
18. Owner of a Necrotic Intestine
19. Newborn Regurgitation
20. Torsion of the Testicle
21. Worm Eaten Rectum
22. Chronic Lymphatic Leukemie
23. Meatal Ulcel
24. Purulent Discharge from the Urethra
25. Vaginal Obstriction
26. Cloudy, Grayish Vomitus
27. Fleshmangler
28. Splattered Brains (Agathocles cover)
29. Bulging Vaginal Septum
30. Acute Urinary Infection
31. Severe Necroses of the Face
32. Bleeding Peptic Ulcer
33. Face Mutilation
34. Extensive Ulcerative Tumor
35. Tumescent Foetal Fluids to Expurgate
36. Carbonized Bowels
37. Effortless Regurgitation of Bright Red Blood
38. Basic Torture Procedure
39. Phrenetic Chainsaw Slaughter of a Crippled Infant
40. Revel in Menstrual Excrements
41. Uncontrolled Anus Violation
42. Drugged, Raped and Excreted
43. Self-Dismembered Foetus
44. Bloodspattered Wideopen Abdomen
45. Deranged Menarche Injection
46. Bludgeoned to Death
47. Drastical Decapitation of a Raped Infant
48. Forced Abortion Through the Rectum
49. Maiming the Defenseless
50. Bloody Ejaculation
51. Coprophagical Mutilator
52. Putrid Reek of Decomposed Embryos
53. Putrefactive Bowel Consumer
54. Frenzy Faecal Munching
55. Corpse Allergy
56. Sickening Thoughts
57. Brainscrambler
58. Regurgitated Giblets
59. Methylated Bile
60. Liquid Excrements
61. Carnal Cacophony
62. Vomit Breath
63. Suicide...

I wonder if they even understand the meaning of vivisection

When - The Black Death (1992)

When is the long-running project of Lars Pedersen, a Norwegian experimental musician. Difficult and unnerving, The Black Death is a sample-heavy, industrial sound-parade of screams, sinister voices, cawing crows, lashing whips, Norwegian folk music, dissonant strings, twinkling keyboards, etc etc etc.

No need for a track listing - it's a single 38-minute long composition.

"To drop the flesh off of the frame
The earth and worms both have a claim."

Lycia - A Day in the Stark Corner (1993)

Majestic, etheral darkwave. Churning, reverb-soaked, tormented gothic dirges made up of lush, layered guitars, angelic keyboards, minimal drums, and murmured male and female vocals.

Track listing:
1. And Through the Smoke and Nails
2. Pygmalion
3. The Body Electric
4. Wide Open Spaces
5. The Morning Breaks So Cold and Gray
6. The Remnants and the Ruins
7. Goddess of the Green Fields
8. Everything Is Cold
9. Sorrow Is Her Name
10. Daphne

Crawl back home and smile again
Smile like a madman
Look in here and fear again
Afraid of these ruins

Enemite - Wuyuan (The Necrolatry) (2004)

Ritualistic dark ambient solo project of Chinese musician Li Chao. This is his only release under this name, and it contains some of the most terrifying music that I've heard. It sounds as though he's taken elements of traditional Chinese music -- percussion, pan flute -- and channeled them through some sort of hellish spirit world, wherein a legion of demons and ghosts caught wind of the project and offered to contribute some vocals.

Track listing:
1. Intro: The Resentment
2. The Headstream - River of Death
3. Blaspheming the Sutra - Disconcerted Mourning Recollection
4. Beckoning the Pneuma - Malefic Roots
5. Sepultura of All Imago - The Anathema
6. Lake of Mirror - The Passing Bell to My Son
7. The Ancient Scintilla - Lasthome of Fury
8. Outro - The Enmity

Today, total death

Embrace of Thorns - Atonement Ritual (2009)

Thick, atmospheric Greek death metal with black metal undertones. Gross guitars, cavernous puking vocals, unsettling interludes, violent Satanic blasphemy. SICK.

Track listing:
1. His Bloodstained Claws of Victory (Intro)
2. Atonement Ritual
3. Tombs of the Desecrated Zealots
4. Impure Orgasm (Intro)
5. Nemesis of Purity
6. Venom in Veins
7. Death Yells in Triumph
8. Litanies of Inversion (Intro)
9. Ceremonial Rites of Fornication
10. Hymn to Triumph and Treachery
11. Perdition Hammer
12. Perished in Mortal Agony (Second Death)
13. Altars of Malefic Triumph (Outro)

Putrid once-female entities
Are caressing a grey mummified body
The leader that supposedly could lead them to fertility,
Prosperity and glory

Vomit Orchestra - Macabre Paradigm (2005)

Vomit Orchestra's sole member, Daniel Martin, is also the sole member of perennially underrated US black metal outfit Vrolok, and can be heard as a pure distillation of that project's disturbed, drug-infused essence. A nightmarish realm of fragmented feedback, dissonant guitars, heavily treated, echoing vocals, blown out percussion, samples, and droning keyboards. Macabre Paradigm collects five early VO demos, released from 2002-2003, and adds a disc of unreleased material from the same era.

Track listing:
-Disc One: Makkabios-
1. Under the Shadows... (full demo)
2. Behold... the Eve of Conclusion (full demo)
3. Black (full demo)
4. Drone (full demo)
5. Decrepit (full demo)
-Disc Two: Paradeigma-
1. Fear
2. For Death Holds No Dreams
3. Wormhole Through the Decay of Time
4. Paradeigma
5. Benediction
6. Stained Shadow Reverie
7. Cadere

When darkness is the answer to a question asked for years
You'll find me swimming deeper
Turning purple in the dark.

Igor Wakhévitch - Logos (1970) + Les Fous d'Or (1975)

Two albums of unsettling modern classical and experimental electronic music from French composer Igor Wakhévitch, who surely deserves a better writeup than this, but I have shit to do.

Track listing:
-Logos-
1. Ergon
2. Minéral - Végétal - Animal
3. Homo Sapiens Ignorabimus
4. Initiation (1ère Partie)
5. Initiation (2ème Partie)
6. Delirium
7. Danse Sacrale
8. Point Omega (Mort Ou Résurrection)
-Les Fous d'Or-
1. Cornerstone - Twilight and Call of the Ascending Spirit
2. Arrival of the Magic Doll
3. Rites of the Doll
4. Les Fous d'Or - Henry the Fool of the Doll
5. Eve Speaks
6. Ritual of the Master of the Doll

No dreams tonight

Striborg - Mysterious Semblance (2004)

Between 2003 and 2009, one-man Tasmanian black metal force Striborg released twelve albums, plus a bunch of demos, collections, splits, EPs, and a box set, all of which makes for one of the genre's densest, most inscrutable and, potentially, impenetrable discographies. While there is very little sonic variation from album to album, Mysterious Semblance, his second proper full-length, is IMO his most difficult and satisfying work.

Following a genuinely unsettling keyboard intro, the listener is treated to the twenty-minute title track, a full immersion in sole member Sin Nanna's (yes, nerds, Sunn O))) named a song after him) dissonant, esoteric world of distant, buzzing guitars; echoing, goblin-like rasps; out of tune basslines; and sickly, horror movie keyboards. If you make it through this front-loaded earfuck without frantically mashing the 'stop' button, then you are a musical masochist, and you are going to love everything else Striborg has recorded. If not, congratulations, you're probably in a better emotional and/or mental state than the rest of us.

Track listing:
1. A Sour Pale Ghostly Dawn
2. Mysterious Semblance of Spectral Trees
3. Dark Storm Brooding, Lightning in the South
4. Looming Black Apparition
5. The Ghostly Pallid Hand of Fear
6. As Sad as a Cemetery in the Winter Darkness
7. The Screaming Winds
8. Lurking the Murky Damp Forest

Somnambulist nightmares

Anna Själv Tredje - Tussilago Fanfara (1977)

First and only album from this Swedish duo. Synth-based excursions into the dark, mysterious, possibly haunted woodlands of Sweden. Aside from certain aesthetic touches - ghostly whispers, howling wolves, the awesome album art - Tussilago Fanfara is not too far from the contemporaneous sounds of Tangerine Dream/Klaus Schulze/Ash Ra/etc.

Track listing:
1. Mossen
2. Inkomster Utanför Tiden
3. Den Barbariska Söndagen
4. Tusen år & Sju Timmar

Wrapped in a cocoon out of harm's way

His Master's Voice - Missionary (1984)

Alright, it's October, it's cold out there, let's get Halloween-y. To kick things off, here's the only release by His Master's Voice, a female-fronted goth rock band about whom, after a cursory search, I have found virtually no information. I don't even remember how this got on my computer, but it's awesome.

Track listing:
1. Desire
2. Kazan
3. Island of Red Light
4. Genre #2
5. Love Tragedy

Screams in the dark