Gianni Ferrio - Perversion Story (1969)

The soundtrack to Lucio Fulci's very first piece of giallo, Una sull'altra (aka Perversion Story). Encompasses big band jazz, cool jazz, psych pop, deranged carnival tunes, and general abstract horror creepiness.

Track listing:

1. The Mess

2. Tell Me

3. Strip for a Teenager

4. Hammond Psychedelic Concert

5. I Love You More Than What You Do

6. Psychedelic Concert

7. L.S.D. Atmosphere

8. Old Little Theme

9. To End

10. All I Need

11. Psychedelic Concert

12. Harry's True

13. Violence for Sax

14. L.S.D. Atomsphere

15. London Ride

16. Helen, My Love

17. In a Strange Mood

18. A Man in the Shadow

This is a crazy man

More Italo-horror soundtracks:

Nora Orlandi - Il Dolce Corpo di Deborah (Colonna Sonora Originale) (1968)

Bruno Nicolai - Tutti i Colori del Buio (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1972)

Matthew Johnson - Ghosts in the AI (2009)

Tech-house with eerie, horror-steeped synths. I'm currently buried alive in school work -- y'all don't even know I'm in fucking 5 classes this term, and they're all hard -- but if I die down here, trust that I will come back and haunt the shit out of the two classmates who skipped our last meeting knowing that we'd still put their names on our document.

Track listing:

1. Ghosts in the AI

2. Technology

3. The Alchemist

4. Technology (Edit)

Cut out windows and doors

It is the empty space which makes the room useful

Also listen to:

Horror Inc. - Horrorama EP (2003) + I Plead Guilty (2004)

Padded Cell - Night Must Fall (2008)

Daniel Lentz - wolfMASS (2000)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

Harold Budd, Ruben Garcia, & Daniel Lentz - Music for 3 Pianos (1992)

A disorienting, whimsical, sacrilegious take on a Latin mass mixing MIDI keyboards and choral vocals. I've only heard two other solo Lentz works, but contemporary classical pieces powered by highly synthesized sounds seem to be his specialty. I'm not sure I really understand wolfMASS -- as far as I can tell, it's more of an "Animal Mass", or perhaps a meditation on violent conflict -- but it's a wonderfully warped pleasure to listen to.

Track listing:

1. Preludium

2. wolfKYRIE

3. bearGLORIA

4. eagleCREDO

5. cougarSANCTUS

6. manAGNUS DEI

Wolf is dead

Also listen to:

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

Michael Torke - Color Music (1991)

Kutabare - Finger Food Fetish for the Morbidly Abnormal (2003)

A big, muddy pile of Australian death metal gore with very little concern for song structure, dynamics, variation, or any other basic musical principle. Pretty sure this is what all death metal sounds like to people who don't like death metal. Absolutely disgusting. 

On a different topic: some crusties I went to high school with (two of whom formed Inure during senior year) had a succession of jokey grindcore bands, the best of which was called Morbidly Obese, whose gimmick was that they were all trying to get extremely fat and die -- a fool's errand, based on the fact that they were all vegan. Seemed pretty hilarious at the time.

On another different topic: have any of you ever seen Naked Blood? What a fucked up movie. It's a Japanese gore movie about this creep who modifies an experimental drug to turn pain into pleasure, then secretly gives it to three women; one cuts off, cooks, and eats her own body parts, including her nipple and labia, and another engages in some serious self-mutilation due to body image issues. What happens with the other one? Well, you'll just have to watch the movie to find out, which I seriously doubt you will because there's no way it's streaming anywhere. But I bought the DVD on Ebay like 20 years ago, so if you live in Portland, hit me up. (This is a joke.)

EDIT: A helpful commenter hipped me to the existence of a full rip of Naked Blood on YouTube, so have at it!

Track listing:

1. Religiously Frustrated

2. Moistened Cunt

3. Frotage the Fromage

4. Siamese Twins

5. Rime of the Ancient Marinated Corpse

6. Dildo of Death

7. Alien Intelligence

8. Maggot Laced Meal

9. Assassin

10. Guinea Worm

Fuck me gently with a chainsaw

If you like this, listen to:

Disastrous Murmur - Rhapsodies in Red (1992)

Death Vomit - Gutted by Horrors (2014)

Kallabris - Njonto (1988)

10 untitled tracks of weird-ass experimental sounds from the German industrial underground. Droning accordion, rumbling noise, warped keys, and disjointed whispers. At times, almost sounds like a lost LLN project.

Did you dream last night?

More club bangers to get this fucking party fucking started:

Ruth White - Flowers of Evil (1969)

Mother Tongue - Open in Obscurity (1988)

Wilt - Wither (2001)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

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

Wilt - M Y T H O S (2016) + Funeral Song (2016)

Utterly unmusical dark ambient/noise from Wisconsin (now Illinois) musician James P. Keeler. Crackling flames of harsh noise, droning black winds, and shimmering echoes of the void.

Track listing:

1. Passage of Seasons

2. A Bridge Between Two Drums

3. Soiled

4. Shivering Spine

5. Mud

6. Bloodletting

7. Still... Violent Waters

8. Black Amphora

9. The Burden of Flies

10. Taunting the Raven

11. Fallen Harvest

12. From Dying Branches

13. Untitled

14. Autumn Calls

15. Winterkill

Terror management

Also listen to:

Hollow Earth - Dog Days of Holocaust (2006)

Aymrev Erkroz Prevre - Noir Voyage Obstrué de Rencontres Difformes (2006)

Emit - Spectre Music of an Antiquary (2012)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

Emit - A Sword of Death for the Prince (2005)

Real haunty-boi hours. Dissonant, reverb-drenched, blackened ethereal darkwave -- spectral synths, skeletal drum machines, and moaning, rasping, wailing vocals.

Track listing:

1. Haunter of Benighted English Summers

2. Mors Wher Devels Are Abrod

3. The Dusk Gardens of Translucent Mansions

4. Shades Over the Mere

5. Trees Once Adorn'd with Severed Heads

6. Sylvan Old Enchanter

7. The Meadow Reapers (A Field Recording)

8. Emanations from Beneath Far Hills, Beyond Far Moons

A lunatic hermit dies in his woodland home

You should also hear:

Shadowseeds - Dream of Lilith (1995)

Belzebuth - Belzebuth (2007)

Devil Doll - The Girl Who Was... Death (1989)

A symphonic horror-prog epic for the ages. A single, 39-minute-long journey through the nightmare dreamscapes of the mysterious Mr. Doctor. I had zero context for this the first time I heard it, and honestly, that might be the best way to go into it, so I'll leave it there. Just know that this is required listening and will be on the exam.

One track: "The Girl Who Was... Death", followed by about 25 minutes of silence, then a cover of the theme from The Prisoner.

Don't trust him

When he turns his back

He looks at you

Don't trust him

When his eyes are closed

He looks at you

If you like this, listen to:

Present - Le Poison Qui Rend Fou (1985)

Art Zoyd - Berlin (1987)

GGUW - Gegen Gravitation und Willensfreiheit (2011)

Three untitled pieces of utterly mesmerizing black metal that demand close, repeated listening. This record is just so fucking cool. The black ocean of restless guitars, the vocals struggling for air just below the surface, the foreboding figures rising from the murk, all delivered as minimalistic raw black metal -- it's just perfection. Sadly, it's also the only record this band made before one of their guitarists committed suicide; they've put out one more EP since but, for me, it doesn't have the same alchemic dark magic.

That's how we stay young these days

You should also hear:

Cendres - Ungeziefer (2007)

Haunting Depths - Death's Sacred Fire (2017)

Every New Dead Ghost - An Endless Nightmare of Stations (1992)

Driving, hard-edged goth rock. An Endless Nightmare of Stations was this UK band's swansong, but it definitely doesn't sound like they were running out of steam -- it's energetic, muscular, punk, and even kinda fun, all while maintaining a 100% morbid goth aesthetic.

Anyone who has a better rip than 192, get at me.

Track listing:

1. Decadence

2. Obvious

3. Not in a Lifetime

4. Headless

5. Relics

6. Insanity

7. Sweat

8. Understanding

9. Small Talk

10. Signs for the Sacred

What's happening in the city?

You'd also like:

Pressurehed - Sudden Vertigo (1993)

Autumn - The Hating Tree (1997)

S·Core - Pretension (1988)

Uneasy experimental sounds from Japan. Frail keyboard figures floating amidst abstract, analogue drones and muffled industrial noise. Music for ghosts to listen to when they're alone.

Track listing:

1. Plasmodium

2. Giaour

3. Lame Meter

4. Somnus

5. Concussion

6. Hard Words

7. End All

Set: The leathery skin of a female straddling a furnace. Illuminates in blue. Hands melt against the burning surface. Feel no pain. Kiss the burner. Lips fall away. Blood runs down the inside of her thighs. She tightens her grip in one last exaggerated movement and falls to the ground. A pile of ashes. The furnace stands triumphant over the mound.

If you like this, you should hear:

Attrition - Death House (1982)

raison d'être - Residuality (1993)

Come - Eleven:Eleven (1992)

Related:

Uzi - Sleep Asylum (1986)

Alright, so this one doesn't really fit my Halloween theme. It's dark for sure, but it's the oppressive, existential dread kinda darkness, not the "look out there's a wolfman behind you" or the "let's conjure Satan" kinda darkness. But fuck it, I'm sick of this record not getting the respect it deserves. It's absolutely one of my favorite records of the alt rock era -- explosive, simultaneously sludgy and sharp guitar work that's heavy on slide guitar and whammy bar; a dynamic, dialed-in rhythm section; and the raw, strung-out-sounding vocals of Thalia Zedek at the peak of her powers. An actual masterpiece. Yet you can (as I did) still find sealed copies of the 2013 Matador reissue for under $20. What's up with that?

Track listing:

1. Submerge

2. Dead Molly

3. Brand New Vein

4. Off to One Side

5. Bell

6. William

7. Sad Eyes

8. Power Failure

9. Orbit

10. Fast Piss Blues

11. I Got the Blues

Well I taste the sweetness of life

And I lick off the knife

Then all the blood in my brain

Will pump out a brand new vein

Also listen to:

Helium - Pirate Prude (1994)

lowercase - The Going Away Present (1999)

Screaming for Emily - Scriptures (1987)

Synth-y goth-rock for heartbroken ghouls that's almost punk in its theatrical angst and lyrical bluntness. Makes me want to grab my Discman and pack of Camel Lights and go cry in a graveyard.

Track listing:

1. The Love

2. Too Late for Prayer

3. Last Goodbye

4. Another Girl

5. From Your Heart

6. Just a Lie

Get ready for the last goodbye

Get ready for a real long cry

More like this:

The Essence - Ecstasy (1988)

Maskull - Maskull (1997)

Ophthalamia - A Journey in Darkness (1994)

Related:

Abruptum - Obscuritatem Advoco Amplectère Me (1993)

Abruptum - Vi Sonus Veris Nigrae Malitiaes (1997)

Swedish melodic blackened doom featuring the guitar stylings of the late, great It. Riffs right out of the Sabbath/Candlemass playbook, raspy black metal vocals, and some goth-y keyboards here and there for atmosphere. Get it, you fools!

Track listing:

1. A Cry from the Halls of Blood / Empire of Lost Dreams

2. Enter the Darkest Thoughts of the Chosen / Agony's Silent Paradise

3. Journey in Darkness / Entering the Forest

4. Shores of Kaa-Tu-Nu / The Eternal Walk, Part II

5. A Lonely Soul / Hymn to a Dream

6. Little Child of Light / Degradation of Holyness

7. Castle of No Repair / Lies from a Blackened Heart

8. This Is the Pain Called Sorrow / To the Memory of Me

9. I Summon Thee, Oh Father / Death Embrace Me

My blackened teeth chew at the air we breathe

If you like this, check out:

Shadowseeds - Dream of Lilith (1995)

Necromass - Abyss Calls Life (1996)

Sepsism - Purulent Decomposition (1999)

Sick USDM with a queasy, dissonant style of riffing that just fucking churns my stomach in all the best ways.

Track listing:

1. Surgical Atrocity

2. Pathological Disfigurement

3. Necrotic Flesh Rot

4. Shredded in Cannibalistic Violence

5. Dissection

6. Internal Fermentation

7. Uterocasket

8. Brutally Butchered

9. Murdering at Random

10. Veneno et la Sangre

11. Punctured Internal Organs

12. Born into Oblivion

Bloody chunks of human meat

Hanging from my sharpened teeth

Also:

Grog - Macabre Requiems (1996)

Mortal Decay - Sickening Erotic Fanaticism (1997)

AFFECTVS & Lamia Culta - Blessing from the Darkness (Opus II) (2017)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

Lamia Culta - Patre Satanas (2009)

Excellent ritual dark ambient from a Russian-Ukrainian collaboration. A positively spellbinding vocal performance from Fosco Culto (aka Lamia Culta), who whispers, sings, chants, hisses, moans, and screams like a woman possessed into AFFECTVS' utterly lightless, immersive sound-void.

Note: Bizarrely, Blessing from the Darkness (Opus II) is the second of three different titles under which this record has been released, but it includes 4 crucial additional tracks that weren't on the first one, so it's the version you're getting.

Track listing:

1. Retson Retap

2. Verbum Portae Aperio

3. In Nomine Mali

4. Nahema Sinistra

5. Luna Sacra, Luna Atra

6. Reiran Modor Lilith

7. Spirits Ov Damned

8. Sama Atar

9. Maniestatio Ahriman

10. Notammargartet

11. Requiem

"Here the possession of the Darkness come into contact with the human world."

More dark magicks:

Diamanda Galás - The Litanies of Satan (1982)

Halgrath - Liquid Mind (2010)

Corpses as Bedmates - Venus Handcuffs (1986)

Lo-fi experimental post-punk/art-goth madness. A weird, clattering, wheezing cacophony that defies expectation and description.

Track listing:

1. Venus Handcuffs

2. Haesibah

3. As Though Through

4. Fur Man

5. Birds Fly Out

6. Dear Dear

7. Gus Black Box

8. Phantom

9. For the Rest of the Day

10. Rest Home

Rainbow acid cuts my hands

And my head goes into the stream

Similar listening:

Ballet Mécanique - The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation (1981)

Malaria! - Emotion (1982)

Black Widow - Sacrifice (1970)

An underground classic of British occult prog. If you like Hammond organ, saxophone, noodle-y solos, and Satan, you've come to the right place. 

Track listing:

1. In Ancient Days

2. Way to Power

3. Come to the Sabbat

4. Conjuration

5. Seduction

6. Attack of the Demon

7. Sacrifice

Come, come, come to the Sabbat

Come to the Sabbat

Satan's there!

You should also hear:

Aum - Resurrection (1969)

Horrific Child - L'Étrange Mr Winster (1976)

Aelter - Dusk-Dawn (2009)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

Aelter - Aelter II: Follow You Beloved (2011)

Aelter - Aelter III (2011)

Under normal circumstances, I maybe wouldn't post yet another Aelter album, but I'm currently feeling like shit due to getting my COVID booster, and this dark, droning, sickly sound is exactly what I need right now, and it actually works perfectly for Halloween season, so that's what you're getting. Hey I just remembered the time that I had swine flu, which was one of the most wretched fevers I've ever had, and I apparently fully blacked out while listening to ØØ Void in bed, as I came to standing on the stairs with my wife tapping me on the arm.

Track listing:

1. Dusk

2. Dawn

To rest but never sleep

To sleep but never dream

You'd also like:

Grails - Doomsdayer's Holiday (2008)

Blood Fountains - Floods (2009)

Autumn Tears — Love Poems for Dying Children - Act I. (1996)

Ethereal darkwave with an ample helping of goth cheese. Organs creek, keyboard-strings weep, and male-female vocals soar through the night sky like lost spirits.

Track listing:

1. They Watch with Closed Eyes

2. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 1. Spring

3. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 2. Summer

4. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 3. Autumn

5. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 4. Winter

6. The Eloquent Sleep

7. And Then the Whispering...

8. One Tender Kiss (The Lost Seasons) - Prelude to the Garden of Crystalline Dreams

9. Carfax Abbey

My children of sadness

I welcome thee into my arms forever

You might also like:

Arcana - Dark Age of Reason (1996)

Dargaard - Eternity Rites (1999)

Cakebuilder - Decks n' Demons (2006)

Horror-themed, EBM-fueled breakcore from Distorted Memory mastermind Jeremy Pillipow. Blown-out breakbeats, thick-ass synths, distorted vocals, and production that positively demands to be played at speaker-blowing volumes.

Track listing:

1. Book of the Dead

2. Savage

3. Necron the Hell God

4. Demoni

It deals with demons and demon resurrection and those forces which roam the forest and dark bowers of Man's domain.

If you like this, listen to:

Xylocaine - Experiment in Fear (1995)

Fïx8:Sëd8 - Humanophobia (2005)

Mz. 412 - In Nomine Dei Nostri Satanas Luciferi Excelsi (1995)

Related:

Pouppée Fabrikk - Rage (1990)

Black industrial from hell. Ugly drone, harsh noise, industrial excrement, throbbing martial rhythms, distorted synths, movie samples, and Satanic incantations.

Track listing:

1. In Nomine Dei

2. Salvo Honoris Morte

3. Necrotic Birth

4. Black Earth

5. Daemon Raging

6. God of Fifty Names

7. Regis Satans

8. Paedophilia Cum Sadismus

9. Hail the Lord of Goats

Everlasting hedonistic rhapsody

More gnarly industrial:

In Slaughter Natives - Enter Now the World (1992)

Brighter Death Now - The Slaughterhouse (1993)

Wampyrinacht - The Cloven Hoof (1998)

Related:

Nihasa - Brahamanda Xul Grimoire (2009)

Acrimonious - Sunyata (2011)

Acherontas - Ma​-​IoN (Formulas of Reptilian Unification) (2015)

Greek occult black metal. Epic/melodic/quasi-symphonic songwriting, complete with some clean male-female vocals and totally kickass shred solos. Another record that I've been meaning to post around Halloween every year since this blog started.

Track listing:

1. The Mass of Astaroth

2. Spellbound by the Wolves

3. Cup of Immortality

4. The Cloven Hoof

5. The Darkest Sunset (Elisaveta)

Satanas Venire! Diabolus Venire!

You'd also enjoy:

Medieval Demon - Demonolatria (1995)

Diabolical Masquerade - Ravendusk in My Heart (1996)

The Ghastly Ones - A-Haunting We Will Go-Go (1998)

Tongue-in-cheek, old-school-horror-themed surf rock from sunny California. Pure camp, but they have the chops to make it a genuinely entertaining listen. I honestly don't know shit about surf rock, and am only aware of this band because "Hangman Hang Ten" was on one of those random comp CDs that used to sell for like a buck or two (I found it!) at Borders or whatever, and I ended up tracking them down on Napster.

Track listing:

1. An Invitation

2. Ghastly Stomp

3. Hangman Hang Ten

4. Thunderhead

5. Pacific Ghost Highway...

6. Haulin' Hearse

7. Lonesome Undertaker

8. Mysterion

9. The Boys Go Creeping...

10. Diabolo's Theme

11. Action Squad

12. Deadbeat

13. Spookmaster

14. Doctor Diabolo Speaks...

15. Attack of Robot Atomico

16. Los Campiones del Justicio

17. Hollywood Nocturne

18. Surfin' Spooks

19. A Final Warning...

20. The Ghastly Stomp

"Hey, I've heard about him, I hear he's got go-go ghouls."

Never posted a surf record before, so I dunno, try these:

The Vampires of Dartmoore - Dracula's Music Cabinet (1969)

Zombie Zombie - A Land for Renegades (2008)

Ami Marie - Verrückt Nach Glück (1981)

Excellent German minimal wave. Synths, vocoder, and weirdo-creepo vibes. Definitely first found this on the late, great Mutant Sounds, but tracked down a better rip a few years later.

Track listing:

1. Verrückt Nach Glück

2. Zartbitter...

3. Spiel mit Mir

4. Sehnsucht

5. Wir Sind Zufrieden

6. Der Seemann und die Rose

7. Licht Zerbricht

8. Reisen

9. Abschied

10. Epilog (Verrückt Nach Glück)

Wounded in sleep again

You'd also like:

Leda - Welcome to Joyland (1978)

Warning - Warning (1982)

Fursaxa - Alone in the Dark Wood (2007)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:

Fursaxa - Mandrake (2000)

Spectral psych-folk composed of mostly wordless vocal laments and minimalist acoustic figures. A desolate forest trail lined with the spirits of the damned. Free/name your price via the Stench Ov Death bandcamp.

Track listing:

1. Intro

2. Lunaria Enters the Blue Lodge

3. Bells of Capistrano

4. Drinking Wine in Yarrow

5. Black Haw

6. Clé Elum

7. Alone in the Dark Wood

8. Nawne Ye

9. Sheds Her Skin

10. In the Hollow Mink Shoal

11. Rattling the Calabash

12. Birds Inspire Epic Bards

13. Of Tubal Cain

We will conquer this wilderness. It will not consume us.

Also listen to:

Isengrind - Golestan (2007)

Yair Elazar Glotman & Mats Erlandsson - Negative Chambers (2017)

Mysterious Art — Omen - The Story (1989)

[Crypt Keeper voice] Hello, creeps! As I'm sure you know, Halloween Season is always a special time here at Opium GLUM. And your old pal the Opium Keeper has just the twisted tale to start things off on the right foot [holds up severed foot, giggles.] It concerns a group of coked-up Germans who just couldn't get enough of the KNIFE life! [more giggling] So when they conspired to make an album of Hi-NRG bangers, they stuffed it so full of spooky samples, deadly drum machines, petrifying pianos, scary synths, and vampiric vocals -- people who heard it didn't know whether to laugh or DIE! [this one really gets me going, I absolutely laugh my fucking ass off for a full 15-20 seconds] I call this one... Omen - The Story.

Track listing:

1. In Nomine (Intro)

2. Das Omen - Teil 1

3. Requiem

4. Humunkulus (Men of Glass)

5. The Beyond

6. Carma - Omen 2

7. Fallen Angel

8. Don't Fly Too High

9. Heaven's Door

10. Requiem (Instrumental Mix)

11. Humunkulus (Dub Mix)

Look upon your life

Don't cover up the things you've done

Were they always good

Or did you perish for the evil one?

GORE like this:

Easy Going - Fear (1979)

Zombie Zombie - A Land for Renegades (2008)