Part 3 of 3 Octoberween Guilty Pleasures

I would like at times to consider myself a man of music. Though in truth whenever I hear a modern song I’m more often to either instantly hate it or grow to hate it. I did go thru my experimental music listening phases when I was growing up as a kid; I breached the spectrum of all the music varieties that were offered to me on basic radio (this was before internet streaming) and though most of them were appealing for me I just found them okay. It wasn’t until I found two particular local public radio stations that helped to shape my core interests: classic and rock alternative music. An odd combination I’m sure but I was able to pull enjoyment from listening to works done by the greats like Bach and Beethoven along with alternative artists like Sum 41 and Drowning Pool. Right now my current interest at the moment is movie soundtracks and video game OST’s.

Why do I speak of my musical interests? If only to help explain the guilty listening pleasure I speak of now. As of this moment during the month of Octoberween my personal soundtrack consists of Castlevania tunes that run the gauntlet from OST’s to heavy metal renditions of classic themes from the series, classics that have a Halloween/monster/ghost themes from various artists be it either personal songs or songs done for movies. But one artist in particular usually sees heavy rotation on my playlists. I usually don’t listen to Rob Zombie during most of the year for I’m the type of music listener that likes to listen to music during certain “moods” I’m currently feeling. That’s why I have playlist names like “Summer tunes”, “Light songs”, “Jogging songs” and “Gundown tunes”.

And at this moment I have to admit this Octoberween (like prior Octoberweens) have the feel of Rob Zombie. Normally I’m not one for dark, foreboding heavy metal mixed with groove metal but there is something about Rob Zombie’s music, especially in regards to his Hellbilly Deluxe Hellbilly Deluxe: 13 Tales Of Cadaverous Cavorting Inside The Spookshow International release, which I can’t help but find irresistible. I want to chalk it up to the fact that the songs take inspirations from classic horror films, both lyrically and musically, from which I do enjoy watching during this time of year. I also want to chalk it up to the fact that some of his songs from this album have been used in some video game releases during it’s time.  But in truth I enjoy these songs because of how they flow so well together on the CD itself. I usually don’t buy many CD’s for I usually only liked one or two songs out of it. But when it came to the Hellbilly Deluxe it was one of the few CD’s I was able to push play on and let it play from track 1 to the end. When I heard people speak of how some artists released their albums as if they were a “story” I didn’t quite understand what they meant by that till I listened to Hellbilly Deluxe.

And also I am ashamed to admit that I used to listen to certain songs on this CD while I played certain videogames. I’d be sitting at my gamerig, playing my game of choice while I had songs like “Superbeast”, “Dragula”, “Demoniod Phenomenon”, “Living Dead Girl” and “Meet the Creeper” on my cheap walmart headphones. You’d be amazed how much fun you’d have playing “The House of the Dead”, “Dead Nation”, “Doom”, “Castlevania: Lament of Innocence” and “Quake III Arena” while listening to those songs.

Overall Rob Zombie and Hellbilly Deluxe just feel like a perfect fit for me when I want to have a little bit of “darkness” in my Octoberween nights while I fight off the unholy hordes of evil undead. So if I do enjoy listening to this why do I consider it a guilty listening pleasure? The reason for that is rather quite simple for me: though I do enjoy the music I don’t want to go too far in enjoying it. If I let myself go too completely I can see myself taking on the part of a dark individual that would not only scare others but myself. And I can already be scary as it is without taking on the “darker” aspects that Rob Zombie likes to portray himself as. Though I do look in black I’m not sure if I can pull off the makeup.

There are times when it can be good to appear a bit dark and foreboding like a phantom stranger but if I go too far down that rabbit hole, there is no guarantee I can climb back up and continue to be the nice, charming, kill-crazy, virtual reality sociopath you see before you right now.

Even though I’ve long given away my CD of this album, I’ve still have all the tracks digitized for future music use. That reminds me, I need to see about transferring those songs to my Xbox 360/PS3’s hard drives respectively. I have the feeling these songs might have more mileage in them for the latest crop of Halloween games out there. It's time to sin again.

Ta-ta

“N”