Scary Words, Scary Tune

With this blog very much back up and running again I think it's time for another selection of topical tunes to celebrate that especially spooky time of year - All Hallow's Eve!  In fact, looking back at this blog's post history it seems to have been a frankly astonishing (and almost unacceptable) 8 years since I last did a Hallowe'en-themed entry, so let's put that to rights right now with the following five frightening refrains from the terrifying Twenties and thrilling Thirties.     

 

We kick off with British bandleader Jack Hylton & His Orchestra and their 1929 recording Bogey Wail.  One of four sides the band cut on the very un-Hallowe'en date of the 13th February 1929 it features a common motif of the time in the form of the Bogeyman, the æthereal monster hiding under the bed/ in the cupboard and which has scared the pants off generations of children around the world for centuries.  This particular recently-uploaded video features some very well done period-style animation which just adds to the overall eeriness of the song.  

 

Jumping forward eight years and something slightly different but no less scary is lurking in the cupboard in this next tune, consummately performed by another great of the British dance band era, Nat Gonella & His Georgians.  The Skeleton In The Cupboard was originally recorded a year earlier by Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra for the 1936 Bing Crosby film Pennies From Heaven.  The title song rightly went on to become a jazz standard, subsequently recorded by multiple artists over the years, but in the process left the likes of The Skeleton In The Cupboard slightly forgotten - an oversight I'm happy to try to rectify by including Nat Gonella's bouncy version here. 

 

From Bogeymen to skeletons to zombies next in this 1934 recording by the now obscure American dance band leader Gene Kardos.  With his orchestra Kardos actively recorded from 1931 until 1938 (with vocalists including Dick Robertson and Bea Wain) at which point he "retired" and went to work for the New York City postal department(!) while at the same time performing in a small Hungarian restaurant in the Manhattan suburb of Yorkville.  Cut on the 26th June 1934, Zombie is an early example of the term appearing in musical form and was allegedly inspired by the pre-Code 1932 Bela Lugosi horror film White Zombie.  

Another forgotten American band leader features in this next song from 1930, written, composed and performed by Wayne King and His Orchestra.  Known at the height of his fame from 1931 to 1940 as "the Waltz King" after his most favoured variety of jazz he slowly faded into obscurity after the early 1960s and although he continued to perform at various venues around America right up to the 1980s he had by then, like Gene Kardos, gone into "early retirement" from the music scene and in between appearances ran a cattle farm and car rental business from his Savanna, Illinois home.  Swamp Ghosts is a wonderfully typical example of early 1930s creepy jazz, helped along in this video by some fittingly ghostly images!

For the final tune in this post we return to Britain and another top band leader of the 1930s, Roy Fox and His Orchestra, with their 1934 offering The House Is Haunted.  Sung by the equally-noted (and brilliantly named!) British vocalist Denny Dennis it is actually really more of a romantic ballad, as the lyrics suggest, but teamed with some superbly spine-chilling footage from the 1922 film Nosferatu it earns its place here as a suitably supernatural offering.

source - Wikipædia

Well there we have it then - five spooktacular songs from the 1920s and '30s to hopefully help your Hallowe'en go with a swing.  I hope you all have as enjoyable an All Hallow's Eve as it's possible to have in these trying times - do let me know what you have planned or what you got up to in the comments.  Noseferatu happens to be my favoured choice for the Partington-Plans' 2020 Hallowe'en showing although it's facing some stiff competition this year, with my fiancée pushing for Pride And Prejudice And Zombies (I'm still not sure myself...) or the 2019 animated remake of The Addams Family.  Maybe we'll end up doing a triple-bill, we'll have to see...

It was a dark, Dark Knight...

With All Hallow's Eve, or Halloween as it is more commonly known, just around the corner it's time for my own spooky themed post of the year, methinks.  This time I'm going to take a slightly different but hopefully no less spooky tack, doing my first Pinterest-inspired post in honour of my one of my favourite pop culture characters - the (sometimes) dark, Gothic, unnatural, eerie and mysterious superhero that is:

Batman, as well as having that frightening other-worldly mysteriousness about him as already mentioned, is also deeply influenced by Gothicism.  Which is probably one of the reasons he is my favourite superhero; who doesn't like a bit of Gothic symbolism in their fictional crimefighter?  I happen to like bats too (excepting the time one nearly flew into my face while I was walking down a dark Devon lane) and what is Batman other than a man dressed as a bat?  And bats are a Halloween staple!

I think another reason I'm drawn towards Batman is that mysticism surrounding the character.  He fights crime from the shadows; no-one know who he is or whether he's even human and he uses fear and surprise to overpower his enemies.  It's still good versus evil, but the contrast isn't as great (and in the case of the Joker, it could easily said to be in reverse).  That's also why Batman and Batman Begins remain my two favourite Batman films, with the superstitious and eidolic aspect being played up to great effect.  Probably a great many other Batman fans feel the same way and it is undoubtedly these characteristics, this flip-side of a traditional superhero, that has allowed Batman to endure for 75 years and remain an incredibly successful cultural icon.

The history of those 75 years is fascinating as well, with the character's origins from the 1930s and '40s (and earlier) just adding more to his appeal.

Created by the comic-book artist and writer duo of Bob Kane and Bill Finger in 1939 Batman's first appearance in the May 1939 Detective Comics #27 is only eleven months after Superman's debut in rival Action Comics #1 (it was the success of the latter that spurred DC on to create a superhero of their own).  The idea of the superhero had gained currency in the 1930s and Batman was clearly influenced by the first, earlier prototypes of The Shadow and The Phantom.  Going even further back, Zorro has been cited as an influence, something writers worked into Batman's origin story (it was the 1920 Douglas Fairbanks Sr. The Mark Of Zorro that the Wayne family saw before the parents were murdered outside the theatre).  Bob Kane also took themes from popular culture of his youth - films like 1926's The Bat (and the 1930 remake/sequel The Bat Whispers) and Conrad Veidt's Gwynplaine in 1928's The Man Who Laughs.  (As a result of this there are some excellent vintage Batman parodies to be found on YouTube...)

In the 1940s Batman, like so many action heroes of the time, featured in a couple of movie serials - Batman in 1943 and Batman and Robin in 1949.  They're standard 1940s serial fare, very much of their time (especially the 1943 one, which features some very dubious propaganda) with pretty suspect costumes, sets etc.  I won't add them here, but they can be found easily enough on YouTube - here and here.  Again they have both inspired some excellent alternative thinking on the part of some YouTube users.

Glossing over the Sixties television series and film, which are good silly fun and set the tone for the next two decades but not the sort of Batman to feature here we arrive instead at the Tim Burton Batman films and DC Comics' attempts in the mid-1980s to return to a darker characterisation with graphic novels such as Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns.  The films Batman and Batman Returns featured this dark re-imagining to great success (and Michael Keaton remains, on balance, my favourite Batman/Bruce Wayne) but then Joel Schumacher took over - and the less said about that the better!

In the early 1990s, following the success of the first two modern Batman films, the cartoon Batman: The Animated Series appeared and this brings back many a happy memory of Saturday morning television, as well as furthering my interest in the character (the "Dark Deco" style in that series also helped!).  Then of course more life has been breathed into the character in recent years thanks to the "Nolan Trilogy" of films which culminated in last year's critically and commercially successful The Dark Knight Rises.  Thanks to these Batman's stock has never been higher - he still appears in DC Comics today, in numerous award-winning video games and fashioned onto (or into) almost anything you care to name. 

The Batman's next 75 years would seem to be assured, then, although rumblings continue over the decision to cast Ben Affleck in the role for the upcoming 2015 extravaganza that will be Batman vs. Superman.   However that turns out I'm sure the Batman will endure, continuing his adventures and forever striking a fearful and unnatural shadow over the cowardly and superstitious criminal.

*Below are the two "vintage Batman" videos mentioned earlier.  Who was your favourite Batman/Bruce Wayne?  Is Ben Affleck a good choice to play the next Caped Crusader?  Do let me know in the Comments section - and have a happy Halloween!

Here comes the Boogie (Woogie) Man

Well the clocks have gone back one hour to good old Greenwich Mean Time and thoughts have turned to the fast approaching night of 31st October - All Hallow's Eve!  Inspired by a recent post by Mim over at Crinoline Robot, I thought I'd do for Hallowe'en what I did for my last two bloggy Christmases so I've cobbled together a selection of spooky songs from the 1930s and '40s by some of my favourite artists of the day.



Mysterious Mose was an early Betty Boop cartoon from the Fleischer Studios (who would later have further successes with their famous Popeye and Superman cartoons).  It in turn was inspired by this song, written by Walter Doyle and also released in [April] 1930, originally by Rube Bloom and His Bayou Boys but swiftly recorded by a number of bands including Harry Reser, Cliff Perrine and and Ted Weems (with their respective Orchestras).



The great Cab Calloway features here twice - first in the seldom-heard 17th June 1931 recording of The Nightmare and then the later (28th February 1939) recording of The Ghost of Smokey Joe.



Me And The Ghost Upstairs often appears on Fred Astaire CD anthologies but was actually cut from the film in which it featured, 1940's Second Chorus. Luckily the raw footage still exists, albeit in pre-production quality and not subject to the final Astaire polish (not that you'd notice!) so we can see Fred jitterbuggin' and lindy-hopping with a ghost (actually his long-time friend and choreography partner Hermes Pan shrouded in sheets and wearing high heels!).



One from our English bandleader Henry Hall, who was well-known for doing child-friendly songs such as The Sun Has Got His Hat On and The Teddy-Bears' Picnic and who here performs a splendid rendition of Hush, Hush, Hush, Here Comes The Boogeyman, with singer Val Rosing, from 1932.



Tommy Dorsey and His Orchestra are on fine form in this sweet version of a Larry Clinton composition from 1937, Satan Takes a Holiday.



We finish with the wonderfully-titled Celery Stalks At Midnight, originally recorded in 1940 by Will Bradley and His Orchestra but in this version from a year later (6th February 1941) masterfully sung by Doris Day, with Les Brown and The Band of Renown.

As well as playing these cracking and creepy tunes I have also lined up a Boris Karloff-fest for Wednesday night with a programme featuring Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein and The Mummy (plus Ghostbusters, of course - if I can fit it in!).  Have a spooktacular time, everyone!

Happy All Hallows Eve

With thanks to The Spectator

Plus three of my favourite classic horror films - Nosferatu, Frankenstein/Bride of Frankenstein, and The Mummy:



Have a spooktacularly vintage night, everyone!