# 93 Days Till Halloween



## Dinosaur1972 (Mar 28, 2007)

93 Days Till Halloween
7/30/2013

Shifting gears, I’m hitting the “Modern Mixes” folder today. It might be all I get to, because I’m starting with a 4 CD set…

*100 Hits - Halloween (2009)
*This is a pretty typical collection of pop songs that have some connection (however tenuous) to Halloween. It is all here, starting with “Ghostbusters”, “Monster Mash” (#3), “Amityville” … everything you’d hear on your local top 40 radio station on Halloween. (Aside: Why do radio stations play Christmas music for WEEKS before the big day, but Halloween might get ONE HOUR during the drive home?) CDs 1 & 2 cover radio-friendly songs, 3 has movie / TV themes, and 4 goes to the oldies. One nice thing – these are almost all done by the original artists – even the movie / TV themes. Never heard of some of these … songs by Bloc Party, Landscape, Steps, Kula Shaker among them. Not a bad compilation if you are looking for popular music.

*Monster Halloween Hits (2010)
*There are a lot of the same songs on this 3-CD set as on the one I just listened to. Here, “Ghostbusters” gets second billing to “Thriller”. No movie / TV themes, and the third CD has the oldies this time. Just a few unfamiliar tracks by some familiar and some unfamiliar artists. Still no Rockwell (Beatfreakz again?). “Angie Baby” by Helen Reddy – I like seeing it here. It is a weird, weird song. Hey, whaddya know … “Monster Mash”! Other highlights … Shakira’s “She-Wolf” (I don’t know why I like it), Hocus Pocus, “Attach of the 50-foot Woman” … hey what the hell is the Backstreet Boys’ song “Everybody” doing here? Despite that, I like this set a tad better than the 100 Hits one. This one has “Addams Groove”!

*Chiller Thriller Movie Themes And Sound Effects (1995)
*This CD consists of eleven horror movie themes from all eras. The classics are here … from the very recognizable “Halloween” and “Jaws” themes to the still very famous “Exorcist” and “Nightmare on Elm Street” themes to the theme from “Horror Express” (Wait … what?). Between the tracks we have the sound effects referred to in the title … folks screaming from the water before the “Jaws” theme, for example. Unfortunately, not only are these not the original recordings of the music (which is forgivable), these sound like they were all created on a synthesizer (sorry – not forgivable). “Tubular Bells” is awful. The themes that normally feature stringed instruments (for example, almost ALL OF THEM) sound cheesy thanks to the lack of, you know, STRINGED FREAKING INSTRUMENTS. I think these are MIDI files played through an Apple IIe. This is wasting my time. And now it is wasting yours, dear reader (if you exist). Apologies.

*Halloween A Go Go (2008)
*The album cover features the eyes from an old horror movie poster (White Zombie, maybe?) along with Tor Johnson. So … two points in its favor before I started listening. This is a garage rock compilation with songs from the 60’s (The Electric Prunes) through this century (Tegan and Sara) … the not-famous (Jarvis Humby?) to the world-famous (Bruce Springsteen!). Carl Perkins ups the coolness factor. Zacherle is here, Donovan is here. It is a weird mix, but it totally works.


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