Mocata's Den of Horror

The '70s and '80s saw quite a few holiday-themed slasher flicks.  One that I find to be quite a lot of fun to watch, especially on its respective holiday, is New Year's Evil .  It may not be the most groundbreaking film, but I think it manages to give its audience what it wants and does it with style.  Also, there are some minor departures from the standard slasher formula. DVD Edition   Let's start with one of the biggest differences from most slashers: you see the killer right off the bat.  Usually, you don't know who the killer is until he/she is unmasked right before the big final chase and face-off.  In this one, you know who he is the whole time, as he does not wear a mask (at least not until very late in the film).  Of course, you don't know his name or his relationship, if any, to the other characters in the film and he does put on some basic disguises in the film.  Still, his face shows up onscreen and you know he is the killer, so there ...

Since I did this last year, I figured I would feature some more recommendations this year.  Being a huge metal fan, these will be primarily metal. Necrophagia- Season of the Dead and Ready for Death Okay, I am going with a double-feature kind of thing with this one.  The first full-length studio album by one of the original death metal bands and the album recorded before it that remained unreleased until a few years later.   First, Season of the Dead came out in 1987 and was Necrophagia's one and only album until vocalist/mainman Killjoy teamed up with Phil Anselmo to reactivate the band with a new lineup in the late '90s.  The lyrics are filled with horror influences, as is the cover art.  The music itself is going for a bit moodier sort of feel rather than just out-and-out speed.  It is a classic and always a great listen.  The imagery and mood make it a natural choice for Halloween listening. Ready for Death was recorded in 1986, but was not...

 For decades, one of the top selling authors in the U.K. was a man called Dennis Wheatley.  His books were published in many countries around the world and translated into numerous different languages.  A handful of his novels were even adapted into films.  Wheatley's novels, by and large, were thrillers in the purest sense-- they thrilled his audience.  His books contained things such as adventure, romance, espionage, war, and, probably most famously, the occult.  Out of the fifty-plus novels he wrote, there are a total of nine which are typically categorized as "black magic stories".  These books are not a series really (although some of the included novels are part of various series he wrote), just a general topic that these books were lumped under by the publisher.  The truth is that some of the novels in that group contain little or no black magic.  Others, however, certainly are stories of black magic. The first of these books was 1934'...

 I have previously discussed a couple of Italian cannibal films on here and I figured it was time to do another, so decided I may as well knock out the most notorious of the bunch: Ruggero Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust .  Most people are probably not aware of the Italian cannibal film boom from the '70s and '80s, but many people are still aware of this particular film. DVD release from EC Entertainment   Booklet from EC Entertainment DVD release With a reputation such as the one Cannibal Holocaust has developed over the years, one may wonder whether or not the movie itself can hold up to it.  After all, this is a film that shocked people during its original release in 1980, but the world has changed so much in the four decades that have passed since then, so would it have the same impact today?  Is this a movie that would instead lose any shock value it once had as audiences became desensitized?  Well, first let's talk about the movie itself and then we can...

Despite having five years' worth of releases already, Walk Among Us was the first full-length album to be released by the Misfits, way back in 1982, the year before the band would split up.  By this time, the band's image and sound were both fully in place, with band members sporting the devilock hairstyle, lyrics which made references to all kinds of horror and sci-fi movies, Glenn's vocals, and Jerry's growling bass tone.  The album also features what is arguably the "classic" line-up of the Misfits: Glenn Danzig- vocals, Jerry Only- bass guitar, Arthur Googy- drums, and Doyle- guitar.  Cover of LP reissue from Rhino Records Comprised of thirteen songs and clocking in at a total of about 24 minutes, Walk Among Us is a no-nonsense affair.  This is an album without filler.  Of course, there is the odd inclusion of a live recording of "Mommy, Can I Go Out and Kill Tonight" right in the middle of the album, even though there hadn't even been a st...

For Halloween, there are so many movies to watch to get into the spirit of the season, as well as books to read, and, of course, music to listen to.  I already wrote a bit about Denial of God's most recent album, The Hallow Mass in my post about the book, The Reel Ghoul , so here are a few more that I think really capture the spirit of Halloween. Acid Witch: Evil Sound Screamers This is the third full-length album by Acid Witch, a band that has referred to its own music as "Halloween metal".  That makes Acid Witch a natural choice for Halloween music.  The lyrics often incorporate horror movie themes and Halloween.  There is also some of the stoner doom kind of stuff, which initially put me off from the band, but then I heard some of the band's music and was able to look past the stoner stuff, which I have never really been a fan of.  Evil Sound Screamers , to me, seems to be the most Halloween-oriented album thus far.  Though still present, the stoner ele...