Audio Play - The Cask of Amontillado, starring Mark Redfield and John Astin!

Just in time for the Halloween season, the Poe Forevermore Radio Theater presents THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO - available for a mere $1.99 at CD Baby:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/markredfield2

THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO stars John Astin as Montresor and Mark Redfield as Fortunato. The play was adapted from Poe's short story and directed by Tony Tsendeas.

Poe Forevermore Radio Theater brings you adaptations of contemporary and classic tales of mystery, horror and the imagination. The series is produced and hosted by its creator Mark Redfield.
Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" was published in November 1846, in Godey's Lady's Book. This performance of Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" was recorded before a live audience on June 22nd, 2013 at Westminster Hall Burial Grounds, in Baltimore, Maryland, where Edgar Allan Poe is buried.

I listened to this play on my drive in to work this morning, and it is really terrific. It is adapted from the Poe story, slightly updated but retaining all the Poe chills and charm. Mark Redfield is especially impressive as Fortunato, and it is great to hear fan favorite John Astin at work as well. A neat little Halloween treat - to find out more about Poe Forevermore Radio go to: http://poeforevermore.com

Midnight Syndicate launches Kickstarter campaign in support of MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE LIVE! multimedia Halloween horror concert.

Hey fright fans, Doc Gangrene here with some big news!

 

My good friends at Midnight Syndicate have launched a kickstarter to bring to life something I've wanted to see for years - a LIVE Midnight Syndicate concert - BUT, what they have planned is more than a simple concert - this is going to be a multimedia extravaganza.

 

http://midnightsyndicate.blogspot.com/2013/10/midnight-syndicate-live-kickstarter.html

 

 

 

Midnight Syndicate launches Kickstarter campaign in support of MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE LIVE! multimedia Halloween horror concert.

After seventeen studio albums, including three horror movie scores and a motion picture of their own, Gothic Halloween Horror music composers Midnight Syndicate have launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a multimedia concert experience. Entitled MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE LIVE! the Halloween horror-themed show will feature a unique blend of live Midnight Syndicate music, original films, music videos, and live theatre.

"We want it to be a feast for the eyes as much as the ears," said Gavin Goszka, "a unique show that is not only a Midnight Syndicate concert but also something that stands on its own as a great horror multimedia experience." In order create the visual elements of the show, the band is teaming up with of veterans from the special FX, film, and haunted house industries. The initial group includes special FX legend Robert Kurtzman (Creature Corps, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, KNB EFX), director Gary Jones (XENA, AXE GIANT), David "House" Greathouse (FACEOFF, Mushroomhead), Jason Carter (BABYLON 5, THE DEAD MATTER), Beki Ingram (FACEOFF), and Jason Blaszczak of Screamline Studios (Rob Zombie's AMERICAN NIGHTMARE). "Because of the style of our music and our ties to the film, roleplaying game, and haunted house industries we're in the perfect position to put together a unique show that blends the best of these different worlds," said Edward Douglas. "It's a project almost two decades in the making. We want to bring your nightmares to life," added Gavin Goszka.

"We've always been our own label and distributor with little commercial radio airplay, so it's really been the fans' support over these past seventeen years that has allowed Midnight Syndicate to continue to grow. They really are the best fans in the world," said Edward Douglas. "This live concert is something that our fans have been asking us to do for many years. The Kickstarter campaign is giving us the opportunity to involve them from the beginning and allowing us to take this exciting next step together."

MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE LIVE! Kickstarter Campaign:

Midnight Syndicate Official Website: www.MidnightSyndicate.com

MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE

For almost two decades, composers Edward Douglas and Gavin Goszka have been known as Midnight Syndicate, creating symphonic soundtracks to imaginary films that facilitate a transcendental and adventurous escape into the secret dimensions of the mind’s eye. To many of their fans, they are Gothic music pioneers brewing a signature blend of orchestral horror music and movie-style sound effects. To others, they remain the first “haunted house band” that forever changed the Halloween music genre and became a staple of the October holiday season. And some know them as the duo that teamed up with Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast to produce the first official soundtrack to the legendary Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. Their critically-acclaimed works are reminiscent of sweeping, complex masterpieces by artists such as James Horner, Danny Elfman, Black Sabbath and King Diamond and have been featured as a part of films, television shows, video games and at haunted attractions, amusement parks, and live performances worldwide.

Midnight Syndicate’s music has become integral to setting a powerful mood at top-rated haunted attractions and amusement parks as well as at costume shops, gaming and Halloween parties and Halloween-themed cruises from Siberia and Hong Kong, to Europe and the United States. The duo has released 15 studio albums since 1997, and Douglas and Goszka’s original, work also been used at Hugh Hefner’s Halloween parties, on episodes of The Barbara Walters Special and in the drive-in film THE RAGE, Universal Studio’s Horror Nights XVIII as well as by Monday Night Football and by artists Insane Clown Posse, Three Six Mafia, Twiztid and The Misfits. In 2010, Midnight Syndicate released a full-length horror film called THE DEAD MATTER, directed, scored and co-produced by Douglas alongside special FX legend Robert Kurtzman and director/producer Gary Jones.

Midnight Syndicate continues to pursue its quest to use instrumental music to tell explicit stories full of tension, twists and turns. Most recently, the band completed the score to the grindhouse thriller AXE GIANT: THE WRATH OF PAUL BUNYAN. In summer, 2013, Midnight Syndicate released the soundtrack to that film along with MONSTERS OF LEGEND a tribute to the classic Universal, Hammer and Euro horror films that gave birth to horror cinema. MONSTERS OF LEGEND has quickly become the band's most critically-acclaimed album to date.

Joe Badon kickstarter - Outside the Lines

Illustrator/writer Joe Badon has a kick ass project I wanna tell you guys about that's in the final stages of its kickstarter campaign. it's called OUTSIDE THE LINES - go check it out. It's a 70 page, soft cover book that's half art prints and half sequential short stories.

Now I don't typically endorse kickstarter campaigns, but Joe's is one that's definitely worthy - check out his video and go donate if you're able!!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1857321894/outside-the-lines-art-and-short-stories-book

Belcourt Spreads Halloween Fun All October

This year the mighty Belcourt theater in Nashville is again bringing a horde of Halloween fun to Music City, but instead of presenting it marathon-style in one all-day event as they did the past two years, they're spreading it out over the entire month of October this year!

First off they are introducing a weekend classic series of VINCENT PRICE films! Anyone who knows me knows of my obsession with all things Price related - and now I'll get a chance to see 4 Price classics on the big screen, and you will too - THE TINGLER, THEATRE OF BLOOD, MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH, and HOUSE OF WAX (2d). Showtimes will be announced soon, but if they do it like they did the Hitchock and Harryhausen classic series of this summer, they'll show them on Sat. and Sun. afternoons.




Next up is a series of double-features every weekend! These look to be especially fun, screening one film at ten and a second-feature at midnight each week. Check out these great films - Argento, Fulci, and even Rosemary's Baby and The Wickerman!  Amazing lineup...

Wickerman 

Oct 18-19 - 

Special Restored FINAL CUT version!

Convalescent Terrors

I am always intrigued when creative people tread common territory. I’m not talking about plagiarism, mind you, just coincidental mining of similar themes. I ran across just such a case recently while I was reading an old issue of WEIRD TALES MAGAZINE – actually, it was a Weird Tales paperback book, the 4-issue series Edited by Lin Carter. It was in issue 2, a story called FEAR by JOSEPH PAYNE BRENNAN.

It is one of Brennan’s supernatural detective stories featuring detective Lucius Leffing, on a case in Connecticut with his assistant. Here’s the plot – Leffing and partner have been called to investigate a series of strange deaths at the Hemlock Hills Convalescent Center. Turns out a supernatural being is stalking the halls of the nursing home, and the patients are dying of fright at the sight of the hideous being.

I was, of course, immediately reminded of BUBBA HOTEP, written by Joe R. Lansdale and filmed by Don Coscarelli. Perhaps the only similar element between the two stories is a supernatural entity in a nursing home, but that in and of itself is pretty significant. Beyond that the two stories diverge pretty widely, and Lansdale’s plot features a retired Elvis Presley in place of a supernatural detective. The actual monster is different, too – it’s an ancient mummy in the Lansdale story, while here it is the physical manifestation of a witch who was burned alive 200 years prior. Still, the description isn’t that far off from ole Bubba H. –

“The air appeared to shift and waver and the ghastly remains of a face, little more than a blackened skull with shreds of shriveled flesh, etched itself immediately in front of me. Puffy lips writhed away from a toothless mouth set in a rictus of final agony. The red, glazing eyes seemed to reflect fire; they glared from the wrecked face with an expression of ultimate fear and ferocious hatred which I hope never to see again.”

Brennan and Lansdale were definitely both inspired by the depressing and oppressive nature of retirement homes, and the constant companion of death that always lingers nearby. Makes for an interesting study in similarities between the two tales. 

2-part interview about Vincent price

It was my pleasure to appear one more on MonsterKid Radio to chat with host Derek Koch, this time doing a top-three Vincent Price film countdown. We talked all things Price related, and had a great time in the process.













You can check it out here:
Part 1

 

Part 2

 

Dr. Gangrene on Monster Kid Radio

Last week it was my priviledge to appear as a guest on the podcast MONSTER KID Radio, to discuss the film Tarantula, its star John Agar, and much more, with host Derek Koch.

 

You can check out part one here

 

and part two here