I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: PHISH-“The Chinese Water Torture” (MGM Grand Garden Arena, Friday 10, 31, 2014).

In honor of Halloween, these Ghost Box stories will be attached to a recent Phish Halloween show [with quoted material from various reviews]. 

Known for dawning musical costumes to celebrate [Halloween], Phish broke with tradition last year to offer a set of original music.  The Phish Bill read that Phish’s musical costume would be a 1964 Disney album of sound effects – Chilling, Thrilling Sounds Of The Haunted House.  But it wasn’t a cover set. Phish played original music set amongst an incredibly psychedelic, theatrical graveyard stage accentuated by zombie dancers and a ghoulish MC.  At the start of the set, the stage was cleared before a graveyard came to the foreground.  Smoke filled the air, zombie dancers appeared, and music filled the venue. A haunted house was brought to the front of the stage, which eventually exploded, and all four-band members appeared, dressed in white like zombies. 

“The Chinese Water Torture” was scored with an upbeat groove that almost seemed like a mix of “Cars Trucks Buses” and “Axel F.” There was a familiarity to all the progessions Phish debuted in the Haunted House, but this was Phish drawing on their influences and own music to create something completely new and original. “The Chinese Water Torture” also contained a potent jam filled with bombastic leads from Trey.

There’s a cool key board melody while Trey is doing so solo bends.   And then he starts taking off on his solos.  There’s a wailing solo by the end with some great drums from Fish.  I like that the drop from the record is sampled throughout.

And I guess we’ll just leave out that this is all pretty racist.

[READ: October 16, 2017] “Opening the Door”

Just in time for Halloween, from the people who brought me The Short Story Advent Calendar comes The Ghost Box.

This is a nifty little box (with a magnetic opening) that contains 11 stories for Halloween.  It is lovingly described thusly:

A collection of chilly, spooky, hair-raising-y stories to get you in that Hallowe’en spirit, edited and introduced by comedian and horror aficionado Patton Oswalt.

There is no explicit “order” to these books; however, on the inside cover, one “window” of the 11 boxes is “folded.”  I am taking that as a suggested order.

I’m intrigued that older stories seemed to want a kind of narrative device to tell stories like this.  Whether it was the radio station in “The Night Wire” or the way “The Clock” was told in response to another person’s story, there’s seems to be a need to frame these stories.

In this one the narrator is a newspaper reporter.  He says that during his ten years at Fleet Street he came across stories that were definitely odd but which did not make it into the paper.  There was Campo Tosto a Belgian who lived in a place called Burnt Green (a translation of his name).  He shot at trespassers with a bow and arrow.

There was the J.H.V.S. Syndicate which dealt with a Cabalistic cipher dealing with the Glory of the Lord.

But then there was the queerest story about Reverend Secretan Jones, the Cantonbury Clergyman.  He grew to minor prominence in 1907.  The motor industry was still in early stages and he, disturbed by the rattle and noise of the carriages, saw the future.  He wrote to the papers that the roads would all collapse from the weight of these vehicles.  The earth would be rent with explosions and the streets of London would go up in flame.

Sometime after that, Secretan Jones disappeared from his house with no word or sight of him.  Because he was still remembered for his prediction, people took notice.  But he was gone for six weeks and people just assumed he’d disappeared on purpose.

Then he just appeared back at his study.  His housekeeper was shocked but thrilled to have him back again. But he didn’t know what to think.  What did she mean, “Back again?”

This new aspect of the story brought the reporter to meet Mr Jones.  Jones said he couldn’t tell him anything.  He had no information.  But they became friendly and wound up having dinner a few times.

And then Jones revealed what he could.  He said that he was very busy studying–head absorbed in books.  And one day he went for a walk but at some point he forgot where he lived.  The reporter says it’s perfectly normal.

But he says he remembered his name and address, he just realized he looked up, in a place he had been many times, and realized he didn’t know where to go next.  He took a cab home.  But that was just the beginning.  He found important papers in weird places–like under couch cushions.

And then he told the reporter that one day he went out his garden gate, and that’s when everything changed.  I really enjoyed the way the book ending so mysteriously.

And we must always remember, Est enim magnum chaos, “for there is a great void.”

I loved the feeling of H.P. Lovecraft in this story.