Tangled Rope

Episode 7 of The SciFiPunkRockabillySurfHorror Half-Hour for DS106 Radio:

Episode 7: Reanimate? Annihilate!

1. Zombina & The Skeletones – Evil Science
2. The Creepshow – Grave Diggers
3. Nekromantix – Luni Lab
4. Frankenstein “It’s alive!”
5. Plan 9 – Manmade Monster
6. BALZAC – Frankenstein’s Walk
7. 12 Step Rebels – The Ballad Of Frankenstein’s Monster
8. Cobra Skulls – Dead Inside
9. The Koffin Kats – Graveyard Tree 2
10. Groovie Ghoulies – Daughter Of Frankenstein
11. The Apers – Reanimate My Heart
12. Famous Monsters – Blood of Frankenstein
13. Groovie Ghoulies – 99 Lives

Episode 6 of The SciFiPunkRockabillySurfHorror Half-Hour for DS106 Radio flaps heavy on the rockabilly/psychobilly side of the alley.

Scheduling seems sketchy, so I can’t say when this might play, but here’s the set list anyway:

Episode 6: Sucks on the Beach

1. Batmobile – Bat Dream
2. The Coffinshakers – Dracula Has Risen From The Grave
3. Vampire Beach Babes – Gothic Surf-A-Rama
4. Groovie Ghoulies – Do The Bat
5. “The X-Files” – We Got Em
6. Zombina & The Skeletones – Dracula Blood
7. Thee Flatliners – Vampires
8. Blitzkid – Nosferatu
9. “Dracula” – He Opened a Vein
10. Devils Brigade – Vampire Girl
11. The Misfits – Vampira
12. Docteur Legume et Les Surfwerks – Vixen Vampira
13. “The Vampire Lovers” – Beware
14. Zombie Ghost Train – Step into My Coffin
15. Rezurex – Vampira Calling
16. Tiger Army – Santa Carla Twilight

A lot of these selections were obvious, though a few were tough. For instance, I had a hard time settling on a Thee Flatliners track from the Vampires EP–I favored “Dracula’s Descendants” but ended up choosing “Vampires” because of its distinct Castlevania sound. Blitzkid is not a band I’d normally favor for this show, but, man, this track “Nosferatu” is crazy! Tiger Army finishes with a slower, introspective track — a little more subtle than the rest of the psychobilly songs in this set.

Another episode of The SciFiPunkRockabillySurfHorror Half-Hour for DS106 Radio.

Episode 5: The Invaders

Synopsis: Dragonmen and Devilgirls invade the Earth, using our own rock n’ roll against us!

1. Pixies – The Happening
2. Groovie Ghoulies – 50000 Spaceships (Watching Over Me)
3. Mad Sin – U.F.O.
4. “The Invaders” – David Vincent, Mental Case
5. Frank Black – Bad, Wicked World
6. Zodiac Killers – UFO Invasion
7. The Lillingtons – Target Earth
8. Man or Astroman? – Invasion Of The Dragonmen
9. Ramones – Zero Zero UFO
10. “Devil Girl from Mars” – Much As We Expected
11. The Misfits – I Turned Into a Martian
12. Man or Astroman? – Evil Plans of Planet Spectra
13. The Heartaches – Rock N Roll UFO
14. “Space Ghost” – Energy Ray
15. Docteur Legume et les Surfwerks – Raumpatrouille Surf
16. Zombina and the Skeletones – End of the World
17. Teenage Bottlerocket – Forbidden Planet

Special thanks to Bradley Trinnaman for introducing me to some great, new psychbilly and horror punk this week–plenty of material, now, for the next several episodes. Coming up: vampires, ghosts, evil laboratories, and more zombie love.

Not sure if/when this will play on DS106 Radio, but here’s the next episode of The SciFiPunkRockabillySurfHorror Half-Hour.

Episode 4: Monster Attack!

Synopsis: Sharks in the surf! Primates from prehistory! Monsters by the megaton! Hippies without heads!

1. Man or Astroman? – Mystery Science Theater 3000 Love Theme
2. The Lillingtons – Caveman
3. Groovie Ghoulies – Blood Beach
4. Beach Girls and the Monster – Making Hey Hey
5. Daikaiju – Sharkakhan
6. The Aquabats – The Shark Fighter!
7. Horrorpops – HorrorBeach Pt. II
8. The Dead Milkmen – The Thing That Only Eats Hippies
9. Groovie Ghoulies – The Lizard King
10. Famous Monsters – Monsters Over Tokyo!
11. The Creepshow – Run For Your Life
12. Man or Astroman? – Gargantua’s Last Stand
13. Zombina & The Skeletones – Teenage Caveman Beat Gargantua
14. Groovie Ghoulies – The King Kong Stomp

I lived out a bit of a childhood dream by creating set lists for a music show on DS106 online radio station, as masterminded by Jim Groom, Grant Potter, et al. Frankly, I could run a different kind of set night after night, week after week, from industrial to electropop, from post-punk to classical, but decided to focus on a peculiar theme that I’ve enjoyed for a number of years, the exotic, bizarre, obscure, and often silly sci-fi/horror themed music put out by a small group of punk rock, surf rock, and rockabilly/psychobilly bands. And so we have the SciFiPunkRockabillySurfHorror Half-Hour.

Since the songs themselves tend to be highly narrative, it was easy to put them together in a way that created something approximating a narrative arc. I sometimes traded variety to showcase my favorite bands repeatedly, yet am proud to have been pretty stubborn about excluding songs/bands if they didn’t fit the plotline.

Here are the set lists for the first three episodes, along with a synopsis of the storyline I had in mind:

Episode 1: Young Zombie Vampires in Love

Synopsis: Young (vampire) love is threatened when an asteroid on a cataclysmic collision course with Earth is preceded by radioactivated zombies.

1. Me First and the Gimme Gimmes – Science Fiction Double Feature
2. Man or Astroman? – Planet Collision
3. The Epoxies – Radiation
4. Groovie Ghoulies – Deviltown
5. The Lillingtons – Zombies
6. The Soviettes – Paranoia Cha Cha Cha!
7. Koffin Kats – Graveyard Tree
8. Groovie Ghoulies – Vampire Girl
9. The Creep Show – Zombies Ate Her Brain
10. The Incredible Staggers – Zombies of Love
11. The Dead Milkmen – Lucky
12. – La Fin Absolue du Monde
13. The Riverdales – Countdown
14. The Phenomenauts – Infinite Frontier

Episode 2: Crossed in Space

Synopsis: The vampire-turned-zombie lovers escape a doomed Earth, but will romance survive capture by the alien cyborgs who are following in the asteroid’s path?

1. Shonen Knife – Riding on the Rocket
2. Batmobile – Rock This Planet
3. Man or Astroman? – Cyborg Control
4. Damon Alexander and the Ten Cent Rentals – Robot Monster
5. The Lillingtons – I Saw the Apeman on the Moon
6. Dr Who – You Will Become Like Us
7. Zombina and the Skeletones – Love Droid
8. Devil Girl from Mars – Johnny
9. The Phenomenauts – Cyborg
10. The Dollyrots – Because I’m Awesome
11. Docteur Legume et Les Surfwerks – La Femme Electrique
12. Teenage Bottlerocket – Lost in Space
13. Stereophonic Space Sound Unlimited – Birdman

Episode 3: Eternal Return

Synopsis: Our vampire-turned-zombie-turned-cyborg hero returns to a scorched Earth. Tormented by memories of his lost love, he flees to his homeland of Transylvania.

1. Teen Idols – Midnight Picture Show
2. The Lillingtons – Black Hole in my Mind
3. Ramones – Pet Sematary
4. Batmobile – Transylvanian Express
5. Frank Black – The Black Rider #1
6. Docteur Legume et Les Surfwerks – Bienvenue a la Maison Meduse
7. Teenage Bottlerocket – They Came from the Shadows
8. The Horrorpops – Hitchcock Starlet
9. The Sonics – The Witch
10. Groovie Ghoulies – Wolf Girl
11. The Phenomenauts – Make a Circuit with Me
12. Groovie Ghoulies – Til Death Do Us Party

Episodes 4 & 5 are both planned, and will showcase Nekromantix, Zombina and the Skeletones, Famous Monsters, Daikaiju, The Pixies, and more.

I hadn’t watched Dreyer’s La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc with composer Einhorn’s “Voices of Light” until just this week. Einhorn has done a masterful job with the work, and indeed accentuates this already stunning and troubling film. If you haven’t caught this on Criterion, do. Here’s a clip from what I thought to be the most breathless scene, Jeanne’s confession: