The inimitable Robert Smith on the red carpet following The Cure's induction last week into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Here's their performance:

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Siouxsie and the Banshees' "The Killing Jar" from Peepshow (1988) is easily one of the band's finest tracks from an incredible body of work that has aged with grace. I consider this isolated recording below of Siouxsie's soaring and hauntingly majestic vocals to be a gift from a time when I wore too much eyeliner and drove hundreds of miles with my best friend to see the Peepshow performance in a small Detroit theater. Yes, it was worth it.

And here is the full recording of "The Killing Jar":

(via Dangerous Minds) Read the rest

Creepbay is a beautifully selected catalog of online "creepy and cool" merch, skewed heavily to Etsy, though not limited to it: it's full of stuff that will probably end up in my house, eventually (this planter will look great in the tiki bar we're building; this is next Christmas's door-candy; and someone in my life surely needs this) -- better yet, there's RSS, so expect more from this feed to show up here in the fullness of time. (via Metafilter) Read the rest

On January 29, 1979, six weeks after the band formed, Bauhaus recorded their iconic goth anthem "Bela Lugosi's Dead" and four other songs. Now that entire session, remastered from the original tapes, will be released on vinyl and digital download in November to celebrate the band's 40th anniversary. "Some Faces," "Bite My Hip," and the original version of "Boys" have never been available before. "Harry" was an early B-side.

"The Bela Session" (Bandcamp)

Fan video for "Bela Lugosi's Dead":

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Krampus LA co-founder (and occasional BB guest blogger) Al Ridenour is taking a stab at podcasting with Bone & Sickle, a show that "celebrates the intertwining of horror and folklore."

He writes:

Like my Krampus book, the show explores elements of horror within folklore, or folklore within horror. It’s not an interview show, but more of a manic lecture spun into an overwrought background of original music, drones, effects, snippets of found audio, etc. All within a fictional, manor house framework. Featuring Rick Galiher as my much abused valet, Wilkinson.

In honor of the German holiday of Walpurgisnacht on April 30, Al has "binge released" three 30-minute episodes at once. He suggests starting with the third episode.

Here's a taste of what to expect:

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Remember when MTV was quirky and cool?

Well, it was. In fact, in 1984, MTV asked Elvira, the legendary Mistress of the Dark, to host a six-hour special on Halloween night.** That special was titled, "Elvira's MTV Halloween Party" and looking at it now, it seems so experimental, like the theater kids were let loose in a TV studio, and I mean that as a good thing.

Forces of Geeks writes:

Elvira was given a 6 hour programming block on Halloween night 1984 to show all the spooky music videos there were interspersed with her usual shenanigans. Not just that but the middle 2 hours of this was a showing of Night of the Living Dead (with a special, shot for MTV, intro by George Romero) which Elvira would pop up into now and then.

Watch in this video uploaded by YouTuber Rockula Presents as the campy queen of Halloween pimps her own merch, brings on special guests, and shares old black-and-white horror movie clips and many music videos -- ranging from The Specials' "Ghost Town" to Oingo Boingo's "Little Girls" (no, that isn't Peter Dinklage at the 8:19 mark) to The Residents' version of "This is a Man's World" and, of course, Bauhaus' "Bela Lugosi's Dead."

Also see her demonstrate the proper way to carve a Jack-o-Lantern, you know, with a chainsaw.

Other notable moments:

-- I believe that's John Paragon playing "Breather" (uncredited) at the 13:05 mark. You may remember Paragon was the actor behind Jambi, the genie of Pee-wee's Playhouse. Read the rest

If Dracula needed a place to keep 60 twelve-oz.cans cool, this is probably what he'd use: an inflatable coffin float by holiday brand Beistle.

Unfortunately it's not for using as a pool floatie. It's just for storing "buffet" items.

Still, it would make a great goth-y addition to a Halloween party. Available for $17.89 on Amazon.

(Dangerous Minds) Read the rest

Here's The Cure performing "A Forest" live on television at Paris's Theatre de l'Empire on December 3, 1979. Robert Smith was 20 years old at the time.

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Al Jourgensen may prefer to forget that he once cultivated an English accent and created this underground club hit, but on this day, we happily remember Ministry's "(Everyday Is) Halloween" from 1984. Above, a fan video cut up from horror films.

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Elly from Microcosm Publishing writes, "Artist Automne Zingg started drawing pictures of Nick Cave gorging on comfort foods and Morrissey hoarding treats a few years ago to get over a breakup and it turned into an obsession. We got rockstar chef Joshua Ploeg to write lyrics-inspired vegan recipes to go with the books, and the result is... magic." Read the rest

This $10,000 coffin sofa was created by Etsy goth outfitter Von Erikson: it's available with purple, red or black upholstery. (via Marxist Barbie) Read the rest

A group at Saudi Arabia's King Abdulla University of Science and Technology have developed a new carbon-nanotube-based material that absorbs 98 to 99 percent of light between 400 and 1,400nm, from all angles, making even blacker than Rice University's 2008 none-more-black, Boston and Duke's 2008 none-more-black and Leiden University's 2009 none-more-black. That's pretty fucking black. Read the rest

The Sisters of Mercy's classic 1987 beast of gothic bombast, Floodland, will be reissued next month as a 4-LP vinyl box from Rhino records featuring the original album along with three 12-inches from the time. Floodland was the second full-length released under the Sisters name, and at that point the band consisted of founder Andrew Eldritch, new bassist Patricia Morrison of Gun Club fame, and the thunderous drum machine known as Doctor Avalanche. Meat Loaf producer Jim Steinman brought his orchestral magic to a couple Floodland tracks, including "This Corrosion," above, one of the greatest goth dance songs ever produced.

Sisters of Mercy: Floodland Era Vinyl Box Set (Amazon)

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Nosferatu's Hand Belt Buckle ($85) -- for when you want people to think of the withered, wrinkled appendages of the ancient undead while looking at your beltular region. Read the rest

The Cornaro Chapel at the Santa Maria della Vittoria church in Rome sports many beautiful works of art, but I'm especially taken by the skeletal figure set into the floor tiles, whose upraised arms seem ready to snatch sinners into the underworld. The photo above was taken by Chris and memorialized in a fabulous post on Roman Patina, which also includes photos of many of the other works in the chapel.

Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria

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Middle-class Kenyan teens are inventing a local version of goth subculture, and are at the center of a moral panic about kids-gone-wild -- according to an article in Think Africa Press. The article is shy on details or photographic evidence, but I hope its true about the subculture (and not about the moral panic). Anyone have more evidence of this?

The negative public image of the goth scene also extends beyond the general public and is apparent in the attitudes of local authorities, at times with dramatic consequences. David used to have long hair, another way to stand out in a country where men tend to wear it very short. A couple of weeks before I met him, he was walking in town at dusk, waiting for the bus back to Nakuru, when a police car pulled over in front of him. The police approached him and asked to see his passport, which he was not carrying, before they accused him of looking like ‘an al-Shabaab’ – a Somali militant Islamist group responsible for several terrorist attacks in the region.

David denied this, stating that he was a Kenyan. The police then challenged him as to why he had untidy hair and facial piercings, preposterously claiming that these are hallmarks of Somali terrorists. They put him in their car and drove him to a nearby barber where they forced him to shave his head. They said that this would "stop confusing them", and they told him to "dress like a decent person" in future.

Goth anthem "Bela Lugosi's Dead" by Bauhaus time-stretched into nine hours. Oh Belllllaaaaaa! (via Dangerous Minds, thanks, Patrick Kelly!)

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