Keep those hits coming!

Gotta keep moving, lest the twin weevils of laziness and anger take hold and tether me to the ground (or at least the couch.) 'Twas an indulgent blast indeed, engaging our first horrorcast™ post-
WFMU marathon, but it's important to note that this year's was a record-breaker, and I personally want to again thank all who pledged to My Castle of Quiet, especially those selfless souls who pledged off-air and within the past week, after our second and official "last" fundraising show on 3/14-15. The support and dedication you demonstrate to our program is most deeply appreciated!

As is the case with many of our DJs, marathon shows necessitate a slightly different approach on-air (more talk, and familiar, shorter selections), so what happens with many of us is that THOSE IDEAS start to build like a rush of water against the dam of our creative souls, so the week(s) of programming that immediately follow the annual fundraiser are typically a real kicker.

Though comment chatter was light, I know you were out there (both in the literal and figurative sense), and new material and releases dominated, from DARGAR (coming soon!) | Moloch (reissue on the Argento label) | Cold Fell | Vanyar | Barghest | Moros | Circle | Ride For Revenge | Occulted Death Stance | C. Lavender ... hope you enjoyed our mostly blackened and positively chilly fellowship.

Want to say a bit at this juncture (larger post to come) about the Rise William Rise various artists digital compilation, released only a few weeks ago, lovingly compiled by Don Sigal of Opposite Records, and featuring almost more friends of myself personally and more stars of our horrorcast than I can count (22, to be exact), the whole release designed to benefit ongoing medical expenses, tests and treatments resulting from the stroke that felled me last November. I couldn't be more humbled and grateful to all involved. Due to WFMU's norms and nonprofit regulations, my hands are tied a bit from promoting the release on air, but we did hear the diobio selection this week, and I do urge you all to check it out, as all purposes aside, it is a damn fine collection.

We heard once again the title track from IDES' Born To Run In Place, and I'm very pleased to announce that the IDES live appearance (rescheduled from December 2016 due to my health house of cards collapsing) is again ON, scheduled for My Castle of Quiet's April 11-12 broadcast (Facebook event to come.) Born To Run In Place is quite the achievement, one of the best punk albums of any year, and I'm excited to host the band for the second time and feature their great new material live and in person.

Click on the picture/screen capture up top, to stream the full archive for this week's horrorcast.

ATTACK! ... You and C. Lavender are cracking me up.

What great fun it was to have C. Lavender make a rare return as co-host, engage in some hilarious banter with me, and perhaps most importantly share some of her wonderfully concomitant musical selections with myself and Castle listeners. As with all of the guest DJs I've had on recently, a buying jag on my own part has already ensued.

C. Lavender especially makes a great co-host for the Castle, as we share many common interests in film, music and culture, and both have no need for popular culture whatsoever. We became fast friends back in the early days of the radio show (Summer '09), and I've always felt that these and other factors bring a natural, easy humor to our rapport, and I only wish that she lived closer to WFMU, so that co-hosting on her part could be an option more often. It's rare that a natural outcast such as myself, full of opinions and bile, should find the perfect foil in a radio co-host, but in Lavender I seem to have found just that. You can keep track of Lavender's artistic activities at her Web site, right here. "Meet Me at the Station, buddy."

There was only one playlist shout-out for a specific piece of music this week, a track by the excellent NY band Occultation, reminding me that I must contact the band tout suite about an on-air appearance. In the meantime, here's a live clip of Occultation by (((unartig))), featuring one of the the tracks from their absolutely excellent 3-song CDr demo.

In other, non-Castle-related matters, the Prison Tatt label presents our first showcase this week, at Brooklyn's Cameo Gallery, featuring artists that have, or are soon to have, releases on the label—The Communion, Husere Grav (you can buy HG's Myths one-sided LP right now at the Prison Tatt site—it's a gloomy, Lovecraftian winner, comprised of four tracks of great, graveyard soundtracks), Long Distance Poison (their Bog Nebula one-sider is coming soon), and Todd Pendu's Chaos*Majik, whose CD, Telestic Madness—Magickal Music is an outright masterpiece (the release has experienced some artwork-related delays, so we won't have them for sale at the show, but not to fear—it'll be well worth the wait!)

This all happens Thursday night @ 93 N. 6th St., with The Communion opening the evening at 9:30 sharp (these are real times, as we want all the artists to have the chance to play a full set.) Please note that all in-print P-Tatt titles (and as many distro items as I can carry with a somewhat f-dup hand) will be available at the show.

Hope to see you all there.

So, this means that WFMU's bright new(-ish) star Jeff Mullan hosts My Castle of Quiet this week on the radio, as I'm still working on being in two places at once. I have no idea what Jeff has planned, but I also have no doubt that it will be good. Not just anyone gets asked to fill-in for The Castle.

Thanks, Jeff!

I'll shoot out a reminder about the Prison Tatt event later this week. As always, thanks for your support, your ears, your eyes and minds. I return them, hopefully in somewhat-electrified condition....

Click on the image of that nasty, shape-shifting seductress up top, to access the playlist and audio archives of this week's horrorcast™.

TONIGHT on The Castle—The Return of C. Lavender!

Sounds ominous. Like a sequel that's going to be better than the original. She's going to rip out my esophagus, and tie off her pretty hair with it. One can hope.

One of the earliest friends and most consistent supporters of My Castle of Quiet, sound artist C. Lavender returns tonight, not to perform—though you can hear her magnificent set from the show last year at this link—but to co-host with yours truly, as she's done before, bringing her dour wit, casual charm, and some musical selections of her own for y'all Castleheads. Perhaps we'll also premiere a track from her new tape on Spectral Evidence, Meet Me at the Station. I'd say definitely. Don't miss it; C. Lav is bestowed the dubious honor of being the most complimentary co-host the show has ever known, which is to say that she digs the music (though not ALL of it), "gets" the show's reason for being and has from day one, and tends to give me scolding and praise in just about even measure.

Don't miss it; we start at the witching hour.

Also, tremendous, hearty HAILS, my goblet overrunning with mead, to all the devoted Castleheads who were able to contribute to the show during last month's WFMU "stealth" Web-only fundraiser, putting MCoQ's individual show-total at 100-fucking-percent. You've all done me proud, and I dive in this week with renewed vitality (though I always give my absolute best.)

Seriously, thanks! We'll see you tonight on the playlist.

killer babies are cool

I knew it was going to be a good night when C. Lavender showed up with disco fries. "Disco fries" are the closest New Jerseyans ever get to the Canadian delicacy of poutine (a slovenly dish with which I am unashamedly obsessed.) Even in Canada, melted mozzarella is often substituted for the fresh, white curds that make poutine special, to say nothing of the fact that Canadian gravy is generally more savory, and the fries themselves crisper and less floppy than the Jersey-diner standard fare. But I do digress.... All the talk of Vancouver on last week's Castle playlist got me a hard hankering for some sweet poutine, or its nearest approximation, so on the way home, I stopped at the famous Tick Tock Diner and got me some muthafuckin' disco fries. Exactly one week later, C. Lavender shows up to play, and immediately runs out to The Flamingo, the foulest of the foul of Jersey City eateries, and returns with—disco fries! Never, NEVER try and tell me that there is not a cosmic order to the universe, as there so very plainly IS.

Lavender's performance was possessed of the grace and consideration I always hope for in a Castle-guest set. She considered the opportunity (that being something more than a live gig, somewhat less than a recording session in earnest), the setting (a radio/music show "about" horror movies), planned a unique presentation, and delivered accordingly. Her set, as yet untitled, will post next week to WFMU's Beware of The Blog and Free Music Archive, the latter posting via my curator portal on the FMA, of which I'm quite proud. In the meantime, you can click on Jennifer's now-very-bloodstained prom dress above to stream last night's full horrorcast™ and also view the playlist and comments there.

Some love was expressed on our playlist (love being, after all, the law) not only for our guest, but also for Twin Stumps, Bee Mask and Habsyll.

C. Lavender is coming to kill you. You have about a day and a half to live.

You've heard Ms. C. Lavender sass me on the Castle program before, but that was all in good fun. Her sets tomorrow night, somewhat less so.

When she isn't lurching amps across the room with the Laundry Room Squelchers, or leaping into crowds off a Cock E.S.P. stage, or traveling great distances to play four-minute INC sets, C. Lavender is in her studio crafting the excellent tracks currently up at her myspace page.

Lavender, the multidisciplinary artist who formerly Paid you in Puke, now calls your marker with heightened brutality, all the more potent (in part due to that woman-energy stuff.)

Lavender has been an avid supporter of the My Castle of Quiet program from the very start, having initially put the word out online, and co-hosted the show with me twice in the past. She also contributed the chilling-yet-somehow-buoyant track "Rites of Winter" to the MCoQ 2010 WFMU Marathon premium CD. Now she returns to WFMU to ply her considerable sound-mashing talents. With her set-up always changing, and her sets varying in length and intensity depending upon the atmosphere of the performance space and the mood of the moment, I hope I don't have a big fuckin' mess to clean up. Haha.

I break open the doors with an impossibly huge graveyard cross @ 12 mid.
C. Lavender @ 12:30 approx.
WFMU 91.1 FM (NY/NJ)
WMFU 90.1 FM (Hudson Valley)
wfmu.org live on the Web

I'm pretty sure Lavender hates this set below, due to the unplanned radio interference, but I quite like the battle myself, and there's some wonderful sonic excitement (at about 3 min., the RFI goes down for the count.)

C. Lavender from My Castle of Quiet on Vimeo.

Upcoming Performances:

7/16 - Collab w/LDP for Rooftop Films, Brooklyn, NY
7/17 - Cryptic Carousel Fest, Division of Human Works, Brooklyn, NY

All Hail! The WFMU 2010 Marathon Begins!

The gloves are off, and the WFMU 2010 fundraiser has begun! Tune in TONIGHT @ 8 p.m. ET, when my co-host will be Sue P., our sludge/noise/hard rock queen of Thursday>Friday overnights. We'll be scouring the lands around the Castle on horseback, looking for your "donations" to the "kingdom," and, to show our gratitude to the multitudes over which this Castle governs, offering SWAG aplenty. CDs, tapes, books and movies. TG Gristleism box, anyone? How about a Bill Zebub DVD 2-pack? Not to mention my absolutely bloodletting premium CDr, featuring all-new, exclusive tracks by Liturgy, Enslaved by Owls, Grasshopper, Kevin Shields, Slasher Risk, Nuit Noire, C. Lavender, Telecult Powers, Kommissar Hjuler und Frau, Two Years on Welfare, Caldera Lakes, CM, Umberto, and Jabladav—with an arresting, creeped-out, original-art insert by Caroline Teagle.

A Castle banquet on the air! All will be rewarded!

it's nice to fall asleep to.

Ah, sleep. That good sleep, the final one, the one that lasts forever.

Commiseration with Kraut-vibes under a sheet of dirty ice. Punk rock in an unholy dance with blackened Oi!; all this, and black-metal pizza bagels—because life is full of silliness, too! Analog squeedles, hammering 2/4, and casual hobnobbing* with C Lavender—such was the stuff of last night's horrorcast.

Click on the sad, confused young mother from The Silent Scream above, both to see her wiggle at the end of that rope via animated gif, as well as to access the playlist and streaming audio of last night's Castle program.

Starring the perennial Sand, Hellvete, Grinning Death's Head, that awesome new Skullflower double CD, Haare (again!), and Fluorescent Vibes (coming to the Castle 3/31!)

*incl. tinfoil-hat jams

Quick, roll for initiative!

Last night's show was good, if I say so myself. And before you start to sing "ego, there you go"—I give substantial credit to C Lavender, who kept me from falling off the edge of the multiverse as I usually do (banging my head all the way down.)

What's with the fucking attack on my playlist of Varg Vikernes and his prison-bound presets? For shame, boys. White-supremacist, ex-con musical genius/prodigies are such an easy target!

Starring that deadly new Slither LP, that creepy/proggy Weirding Module tape, Haare, and motherfucking Physical Demon. Sorry, I'm in a sweary mood today. Click on the gas-masked fool from Lifespan above to see the playlist and hear the audio stream of last night's horrorcast.

Update 12/23 --- C Lav co-hosts

On tonight's Castle, I'll be joined by co-host and NJ-based noise musician C. Lavender. Tune in as C Lav breaks up my "ums" and "ahs" with young synapses firing quickly.

C Lav video ---

C Lavender - Industrial Pipe Dreams from c lavender on Vimeo.