“Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast; for it is the number of a man; and his number is 666.”

Welcome one and all to Off The Hook, I’m Brandon, your curator of all things horror. My small corner of the TerrorScene universe is going to be very free and loose. Top ten lists, movie reviews, music reviews, books, websites, you name it! Nothing is off the table here.

With this being the first edition of OTH, I thought I’d take a little time to introduce myself to the masses. What a better way to eviscerate my soft underbelly for all to see than a few short top 3 lists of some of my favorite things? I could go into a long monologue about my personal life, my education, etc, but no one wants to hear that nonsense. Let’s just say that I’m a horror freak that had the joy and honor of seeing both Jaws and The Exorcist in theatres (not on their original run, im not THAT old...), but is also rooted in the deep dark underground. Let’s get to chopping up those lists, shall we?

Slashers

-Daniel Robataille (Candyman)

-Leatherface (Texas Chainsaw Massacre)

-The Photographer (Murder-Set-Pieces)

Let us remember way back to the year of 1993. The siege on Waco, Brandon Lee gets killed filming the Crow, Prince changes his name to a symbol, and the parents of your new friend and narrator rent a new release in the horror section of Blockbuster Video called Candyman. Now being a young know-it-all that can handle anything, I decide that I’m going to watch this new video. Let’s just say that I made it through right until the first large murder scene. I realize now that it was likely the way the scene was shot, but holy hell was that scary. Daniel Robataille, or as many know him, Candyman, has left quite an imprint on me to this day. Most likely one of the main reasons I collect meat hooks and also the name of this column.  

Horror Directors

-Fred Vogel (August Underground series, Redsin Tower)

-Andrey Iskanov (Visions of Suffering, Philosophy of a Knife)

-Andreas Schnaas (Violent Shit series, Anthropophagus 2000)

Anyone who was around in the early days of the internet will remember AOL chatrooms and more specifically tape trading. I was very active in these, amassing a nice collection of very hard to find movies for the time, like Let’s Scare Jessica to Death or Darkness. One of the new users that popped up repeatedly boasted about a large collection of European splatter films. At this point, I’ve only really heard of these forbidden gems from the odd Angelfire or Geocities pages that are in broken english at best. I engage the user and I find out he’s from Brooklyn. “Hey! That’s less than an hour away!” I think, and arrange a meet up with the user.

We meet up about a week later. We exchange pleasantries, and discuss a bit about the films that he chose for me. Since I knew nothing about these, I asked him to just “give me something sick.” And did he ever. He handed me a tape with Ostermontag and Violent Shit 1&2. I couldn’t get enough of Violent Shit 2. It was depraved. It was brutal. It was gory. And holy hell was it CHEESY! With that, one might say my love of underground films bloomed like a flower of flesh and blood that day.    

Horror Genres

-Slasher

-Cannibal

-Gore

Blood. Guts. Vomit. Show it to me. All of it. Pseudo-Snuff, Ultraviolence, anything. I want to see it all. The more the better. Remember, it’s just a movie, RIGHT?!?!?

Horror Video Games

-Silent Hill 4

-The Suffering

-Castlevania 2

This was probably the hardest one for me to pick my top 3. There are so many horror games out there through the years that have really had an impact on me that I’ll probably do an article on horror video games at some point. That’s the only way I could truly do this topic justice. The games I listed all had a common thread to me, which is the ability of being able to drive you absolutely insane while playing. And if you don’t see how Castlevania 2 fits into that, you also won’t tic when hearing the words RED CRYSTAL.

Horror (themed) Music

-The Misfits

-Cannibal Corpse

-Amigo the Devil

If you’re gonna scream, scream with me in the attic filled with foul odors while I pried his kneecaps up like the lid from a can of paint. Hey, that kinda worked! Horror-core, Murderfolk, whatever you want to call it, its for me. This is the topic nearest and dearest to me. I am an avid vinyl collector, amassing quite a collection of all genres of music, most of which consist of metal and punk. I’ve had the opportunity to meet a few of my favorite artists, which I can happily say they were all way cooler than I could have ever expected. Especially Danny Kiranos, professionally known as Amigo the Devil. Go check out a show. Like what you see? Hang out for a bit after. Chances are you’ll be able to tell the man what you thought of his show right to his face.  

Well, if you’ve made it this far, I guess we may have a few things in common. Maybe you think I’m crazy and my picks are ridiculous. I’ll never know unless you tell me! What topic do you want to see me brutalize? I’ll begin with one on my next column that we all have had in our lifetime, and each of them is most likely unique in their own way. At the end of each column, I will give a hint to the topic of the next in the form of a movie quote. Here’s your clue:

Like Ms Baylock told Damien Thorne in The Omen, “Have no fear, little one... I am here to protect thee.” Til next time...

-V

Article I (July)

archives

Article II (August)