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Halloween Spook-tacular!
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🎃 Spooktacular Halloween Special 🎃
In this chilling Halloween special of Friendless, host James Avramenko dives deep into the eerie world of horror movies and books, sharing his favourite spine-tingling picks and answering listener questions. From his personal "Mount Rushmore" of horror films to freshly-released gems like "The Substance" and "Oddity", James explores the genre's creativity and its platform for marginalised voices. He also highlights psychological thrillers like "I Saw the TV Glow" and Ti West’s gripping XXX trilogy.
James delves into horror literature, recommending unsettling reads from authors like Clive Barker and Eric LaRocca, and classics like "Frankenstein" and "Salem’s Lot". Whether you love imaginative narratives or are looking for your next Halloween watch or read, this episode offers something for every horror fan.
Plus, James confronts his fear of haunted houses, shares his take on WWE entrance themes, and hints at exciting future content. Tune in for a spooktacular mix of horror love and introspective discussion, perfect for the October season! 🍂💀
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Transcript
00:00:08
Speaker
Well hey there sweet peas, welcome back to Friendless. I'm your host James Avermanco and this week we're doing a Halloween spooktacular special. I'm going to talk about some of my favorite recent horror movies as well as my personal Mount Rushmore of horror. We're going to look at both movies and books.
00:00:29
Speaker
And then to top it off, I've got a couple Halloween themed listener questions to get to. It's gonna be a blast, so let's get to it, lean back, get comfy, sector volume at a reasonable level, and enjoy my spooktacular special here on Friendless!
00:00:47
Speaker
Long time listeners of the show as well as personal friends of mine will know Halloween and is my favorite time of year. I absolutely love all things horror. I love Ookie Spooky and October is just such a perfect month for me emotionally. It's rainy. It's dark. Everybody's inside. Nobody wants to socialize. It's perfect. I love it.
00:01:12
Speaker
One of my favorite things to do when the weather turns like this is to curl up on the couch and do a little double feature of um movies. um And this year, 2024, has been a really solid year for horror movies.
00:01:28
Speaker
um The genre as a whole tends to be a little bit of a, um what would you call it, almost like a forerunner of trends in the rest of the industry and it's really exciting to see so much independent horror and so much um um innovation and creativity coming out of the genre. One thing I've always loved about just genre films in general but horror especially is that They are often the realm of the most creative and the most exciting voices. They're often ah queer voices, marginalized voices, um types of artists who aren't necessarily going to be seen in the sort of traditional mainstream ah movie realm, ah get to express themselves and and express themselves incredibly um bravely and and openly and in just such exciting new ways.
00:02:21
Speaker
through horror. I've always found personally that horror gets a really bad rap socially. you know People think that we're we're watching these movies or or people are creating these movies because they're sick. you know they're theyre They're bad people. They're twisted. Who would want to watch movies about horror?
00:02:38
Speaker
ah you know but murder and mayhem and all these things. And and honestly, you know to a degree, they're right. um I was having a really interesting conversation with a friend the other day about how it is a type of privilege to get to explore these themes from a place of safety. It's it's a privilege to be able to watch you know mayhem and and gore um from a comfortable position, from a place of safety, from a place of expression.
00:03:07
Speaker
when there are so many places in the world right now where that is a literal day-to-day experience. And I agree with that statement ah wholeheartedly. At the same time, too, I do find that these expressions and these explorations are really helpful for understanding ourselves. You know, um life is... a horror show for most of us. And whether that is literal or just emotional, psychological, um most of our lives are spent being traumatized and then dealing with that trauma for the remainder of our lives.
00:03:49
Speaker
one thing I always have to kind of laugh about whenever I think about the idea of you know what kind of horror character I would be I wouldn't be one who would want to survive is is how I always see it like if I were you know in a slasher movie or if I was in a you know ah alien movie or something like that I wouldn't want to survive because having to carry the knowledge that that thing exists in the world would be way too much for me to bear I already have a hard enough time just getting through my day knowing what I know about the world let alone if I was like oh and also Michael Myers is out there you know still it is an incredibly fun genre I'm obsessed with it um and ah lately I have had the ah the opportunity to watch a lot of the new films that have been coming out and so many of them have been
00:04:41
Speaker
Really really impressive and just ah um you know I don't know if they're all gonna be like classics that I'll go back to for the rest of my life But there are a couple that have been incredible Standouts that I think everybody if you are into it and also if you can handle some gore um Are well well worth your your watch um The very first one I wanted to start with is the substance Oh my god, this fucking movie. um I'm not somebody who has ever been very into body horror. I saw um the fly when I was a kid, like way too young, and it completely fucked me up. The one with like Jeff Goldblum and all that.
00:05:22
Speaker
and Ever since then I have been really really reluctant to watch body horror um I'm not somebody who likes saw What was the other one hostile? I don't like those kinds of movies very much um So I was tentative watching the substance, but I had heard such good things that I loved Demi Moore so much and I've also ah had just like a very inappropriate crush on Margaret Qualey ever since seeing her in that like it was like some kind of like Dior commercial or something like that where she just like danced around this palace it's unbelievable um I remember watching that on repeat for for weeks um but so you know those two actors together I i wasn't gonna be able to miss it and I'm so so glad I did watch it it's
00:06:11
Speaker
it's um it's so hard to describe, it's so hard to explain, it's just an utter mindfuck. The allegory that it's playing with about the objectification of ah women's bodies, um you know it's it's um very direct, it's very clear, but it doesn't come across as preachy and it doesn't come across as Despite it being you know borderline on the nose, it doesn't come across as um oh wow maybe oversimplified is is the word I'm looking for. like for instance i think it's easier for me to give an example like um Blink Twice was another movie that came out this year. and
00:06:52
Speaker
that movie essentially boils down to like ah assault bad and but the moral of it kind of turns into the only way to fix that is to um just be the one in power um and and I don't know if I really like the the the sort of the lesson of that movie whereas in the substance um Despite it being very direct about the metaphor, the the resolution of it and the sort of degradation of the body, um I found to be much more interesting in terms of the sort of the thoughts that the movie leaves you with at the end.
00:07:29
Speaker
i Can't recommend it highly enough, but it does come with a massive massive content warning because it is Goree and you don't really expect it the way that the movie sets itself up and then the way it gets to the horror um is very progressive and and when it finally happens you're like oh fuck but I I watched it by myself ah in my living room and I was screaming throughout, just having an absolute blast. I cannot recommend it highly enough. The other one that I watched recently with some friends and we had an absolute blast with was Oddity. This one is an Irish movie that I had never heard of, we just threw on. We were doing a little doubleheader. The first movie we watched that night was The Changeling, which is a classic from the 80s.
00:08:25
Speaker
it was actually i don't know if i would call it the first horror movie i ever watched but it was the first horror movie that truly fucked me up as a child another one of those movies i i just should not have seen when i saw it i was like eight And um it's it's you know if it really messed me up as a kid. As an adult, ah going back to it, it's awesome. Super fun movie, ghost movie. But um Oddity was the second one we watched that night.
00:08:57
Speaker
And it's one of those movies that, you know, I went in completely blind, no idea what it was about. And I think that's the best way to experience it. um It's that the setup is a woman is murdered a year later, her twin sister returns to the home to investigate let's call it um and and spooky things happen um it's a it's a lot of fun you know it really plays into the name itself oddity it's not just a ghost story it's it brings in all kinds of different things there's golems there's um ah there's there's
00:09:38
Speaker
There's cursed objects, there's telepathy, there's but all kinds of fun stuff. There's twists, turns, serial killers. um and And yeah, it's just a blast. It was another one that really fun to watch in a group. um that's That's I think one of the best experiences is watching a great horror movie with a group of people. Just the tension, the kind of nervous giggles, the surprises, the shocks, how people are gonna react to it. it's It's a ton of fun.
00:10:06
Speaker
um I obviously, I watch most of my movies alone, but um if you can see it with a group, you'll have an absolute blast. I've got two other the recommendations before I get into my my Mount Rushmore, but um one is, um I saw the TV glow, and this was a movie that I still can't decide what I think of it. It was a really,
00:10:32
Speaker
it's It's kind of more psychological. It's very interior. It's very quiet. It's kind of, if you're not sucked into it, it's a little dull at times, to be completely honest. But I found the metaphor behind it, the idea of metamorphoses and being trapped within a body that you don't want. um It was written and directed by a trance artist, ah Jane Schoenberg. i I'm sure I just absolutely butchered that.
00:11:01
Speaker
But it it plays with a lot of themes and concepts around, you know, who you are, who you're trapped within, and and how do you find yourself in in a world that ah you don't feel like yourself within. and um Fred Durst is in it in an absolutely ah perfect casting. um There's lots that plays around with sort of like the It's not that I'm hesitant to call it good. I think it's a great movie. I just think it's not necessarily going to be everybody's cup of tea. It's a very differently paced movie. It's very contemplative. It's very interior. But I found myself absolutely late nineties transfixed early two thousands of nostalgia and the sort of tainting tainting of our memories by it.
00:11:58
Speaker
and um I actually went on to watch another one of the director's films, um ah ah We're All Going to the World's Fair, which is another really quiet contemplative interior movie, but um just beautifully done, really inspiring. I also find myself, I think one of the things I find most exciting about horror movies in general, but indie horror is, I take a lot of inspiration from it and I take a lot of um encouragement from it, you know, seeing what is possible on these like shoestring budgets, which is a little bit of tenacity and ingenuity and some passion. um And it really, it gives me, ah I guess, you know, your courage to continue writing, to continue creating, continue trying out my own visions and my own ideas.
00:12:47
Speaker
but yeah i saw the tv glow followed up do a little double bill with we're all going to the world's fair have a really quiet interior traumatized night it's uh yeah it'll be a lot of fun for you and the the last recommendation um is actually kind of okay so that the most recent of the trilogy is maxine that came out but what i would actually recommend is pearl so there's a trilogy of horror movies that have come out from tie west and uh... it started with uh... triple x and then there was a sort of sequel prequel pearl which is in my opinion the best of the three and then this year the trilogy was closed out with maxine uh... it it it follows uh... reoccurring characters throughout throughout the three. um And and it's again, it's one of those movies that's, you know, it's fun to go in blind. I think for a long time, for years, I used to kind of prep myself with horror movies. I would often, because I was really anxious around them, I was really scared of like, what if there's going to be unexpected types of horror that I'm not ready for? What if I'm not going to be able to handle it? So I would do things like,
00:13:55
Speaker
you know i'd read synopses i would watch spoilers i would watch you know one of my favorite youtube channels is um dead meat they do kill counts and so i would watch their videos to sort of gauge if i could handle the movie um but lately i've been you know i've been real brave i've been a big brave boy
00:14:14
Speaker
and And I've just been going in blind and it's been so much more fun to to you know kind of rock with the surprises. and yeah triple x is It's it's a the very classic set up. It's a group of porn directors, a porn director and his cast, and they have rented a farm.
00:14:34
Speaker
to film their latest movie, and it turns out that there are killers on the loose. Pearl follows um one of those characters in their youth, and then Maxine picks up with one of the survivors of the first movie, now trying to make it in Hollywood. um That's all the setup you're gonna need. The rest is is just real fun. um They do get better with every iteration, but Pearl, ooh, Pearl is a Hell of a movie. So those are all the the the latest horror that I've checked out. But something I've been thinking a lot about, I'm not somebody who tends to really rank things. um I try my best not to make like, best of, worst of, black and... you know big I find that those kinds of listings can lead us to these sort of black and white
00:15:26
Speaker
thoughts and they can make us feel like we have to defend um you know why this is better or why this is worse things like that um so I've never really been all that interested in it but I've been listening to a lot of movie podcasts lately and they've been doing all these different kind of rankings and And I got thinking about my own. um you know mine you know My favorite movie at any given time is gonna be very fluid. It's gonna fluctuate year to year, month to month, day to day. um But I sat down and I thought about the sort of Mount Rushmore of horror movies for me. The movies that I'm always coming back to throughout the years. i'm always you know I've continued to think about. They've continued to kind of impact me.
00:16:07
Speaker
um but I hate using the Mount Rushmore image, but there's no like Canadian equivalent. um so so But four feels like a good one, because five feels overweighted, three doesn't feel like enough, so four feels like a really, really nice little kind of bridge in the middle. but um the the these don't These aren't in any particular order of best worst, but the the first one is going to be Silence of the Lambs. um I am an utter sicko in that Silence of the Lambs is a movie that I will put on as a comfort watch. um It is a movie I can always have on, I can always find something new in, I can always enjoy myself.
00:16:48
Speaker
um I've seen it so many times. I know, you know, I know exactly what's gonna happen, but I'll still forget sometimes and I'll be like, oh yeah, right, this is gonna, you know, and it's just, for my money, it is a perfect movie. Just the structure, the pace, everything about it, the twists, the turns, the, you know, the build-up, the anticipation of a Hand of Electors escape, all that is just a blast. Jodie Foster is iconic.
00:17:17
Speaker
um And it's just it's a it's ah it's just a great movie, it's it's a great time. um Number two is Zodiac. um That is a movie that to this day disturbs me. um the the so The actual brutality that they show in it is, some of those scenes, since my first viewing of it, have stayed with me, especially that the lakeside killing is just like, it's It's a lot and and I what I appreciate about that movie is it doesn't glamorize anything it doesn't ah Make the serial killer ah out to be any kind of anything to aspire to he's just he's a fucking loser who is a Piece of shit and it's depicted as such and I really appreciate that framing
00:18:05
Speaker
ah Number three is is a bit of a toss-up between Midsummer and Hereditary. um I'm gonna go with Midsummer because it's the one I've watched more than the two. um I think you could probably make a pretty good argument that Hereditary is a stronger movie, but I think a daylight horror is something that always really intrigues me, so I love that Midsummer is so bright and colorful and vibrant, but then it's just horrific. um I really like that. um I think Toni Collette from from Hereditary is one of the great Oscar robberies of all time. The fact that she wasn't even nominated, let alone just swept the awards category that year, is beyond
00:18:54
Speaker
ah shameful, in my opinion. um but But the same could be said for for Florence Pugh and in Midsomer. I think she's fucking incredible in it. um ah yeah you know And I think one thing that I love, especially about Midsomer, but I think about both, is that it it's very um female perspective-oriented. It really dispels the traditional male gaze of of horror movies.
00:19:20
Speaker
um And you get to see some flopping dong just running wild and terrified. and Who doesn't love that? And then lastly, again, I'm cheating. I admit it. I'm technically talking about six movies, but they're just their neck and neck for me. The other one is going to be either Event Horizon or the Blair Witch Project.
00:19:40
Speaker
um I think if I'm gonna lean towards Blair Witch, you have to pair it with the ah the Curse of the Blair Witch, which is the the documentary footage that they created around Birketsville, and there's much more like interviews of the people in town, there's much more history. i a total sucker for lore so i really love that kind of stuff Blair Witch Project is one of the first movies i can see i can remember seeing in theaters and just being utterly glued to my seat terrified the entire time i got to see it in like a rickety old theater in Calgary right when it came out they were doing a late night run and i again way too young but i was there and i didn't sleep for weeks
00:20:22
Speaker
um so I just I love that movie it is iconic and those actors should have been paid they were they were they deserve so much better than the way they were treated after um on the other side event horizon is just like it's ah haunted house in space and who who doesn't love space movies and who doesn't love haunted house movies you know it's like two really fun jal or sandwich together plus you get Lawrence Fishburne and my daddy Sam Neill it's just it is um just a mash and the other of so many things I love and ah plus really weird hell set orgies who doesn't love that
00:21:02
Speaker
So that is my Mount Rushmore plus addendum cheating extras. We're looking at Science and Lambs, Zodiac, Midsummer, Event Horizon with little asterixes beside Hereditary and the Blair Witch Project.
00:21:17
Speaker
Now, the other side, I wanted to talk a little bit. I'm not going to go quite as deep with it, but um um horror books are, again, some of my favorite. ah Horror in literature is such a fun experience because I find when it's written well, it's exponentially scarier than anything you could ever film because you're imagining it all, right? So so you can make the horror as awful as you want it to be. um And I find that just so much more fun.
00:21:45
Speaker
um Eric LaRocca is somebody who I've been reading a lot of the last couple years and I will recommend anything that they write. ah But um the one that I just recently ah ah read and absolutely loved is Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. It is...
00:22:06
Speaker
really short but harrowing. um he just o He can really get under your skin and just dig in, um um but he's also like really readable. yeah You can really blast through one of his books so it doesn't feel like a huge commitment.
00:22:23
Speaker
um On the other side, ah Cold Heart Canyon by Clive Barker, um who, if you're familiar, he he wrote Hellraiser or whatever i the Telltale Heart or something. I can't remember what that... There was ah there was a book that got turned into Hellraiser, um but Cold Heart Canyon is a book that I read over pandemic and it has stuck with me. it's about ghosts and old Hollywood and trauma and and exploit expectation and it's just it's ah it's a hell of a read it gets a little wonky near the end but but it's a really real roller coaster of an experience
00:23:04
Speaker
um An author who I have an ongoing love-hate relationship with is Brett Easton Ellis. I had a couple years where I was absolutely obsessed with him and then he, as a person, I started disagreeing with and what he was putting out in the world, just on his podcast and just the way he was showing up. I i appreciated his kind of out of the box thinking, but I didn't necessarily appreciate how he was framing things. um But I absolutely love his writing. I think he's one of the most incredible modern writers. American Psycho is devastating, and but also kind of boring. um The one that I really recommend, though, is Lunar Park.
00:23:49
Speaker
um This is a book where he sets himself as the narrator, as the the protagonist of the book, and it's about him kind of falling into madness. And just the depictions of addiction and the depictions of anxiety and paranoia um are, I think, Lunar Park is probably the best example of his style of writing. um it took me It actually took me a couple of years to finish that book. I kept on Stopping because it's really scary at times and then I would restart it You know a year later and then I would get to the same part and just be like oh I can't do it and and Finally years later. I i pushed through and I finished it and it is well well worth it um you know if you can kind of swallow his Personal shit header e I think he's an incredible talent and yeah lunar park is definitely the one that's worth worth checking out and I haven't really read any like modern or like current horror books. I tried reading ah Cuckoo or Cuckoo by um ah Gretchen Felker Martin. She wrote ah Manhunt a couple years ago. which i you know I thought was good um and I tried reading cuckoo or cuckoo and it's a great setup and I just found myself kind of bored by it if I'm being completely honest I just I didn't super dig the characters but the premise is really really interesting so I am gonna try and go back to it
00:25:19
Speaker
But, um you know, in in tandem with the Mount Rushmore movies, I was thinking of what were the books that have stuck with me longest? What are the ones that have really, really fucked me up throughout the years? um And these ones are pretty, they're a lot more clear cut for me. ah Number one is Salem's Lot. I think hands down that is the scariest Stephen King book ever written.
00:25:39
Speaker
um Now, granted, I haven't read all of his books, but of the ones that I've read, Salem's Lot stuck with me. um you know i I was reading it while I was living in a hundred plus year old house, and ah the scenes of like the little boy vampire coming to the window and tapping and giggling, just I could see that happening in my bedroom, and so it really fucked me up.
00:26:01
Speaker
um The Haunting of Hill House, ah while it isn't by modern standards the scariest book, it is a book that has continued to stick with it me because of its ambiguity. I think something I love so much about Shirley Jackson in general is that um While you're reading her books, you're not necessarily out and out terrified, but there's just this tension in everything she writes um that I think is best exemplified in Hill House. um The other one, I think it's called We've Always Lived on the Hill, something like that. That's another one that really stuck with me a lot, but Hill House is the one that really got me into her writing and I think is just an absolute classic.
00:26:45
Speaker
um continuing on the thread of classics, i add another cheat, but um Frankenstein and Dracula, both. They're classics for a reason. um Again, not necessarily out-and-out scary, but um the the style, the epistolic style of the the letters and the way that the story's told and just um the way that the plot unfolds I think, especially for Frankenstein, I would definitely rank it preferable to Dracula, but I think both are well worth the read. If you haven't read the original books, but you've you know watched some iteration of the movies, or are familiar with the characters, whatever, I think they're really, really worth going back and checking out. um Because you can see what what elements have been picked up in almost all iterations, what elements have never been used that I wish badly they would bring back.
00:27:37
Speaker
um but But Frankenstein, yeah, it's ah that's ah that's a wild, wild read. And lastly, this is one that I um was hesitant to recommend because I've never finished it because, quite frankly, I've been too scared, um which is House of Leaves by Marc Danielewski. This is a book that actually terrified me as I was reading it. um it's I can't describe it to you. I have no idea how to explain what it is. It's almost like reading a haunted textbook in a way, which was another element of why I didn't finish it because there's so many addendums and asterisks and appendices and footnotes and all these things that it's kind of a bit of a chore to read. But the the actual narrative within the center of the book is terrifying.
00:28:31
Speaker
um and And it's one of the most acute sensations of horror that I've ever felt as I was reading that book, just literally feeling my body tense up in my like vision tunnel and my like just like actual authentic fear building in my body as I was reading it. I've never truly experienced that reading any other book other than House of Leaves. And because of that, I've never finished it. So I highly recommend it, but be brave.
00:29:02
Speaker
So those are all my recommendations for you, movies, books. If you've got a favorite, let me know. um There's nothing more fun in October than curling up, watching a couple movies, and then just continuing the horror, getting into bed, and reading a real scary book just to really keep the anxiety going. People who say that they relax watching true crime TV shows or listening to true crime podcasts, they're cowards, rookie numbers if you're only listening to true crime.
00:29:30
Speaker
Be brave and really get into the the thick of the horror genre. I've got a couple quick listener questions that I wanted to get to this week. um Next week, I've got an interview booked with a guest that I'm so excited about. I can't believe I managed to book her, but because of that, I'm rearranging things, so we're going to do listener questions this this week instead. um And we've only got a couple, but they're a ton of fun. The first one, ah building off of a ah TikTok that I put out recently, I think they ask, without generic or sterile terms for mental health,
00:30:04
Speaker
how is your mental health this week? And I really appreciate that question. It's spooky. A spooky question about how's my brain.
00:30:17
Speaker
i yeah I posted to TikTok recently that was saying i'm I'm no longer using traditional terms for mental health. Instead, I'm equating it to whatever movie I'm watching that day. so For instance, that day, ah I was in the state where I was watching the substance at 9 AM, m um which you know you can interpret however you like, mentally, healthily. um Currently, this week, I would say I am let's call it i am and mentally in a Friday the 13th marathon.
00:30:53
Speaker
Because every time I think I've solved the problem, Jason just keeps on popping back up. Newer and gorier and more hockey masked than ever.
00:31:05
Speaker
Thank you for the question. This is the the most Halloween-y, Halloween-er, Halloween-esque themed question. Because it's Scary Month, what haunted house theme do you find scariest? And they ask, they give a few examples. Serial killers, clowns, the most awkward moments of your life revisited, constant jump scares, a mere maze of unrelenting tense music, bodily juices,
00:31:33
Speaker
um I I love the OK so haunted houses have never really been for me I've never been a much of a rides person I've never been a roller coaster rider um I like horror because you can sit in your safe little nest and enjoy yourself and you know all the oaks and the spooks are on the screen but you're protected Whereas you know roller coasters haunted houses you're you're up in them guts of the thing um So really haunted houses are just always gonna be scary for me um ah For anyone from Calgary ah When I was growing up there was a place called Callaway Park and they had this absolutely rickety terrible I'm sure if I went back to it now it would be just like the most
00:32:21
Speaker
Barebones garbage, but the haunted house when I was a child was the scariest place on earth um Teenagers would always hide in there and like jump out at you and yell and and you know be generally up to no good um so so you know the initial thought is if it was just the Callaway Park haunted house that would be scary enough for me and But I think if I you know as an adult in my brain the thing that I would want to be walking around in least um Would be yeah something like those you know those fright nights where like they have people actively allowed to touch you and like do things to you, I think ah strangers dressed up as clowns who are allowed to Touch and push you I think that is my idea of hell also
00:33:13
Speaker
you know I've just spent a half hour extolling the virtues of horror, but I do think that people who act in those Friday Night 100 houses, I think they are dangerous, and I think they they are unwell, and I think that they should all undergo some very serious therapy, because I don't know what's fun about that.
00:33:39
Speaker
Although, you know, it's funny, the other side of my brain is like, I love scary movies, but I don't understand people who like scaring other people. I used to know this guy who used to like love scaring his partner. He used to like hide and like jump out and scare her. And I just like, I never understood that. I always thought it was so weird and mean. Like it was just mean-spirited.
00:34:06
Speaker
um So the the whole sort of concepts behind that I've just yeah it's a funny opposite side of what I've been you know ah ah praising for for this whole episode but but yeah I think you know we contain multitudes.
00:34:25
Speaker
Last question of the week is a great one. What is your favorite w WWE entrance theme? And look, that is a big question. um That's not a simple one. um And as somebody who is neurodivergent, I'm not capable of just giving a clear cut answer. I mean, Jesus Christ, I've spent a half hour being like, I like this, but also this.
00:34:46
Speaker
um Now, okay, there's a couple arguments to be made. I think obviously one of the most iconic is going to be something like Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, you know, any of these theme songs that like the so the first note, you're like, yep, I know exactly who who that is. That's that's the mark of a great theme song.
00:35:05
Speaker
um but there is this one it's a deeper cut especially for people who like aren't current fans there's this guy Bobby rude who has this theme song glorious and it just like it's unbelievable it literally is just a choir singing like You know, and it it just it's the greatest. It just like it fills me with so much joy and and it just um it's just it's a great time. um He's not the best wrestler. ah But that theme song. My God. There was also this like really deep cut one that I love.
00:35:42
Speaker
There used to be this this couple, Mike and Maria Kanellis, and they used to have this song called something like True Love or The Greatest Love, and it was like ah kind of like a hair metal power ballad. It was like, the greatest love.
00:35:57
Speaker
And that was another one that ah the the whole gimmick that they had lasted maybe two weeks. But that theme song has stuck in my brain for 10 years. And I just I love it with my whole heart. I'm terrified of like somehow getting copyrighted or sued or something. So I'm not going to play those in the episode, but I am going to link them in the show notes. So if you want to listen to those theme songs, go to the go to the ah show notes and and listen, because they are an absolute blast.
00:36:27
Speaker
Producing theme songs. It's what an incredible art form um That that comes out of that, you know, it's like you have to you have to get that initial pop so you have to have that first note where people hear it and they're like I know exactly who this is and then you have to maintain the energy of the wrestler like coming through the curtain and coming down the ramp and then doing their little poses and their schmooze in the ring and And so it's it's such a beautiful, intricate dance that comes out of theme songs. I really feel like it is a very, very underappreciated type of composition or art. And it kind of makes me want to think more about it, maybe do a little bit of writing about it, because it's a really fun little subgenre of music.
00:37:18
Speaker
But that is gonna do it for me this week. Just keeping it light, keeping it easy, keeping it brief. I have a fantastic guest lined up for next week. There was some reshuffling with some of the schedules, so that's why I've had to do a few more solo episodes than I had initially planned. But I hope you enjoyed it. It's a lot of fun. I love talking horror movies. If you want to hear more about that stuff, let me know. I will talk much more in depth any time you request. But Yeah, that's gonna do it. I don't really have anything else to add here as always check out the sub stack I am getting back in the groove of posting stuff This week and this month in general I had a couple kind of mental roadblocks, but I am getting back into it So check that out the links are in the show notes sign up. It's free. It's a ton of fun but that
00:38:07
Speaker
is really all I've got to say so you know what I'm just gonna leave it here so I hope you have yourselves a wonderful week and I hope to catch you back here next week with a brand new episode but as always I'm not gonna worry about that right now and neither should you because that is then and this is now so for now I'll just say I love you and I wish you well fun and safety and a few spooky sweeties