The Fellowship of Horror

I remember right around this time in 2019, I was beginning to create a calendar for all of 2020. Projects, tour dates, recording schedules, new projects, new ideas and all kinds of plans. We all know how that went. 2020 happened and now that it’s almost over, looking back, I’ve done the best that I can. I have followed the rules, stayed as safe as possible and made the most of the time that I’ve been given.

I’ve been very busy. By the day, as my Bruce Wayne type Avatar, I’ve been going to work or at least working from home a lot of the time, attending to my school work and being a part of an internship. That shall put me through to complete my Bachelors in Social Work by the end of this year. I’m talking about next month. I understand what senioritis means. I want to be done and I am just cruising towards the end. When it is all said and done and there is no more school to be had-at least for a WHILE- I shall find myself with a LOT more free time. For this, I am SO STOKED! I am quite READY to be DONE!

By the Dark of the night, I am still my own Batman and being a part of certain things that Define the creature that I am. There have been a lot of projects and creative Endeavors put on hold due to the pandemic and the crap show that we have been given this year, but that does not mean there has not been a lot going on. It just doesn’t seem as important as it used to, what with so many people dying and so much dissonance within our world. In one way or another, it’s always been that way, but 2020 needs no further introduction to its vile nature.

The Two Terrors

What the hell has been going on ALL YEAR? Well, in no particular order, I have been working (ever so slowly) on a few different works of the written word. Under my daytime name of David Mark Stashko, I have been creeping away at little books called The Anomaly-a strange sci fi type of thing, A Screamin’ Splatterpalooza-a rock and roll horror show that is a cross breed with Rocky Horror, Scooby Doo and the X Files…this is meant to be a book to begin with, but it deserves a movie, for sure, and that will happen. Oh, yes it will….from the darker side of my horror resume, I am chipping away at another grotesque edition of my crazy brain world. This one does not have a title, just yet, but it is brewing..and it is a twisted sicky.

Musically, I have made some David creations, which can be found if one simply looks, but it is not the main focus. It happens when my heart directs me. Such as the musical works of Lucifer, but that is a different story. Lucifer has been working hard on the Cryptozoology record by Lords of October-that is, going over what we began to do earlier in the year and seeing what kind of updates I can bring to the table. We will get more to that once we are best able to gather and not take risks with this virus. I mean, we have a LOT of this record working together. But we have to get back into it when we can. In the meanwhile, I came up with another 5 song grip of tunes for LORDS that I will work on with my beloved Uncle Salem and family. I thought it might be cool to do a concept of something that has to do with Michigan ghost stories. Something like that. Tribute to our home state. I have outlines of songs already, but that won’t happen before Cryptozoology. In addition to that, we wanna do some re-workings of classic Halloween songs, acoustic songs, all kinds of ideas. Not only that, I have been wanting-for a long while-to create various events throughout the year that highlight some of the most wonderfully wicked and spooky aspects of our planet…and have Lords perform at each one! haha. How self serving. Still, no public type events right now. Just. Gotta. Be. Safe. So, more music videos. Did you see the Annabel Lee lyric video? My wife put that together. We also put out a cheap ass video for Sci Fi Double feature from the last record…and Uncle Salem is putting one together for HOUSE by the CEMETERY, also from the HAUNTING at BECKWITH COURT.

More music? Why, yes, please.

THE ELDER SIGN, by Lucifer Fulci, is almost done. I have released 4 songs out of 5 already, and currently working on a music video for FORMLESS, with special guest vocals by Uncle Salem, himself! I love this album. So much great guitar work from Matt Namzor. Love this one. I am hoping to get some vinyl of this one, but we will see what we can do there. I have another 5 songs or so for another one, which might be another different avenue of hard rock and metal. I love to mix it up, but I also really want to re-do a lot of the tunes from my earlier records as Lucifer. The production sucks ass on several of them! Gross! I love the songs, tho, and I think they deserve a new life. We shall see. Working along with that.

Lastly, GOBLINSPAWN, my not so subtle musical project inspired by the works of GOBLIN, John Carpenter, ZOMBI, Fabio Frizzi and more, will be releasing another record. I have been working on music for this, too, thruout 2020, but I simply cannot begin one thing fully without finishing other stuff. I will probably get to working on this one after the last Lucifer song is posted. I know that I can do all the GOBLINSPAWN music on my own, socially distant and safe, so that seems to be the reasonable thing to do. Funny, too, about this project…I am taking no effort to really promote it, it is not available anywhere except on Soundcloud for now, but it keeps getting more and more fans. I dig it. It is just so much fun to make music that I love, inspired by the horror movies that I love. I might get more official with it later, but for now, I am stoked to see so many people that are into it. Thanks!

The Return of the Thing

Ah, yes, the ending of the trilogy of words here. Time to wrap it up, eh?

Short films. Speaking engagements. Podcasts. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I began a couple of those this year, too. Now it is official, EVERYONE has a fucken podcast! haha. I LOVE LUCIFER is a LOT of fun to do. I have only done a couple and I will do more, but hell yeah, what is better than hearing myself speak? Hearing others speak, for sure! I did another one called Light, Darkness and Dreamscapes, too. My wife joins me on that one and we have had a lot of fun exploring weird locations and we even interviewed the art legend Stephen Bissette. Only done a few so far, but it did happen in 2020.

A LOT happened in 2020, to be sure, but like I said before, the creative stuff, while important for us ALL to continue to do, just did not seem as important or relevant with so much true horror happening all around us. There are a few sparks of hope that have been shining through as of late, but it remains to be seen. One day at a time. I do have hope. And I have a lot of faith that everything happens for a reason. In fact, when I think of how things happen or why, I always seem to be taken away much further than what seems so obvious. We are much more than what we are taught. There is so much more happening than just waking up, watching the news and living on this planet. Remember to think. What are we? Floating around on this giant, living space ball in the middle of eternal darkness. There is light at the end of many warp tunnels. It all just so happens to be right in front of us. Do you see it?

The light of the universe. It lives in all of us.