Blood, Death, Satan & Metal

Time for another round of haunting, jamming black metal and dungeon synth in its physical form. And why tapes? Well, they look kinda cool in their own aesthetic way, they make a ka-chunk in the machine, and some of them are literally hand-dubbed and decorated by the musicians or indie label dudes. They have sort of a grungy quality to the sound (especially if your machine makes a tape hiss). A worthy addition to your table if you like to physically DJ the soundtrack to a session. Warduke- Module 1 Dungeon Chip Music? Yup. It takes the point-and-click or text-based vibes of classic DS and says "But what if Zelda?", and it works. Despite high recommendations for Warduke's discography across the board, only Module 1 seems to be available in physical form. Comes in this goofy clamshell, so you could put it on the bookshelf instead of the tape box. Sadly, there is no module within. You can either write a letter about it, or go to heimatderkatastrophe for another tape, since ...

Back with a second round of lo-fi, small batch Satanry in cassette form. You know the drill, it sounds kinda like shit (or "textured") in its production, so buy it in physical-sounds-like-shit form. Direct links to bandcamps, you can buy most of these from Out of Season , who have a fantastic selection of the black metal and dungeon synth we all love. Blood Magic- Goetic Blood Spells Murky, raw black metal. First track is drone, if it doesn't do it for you then don't write it off, the rest will give you your thrills on route 666. Crucified Serpent- No Second Coming Winner of this post's Best Band Name award, and best band member names too ("Cruel Treatment" & "Canine"). Well-composed black metal of the traditional variety with some punky elements and ambient interludes. Warlock Corpse- Cosmic Spell Excellent fusion of outsider dance/rave, dungeon synth, sci-fi sample/sound-collage. Great variety from track to track. Some of his other rel...

I was already a hipster collecting vinyl. I knew it was kind of silly, but hey, I was supporting my favorite artists at shows and often getting a rare, collectible, sometimes signed copy of something I loved. And they really do sound better (when mixed for high dynamic range). Then I went to a show and bought a tape because it was $8 and I didn't like the band enough to blow $25 on a vinyl instead. Now THAT'S silly. They don't even sound good. Of course, neither does a lot of black metal. So that's what I get, primarily, is the black metal that sounds good, but not because of its sound quality or mixing.   Dungeon Synth is also a great genre having its revival on tape, and a lot of those come with cool OSR content or at least vibes . Disclaimer: Many of these may not be available as tapes can be pretty limited in quantity. If not, just listen to the streaming version then imagine it sounding slightly shittier.   Clipping. - Splendor & Misery Ambient noise instru...

Here comes more inspiration and recommendation. This time around, it's archetypes, films so quintessentially and obviously weird that their relevancy to Weird storytelling should leave you with a gameable idea or two almost automatically. November by Rainer Sarnet This is a slow, black & white Estonian film. I'd probably characterize it as a European Kurosawa film in many ways (no samurai though). It has humor, horror and folklore all at once in a mix both incongruous and somehow elegant (think Rashomon). It's about common folk who use magic to control servant spirits called kratts made out of junk. They sell their souls to the devil to make these things, and they go mad and kill their masters every now and then anyway. What a deal. So this movie is about people trying to solve simple problems with extreme solutions. Kind of like a Weird Magic spell! Magic, demons, plagues and ghosts are just facts of life and you work with them just like you would a...