The Giallos Flame: Live From Dunwich

Artist: Giallos Flame
Title: Live From Dunwich
Label: DC Recordings
Cat. No: DCR84
Format: 12"/digital download
Release Date: 03.09.07

Track listing:
A1. Live From Dunwich
A2. Body Snatchers
A3. Out For Justice
B1. Keoma
B2. Wastelands
B3. Crime Squad

My own favourite release of this year from DC Recordings (the record label of UK's trip-hop/big beat pioneer J. Saul Kane a.k.a. Depth Charge a.k.a. The Octagon Man) must be Live From Dunwich (DCR84) by The Giallos Flame, a.k.a. Ron Graham.

(For those unfamiliar with the term, Giallo, "yellow", is an Italian term for pulp fiction -- crime, horror, science fiction -- indicating paperback novels with yellow covers, which term later on also came to encompass genre cinema from the 1960s onwards, with such crime and horror directors as Mario Bava or Dario Argento as some of its prime examples.)

This 20-minute EP or mini-album, which is officially out today, consists of some fine eerie analogue synth melodies accompanied by live drums (which seems to have of lately become a trademark sound of DC Recordings, as many of their other artists such as The Emperor Machine follow exactly in a similar vein). Graham's influences apparently derive mostly from the grindhouse cinemas and import record stores of the sleazy 70s, his sound reminiscent of the soundtracks of Italian horror films in the 1970s as produced by such groups as Goblin or John Carpenter's own film soundtracks, with some added touch from Krautrock or even prog bands like Emerson, Lake and Palmer (minus their most self-indulgent jamming and solos) at their grooviest, à la 'The Barbarian'.

According to the DC Recordings press release notes, Ron Graham has worked before this on some horror film soundtracks himself, but the atmospheric music on Live From Dunwich works great even without the accompaniment of images, putting chills down one's spine. Simply irresistible.