Haunting Sounds

By Joe Kavanagh

With the exception of Christmas, perhaps no other holiday has enjoyed as close a relationship with music as Halloween has down the years, which is only befitting of a festival that has always held music as central to its identity.

Even during its origins as the Celtic festival of Samhain, when Irish pagans made sacrifices and wore masks to appease the spirits of the dead, singing and chanting played a vital role in their efforts to ring in a new year free of pestilence and blight.

Since then, the link has continued with this frightful night inspiring a plethora of songs that have run the gambit from jocular to downright scary. Bobby "Boris" Pickett's Monster Mash, Warren Zevon's Werewolves of London and Lou Reed's Halloween Parade are all examples of tunes that have taken their inspiration from this ghostly night, so it is only fitting that the topic of this week's story should have their own links with the ethereal world of spirits and ghouls.

Despite their undeniably eerie image and otherworldly essence, however, upon hearing this particular outfit, the only thing likely to go bump in the night would be the thump of punter's feet hitting the dance floor.

The Black Ghosts had its genesis, predictably, around Halloween of 2005, when producer, Theo Keating, contacted songwriter, Simon Lord, after a mutual friend had passed on the latter's email address.

As one of the main men in big beat act, The Wiseguys, Keating had previously enjoyed success on a global scale with tracks like Ooh La La and Start The Commotion, which had been featured around the world on commercials for the likes of Mitsubishi and Budweiser, before going on to establish himself as a globally-renowned deejay, under the alias, Touche, which he continues to use to this day.

Lord, meanwhile, was a veteran of the UK indie scene, as singer and main songwriter with critically-acclaimed act, Simian, and his song, Never Be Alone, was transformed into a global dance smash by French remix outfit, Justice, under the title, We Are Your Friends (and memorably caused Kanye West to completely throw his rattle out of the pram when it beat him for Best Video 2006's MTV Europe Awards).

Initially, the two men only envisaged collaborating on one track, with the former providing the music and the latter adding the lyrics and vocals but as the unlikely pair scratched the surface, they soon discovered a host of idiosyncrasies that bound them together and transformed them from collaborators into a fully-fledged act in their own right.

Growing up, Keating had a rather unorthodox youth, in that his parents encouraged him to watch horror movies from a very early age, which becomes a little more understandable upon learning that his godfather was acclaimed Hammer House of Horror director, Alan Gibson.

While most kids his age were tucked away safely in bed, Keating was taking in all manner of movies with titles like The Satanic Rights of Dracula and The Two Faces of Evil, instilling in him a love of all things ghoulish.

This morbid fascination was only reinforced when the family moved home only to discover strange symbols scrawled on the walls of their new house, a Victorian graveyard in the back garden and even a resident poltergeist that frequently threw all manner of things around the house, as an increasingly bemused Keating family looked on.

Lord too had his own supernatural experiences as a child, with a grandmother who served as a psychic, with a particular interest in Russian mysticism, as evidenced by the multitude of books on the subject that packed her home.

Coupled with this link with the occult, was a love of music, particularly with his grandfather who played oboe with the London Symphony Orchestra, playing in the woodwind section for things as diverse as the theme to Star Wars and the Beatles classic, A Day in the Life.

His father proved even more acclaimed in his field, and equally as quirky, with Lord recently recalling of his unorthodox raising: "He built his own synthesizers, and they weren't just for making music. His 'Bio Activity Translator' was a device that clipped onto the stems of plants, then translated their electric fields into an analogue hum. He also made a 'Dream Machine' for my sister and I. It generated a gentle white noise that helped us drift off to sleep."

These experiences and a love of gothic novels soon created a close bond that virtually dictated that the men continue their project beyond a solitary song.

With their direction all but fixed, the pair settled upon the name "coz it sounds great" but also because it was evidence of the path they wanted to take or, as Lord would later recall: "It was a decision we made when we came up with the name the Black Ghosts because everything did seem to have this dark sort of twist to it. We wanted to write stuff that could work as a pop song, but we didn't want it to be sugar, bubblegum and all that stuff."

The duo began to work on creating pop music with soul and substance, which would appeal to a broad audience and contain enough textures to ensure that it would last longer than some silly fad.

The results were evident from early on and the pair soon began to release singles and a critically-acclaimed EP, in the form of Any Way You Choose To Give It, which provided ample evidence of their self-described "gothic disco/disco noir".

Amazingly, however, up to this point, the two men had yet to meet, despite the fact that they both lived in London.

Thanks to the wonders of modern technology and the fact that each man had his own recording studio, the two stuck to a strict division of labor that meant they could each work on the tracks separately.

Indeed, they believe that this was part of the reason that they thrived as a musical pairing.

With his background as a deejay, Keating would provide a clutch of songs, focusing on the beats and broad melodies and then pass them on to Lord, who would choose the ones he liked, disregard the rest, and then write the lyrics, record the vocal and add his own melodies.

Both men attest to the value of working this way because neither had to wait around for the other to finish before getting started, it ensured that only the best tracks got through and they could work on the tracks only when they felt like it.

As the tracks mounted up, the pair released an album "Mixtape", which saw them mix several of their own songs, along with a host of others in a traditional deejay format.

They also began to play live, with has been described as a "starkly original" format, where the two men use a host of turntables, synths and electronics to reproduce and reinterpret their songs, with Lord providing live vocals, all set to some stunning visuals that reinforce the dark edges that drive their sound.

As Lord puts it: "It's based around the DJ set, but it's got a live twist to it. We don't have a band because we didn't want to go that way. That isn't what the record is about. We made it as electronic producers and it didn't feel right to have a band just for live performances."

It has subsequently traveled the dance floors of the globe to raving reviews, if you'll pardon the pun.

Then, in July, the band released their self-titled debut album, which is one of the best club-oriented albums that you are ever likely to hear.

Taking in the broad spectrum of beat-driven music, from hip hop to electro, disco to house and beyond, it is nothing short of a triumph that contains enough musical integrity to all but ensure that it will be on virtually everyone's best of year list, whether they are fans of the dance-music genre or not.

It is one of those rare commodities in the world of beats and blips, in that it is a work of obvious substance, rich on hooks, moods and melodies and lyrically superb, transcending the genre that most people seek to attach it to for convenience sake.

As Keating recently claimed: "We have made music that has a foot in both camps. People who are into songs can listen to it and, at the same time, people who are into more of the club stuff can listen to it. That's always a really tricky balance to get right. Electronic music that works in a dance arena and has a decent enough song attached to it to give it a bit of longevity."

Mission accomplished because these ghosts have created something that will be haunting music fans long after we're all gone.