Welcome back to Secret Fun Spot, your source for the latest news in Halloween audio cassettes from thirty-five years ago. This year I completed a set of five Halloween titles from a Canadian label called Madacy. Or so I thought! As I was finishing up this review, looking for audio links, I made an earth-shattering discovery. There are multiple versions of some (possibly all) of these tapes! The realization essentially ruined everything I’d written about them. Re-writing, and revising has been overcomplicated and confusing. The review as it stands still feels half baked and lacking the hilarity and hijinks that I like to include, but if I don’t post it soon I could miss this year’s Halloween season.
I've been especially interested in this set because I bought the one called Horror at the Graveyard for my previous Halloween tape reviews and it may be my single favorite Halloween recording of all-time. When I figured out that it was part of a series, I couldn’t wait to hear the others. My curiosity intensified when I saw a video from a Youtuber named Zaranyzerak where he reads reviews of various Halloween cassettes that he wrote when he was a kid. Two of his highest-ranked picks are from this Madacy series. I put them in my ebay search alerts a couple of years ago, and finally, a string of affordable auctions let me assemble the five titles. I was already excited to be the first-ever human to review these as a whole, and that was before my stunning revelation about the different versions. So even though I only own half of the recordings I will proceed with my partial review.
Madacy was a Canadian record publisher that operated from 1968 to 2009 and distributed a wide variety of musical genres. They catered to bargain seekers, often utilizing public domain material. Their annual releases were sparse until the 1990s when their output ramped up. That’s when they (probably) released their first Halloween tapes. The five earliest Halloween titles feature unified cover art and typography along with the a warning not to listen in the dark. They also share the same group of voice actors. As with most Halloween audio, the artists, writers, and performers are not credited. The copyright dates of all the albums are equally mysterious. Discogs lists Sounds of Halloween as a 1990 release. While I have trust issues with some Discogs Halloween audio dates, that does gel with the Youtube video I mentioned earlier because he bought his copies in October of 1991.
These five titles were each released with two different item numbers. The first sequence runs from #H-13 to #H-17, and the second one goes from #HA-20 to #HA-24. The ‘HA’ series features a white oval around the item number. My grand revelation revealed that the ‘HA’s are re-recordings of the content on the ‘H’ series. So with the help of online audio, I will attempt to do a tape-by-tape breakdown covering both recorded versions of each title. I’m going to list them in what I’m guessing to be chronological order.
*Halloween Tricks and Treats (H-13 version)
I bought a factory-sealed copy of this one, but I discovered that the cassette inside is labeled The Haunted House (H-14) which is another tape in this set. I thought they just put the wrong tape in the case until I realized that my legitimate copy of The Haunted House has completely different audio. I was unsure if a “true” copy of Halloween Tricks and Treat (H-13) even existed until I came across this archival list of Halloween audio that shows that there is indeed one. Inconsistencies like this one are making it difficult for me to achieve my singular goal of creating the greatest document on Madacy Halloween tapes in all of humankind’s collective knowledge.
My The Haunted House that was in the Halloween Tricks and Treats (H-13) case has a story spanning both sides of the tape where a serious-sounding narrator tells of his experience in a mysterious haunted house that appeared out of nowhere on Halloween night. The tale is driven by the expected haunted sounds of laughter, footsteps, bats, creaking, eerie music, and such. It turns out that everything was just a bad dream. Or was it? It seems likely that random sound effects were gathered and then strung together with narration after the fact.
*The Haunted House (H-14 version)
To complicate things even more, this tape has The Haunted House (H-14) printed on one side, and Halloween Tricks & Treats (H-14) on the other! It too contains a story that takes up both sides. It’s about a group of kids who decide to explore the mysterious Dalton house that’s rumored to be haunted. It plays out in the Scooby-Doo tradition where a series of supernatural scares happen, followed by a natural explanation. The tale is told by a female narrator and the voices of the kids sound suspiciously like the same lady.
Sounds of Halloween (H-15 version)
The French cover version is Sons d’Halloween (HF-10).
I’ve only heard the H-22 version of this one (see below) so I’ll update this entry if I ever come across this version.
*The House that Died (H-16 version)
This one has a story on one side and sound effects on the other. It’s about a woman who inherits her uncle's mansion and attempts to walk through it with dreams of restoring the place. The house itself turns against her, cutting her tour short. Unlike The Haunted House, there are supernatural forces at work, and even the weather is affected. Some eerie moments could easily freak out a kid, like when the house whispers at her, but even scarier is her discovery that the renovations will be more expensive than expected.
Horror at the Graveyard (H-17 version)
The only evidence I can find that this version exists is that list of Halloween audio on this site. I’m ridiculously curious about what’s on it. The version that I own is listed below.
Now we have reached what I call The Great Madacy Re-Recording. It would seem that the initial releases sold well enough to merit another retail wave, but for reasons unknown, the recordings have been updated with heavily processed, reverberating vocals, all provided by the same man. They also feature a new, original synth score. Different variations of the musical theme can be heard on the different stories, which I think is a nice addition. Aside from the new item numbers there is no outward indication that the products were “new and improved” which is a baffling choice. Unless it was some legal move to deny payment to the original voice actors, or something like that. Or could it be that it was a genuine effort to deliver a more sophisticated product? I certainly think the re-recordings are better. The cheesy, stylized storytelling is what puts them in a class of their own.
Halloween Tricks and Treats (HA-20 version)
The mysterious Dalton House from The Haunted House (H-14) is back, along with the young explorers, except in this re-recorded version, each kid has a different style of audio processing to differentiate their voices. They all share the same severe reverb that the spooky narrator has, which makes zero sense, plus it makes the dialogue difficult to understand. But these flaws only make me love it more.
The Haunted House (HA-21 version)
I see pictures of this version online, but until I find a cheap one, I can only speculate on the contents.
*Sounds of Halloween (HA-22 version)
This is a better-than-average montage of music and sound effects that encompasses both sides. It’s the only album in this series that is entirely made up of soundscapes. There are so many subsequent versions of this one that Madacy released through the years that I’m too overwhelmed to thoroughly tackle its legacy here. This is the only version I’ve heard, so I don’t know if it was re-recorded.
Thanks to the Youtube upload we know that this re-recording replaced the female narrator from the original with my favorite narrator, Mr. Reverb. More of that guy is exactly what I was hoping for when I started buying these. Being able to compare and contrast his performance to his predecessor is the type of experience that we geeks live for.
Horror at the Graveyard (HA-24 version)
This is the one that kicked off my entire obsession. It’s the gold standard of Halloween audio. Told in first person, a man finds himself in a sinister cemetery where he is plagued by evil spirits. It’s less a story, and more of a loose sequence of events designed to showcase a variety of sound effects. For me, the droning storytelling accompanied by the thin synthesized score captures the essence of Halloween in the analog age. The final line of dialogue and the musical crescendo that follows never fails to delight me.
I enjoy fantasizing about the project origins of this line; the business meetings, and the creative process. Were these products purely driven by market data, or did someone wish to express their spooky side? Were they handled like just another Madacy album, no more or less special than their last Engelbert Humperdinck release? Or was there was a desire to explore the possibilities of compact cassette technology, in an effort to give kids fuel for their frightful fancies? I can’t decide if I prefer to romanticize the whole thing, or if it’s more fun to think of a bunch of work-a-day employees forced to whip up disposable ghost junk for the kiddies.
But there it is. Everything I know about these things at this point in time, presented to the internet at the request of nobody. Alas, I’m only halfway there; a thought that is both exciting and a bit exhausting. Perhaps we’ll have more to discuss next Halloween.
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