Kool Kat of the Week: Rockin’, Rollin’ and Raisin’ Japanese Monsters with Shane Morton at the Starlight Drive-In

Posted on: Jun 2nd, 2011 By:

What’s more Retro than watching a classic horror movie at the drive-in? Lucky Atlantans will get that rare opportunity this Sunday June 5 when the annual ROCK ‘N’ ROLL MONSTER BASH invades the Starlight Six Drive-In, one of the country’s last remaining drive-in movie theaters. Even better, the eerie all-day extravaganza also features a frightening fantastic line-up of bands, a Miss Monster Bash contest, vendors of spooky merchandise, custom hearses and not just one but three Japanese horror classics, GODZILLA 2000 (1999), HOUSE (1977) and RINGU (1998). Gates open at 10 AM, live performances start at 2 PM, the movies roll from dusk into the wee hours of the morning, and for those who want to party all weekend, there’s even a Monster Bash Pre-Party on Saturday night (June 4) at the Star Bar with even more bands.

ATLRetro caught up with Shane Morton, the Silver Scream Spookshow‘s Ghost Host with the Most Professor Morte, musician (Super X-13/Gargantua/etc.), painter, tattoo artist, SFX artist, actor, all-around horror Renaissance man, and one of the mad masterminds behind ROCK ‘N’ ROLL MONSTER BASH for a scary sneak preview…

How did the ROCK ‘N’ ROLL MONSTER BASH get started?

Billy Messina, Ben Armstrong and Tim Dolph of Netherworld fame were the original mad scientists that brought this thing to life.  Atlanta’s horror community deserves its own horror-themed DRIVE INVASION! they would always contact me for help in the rock ‘n’ roll dept. Billy and Ben are just too busy with netherworld—in my opinion, the greatest haunted house attraction in the world—so Tim, Jim Stacy [Starlight manager/ Palookaville mastermind/Greasepaint/AM Gold/etc.) and I took it over four years ago.

Professor Morte sings with the Silver Scream Spookshow band at Monster Bash 2009.

What’s the band line-up this year, and why should we be excited about it?

This is a great rockin’ line up this year with something for everybody! Spooky Partridge is a fun family band—[as in] Addams Family, ha!—that play a lot of punk covers along

LUST. Photo courtesy of Barb Hays.

with cute originals. The drummer is just a li’l kid, but he’s already one of the best in the city with all the stick spins and showmanship kicking already. It’s amazing to watch! Radio Cult is also a very visual band—almost like a fem-fronted ‘80s Van Halen! Big fun and way over the top! LUST needs no intro as they put on legendary and hilarious shows! [see ATLRetro’s Kool Kat interview with Barb Hays for more about LUST]. I love these gals like sisters, so it’s always a pleasure to have them on the bill. The Brimstones are New York City’s greatest spooky garage band. Trust me, when you see Justin’s Farfisa [organ] solos while in a headstand, you’ll know why they are so famous! Super X-13, ‘nuff said. This line-up of music is gonna tear your face off and rip up the pavement!

Read the rest of this entry »

Category: Kool Kat of the Week | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Weekend Update April 29-May 1, 2011

Posted on: Apr 28th, 2011 By:

Friday, April 29

Inman Park Festival launches from noon to 4 PM with day one of its Tour of Homes, quite possibly Atlanta’s oldest ongoing annual peek behind the doors of private residences. The fun of this tour is not just the historic Craftsman and Victorian structures but the interior decor which often reflects that quirky artsy character of the neighborhood’s residents. Also launching today is the Druid Hills Tour of Homes (10 AM to 5 PM) which this year features houses built from 1918 to 1955 in the city’s first driving suburb originally designed by legendary landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted.

Flashback to the ’80s with Brazilian heavy metal/death metal band Sepultura at Masquerade. Wauchope Krewe plays a mix of New Orleans funk and R&B, along with blues, jazz, Latin and original music, at Fernbank Museum of Natural History’s Martinis and IMAXJoe Gransden and Kenny Banks jazz up The Mansion on PeachtreeLittle G Weevil brings the blues to Fat Matt’s Rib Shack,and Electromatics fuse blues, jazz and soul at Northside Tavern.

Saturday April 30

The Inman Park and Druid Hills Home Tours continue, and the Inman Park Festival shows why it’s Atlanta’s most creative street festival from a bodacious artist and vendors market through the Victorian neighborhood to a one-of-a-kind parade at 2 PM. Plenty of live music, too, with today’s Retro highlights including Zydeco T at 1 PM, crime-fightin superhero Falcon Lords at 4:45 PM, 17-piece big band Usual Suspects at 5:30 PM, and ’20s ragtime-inspired Blair Crimmins & the Hookers at 6:45 PM.

In an extra terror-ific treat, Professor Morte and the guys and ghouls of the Silver Scream Spookshow screen the 1958 Ray Harryhausen monsterpiece THE 7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD at the Plaza Theatre with a kids matinee at 1 PM and adult show at 10 PM. Read the review by Mark Arson here. Reviving another type of vintage performance, the Atlanta Radio Theatre Company presents Thomas Fuller‘s THE DANCER IN THE DARK, inspired by the H.P. Lovecraft mythos spawned in the 1920s and ’30s with a flavoring of New Mexico, at 2:30 PM at the Academy Theatre in Avondale Estates.

It’s Rockabilly/Redneck Underground heaven as Southern Culture on the Skids headlines the Star Bar with Ghost Riders Car Club opening. Brush up on your GRCC with ATLRetro’s Kool Kat interview with Spike Fullerton from back in February. TheBlues Barons play Fat Matt’s. DJ Romeo Cologne transforms the sensationally seedy Clermont Lounge into a ’70s disco/funk inferno.

Sunday May 1

The Inman Park Festival offers up a final day of fun, including old-time-Western-inspired Cowboy Envy at 2:15 PM and Whole Lotta Dixie, a traditional Dixieland band with a knack for applying that sound to  ’60s and ’70s hits, at 3:30 PM. Six-piece string band The Groundhawgs fuses bluegrass, old-time, jazz and swing, poetry and blues, classic country and a little bit of Southern rock during “dunch” between 1 and 4 PM at The Earl.

Read the rest of this entry »

Category: Weekend Update | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Retro Review: Harryhausen’s Dynamation Still Holds Magic in THE 7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD

Posted on: Apr 28th, 2011 By:

By Mark Arson, Contributing Writer

Silver Scream Spookshow Presents THE 7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD (1958); Dir: Nathan Juran; Starring Kerwin Mathews, Kathryn Grant, Torin Thatcher; Sat. April 30;  kids matinee at 1 PM and adult show at 10 PM; Plaza TheatreTrailer here.

The Internet has changed our lives in immeasurable ways. The availability of near-limitless information has made audiences more savvy and sometimes more fickle. That doesn’t even include the extras on a DVD that a consumer buys for next to nothing at the grocery store. There’s almost no point in making entertainment that breaks the fourth wall any more, since audiences are hyper-aware of the fourth wall in the first place. As such, the standard for special effects has changed. You can count on every member of the audience knowing how practical effects work and when and where to spot CGI. Strip away the end result though, and it’s hard not to notice hard work and creativity being poured into the handling of the special effects on a film.

Read the rest of this entry »

Category: Retro Review | Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

© 2024 ATLRetro. All Rights Reserved. This blog is powered by Wordpress