Album Review

darlingkandie [discogs.com]

Although this is called ''Chilling, Thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House'', just glance at the track listing and you might notice that the only bits here that have anything to do with spooky material or the supernatural are a small collection of sound effects and one short audio sketch.

Still, this was an important record in my childhood, and I suspect the youths of many others, too. It was marketed to children and required the use of the imagination to visualize what was being portrayed through the sound effects.

Some of the effects, like the howling dogs, the wind, and the rain, have been used numerous times in different movies and cartoons. A few of them have been sampled for different electronica projects too. For example, ''Theme From S'Express'' uses the female narrator's voice from The Martian Monsters (''countdown is progressing''), and The Orb use the harrowing falling scream in ''The Unsafe Bridge'' for their track ''Assassin''.