Discography Review - Boogeyman

 

Rising from the dusty desert crypts of Phoenix, Arizona, Boogeyman are one of the finest horror punk bands currently around; macabre storytellers who deliver infectious punk rock and weave tales of horror through a thoroughly mesmerising connected series of songs in the bands 'Devils Song' saga. As another band that has come to my attention largely through their being on the We Are Horror Records label, and with a brand new EP released, which itself serves as a prequel to the tales told on their first two albums, I thought it was about time to dip into the second of the 'discography' reviews on this blog - a look back at their past releases whilst featuring the new EP in it's own review which you can read here. 

In the post-pandemic years the band have really emerged as a band to watch closely. Appearances on compilations, some excellent videos and two great full length releases - as well as some glorious artwork and iconic logo and merch - have started giving the band the recognition they deserve. The three piece band is made of Jason Payne on vocals and keyboard/piano/organ, Eric Zellmer on drums and Ryan Zellmer on guitar and bass for their releases. 

Discography Review - Rise From Your Grave

With the pending release of the bands new album (Choose Your Scare, the review of which you can check out here) I thought it was about time I did the first deep dive into a band's past discography, something I will be doing more of in future - and there are few better bands to do that with than Rise From Your Grave. Sporting an inspired choice of a name (and throwing up memories of the classic Sega arcade game Altered Beast alongside the band's frequent referencing to classic horror video gaming), consistently excellent artwork and most importantly some great horror punk, a proper look at what is a very respectable - and pretty extensive - back catalogue from a band that deserves the attention of any self respecting horror punk fan, was definitely due.

Rise From Your Grave hail from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and for a decade now have been releasing horror punk with a pronounced metal influence. Thematically there's plenty of cosmic horror monstrosities and a sense of dread running through their library, especially in their earlier releases, with plenty of other horror movies, literature and games popping up, especially in later releases. Vocalist Tom Gaffron, guitarist Brandon DeLanzo, bassist Adam Kephart and drummer Justin Fantuzzo combine horror punk harmonies with a thrash metal backbone, painting vivid aural pictures positively dripping with terror and unnerving atmosphere. Let's take a look at RFYG's releases through the years - I'll pre-warn that almost certainly I've missed some references through these releases, made some mistakes, probably repeat my words too often as I grapple from talking about games for over a decade to music, as a complete non-musician. Feel free to send corrections over to me!