On the brink of celebrating the festivities that All Hallows’ Eve has to offer, what better way to get into the Halloween spirit than to listen to the latest musical offering from indie/alternative electro pop group, The Marshmallow Ghosts. Newly released music video for the track “S.O.S.” featuring The Casket Girls is another in the cannon for Halloween nostalgia that relies heavily on its unique kitschy charm. The Marshmallow Ghosts’ new album The Old Witch’s Cavern was released on Graveface Records, also home to aforementioned The Casket Girls, Friday, October 25.
The video opens with a group of three women, in goth attire, lighting a candle with an Ouija board visible in the foreground. One of them pulls out a book of spells otherwise known as a Necronomicon. Trading glances with one another, presumably anticipating to see what impending events lie ahead, they begin reading from the aforementioned book and starting a seance. Conjuring up souls, the women are confronted by what looks like the undead brought to life (when really it looks like people in skelton grease paint makeup) beginning to appear when the lights come on revealing they’re in a record store. The women are now panicked, but quickly come to party and dance with said souls, whom are also scanning through vinyls.
The title of The Marshmallow Ghosts’ new album The Old Witch’s Cavern has interesting folklore origins behind the name. According to a press release, “Older Georgia natives might remember the legendary haunted attraction, the Old Witch’s Cavern, which operated out of Port Wentworth from May 1972 till its tragic closure in early October 1973. It was an ahead-of-its-time dark ride that dared customers to creep inside a rickety wooden mine cart for a ghastly tour through an underground maze of ghastly ghosts, ghouls, and goblins.”
The story goes that the operator behind the aforementioned haunted attraction, “Freaky” Fred Crimpens, was plagued with some bad luck. As previously stated the haunted establishment tragically met its demise when, “…a devastating fire burnt the attraction to the ground, Crimpens believed arson was the origin especially after he received dozens of death threats from conservative townsfolk. Not long after his insurance claim was denied, Crimpens drowned in the Savannah River. Police ruled the death a suicide and the Old Witch’s Cavern was closed indefinitely.”
According to Flood Magazine, one of the members of The Casket Girls spoke about their collaboration and the real-life anxieties that was the basis of the track. Elsa Greene had this to say, “‘S.O.S.’ is about living inside your head. Where mild anxiety can morph into delusion. Where imagination and reality collide. Dreams can be just as real as waking life.”
To listen to “S.O.S.” stream below, via YouTube.
Photo Credit: Brett Padelford