Thriller nights

by LORRAINE CARPENTER

Note: All events, unless otherwise indicated, take place on Saturday, Oct. 27.

Saphir invites goths, glammers and other assorted rockers to choose between a pair of spine-tingling soirées on Friday, Oct. 26—upstairs, dig Buried Alive with DJs Mr. Black, Kaotik and Uriel, with VJ Athanore, for a night of goth, alternative, industrial, electro, EBM and synthpop, with costume prizes from Cruella, at 9 p.m., for $12 in advance or $15 at the door. Downstairs, Panic rules with DJs Plastik Patrik “l’Etrangleur” and Napoléon “le Tyran” spinning the hottest hair-raising glam rock, punk, new wave, indie pop and more, for $6, with prizes going to the most horrifying costumes.

Théâtre Plaza will be the site of some ghoulish goings-on Friday, Oct. 26 as the I Am a Monster party comes to power in two rooms, featuring the ’80s, rock, electro and house sounds of DJs !Basta!, Macfly and Raz and the sights of VJ Phil. Costumes aren’t mandatory but they’re “strongly suggested,” and the unadorned will be forced to suffer evil eyes. Doors open at 9 p.m., tickets cost $10 in advance, $13 at the door.

Also on Friday, Peer Pressure’s A-Rawk, Hatchetmatik, Merkenstein and host DL Bones will tear your face off for the third year running, this time bringing their “Shalloween” party to Coda, for $5 before midnight, costumed clubbers only (“leave early, come dead”).

The next night, DL Jones hosts the haunted edition of Voyeur at SAT, featuring resident evil Jordan Dare, nasty boys Nu Ravers on the Block and Melbourne’s top electro-singer/flesh connoisseur Muscles, who will perform live, and a costume contest. The fun gets frightening at 10 p.m. and tickets cost $10 in advance and $15 at the door.

A small army of devilish DJs from London, Brighton, NYC, Jakarta, Milan and Montreal will work the wax at Black Light 3, a monster mash-up of trance, happy hardcore and more, split between two rooms at an undisclosed Quebec City location—call (418) 621-6555, 48 hours ahead of the event, to confirm. Advance tickets ($35) are available at Psychonaut (154 Prince Arthur E.) for $35, and it’ll be more at the door.

Techno terror hits home as Amazone Halloween Ritual pairs DJs from Tech Safari Productions with Hamburg’s the Delta, who will perform live, as will the Delta’s Marcus C. Maiche, solo. As of 9 p.m., Bain Mathieu will be transformed by VJ Cafrine, décor by SPAK and a laser show by Gudvibe. Tickets cost $30 at Psychonaut, Moog Audio and St-Jérome’s Chanvre du Nord, or $40 at the door, and prizes will go to the best dressed.

Meanwhile, the no-alcohol afterhours bar le Chill invites you to Dance Till You Die, an achievable goal considering that this is an 11-hour party—don’t forget to hydrate, folks. As of 9 p.m., tech-master Ulrich Van Bell and a half-dozen fellow Québécois DJs will do their damnedest to overwhelm your ass with hardcore, trance and a touch of haunted house. Tickets cost $15.

Famous faces, from superheroes to celebrities, is the theme at Grappa Lounge’s Halloween party, featuring a team of DJs on hip hop/R&B/reggae/party-classics duty, door prizes and other devilish delights, as of 9:30 p.m., for $10.

Go Guyanese at Club Balattou, where the 13th annual Touloulou Ball goes down tonight, Oct. 25 at 9 p.m. Following a tradition that dates back to the ’50s, women wear the costumes, becoming anonymous “Touloulous” and inviting men to dance to the tropical rhythms that will dominate the soundsystem all night. The number of dance partners, the beauty of the costumes and the effectiveness of the disguise are criteria for the judges, who will award cash prizes to the top three Touloulous at midnight, but door prizes will be doled out to both genders throughout the evening.

The Halloween edition of Dizzyphunk brings fear to the floor on Tuesday, Oct. 30 at Salon Daomé, as of 10 p.m., with DJs Clifford Brown and Maüs, for $4.

Le Social hosts a pair of McGill parties this year, the first of which unfurls on Wednesday, Oct. 31, wherein the downtown mansion will be transformed into a haunted house, “the scariest bar in town.” Costumes are mandatory for this and the Tuff Love Thursday party on Nov. 1, where McGill’s future lawyers will defend their right to dance. DJs Slice and Henceforth will, in turn, present the court with the very best electo, crunk and mash-ups. Case closed!

Dread comes to Bobards with Monster Soundsystem, featuring Bass Ma Boom, Mad’Msizele, Giraf and Riddim Wise. That’s on Wednesday, Oct. 31, 9 p.m., for $5.

And on Saturday, Look Out Production and cancer charity Think Pink present Thriller, a dance party at le Social, 10 p.m., $10/$15, featuring Ottawa DJs Illo and Drastik, A-Rock from Peer Pressure, and a costume contest. All zombies welcome!

Night creatures call

If live music is your bag of tricks, there are plenty of treats in store. The cave that is Zoobizarre hosts “hellecktronique” rock ’n’ rollers Chernobyl Cha-cha alongside no-wave synth-rock act Pornorobo and DJs Sentimental Sénéchal (aka Xavier Paradis of Automelodi/Echo Kitty) and Chernobyl’s Jef Hell, playing old/new wave, electro, Italo-disco, ’70s punk, glam rock and hair metal. That’s on Friday, Oct. 26 at 10 p.m., for $5, or $2 for those in costume.

Beware of burns as the searing psychobilly of the Creepshow rocks Foufounes, where $500 will be awarded for best costume, and door prizes go to the rest of the damned.

Over at le Medley, a deadly mix of rock music, dance DJs and kinky theatre awaits you at Bal Bizarre, with KISS tribute band Phantom of the Park, a hellish fetish show by Fighting Madness, the sinister sounds of DJ Faith,

Dr. Demento’s Mental Klinik ($5 per visit) and a costume contest promising “dangerously big” prizes, at 8:30 p.m., for $10 general admission or $20 seated VIP. Go to BalBizarre.com for more info.

On Wednesday, Oct. 31, Lake of Stew, Mike O’Brien and Vancouver’s Glenna Garramone will brew up a potent Halloween party at Cagibi, where patrons are invited to come early and in costume before the craziness begins. Also on the rootsy tip, and also on Oct. 31 (at 9:30 p.m.), les Batteux-Slaques conjure up country from an Indian burial ground at Divan Orange. For more ambient thrills and chills, the Doom & Drone party at Casa del Popolo promises doomgaze, dronemetal and an uncanny atmosphere with Montreal’s Armless Ensemble and thisquietarmy, alongside Ottawa’s Shane Whitbread, and the eerie, ethereal selections of DJs Apillow (aka Patrick from Below the Sea) and Ixe-13 (aka Mathieu from Destroyalldreamers). That’s at 9 p.m., for $5, or less if you’re wearing a costume. Also on Wednesday, l’Escogriffe features a monster indie show with Expectorated Sequence, Titan Towers and Peter and Craig, at 9 p.m., $5 for zombies, $7 for mere mortals.

And on Thursday, Nov. 1, Zoobizarre’s Poussez Poussez soirée celebrates the day of the dead with the U.K.’s Whitey (live and on the decks), with fellow Brit Rory Phillips and Zoo residents Sons of Warsaw and Why Alex Why? at 10 p.m., for $8 in advance (on sale at Atom Heart, Moog and Zoo) or $10 at the door. Wear your best skull!

Terror on the screen

It’s time for the Time Warp again as the Rocky Horror Picture Show Halloween Ball rolls out its 10th edition at the Rialto Theatre on Friday, Oct. 26 and Saturday, Oct. 27, at 9 and 11:30 p.m. both nights, and on Wednesday, Oct. 31 at 8 and 11 p.m. Host with the mostest Plastik Patrik will agitate the masses and coordinate a costume contest at each screening. Tickets cost $13.95 in advance (at Cruella, Footnotes bookstore and the Rialto) or $15.95 at the door. Don’t forget your T.P., newspaper (use the Mirror!), toast, rice and water pistol.

The annual Spasm festival promises scares a-plenty on celluloid and on stage this year at various theatres and cinemas, including the Grande Soirée d’Horreur on Saturday at Club Soda, culling the year’s best Québécois horror shorts—go to www.spasm.ca for details about this and other programming. But there’s no party like a Spasm party, and this year’s Cabaret Trash costume bash occupies the seedy confines of Café Cleopatra on Wednesday, Oct. 31. Doors open at 8 p.m., tickets cost $15 and if you show up without a costume, hostess Lady Brenda will claim your soul (or maybe just kick you in the balls).

Speaking of kicking and screaming, the Dead Doll Dancers are gettin’ busy this All Hallow’s Eve, showcasing their raunchy zombie moves at three separate events. The first is the monthly Meow Mix, “for bent girls and their buddies,” at la Sala Rossa on Saturday at 9:30 p.m., for $10, with N.Y. performance artist Shelly Mars, Nat King Pole, Gary Dickinson, Rocky Rhodes & Big Moves (the latter is from Boston, and Fringe-goers may remember their Gargantua: Fear of a Fat Planet play), and DJs Natashka and mim playing franco, rock, ’80s, electro, pop and raï, with emcee DeAnne Smith. On Tuesday, Oct. 30, the Dead Dolls hit the Green Room for Diary of a Lost Circus, Dom Castelli’s vaudeville spectacular—the Halloween edition, entitled Sweet Dreams and Little Nightmares, will feature burlesque, freaks, comedy, music and dancing, at 8:30 p.m., for $10, or $12 if you’re uncouth enough to arrive uncostumed, and the best costumes will earn cash prizes of $100, $75 and $50. Finally, the Dead Doll Dancers wrap up their tour at Café Chaos’s Halloween Extravaganza on Wednesday, Oct. 31, doors at 8 p.m., tickets for $10, or $7 if you’re wearing a “good” costume. To boot, Chaos promises live music by Igloo Arsenal, described as “rock with undertones of folk, punk and jazz,” a DJ spinning Halloween favourites and dark trance, a costume contest, raffles, games, a fortune teller and projections of classic horror movie scenes in a separate screening room all night. And, the last but not least incentive, everyone gets a free pint of Boréale!

Darkness falls across the land

One of many thrills available for adults this time of year is scaring the piss out of small children, and what better way to do so than with spooky stories? Peur Bleue, presented by the Blue Metropolis Literary Festival, is an English-language storytelling activity for kids aged 8–10, starring Elizabeth McDonald, Dylan Spevack-Willcock and Dan Yashinsky at the Maison de la culture Notre-Dame-de Grâce (5783 Botrel) on Sunday, Oct. 28 at 3 p.m., for free, though you have to acquire passes beforehand at the venue. The pick-up limit is two tickets per person, and proof of residency in Montreal is required. Call (514) 872-2157 for more details.

More eerie educational delights await you at the Montréal Museum of Archaeology and History (Pointe-à-Callière), presenting a lesson about the cultural origins of Halloween and related beliefs, as well as the Jack O’Lantern Tour, described as a “humorous and whimsical trip through an authentic archaeological site in search of some strange but friendly characters.” This fearsome fun for the whole family happens on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 27–28, with English-language tours (45 minutes long) beginning at 12:50 p.m. and 3 p.m.

Another event for those running scared on Saturday and Sunday, the Labyrinthe of Hangar 16 offers family-friendly frights at an enclosed spooky space at the Old Port from 11:30 a.m.–5 p.m. The same site transforms into Halloween Extreme after dark from 7–11 p.m., plunging all (16+) comers into complete darkness, with only a flashlight and the screams of your friends to guide you back to the real world. For details, visit labyrintheduhangar16.com.

And of course there’s the Grand Masquerade, an outdoor Halloween extravaganza that’s becoming a staple of the season. From Friday, Oct. 26 through Sunday, Oct. 28, and on Wednesday, Oct. 31, the streets of Old Montreal and the Old Port will be filled with ghastly ghouls, monstrous marionettes, a Halloween parade (Saturday at 7:30 p.m., come one, come all, in costume), a ghost hunt (Wednesday at 7:30 p.m.), fireworks on Friday and Saturday nights, and plenty of fun for kids on Sunday from noon–6 p.m. Adults can also enjoy The Sacrificial Night Ritual on Friday, with DJs Ostrogoth and Cherry Cola, and The Infinite Unfolds on Saturday, with DJs Dee and Franco Fabi, both at 10 p.m. at the Belvedere in the Old Port pier, hosted by Annie Dufresne, with VJ thisisnotdesign. As a bonus, the Grand Masquerade has invitied Kane Hodder, the hockey-masked man who played Jason in the Friday the 13th series, to be the festival’s special guest! He’ll be on hand every night (hopefully minus machete) to meet and greet. For more, go to grandemascarade.com.

BUTTING IN: Dead Doll Dancers

Creatures crawl in search of blood

If you seek culinary satisfaction alongside all the creepy action, Le Quartier restaurant (1000 Place Jean-Paul-Riopelle) invites you to their old-time Las Vegas Halloween bash on Wednesday, Oct. 31. The dress code is his ’n’ hers eveningwear, or anything inspired by Casino Royale. Tickets cost a whopping $100, but not only does that cover a fine meal, the bar is open from 7 p.m.–midnight. For more information, call (514) 875-9669 or e-mail info@lequartier.ca.

Mile-End tapas joint Taza Flores (5375 Parc) is ready to reasonably accommodate all manner of devotees, fanatics and eccentrics, whatever their religion, race or ethnic background, at their conversion party, featuring the rad sounds of DJs Kamikaze and Cinquante Vierges (hey, I thought it was 70!). Gift certificates will be awarded, but they’re not redeemable in the afterlife.

Famous for their delectable feasts and fearsome spectacles, La Maison Hantée (1037 Bleury) is open for business this Halloween, inviting you to revel in their eerie, immersive ambiance for roughly two-and-a-half hours, for $49 per person. View the menu, make reservations and take in all the damned details at www.maisonhantee.qc.ca.