There’s no excuse for the fact that I never had this record when I was a child. Didn’t I need to know how to spell HALLOWEEN? Damn right, I did. I discovered this album only after Jason Willis made his excellent video of the title tune in 2011, but more on that in a minute.

This record popped back into public consciousness after being featured on the now-infamous Scar Stuff Blog where the very same Jason Willis made tons of old children’s Halloween records available to download as MP3s. Of course, that didn’t last very long. Eventually, some of the copyright holders insisted on shutting down his links even though they had no intention of releasing those deep catalog albums for sale. Since then, several people have made Willis’ content available on their own sites. I’ll leave it to you to find them if you’re interested.

Kaye Lande and Wade Denning were the dynamic duo who created this record in 1969. Both had worked on a number of children’s records by that time. Denning went on to contribute to some of the greatest Halloween story and sound effects records on sale at every 70s-era K-Mart during Halloween season.

Willis says this album was originally marketed to educators and included a booklet about how to use it in the classroom. That might explain why it never hit my own personal Halloween radar as a kid. This record may not have been available at my usual vinyl-centric haunts and my teachers were obviously not cool enough to share this with me.

There are ten tracks on the album, which clocks in at just a little over 23 minutes. This was clearly a commercial choice. I mean, 23 minutes could easily fit on one side of an LP. These slackers could have produced twice as much Halloween goodness! And just look at that cover. I daresay it must have been culled from leftover Halloween drawings by the children of Lande and Denning. Nonetheless, what is here is the stuff kids’ Halloween dreams are made of - spooky songs and stories and sound effects.

I just want to delve into the title track for a moment. You can listen to the track and check out Willis’ awesome video below, then we’ll proceed.

There’s something about this odd mix of elements that just works. The music is stolen from Camille Saint-Saëns’ La Danse Macabre. The singer is an unbelievably square white woman who sounds like she sings in the church choir on Sundays and always wanted to sing opera despite not speaking Italian. Best of all, a solid third of the track’s entire running time is taken up with a spooky sound effects mix suitable for any 60s or 70s haunted house. I have no idea how this happened to be created this way, but it’s wonderous.

I’m sad that neither Lande nor Denning has a Wikipedia page filled with information about their lives. I guess we just have to imagine how these two wound up working together on this iconic Halloween album. Personally, I’d like to believe that they were both possessed by the need to further the celebration of Samhain through the schoolchildren of America, but that’s just me.

You can listen to the full album here: