Zombie Friday Night Funkin
Alke Stilwell
Every October, amusement parks scare up monsters, zombies, vampires, and more to celebrate Halloween with haunted mazes and ghoulish attractions. In Southern California, Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights bases mazes on popular movies and TV shows such as "The Walking Dead," Evil Dead and Insidious. But there's one maze that comes with a special soundtrack: Black Sabbath: 13-3D.
As attendees are given 3-D glasses and led into a darkened, red-lit gothic church, they are confronted by a giant black-robed figure, all to the sounds of Black Sabbath's eerie "Black Sabbath." Mazegoers wander through a variety of dark scenes, including World War I imagery, and in each new room they hear snippets of other Black Sabbath songs, such as "N.I.B." or "Children Of The Grave."
The Black Sabbath: 13-3D maze is the vision of Jon Murdy, Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights producer and creative director, who believes Black Sabbath fit two key criteria for lending their music to a horror spectacle.
"Besides their incredible history [and] their catalog, we knew the band was reuniting [and] we knew they were doing a new album with Rick Rubin that was coming out this year. So we thought from an awareness standpoint it was a really good fit," Murdy says. "[Then] in evaluating Sabbath as a potential property for Halloween Horror Nights it really went right to [bassist] Geezer Butler's lyrics. Geezer's lyrics were very descriptive, almost like a movie script, where you could pull out little lines and turn that into what we call a 'living horror movie.'"
Fittingly, music-themed mazes have roots in several shock rockers. In 2011 Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights partnered with Alice Cooper for Alice Cooper: Welcome To My Nightmare, a maze based on Cooper's music that featured guillotines, creepy babies, electric chairs, cadavers, and stilt-walking creatures.
"There are very few people you could say are a true original in this business, especially rock and roll, and Alice is a true original," says Murdy. "He created that [combination of horror and music]."
A creative collaboration between Zombie and noted haunted house producer Steve Kopelman, Rob Zombie's Great American Nightmare features three different mazes, all based on Zombie horror films: In the first maze (inspired by 2012'sLords Of Salem), attendees walk through hooded, using their hands to navigate the walls and find their way out; the second (inspired by the 2009 animated feature The Haunted World Of El Superbeasto) is a psychedelic 3-D journey through a giant vagina; and the third (inspired by House Of 1000 Corpses) can only be described as a snuff film through a variety of ghastly scenes. It is not for children or the faint of heart.
"Everybody that I've talked to that came out looked shell-shocked in effect because the first maze was totally disorienting, the second maze is kind of fun and psychedelic and the third maze is so gritty that you feel almost like you want to take a shower," says Zombie. "So I feel people should feel completely shell-shocked."
This bone-chilling project has consumed much of Zombie's time. He likens the creative process to that of a massive stage production. "I'm on the phone every day about this, texting every five seconds," he says. "That's not to say there aren't many people involved [who] are doing the same thing because there's a huge effort. Every little thing matters to me, I could never just do it and go, 'Oh yeah, stick my name on it.' The fact that my name's on it is a big deal to me.
Musician-inspired mazes are still a relatively new concept, but they are starting to garner attention from fellow artists. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Slash, who recently produced the horror film Nothing Left To Fear, said, "I would love to have some sort of maze based on a movie that I produced and have it be really scary."
"Obviously they can't travel because they're too massive, that would be impossible," says Zombie. "But what I would like to do is maybe next year have the same event in three different cities at the same time. And maybe the mazes that are in California are now in Texas and maybe we build new ones for California and try to slowly expand it each year and see how it goes. I'll put it as many places as I can successfully make it work."
Murdy is optimistic for additional opportunities to collaborate with other musicians on Halloween mazes. This year, the soundtrack to Halloween Horror Nights' Universal Monsters Remix: Resurrection maze was composed by DJ/EDM artist Figure, with the music paying homage to classic movie monsters of the '20s, '30s and '40s. Murdy, who discovered Figure's music via iTunes, believes the merging of musicians and mazes is all a matter of finding the right fit.
"When you go past Alice and Sabbath, then you have to really think about what else might work in this setting," says Murdy. "I would certainly like to continue to do this and I think it's just finding the right person and the right opportunities."
This installment of GRAMMY Rewind turns back the clock to 2016, revisiting Lamar's acceptance speech upon winning Best Rap Album for To Pimp A Butterfly. Though Lamar was alone on stage, he made it clear that he wouldn't be at the top of his game without the help of a broad support system.
"First off, all glory to God, that's for sure," he said, kicking off a speech that went on to thank his parents, who he described as his "those who gave me the responsibility of knowing, of accepting the good with the bad."
He also extended his love and gratitude to his fiance, Whitney Alford, and shouted out his Top Dawg Entertainment labelmates. Lamar specifically praised Top Dawg's CEO, Anthony Tiffith, for finding and developing raw talent that might not otherwise get the chance to pursue their musical dreams.
To Pimp a Butterfly singles "Alright" and "These Walls" earned Lamar three more GRAMMYs that night, the former winning Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song and the latter taking Best Rap/Sung Collaboration (the song features Bilal, Anna Wise and Thundercat). He also won Best Music Video for the remix of Taylor Swift's "Bad Blood."
It's rare that a genre can be traced back to a single artist or group, but for funk, that was James Brown. The Godfather of Soul coined the phrase and style of playing known as "on the one," where the first downbeat is emphasized, instead of the typical second and fourth beats in pop, soul and other styles. As David Cheal eloquently explains, playing on the one "left space for phrases and riffs, often syncopated around the beat, creating an intricate, interlocking grid which could go on and on." You know a funky bassline when you hear it; its fat chords beg your body to get up and groove.
Brown's 1965 classic, "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," became one of the first funk hits, and has been endlessly sampled and covered over the years, along with his other groovy tracks. Of course, many other funk acts followed in the '60s, and the genre thrived in the '70s and '80s as the disco craze came and went, and the originators of hip-hop and house music created new music from funk and disco's strong, flexible bones built for dancing.
Legendary funk bassist Bootsy Collins learned the power of the one from playing in Brown's band, and brought it to George Clinton, who created P-funk, an expansive, Afrofuturistic, psychedelic exploration of funk with his various bands and projects, including Parliament-Funkadelic. Both Collins and Clinton remain active and funkin', and have offered their timeless grooves to collabs with younger artists, including Kali Uchis, Silk Sonic, and Omar Apollo; and Kendrick Lamar, Flying Lotus, and Thundercat, respectively.
There are many bands that play heavily with funk, creating lush grooves designed to get you moving. Read on for a taste of five current modern funk and nu-disco artists making band-led uptempo funk built for the dance floor. Be sure to press play on the Spotify playlist above, and check out GRAMMY.com's playlist on Apple Music, Amazon Music and Pandora.
Aptly self-described as "discodelic soul," Brooklyn-based seven-piece Say She She make dreamy, operatic funk, led by singer-songwriters Nya Gazelle Brown, Piya Malik and Sabrina Mileo Cunningham. Their '70s girl group-inspired vocal harmonies echo, sooth and enchant as they cover poignant topics with feminist flair.
L'Impratrice (the empress in French) are a six-piece Parisian group serving an infectiously joyful blend of French pop, nu-disco, funk and psychedelia. Flore Benguigui's vocals are light and dreamy, yet commanding of your attention, while lyrics have a feminist touch.
Franc Moody's bio fittingly describes their music as "a soul funk and cosmic disco sound." The London outfit was birthed by friends Ned Franc and Jon Moody in the early 2010s, when they were living together and throwing parties in North London's warehouse scene. In 2017, the group grew to six members, including singer and multi-instrumentalist Amber-Simone.
Their music feels at home with other electro-pop bands like fellow Londoners Jungle and Aussie act Parcels. While much of it is upbeat and euphoric, Franc Moody also dips into the more chilled, dreamy realm, such as the vibey, sultry title track from their recently released Into the Ether.
Living Legends is a series that spotlights icons in music still going strong today. This week, GRAMMY.com spoke with Billy Idol about his latest EP, Cage, and continuing to rock through decades of changing tastes.
Billy Idol is a true rock 'n' roll survivor who has persevered through cultural shifts and personal struggles. While some may think of Idol solely for "Rebel Yell" and "White Wedding," the singer's musical influences span genres and many of his tunes are less turbo-charged than his '80s hits would belie.
Idol first made a splash in the latter half of the '70s with the British punk band Generation X. In the '80s, he went on to a solo career combining rock, pop, and punk into a distinct sound that transformed him and his musical partner, guitarist Steve Stevens, into icons. They have racked up multiple GRAMMY nominations, in addition to one gold, one double platinum, and four platinum albums thanks to hits like "Cradle Of Love," "Flesh For Fantasy," and "Eyes Without A Face."
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