Examples of fantasy, science fiction, horror texts in music

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The Tolkien music thread
Tolkien Music s/d

Mervyn Peake
https://rateyourmusic.com/list/Babaji/gormenghast-in-music/

William Hope Hodgson
http://www.johncoulthart.com/feuilleton/2013/04/04/hodgsonian-vibrations/
https://www.discogs.com/Ahab-The-Boats-Of-The-Glen-Carrig/master/876543
https://rhythmplex.bandcamp.com/album/the-house-on-the-borderland

HP Lovecraft
http://www.hplovecraft.com/popcult/music.aspx
https://rateyourmusic.com/list/Cthulhu/the_lovecraft_connection/

Lord Dunsany
https://www.discogs.com/Bob-Johnson-Pete-Knight-The-King-Of-Elflands-Daughter/master/327780

Tanith Lee
http://daughterofthenight.com/tlmusic.html

Moorcock
https://rateyourmusic.com/list/Metallkrieger/eternal_champion/
I've heard that some Summoning songs have references

Frost's "Milliontown" was based on The Apprentice by Gordon Houghton (I fucking love this song).

Dave Greenslade done a Terry Pratchett album.

Thomas Ligotti/Current 93

Master Of The Five Magics by Lyndon Hardy inspired a Megadeth song.

C. Dean Andersson/Asa Drake's Hel/Bloodsong series inspired Bathory's "One Rode to Asa Bay”

I bet tons of this is awful so it's more of a trivia thread than a recommendation one. I'm sure there's a bunch of CS Lewis and Robert E Howard pages on music. Don't know if Camel's Snow Goose book is a realistic book about a goose, cant be bothered checking now.

Bonus points for really unexpected writers.

Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, 13 October 2019 15:48 (four years ago) link

Snow Goose is a depressing ass story about Dunkirk. (or it sounds like it is, I haven't read it).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Snow_Goose:_A_Story_of_Dunkirk

It's not really fantasy per se. I guess maybe it is.

akm, Sunday, 13 October 2019 15:51 (four years ago) link

Quite a few here, mostly usual suspects writers but had no idea Iron Maiden did so much of it.
https://rateyourmusic.com/list/Liero/music-inspired-by-literature/

This is a fascinating various artists compilation I haven't heard. Music for The Devil In Love by Jacques Cazotte. Includes Art Zoyd, Gavin Friday, Jarboe, John Zorn, Keiji Haino and more. I cant imagine many of these bands had read the book before being asked to do this, but what a lineup!
https://www.discogs.com/Various-The-Devil-In-Love-A-Soundtrack-To-The-1772-Occult-Novel/release/2930312

One for Edgar Allan Poe, supposed to be more of a set of readings than music but it features Marianne Faithfull, Iggy Pop, Diamanda Galás, Gavin Friday, Jeff Buckley, Dr. John and Deborah Harry. Another amazing lineup.
https://rateyourmusic.com/release/comp/various_artists_f2/closed_on_account_of_rabies___poems_and_tales_of_edgar_allan_poe/

Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, 13 October 2019 16:35 (four years ago) link

ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet-by-hierarchy/rec/music/misc/SF-references-in-music_List
This page is a tough read (and most of it isn't based on any text) but using control+F for terms like "based on", I found...

Happy The Man (Samuel R Delany)
Stuart Hamm (Philip K Dick, William Gibson)
Joy Division (Ballard)
Oingo Boingo (HG Wells)
Tom Rapp (Ray Bradbury)
Monkees (Heinlein)

This Jimi Hendrix and Philip Jose Farmer thing
https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-secret-science-fiction-inspiration-behind-jimi-hend-5634580

I'm guessing Univers Zero based their name on a Jacques Sternberg story, add to this the similarity of a collection with a similar title to an Art Zoyd album.
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?447023
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?316438

Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, 13 October 2019 17:16 (four years ago) link

The Howling Hex album Rogue Moon was inspired by an sf novel of the same title; I don’t know how explicit the lyrical references are.

drunk on hot toddies (morrisp), Sunday, 13 October 2019 20:39 (four years ago) link

Is the song about teleporting into a lunar death maze?

Beware of Mr. Blecch, er...what? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 13 October 2019 20:44 (four years ago) link

Ex-ilxor writing about Ursula K Le Guin's electronica alb:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2018/mar/27/ursula-k-le-guins-electronica-album-music-and-poetry-of-the-kesh

Ward Fowler, Sunday, 13 October 2019 21:36 (four years ago) link

Guessed the byline wrong.

Beware of Mr. Blecch, er...what? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 13 October 2019 22:06 (four years ago) link

Haggerty/Herrema have a few i think, cf Royal Trux “Shockwave Rider” (John Brunner novel)

Οὖτις, Monday, 14 October 2019 01:50 (four years ago) link

Tons of Hawkwind/Moorcock stuff of course

Οὖτις, Monday, 14 October 2019 01:51 (four years ago) link

jefferson airplane's crown of creation lifts some of its lines verbatim from a john wyndham novel (pretty sure it was the chrysalids)

no lime tangier, Monday, 14 October 2019 05:43 (four years ago) link

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/81UO1qNE1vL._SL1500_.jpg

"Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds", a 1978 album that's exactly what it says on the tin.

Tuomas, Monday, 14 October 2019 12:17 (four years ago) link

Edgar Allen Poe's Masque of Red Death as done by Thrice

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXWymj3yQ7Y


One for Edgar Allan Poe, supposed to be more of a set of readings than music but it features Marianne Faithfull, Iggy Pop, Diamanda Galás, Gavin Friday, Jeff Buckley, Dr. John and Deborah Harry. Another amazing lineup.
https://rateyourmusic.com/release/comp/various_artists_f2/closed_on_account_of_rabies___poems_and_tales_of_edgar_allan_poe/

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, October 13, 2019 4:35 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I had this but don't remember anything about it except for Dr. John's reading of Berenice. Mr. Bungle quoted a few lines of Berenice in Carry Stress in the Jaw. They make up the bulk of the lyrics.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCJM2fxzewk

☮ (peace, man), Monday, 14 October 2019 15:48 (four years ago) link

doesn't Numan quote PKD and Ballard rather extensively? "Flow my tears the policeman said" etc.

Οὖτις, Monday, 14 October 2019 15:53 (four years ago) link

The Heliocentrics & Melvin Van Peebles - 'The Last Transmission'
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/JpkAAOSw78xcXY~O/s-l300.jpg

A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Monday, 14 October 2019 17:11 (four years ago) link

Wow @ that Ursula K. Le Guin album

change display name (Jordan), Monday, 14 October 2019 18:30 (four years ago) link

Forgot to mention Frank Black's brilliant Bradbury tribute "The Cult Of Ray".

Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 18 October 2019 16:13 (four years ago) link

Stereo Sanctity by Sonic Youth is basically just random bits of VALIS by Philip K Dick

Sonic Youth also references William Gibson stuff in several songs

silverfish, Friday, 18 October 2019 18:28 (four years ago) link


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