WhiteWolfSonicPrincess & A Witch For A Girlfriend

Graphic taken form WhiteWolfSonicPrincess MySpace page.

WhiteWolfSonicPrincess has been evolving over the past year, recruiting new members and beefing up its avant garde indie rock approach. Guitarist-singer James Moeller, who founded the band with vocalist Carla Hayden, has been encountering some intriguing, though positive feedback from audience members, usually based on some sort of comparison to a combination of recording artists or genres. Moeller and Hayden are also the freethinking brains behind Black Forest Theatre, and they approach drama and music with the same witty, imaginative spirit.

So it should be interesting to see what WhiteWolfSonicPrincess brews up for its The Devil and The Vixen Halloween Bash next Friday, October 29th. The party will be held from 7 to 10 PM at the Invision School for Psychics, which is located at 3340 N. Clark Street. In addition to the WWSP performance, there will be Psychic Readers, a costume contest, a DJ, dancing, and comedy. Individual admission is $20, $30 per couple.

And now, here’s another choice from last year’s 31 Songs For Halloween collection. I’m reposting some of the profiles for those who might not have seen them the first time around.

“My Girlfriend Is A Witch” by October Country is just one of the many cool audio artifacts to be found on the Rhino CD compilation, Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets: 1965-1968. Recorded in 1968 by a band that never found success beyond the West Coast, this is classic garage rock, with fun, spooky lyrics like, “Riding high/Leaving trails of smoke across the sky/On a broom/Glad that I am safe within my room.” In this case, having an other-worldly significant other doesn’t seem to have any ill effects, but it does inspire a bit of competition. “What a fate/A worshiper of magic for a day/But tonight I become a warlock just for spite.”

The song was written by record producer Michael Lloyd, who also provided lead vocals and some high-powered psychedelic guitar strumming, along with Marty Arsenault. Almost half of this catchy song is taken up by the musicians’ spirited jamming, which creates a live performance at a 1960s go-go club ambience. There’s no indication that the band took its name from Ray Bradbury’s collection of creepy short stories, The October Country. Instead, “My Girlfriend Is A Witch” has more of a 1960s TV theme feel. In fact, according to the book that comes with Where The Action Is, Lloyd recorded a second version in 1969 for the Saturday morning hillbilly feline cartoon series, The Cattanooga Cats.