“Don't go by the River” by Voltaire

 

In the spirit of Halloween, I decided to make an ILTS article related to this scary holiday. And what better way to do it with a really good scary song from a quite peculiar fellow named Voltaire.

Expert in visual arts by day, musician by night, Voltaire has a really peculiar style of music. It can be upbeat and have quite a really catchy tune to most of his songs; he adds a quite dark and creepy vibe to each one.

His band plays a wide variety of music, mostly focusing on genres like rock, country or folk music. And while the songs may have a normal tune and rhythm that can deceive anyone, the lyrics to most, if not all of the songs they play are quite eerie. I spent some time listening to some of the songs of the songs in his YouTube channel and reading his bio on Wikipedia and I really could gather that Voltaire is really ingenious.

The songs Voltaire play are not truly meant to give a scare though; they are actually really quite fun and entertaining to listen to. Like I said, most of them can be quite upbeat, maybe to the point to start moving to the rhythm of the song, but the lyrics can be stories of horror and despair.

One song I truly like of his is “Don’t Go by the River” from the album “Riding a Black Unicorn”, which pretty much exemplifies what I am trying to say here. The song is listed as “Swamp Cabaret” (whatever that can mean…), inspired by Cajun music; which could be compared to Jazz but in a more folk-ish way. The song has this really catchy tune you will have stuck in your head for the next few days or so, but the lyrics are about being careful and not wandering into the river side at night, where you can find some really creepy creatures and things that could end your life.

I really cannot say that much about Voltaire’s music that it doesn’t do already, but like I said this guy is quite ingenious. He can turn really simple tunes and give them a new interesting twist to them. It is not something new of course, you might probably have heard similar stuff in other media, like movies or cartoons maybe, but he took that and made it enjoyable. I have heard he is quite popular in cons, like Dragon*Con, and he can put quite the show. So give Voltaire a listen; that is something you will not regret!

If you want a song featured in a future ILTS article, be sure to check and post in the Requests Thread in the VOG Forums. Also be sure to leave a comment, those are good too!

Until next time, keep on scarin’!