Things that go bump in the night
“What impressed me about Rabbit’s Moon wasn’t the film itself — a seven-minute, black-and-white affair in which three clowns prance around in a moon-lit forest. No, what really caught my attention was the soundtrack — a demonic laugh kicked off a jaunty, organ-driven Beatlesque song that sounded like some half-forgotten top forty hit from the glam-rock era.” The search for the song and its elusive composer! A new article on Flickhead by Michael I. Cohen.
By A Raincoat (mp3)
posted by Ray Young at
2:32 AM
45 Comments:
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Awesome article!
You should know - a group of Andy's former students have just discovered this gem of a piece and have started mailing it around : all this history we never knew!
What a joy to find out how much more he has made his mark, apart from being one of my favourite sharers of innuendo and quirky musical mayhem whilst at university.
Nice work Flickhead!
Cheers
Demis
(hi andy - i know you'll find this eventually...)
Demis --
All credit goes to Michael Cohen, who did an excellent job of tracking all that information down and supplying the images of Andy's recordings.
That song haunted me for years!
-- Ray
That is a very catchy song; I can see how it would have haunted you for awhile.
my friend, you are a genius! i've been trying to track this song down for a long ass time. thanks ever so much!
-Darnell Witt (your friend from Chicago, IL)
I saw Rabbit's Moon as a teenager, back in the late 1980s, on Britain's often somewhat arty Channel Four. I found the film intriguing and thought-provoking, but I loved the soundtrack! It's been going round my head for something like eighteen years, until at last I tried searching for it. Fortunately I didn't have to go through all the work you did, as your page told me everything about it I could want to know! I'm particularly grateful for the MP3, which is excellent quality. I'd love to have a CD recording from EMI's original tapes, but I hardly think that's likely. You might be interested to do a search on the song's name: a few people have it listed now as one of their favourites, and I even found one page where it plays as a soundtrack when you load it! Thanks again for your excellent work, and I hope Blogger.com lets me post the comment this time.
So glad you did this. Please repost the mp3. It has been deleted due to inactivity. Please. Please. Thx
Please refresh mp3. It has been removed due to inactivity. Thanks so much.
Found your blog searching for the song that has racked my brain since film school some 12 or so years ago. Having a VHS copy of Angers Film I have always been able to pop it in and enjoy the tune whenever I needed a Fix. But for the past, I'd say 7 to 8 years I have been professionally doing vinly to Digital transfers and just tonight the song, while finishing up some work, popped into my head and I wondered, "I wish I could find this on an LP or 45 so I could listen to it in my car or stereo." Then I stumbled across your site. Looks like it's going to be a hard plate to track down, but at least I now have some information to go off of. Thanks so much for all the work you have already put forth. Like you, this song has been with me for all these years. I would point to the night sky and say "It came in the night" and friends would look at me like I was nuts. I was just hoping they knew the song.
Thanks again. This information will save me a ton. Now to track down the 45. This is another adventure, I'm sure.
Thank you ...just, thank you.
My boyfriend and I watched Rabbit's Moon while I was visiting him for the first time in Brighton and the film and song "Things That Go Bump In The Night" really stuck with me. I'm an alt collector obsessive and have grown up with arty channel 4 back in the late 80's early 90's but I never uncovered this gem of cinema and music until now. Thank you researching this and making it an easy find for people who are just coming across this wonderful entity of sound and film.
Take care,
Mel
Just echoing what everyone else said -- Been wanting this for a long time (since film classes at Rutgers, actually!) and was so happy to find it posted here. Thank you! And it's good to know that I'll be beating fellow FMU-er Irwin Chusid to the punch on this one...
hey, great work and a great story! thanks a lot.
now, do you want to do the same thing for jonathan halper's tracks on puce moment? i've tried for years...
Hey - Michael I. Cohen here:
Thanks for all your great comments. I'm glad to see other people appreciated this song and the whole Andy Arthurs/Kenneth Anger story. As for the Jonathan Halper song on the "Puce Moment" soundtrack - this one looks to be impossible (I'm thinking it was an unreleased song by a friend of Angers) but I'll keep trying.
I had only ever seen Kenneth Angers version of Rabbit Moon which consists of various music from the 50's. When I saw the version with the track 'It Came in the Night', I was severely disappointed because the film makes much more sense when narrated with the other soundtrack.Cool that you posted the track but don't really agree with the review posted as I think Rabbit Moon is one of his best work, but the magik of the film lies with the other soundtrack.I think the older version clocks in at around 13 minutes.Fantoma have just released a dvd which I think has the original soundtrack I mention.
Thanks for posting the track but I would urge people to definatley check out the version I mention.
;a)
Have you got the album/singles you mention? I have only the single "I love you for your mind(not your body)"/"Vote for me", and would love to hear more. Your article is the first mention of A Raincoat I've found in many years of searching. Can you help with sources etc.?
Hey guy!! I´m a Brazilian girl froma small ordinary city far from Sao Paulo or Rio (ans who speaks a kins of poor English, I´m sorry). A few time ago I started to read about underground cinema in a book at the college qhere I study. This book is called "Film as a subversive art". I simply loved it and I´ve never thought that someday I would be faced to a material like this in this end of the world where I live! Since I found it, I decided to buy a computer for me to research about these films... another book that uses to be besides this one is one called "An introduction to the Underground Cinema", where I had the opportunity to learn about Kenneth Anger. I simply loved how he, so young, started to make films and his subversion. As I found Rabbit´s Moon at youtube, I felt the same thing as you! I simply loved the song! Because of it, I started to try to find who could be the intrepet of it and, after a long time searching, I found your blog! I started to read it and I thought! "Oh! That´s me trying to find!!" Interesting thing! Thanx for this information! Send me an e-mail commenting!!
Cheers, Julie!
julieadict@hotmail.com
there´s something more!
I can´t find fireworks!
I really want to watch it... do you know where i can download it??
Thanx a lot!
ANDY ARTHURS IS MY FATHER!!!
hey dad... inform me when you read this hahaha
Oh my God. You are my hero. I looked for quite some time about 6 years ago for the song from the Rabbit's Moon, and like you, could not find it. Unlike you, I gave up... until now, when for some strange reason my interest renewed out of nowhere... and what do I find? All of the answers I was looking for on one page, including the very song.
I am ETERNALLY grateful.
Thank you so much!
I've been looking for this song for years. Thank you. thank you. thank you.
Michele from Italy
I was lucky to have seen Anger's movie in 2005, so the whole ordeal took just a few hours of online researching... and now it's all in one page, the top result on Google... almost too easy :-) And you made a good transfer from vinyl available, amazing! Thanks!
Like all things underground, there seems to be a spontaneous community of people who've seen the movie and fell for the song, whether it's Brazil, the US, or Israel.
It appears from the article that you contacted Arthurs himself; did you ask him if he has the masters? Or are these buried at EMI?
the article is very interesting about mr arthurs,do you have any information about another group he was assosiated with in the late 70s TONIGHT songs were drummer man & money,on T.D.S. label,which i think andy owned,could you tell me if they released any albums.
Wonderful detective work and great research!
I saw 4 Anger movies in the 80's on German TV,...so,. 20 years of research and all that wrong information that is around about that song made me nearly giving up on getting the song, Yesterday, I got Angers second DVD,..and researched again as ' A raincoat' is listed on the credits...I really apprechiate all that work,.thanks a lot,...but I still struggle with a similar Problem,..the song used for PUCE MOMENTS (Jonathan Helper ??),..can sombody help out on that one ?,...as well 20 years hopeless reasearch on my side ,,...Thanks so much,.Thomas
Thank you, I could kiss you! I've been trying forever to find I Love You For Your Mind (not your body) but didn't know who it was by. No-one else had heard of it.
My 1st guess was Sparks, my 2nd Sailor but when that proved wrong I had no other leads.
Still don't have the song but at least I know who I'm looking for.
many, many thanks.
Old enough to know better
I'd not heard "It came in the night" before.
I do possess the A Raincoat album (Sing-a-long-a-Macs?), in the loft - must dig it out sometime.
I don't remember this track being on the album.
I also remember it as being a disappointing selection songs - but "I love you for your mind" is FanTASTic!
Didn't mean to be anonymous there -
Thanks for the track.
Chris
i've been looking for the track too!! thanks for posting! but it's been deleted. . .could you repost or send me the file? my email is allana@nyu.edu. thank you so much!
Anon: the link still works for me; try again!
http://rs48.rapidshare.com/files/3408971/ARaincoatItCameNight.MP3
thanks!!
Thank you so much for your exceptional detective work and for making this obscure treasure of a track available!
loved it, amazing article, amazing song... greetings from peru
I have been looking for this for years!! Thank you, a million times!-David
Just saw "Rabbit's Moon" the other night and I just had to have the song.
Thanks so much for uploading it!
thank you thank you THANK YOU for posting this song!!! i've looked for it everywhere. i can't find any of his other records and i really want to listen to them--especially the Macs By Graves/Digalongamacs album. Any suggestions on where to look?????
You're welcome, CJS. Unfortunately, I haven't any information on Andy's other music.
A MILLION Thank-you's for finding this song! It has haunted me since film school, and now I have it on my very own iPod! Thanks again!
Wow, thank you for tracking this down!! I love this song and have been wondering about it for years too. And every-so-often I did internet searches to see if I could find out something about it with no success -- and just now found this! It's amazing all the people posting here who heard that song and had same feeling towards it.
Thank you for this amazing closure. Since 1992 when I took film classes at Hofstra University and saw Rabbit's moon I was hooked on the soundtrack and for years failed to discover it. Always dismayed, I made a cassette recording but your substantive research demonstrates great focus and tenacity. I appreciate your efforts and am at peace. Thank you. NYC Teacher
I Loved A Raincoat from I Love You For Your Mind onwards and have bought all Andy Arthur's records (and related stuff, which is another story) as it came out. As far as I can see, there's only one mistake in your article - the second single was Nostalgia '75 (a slightly edited version from the one on the album)/Not Waving But Drowning. Things That Go Bump In The Night was never released, although a promo video was shown on the Arrows music show, and is now on YouTube. I eventually found a copy of the single in a 10p box - one of my most exciting finds ever!
Don't suppose anyone has a copy of "I can detect you". A friend of mine recorded it with Andy as producer back in 79 along with a load of other Andy Arthur composed tracks - I've copies of all of them but would love to hear Andy's version.
Cheers
Just wanted to add my thanks for the research and the mp3.
I'm watching Anger's dvds right now, and it's interesting to me that so far NONE of his commentary tracks mentions anything about the music he uses. Except during Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome, when he does speak about the Janacek music a bit.
Anyway, you're my hero du jour.
Thanks, Bees!
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