Dead Noise: Best of 2022
It's been a wild year, to say the least — to celebrate the end of it, let's take a look at some of my personal favorite highlights, shall we?
2022 was a big year in many respects — for starters, this blog started up in March, with the YouTube channel beginning a month later, which feels like an achievement in and of itself. Getting started is always the hardest step, right? Both platforms have granted me a space to talk about my two favorite things (rock music and horror movies, if you're new here), connect with like-minded fans, interact with some of the professionals I look up to, and create some work that I'm extremely proud of.
There's still a long way to go and I'm excited for what the future holds, but I'm proud of where things have come in the first nine months of this platform. So to celebrate 2022 coming to a close, I'm going to discuss my personal favorite moments of this year — some choices were hard to narrow down, but others were obvious no-brainers. If you've kept up with my work this year, first of all, thank you, but also feel free to let me know what your favorite works of mine are if they differ from my own. So without further delay, let's get started:
FAVORITE ARTICLE
It would be VERY easy to choose the first article I wrote for the blog, celebrating the 100th anniversary of the German vampire classic Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror — there's a sentimental value with it being the first, it provided a sort of blueprint for my YouTube show 'Monster Memories,' and I feel like it's just one of my more impactful pieces. However, I think I topped it back in October with my celebration of the one-year anniversary of one of my all-time favorite albums, The Silver Scream 2: Welcome to Horrorwood by Ice Nine Kills.
This entire platform is made to discuss things I'm a fan of and have a passion for, but I can't think of a better example of my expression of said passion than with this article — for those who somehow don't know by now, I've been a gigantic Ice Nine Kills fan since 2014 and they've been one of my favorite bands since I first discovered them, so it doesn't take much for me to go on long-winded tangents about why I think they're so great and deserve to be one of the most successful bands in the scene today. Their latest album was a masterpiece in every sense of the word (read the article to learn why), and I feel I was able to get my passion across in a way that I haven't been able to with other articles or YouTube videos. All in all, I'd like to think I did justice to the album and the band, and it's the article I'm the most proud of because of that.
Runner-up: Nosferatu (1922): 100 Years of an Unauthorized Adaptation
FAVORITE VIDEO
The YouTube channel has been very rewarding in terms of creativity — from shorts to interviews to concert videos, I’ve been able to upload a lot of different things, and while certain videos are wicked time-consuming, it’s also a lot of fun to be working on these videos.
‘Monster Memories’ has been my most successful creative venture to date, which means a lot to me because of how much I love the things I discuss in those videos. I’ve made five MM videos this year, and my favorite one is the most recent one, in which I celebrate the greatness of the Gremlins movies — from a video standpoint, I think it’s the most cohesive one of the bunch, and it symbolizes my goals for every episode I make in an ideal scenario. With each video, I try to provide some form of historical context and behind-the-scenes trivia for the film, along with explaining what the movies mean to me as a fan, and I found a great balance of each element in this particular video. I have a few episode ideas for 2023 and I only hope I can continue the trend of making each successive episode the best one, because I already know this Gremlins episode is going to be a tough one to beat.
Runner-up: Monster Memories: The Wolf Man (1941)
FAVORITE CONCERT
It’s no secret that I live for live music — I’ve actually attended more concerts this year than in all my previous years of going to shows combined. I’ve been able to see legends like Everclear, subgenre veterans like Alesana, local groups like Waking Tera, and I’ve had a blast at every show.
While I was lucky enough to cover some local shows at Hooligans Live (more on that later) and have had a great time doing so, it’s hard to top the “Trinity of Terror” Tour’s stop in Myrtle Beach, SC for me. Shocker, right? It was my third time seeing Ice Nine Kills, second time seeing Fame on Fire, and first time seeing Motionless in White and Black Veil Brides, so to finally see two of those bands for the first time after being a fan for so long was a bit of a dream come true. Of course, it was also great to see Ice Nine Kills again, especially on a stage like the House of Blues. For the full recap of the show, click here.
FAVORITE INTERVIEW
Towards the end of summer, I finally found myself in a place to be doing interviews and presenting a professional-looking product in the process — my first interview was with one of my favorite alternative metal bands, Palisades, which was a bit surreal, but I was grateful for the chance and it was very easy to chop it up with the band. Drummer Aaron Rosa and (now former) vocalist Brandon Elgar were down-to-earth people, which eliminated any feeling of being starstruck because it felt like I was just talking with the homies.
Even through technical difficulties during other interviews, I’ve still had a ton of fun speaking with everyone this year. I can’t wait to do more in the coming year, and I think the one that sticks out to me the most is the one I did earlier this month with Johnny Cutt, the general manager of Hooligans Live. I loved hearing another perspective of the music industry, and Johnny’s just a great dude who’s very easy to talk with. In the short time I’ve gotten to know him, he’s truly opened up his doors for me to help me be able to do what I do at Hooligans Live, from interviews to video coverage. I really appreciate the support that he’s given me, and he knows the support goes both ways and I’ll always proudly rep Hooligans and the shows they put on. I highly recommend clicking here and checking out the interview if you haven’t already, and stay tuned for more collaborations between him and I very soon.
VERY close second: Evan Russell Saffer’s Career-Spanning Interview
If you’ve liked what I’ve done so far, I greatly appreciate your support and hope you stick around to see what I’ve got in the works for 2023 — to sum things up, you can expect more of the same, but on a better level. Until the next article, stay tuned, stay scared, and I’ll catch you later!