Halloween In Arkham

Halloween In Arkham - Cover (front)

Halloween In Arkham - Cover (back)

One of the earliest 12" vinyl bootlegs.
It was released before the No Time To Cry single, which was published the 8th of March in 1985.

Release Notes

Label: Arche Noire Records
Catalogue#: ANR 024
Format: 12" vinyl LP
Released: 1985

Remarks

Released in two editions

The first edition is limited to 500 copies and handnumbered.

The second edition is limited to 300 copies.

Vinyls have plain white labels with "Cat# 523" etched into the lead-out groove.

The cover of the first edition has a copper/gold-like coloured print,
while the second edition comes with a pasted b/w copy instead.

The cover front shows a low resolution copy of the art work "Dreams in the Witch House" by Harry O. Morris Jr., a contemporary American artist.

It is part of a serial of 15 grafics titled "Halloween in Arkham" created in 1979, which seems to be the origen of the name of the present album.

The artwork itself has got its title from a short story of the same name by H. P. Lovecraft, published first in 1933.

On the cover back No Time To Cry is remarked as "UNRELEASED".

This information provides the basis for some evidences concerning the release date and the significance of this item.

First - as far as we know there were three 12" bootlegs released in 1984: Live At Brixton Ace, Psychedelic Sessions 1984 and The Lights Shine Clear Through The Sodium Haze. These were the ones with which everything started.

Then in 1985 a lot of new bootlegs were released - also some significant ones. Nowadays it is difficult to figure out in which order they were released, but considering the remark on No Time To Cry, one can deduce that Halloween in Arkham was to be one of the first:

- Cryptic Flowers, Halloween's Day and Knocking On Heavens Door feature No Time To Cry, which was said to be unreleased at that time.

- Armageddon Outtakes and Stonehenge contain recordings from concerts that were performed in April or accordingly in May 1985.

So these albums were released later than the present one.

We still don't have any hint about the exact release dates of the bootlegs Live In The Troyan Horse and Possession, but at least we can asure that Halloween in Arkham was within the first six 12" bootlegs ever released for The Sisters Of Mercy.

Second - it was the first time that a proper song of the The Sisters Of Mercy was publicated prior to the official release.

The '84 bootlegs so far offered alternative versions like the Psychedelic Sessions 1984 album do, live recordings (Live At Brixton Ace), or both of this (The Lights Shine Clear Through The Sodium Haze). But to have all this together and moreover a unpublished Sisters composition was totally new, and - of course - immediately sought-after.

Therefore Halloween in Arkham was right from the start an essential and significant bootleg.