Loren Connors

The horror movie-styled title and that creepy-as-you-like sketch (by Connors himself) that adorns the sleeve should hint at the kind of nefarious doings that surround the making of this long-lost Loren Connors album. According to the tale, Midnight Mary (aka 19th century Connecticut resident Mary Hart) suffered an attack and fainted, believed to be dead. Her husband had her buried only for Mary's sister to wake up at midnight having had a nightmare about her sister screaming from within the grave. After pleading for the body to be exhumed Mary was found with a look of terror preserved on her face, her hands bloodied, fingernails torn off. Her tombstone was subsequently inscribed with the ominous curse: "The people shall be troubled at midnight and pass away". So, legend has it that any visitors to the graveside of Midnight Mary past the stroke of twelve are damned to croak the very next day. Where does Loren Connors come into all this? Well, in 1981 he took his tape recorder to the cemetery in question and set about recording this half-hour set of grim blues incantations in the company of the tragic Mrs Hart, and what an unremittingly bleak song cycle it turns out to be - as he strains and strangles his guitar Connors lets out pained groans, shaping a ghoulish lament over the course of the album. It's a pretty chilling listening experience that evokes the scene nicely, though Connors' own sleevenotes suggest you steer clear from the album altogether lest you find yourself under Midnight Mary's hex...