The Ghouls Dracula's Deuce (LP, colored Vinyl, Ltd.)

Do hearses and hot rods go together? Well, in the vivid imagination of renowned producer Gary Usher, they certainly do! Usher made a name for himself as a songwriter for the Beach Boys (he co-wrote “In My Room” with Brian Wilson) and as the producer of a band called The Byrds, which you may have heard of. Between these celebrated stints, he indulged his love of surf and hot rod music with a series of albums by studio bands such as The Hondells, Mr. Gasser and the Weirdos (with album covers by custom car painter Ed “Big Daddy” Roth), The Kickstands, and The Super Stocks. But the one album from Usher's oeuvre that everyone wanted to rescue from the vinyl crematorium is his hilariously bizarre 1964 foray into horror rock, Dracula's Deuce. In the hands of Usher and his first-rate troupe of Capitol studio musicians (The Ghouls, aka The Wrecking Crew) and longtime collaborators such as singer Ritchie Burns, “The Little Old Lady from Pasadena” became “The Little Old Lady from Transylvania,” “Johnny B. Goode” became “Bela Be Good” and “Be True to Your School” became, you guessed it, “Be True to Your Ghoul.” But for our money, the originals, composed by Usher, Richie Podolor, and Roger Christian, among others, are the main attraction, including the creepy exotica “Dracula's Theme” and the surreal “Monsterbilly Heaven.” Original copies of this album fetch monstrous sums (we know because we bought one), and it has NEVER been reissued in any format. producer Paxton gives excellent imitations of Bela Lugosi and others.