@rvanhornjr

Ray Van Horn Jr.’s Mixtapes of Horror, “Bringing in the Creeps” and “Behind the Shadows”

♬ original sound – rvanhornjr

Bringing in the Creeps, by Anuci Press, and Behind the Shadows, released through Raw Earth Ink.

Available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble.com, Walmart.com and other online retailers. Digitally available on Kindle, Nook and Kobo.

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

On the whole AI assisted writing controversy, I can honestly say that, for better or worse, I subscribe to the AM method to writing: All Me.

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

I was interviewed by Todd Severin at The Ripple Effect, a longtime brother in the metal trenches whose Ripple Music label bands I gave a lot of press love to for years. Todd and his partner Pope John are two of the savviest dudes in the heavy underground.

In this interview for The Ripple Effect’s Ripple Library Author Series, I get into Bringing in the Creeps, Behind the Shadows and behind the scenes of my next novel, “October Rust,” which I am hoping to land a publisher soon.

Todd’s creative questions got me rolling and I even share some insight to my 16 years as a metal, punk and horror journalist. Thanks, Todd, for a banging chat!

Also, go hunt down Todd’s acclaimed new medical thriller novel, Deadly Vision under his pen name, T.D. Severin!

Link:

https://ripplemusic.blogspot.com/2025/07/ripple-library-author-chat-withray-van.html?fbclid=IwY2xjawLx26RleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFnM3ZiQ2I2MFVFZFJEOWh3AR5RPGpguTT38xSRdhenTfmWjdQERvkxFC0w5jgrW_L0usm7DW1c6GaeljUU9A_aem_SvLOD1_p7GoyKXn78ZtHcw

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

This one’s my very favorite Ozzy track from Diary of a Madman, hooked at age 12 by those sinister bass slides and chilling guitar twangs first laid down by Rudy Sarzo and the late, great Randy Rhodes. I was converted from pop kid to metalhead on this song along, though Iron Maiden’s Killers certainly put the nail in the coffin to my prior self.

This is a stellar live rendition of the cut at Budokan 2002 with one of Ozzy’s most formidable later-year lineups: Zakk Wylde on guitar, Metallica and Suicidal Tendencies bassist Rob Trujillo and Faith No More drummer Mike Borden.

Horns up, all the way…

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

One of my treasure photos nearly 20 years ago already in 2006. On the tour bus with the Queen of Metal, Doro Pesch. I was a bit chunkier back then from all the road dogging I was doing in the music industry then, covering 10-12 shows a month, sleeping 3-4 hours a day and working full time. A terrible diet, usually eating on the road to shows. Before I got on my fitness crusade.

A story behind the picture and I was telling it to a new friend the other day. The night before I went down to Virginia to cover Doro’s gig on a Sunday, I was in NYC, assigned an on-site interview with industrial rock legends, Skinny Puppy, at the Nokia Theatre in Times Square. Hiccups behind the scheduling forced my interview to be postponed to a phoner two days later, but it was still an amazing trip. I think I covered an easy 40 blocks on foot that day. Saw Cynthia Nixon of Sex and the City dashing with a companion into a car in Greenwich Village. Had a terrific dinner with a label friend from the old Roadrunner Records, Jen Bryan. Caught the SP show and got some decent pics before I hightailed it on the yellow line back to Battery Park, which dumped us out early about 10 blocks. Saw some illicit stuff going on in Wall Street with no fuzz around at 12:30 a.m. The ride home on the Staten Island Ferry and driving back to Baltimore in the middle of the night was an adventure as well.

Per usual, I got very little sleep between events and I was back at it the next day to interview Doro. I was treated like gold by her drummer and tour manager, Johnny Dee, and Doro had Trans-Siberian Orchestra and Savatage guitarist Chris Caffery in her band and as an opener. I have a separate pic in my archives of the three of us. I’d interviewed Chris a couple times, had good rapport, had a blast with him and Doro all night at this gig. Chris remembered me later at a TSO meet-and-greet, just good stuff.

Enough of the bragging. I left Doro’s gig close to 1:00 a.m. with a three-hour haul back home, already exhausted, but exhilarated from my time spent in the court of the Queen. It had been my fourth time interviewing Doro. Everything you hear about her is true. The kindest, most down-to-earth person in the scene. Legend. So I’m driving in my truck and quickly fading on a back road in Virginia. Suddenly I wake up with my chin resting on my chest. I’d passed out behind the wheel, miraculously with my foot on the brake and in my lane.

I always thank the divine for protecting me that night. I might not have lived to tell this tale.

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

Every single day is that one day I hope for the “big one.” My fellows in the author community know what I mean. Every day is a win and a loss. Every day is outward joy and hidden agony. Every day is filled with the potential of every person becoming a new friend, until they’re not. Every day is filled with words that want to gush with a hopeful continuous ebb.

Every day is a burst of energy and ultimate fatigue. Every day is one where a helping hand may come as often as facing a tundra of radio silence from those you ache to not only reach but impress. Every day your heroes inspire you and at times befuddle you. They’re human too. Every day I face a white emptiness and give praise to the divine when I fill it with black icons, cutting and editing as needed. Sieving my lifeblood from a proverbial vein and feeling incredible release only lovemaking provides better.

Every day I show my soul with some guardedness while wanting to stand upon the highest summit and scream. Every day I network in some fashion, the same way I rose as a music journalist, having the wherewithal to cold contact heritage artists for private conversations that led to where I am now. A-list knocked back down to base in the same long upward march. Every day I remember the thrill when the ether of obtuseness blows into my nostrils.

Every day I seethe with jealousy just as much as I cheer on, support and push my fellow writers. My brothers and sisters know that which I speak. It’s the highest form of ecstasy to earn a publication, to sell a book from your table, to make a new contact with someone who gives a damn about your journey. It’s lonely no matter what level of success you are as an author, unless you’re fortunate like I am to have another author as your mate and biggest advocate. Every day I see the best of myself in my woman, a fellow warrior of the word, and every day I fight that much harder.

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

I am all fired up this morning! Bringing in the Creeps has been awarded a Five Star Review from Reader Views. Anytime your work gets mentioned in the same breath as the Master, Stephen King, is a “Squeeeee!” moment. Thank you with all my heart to Tammy Ruggles. Check it out:

“Bringing in the Creeps by Ray Van Horn, Jr., is the answer to a classic horror lover’s dream. If you miss the days of unabashed horror, then you will love this collection of short stories, which is a follow-up to his first anthology. Each story has something different and ghoulish to offer, so if you’re squeamish or not a horror fan, this isn’t the book for you.

Van Horn has an infectious love for horror, which you can tell as you read. He has his finger on the pulse of what makes horror tick. The topic of murder is just the beginning. The characters and plots are unique and compelling in a delightfully horrific way, but all faithfully horror. By now, the undead in horror has been done to death, but Van Horn gives zombies new life, pun intended. The 1980s vibe of the arcade takes you back to all those B and C horror slasher movies on VHS.

I like the style of Van Horn’s writing–to the point and horror-focused, and I like how he uses interesting settings, like a punk rock show, a reservoir, and an old arcade, just to name a few. Van Horn never lets you forget what horror used to be, and still is today, in the right hands. These are more than throw-back stories. They are true entertainment for horror fans longing to sink their teeth into the meat and potatoes of classic horror. With writers like Van Horn, werewolves, monsters, and the macabre will never go out of style. Now horror fans will have another name to turn to when they want a good scare or gross-out. This collection proves that there is more to horror than haunted houses and possessed children.

The cover alone pulls you in, but once you’re inside the stories, you discover a writer who truly is talented and committed to telling these tried-and-true tales of terror. One of my favorite stories is the first one, “‘End of the Midway,” simply because it introduces you to the quality of writing to come. The writer takes something as familiar and everyday as a midway and gradually but graphically shows you the horror inside it.

The dialogue between the characters can sound almost boring and too everyday, but that’s intentional, as it helps ground you in the real world. There is something oddly lyrical and poetic in the phrasing Van Horn uses, and that may surprise you if you think there can’t be rhythm in horror writing. Van Horn, like Stephen King, writes with a certain ebb and flow that sometimes feels like a nursery rhyme, but with teeth. The vivid imagery puts you right into the time and place he’s writing about, and the characters are fleshed out, though some more well-drawn than others. “Age of Quarrel,” the one about xenophobia and a persecuted teen, is another of my favorites.

Whether you’re a casual horror fan or one who just can’t get enough, Bringing in the Creeps by Ray Van Horn, Jr., won’t disappoint.”

Bringing in the Creeps, from Anuci Press. Now available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble.com and numerous online retail outlets!

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.

Retro Ad of the Week: Black Sabbath, Live at the Asbury Park Convention Hall, NJ 1972