The Ghastly Ones are a surf–garage rock band from Van Nuys, California with a late-night monster movie theme.
The band was formed by two special effects make up/movie monster makers, Garrett “Dr. Lehos” Immel and Norman “Baron Shivers” Cabrera. They infused their love of Halloween records, late night monster movies and Screaming Lord Sutch with inspiration from early sixties surf and hot rod acts like The Lively Ones, Avengers VI, and The Del-Aires to create the first “spooky surf” band.
The band’s first show was at Al’s Bar on Halloween 1996, infamous in the punk world for several rowdy Misfits shows. During their early shows, the stage was often decorated with tombstones and cobwebs to give their performances the proper atmosphere.
Their unique sound and look caught the attention of Rob Zombie who released their first album in 1998 on his label Zombie-A-Go-Go Records, a subsidiary of Geffen Records. Subsequent albums were released on their independent label, Ghastly Plastics Co.
In 2007 The Ghastly Ones toured the East Coast and Japan for the first time and in 2009 they played Nottingham, England. Their music has been featured in the Halloween episode of SpongeBob SquarePants, “SpongeBob ScaredyPants” and the 2010 remake of Night of the Demons.
Selected Discography:
A-Haunting We Will Go-Go, 1998 | All-Plastic Assembly Kit, 2005 | Target: Draculon, 2006 | Unearthed, 2007 | Gears n’ Ghoulfinks, purple vinyl 7″, 2009
