How it all began...

It was on a transatlantic flight to Stockholm on September 1st, 2011 when I discovered H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Dreams in the Witch House.” My trip was to be a mixture of business and pleasure, and my colleague, Andrew Leman had recommended I read the story just prior to my departure. A few days later in Stockholm I was to have a meeting with my long-time music co-writer, Chris Laney, who would eventually provide Industrial Metal tracks for a short film I was working on, using deleted Black Pharaoh footage from the HPLHS Motion Picture, “The Whisperer in Darkness” (directed by Sean Branney). Andrew suggested I read “The Dreams in the Witch House” to gain more insight into the Black Pharaoh, a mighty Lovecraft character who appears as different forms, identified by a variety of ominous names – Nyarlathotep, The Crawling Chaos, and The Black Man of the Witch-Cult.

As the flight continued, “The Dreams in the Witch House” quickly left an impression on me and I began to envision the story on a theatrical stage. It was when I read the following passage that I visualized the Broadway stage ---

And now, too, there was a growing feeling that somebody was constantly persuading him to do something terrible which he could not do. How about the somnambulism? Where did he go sometimes in the night? And what was that faint suggestion of sound which once in a while seemed to trickle through the maddening confusion of identifiable sounds even in broad daylight and full wakefulness? Its rhythm did not correspond to anything on earth, unless perhaps to the cadence of one or two unmentionable Sabbat-chants, and sometimes he feared it corresponded to certain attributes of the vague shrieking or roaring in those wholly alien abysses of dream.

In this one passage Lovecraft made numerous references to sound; faint suggestions pertaining to rhythm and cadence, vaguely shrieking or roaring. I immediately heard a Heavy Metal soundtrack in my mind and the seeds of a Lovecraftian Rock Opera were planted.

During my Black Pharaoh meeting with Chris Laney in Stockholm, I pitched the idea of producing a “Dreams in the Witch House” Rock Opera concept album. Chris had just finished reading Dan Brown’s “Angels & Demons”, and was craving to compose a Gothic Heavy Metal Musical with religious, end-of-the-world undertones. On September 5th, we decided to join forces to produce “Dreams in the Witch House – A Lovecraftian Rock Opera.” Studio production began in February of 2012, and nearly 20 months later, with the added fire-power of producers Lennart Östlund, RingMan, Sean Branney and Andrew Leman, we present the results of an epic project of passion which features 17 dynamic singers, 14 awesome musicians and a lifetime of infinite Lovecraftian dreams. Rock on!

Mike Dalager, Executive Producer