The 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
Never even mind his biggest radio hit, the classic lycanthropic dance tune “Werewolves of London” — the songwriting oeuvre of WARREN ZEVON (1947-2003) conjures a twisted universe where upwardly mobile zoo gorillas steal the lives of urban yuppies, the ghosts of murdered mercenaries stalk their old battlefields, and Earth itself fades to the entropic assault of chemical pollution while love blooms in the mall. Unsettling, surreal, and wickedly funny, Zevon died too soon, but his specter haunts rock & roll forever.
The 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
TOM WAITS (1949– ) has built his oeuvre singing odd stories of life on the road, chronicling hobo existence, underground Americana, and downright weird folks through sordid lyrics and abrasive melodies. Every album is a singular experience, a collection of unique tales told in musical notes and gravel-throated vocals. His latest album, Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers, and Bastards is a tour de force through the weird world of his creativity.
The 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
His voice thunders at you with an undeniable allure. You will never, never understand the songs of NICK CAVE (1957– ) on the first, second, or fifth listens, and you will sometimes question why you’re still trying — and yet, you can’t quite turn him off. He twists mythic language into an apocalyptic sound of fury and decadence, populating his world with killers, wanderers, and fallen angels. It’s as if he could fall apart at any minute — but is haunted by his muses to continue his drunken stumble through your head.
The 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
A touchstone of surrealism in modern pop music, the narrative songs of KATE BUSH (1958– ) evince a fierce intellect and dream logic. She’s well infused with the fantasy genre, addressing it directly in tracks like “Hammer Horror” and “Strange Phenomena.” Her two magical-realist masterpieces, The Ninth Wave and A Sky of Honey, address the nature of reality itself. And at her most wonderfully abstract, in “Suspended in Gaffa” or “Sat in Your Lap,” she uses powerful imagery, redolent of genre, getting into our heads like the best psychological writers.
The 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
The first space alien rock star, DAVID BOWIE (1947– ) has at various times portrayed a dehydrated space traveler, the Goblin King, a vampire, the Elephant Man, a spooky clown, a blue-skinned religious zealot, and Nikola Tesla. He brought rock & roll rebel attitude and artistic credibility to movie roles and lyrical ideas (“Look out your window, I can see his light / If we can sparkle he may land tonight”) normally the province of geeks. He made weird cool.
The March/April 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!
The angelic techno-poet of the 21st century, blown backward into the 20th by a wind called tomorrow. LAURIE ANDERSON (1947– ) conjures the earthbound skeletons of prehistoric whales, writes odes to Hansel and Gretel, and builds digital audio triggers into her violin bows, all the while enchanting us to re-envision the moments of our lives. There’s no substitute for her ineffable stage performances, but listen anyway to The Ugly One With the Jewels and Mister Heartbreak, just for starters.
Readers wrote us in record numbers when we asked you who, in your book, are the weirdest of the weird: the most influentially strange authors and artists and talespinners of all kinds to work their magic on the world in the 85 years since 1923, when Weird Tales was born. We asked that you not limit your suggestions to just fiction writers, and you responded enthusiastically, naming hordes of filmmakers, songwriters, cartoonists, and more. We took your ideas, added a few of our own, called some top fantasy professionals to put in their two cents, and then dove into the long and arduous process of winnowing the list down to a mere 85 names.
Our 85th anniversary issue — featuring fiction by Michael Moorcock, Sarah Monette, and Tanith Lee, nonfiction by Cherie Priest, and Jeff VanderMeer’s interview with China Míeville, and is still available for purchase online — introduced the 85 Weirdest Storytellers individually. If one of your favorite weirdos didn’t make the list, you can share your weird and let us know! Our 90th anniversary isn’t that far away…
Meanwhile:
WEIRD TALES presents: The 85 Weirdest Storytellers 1923-2005
Kudos to them all: creative geniuses whose work, in whatever form and flavor, has shown an affinity of spirit with the brilliantly freaky storytelling that’s been the hallmark of Weird Tales since the magazine was born 85 years ago this very month.
(Don’t see one of your favorites here? Help us compile more weirdness! Go to the Share the Weird page and tell your fellow readers about the weird storytellers you love the most!)
The Uncanny Beauty Issue! “Secretario” by Catherynne M. Valente; Amal El-Mohtar presents Le Tarot de Gaga; Theodora Goss explores strange faces...and much more!
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