Text & Photos by Castle
Tending to the dead is a grave business, whether it’s building mounds or mausoleums, so in keeping with the theme of our current tour and upcoming album, Welcome to the Graveyard, we decided to visit the final resting places of souls alongside America’s highways as we traveled from city to city and record them with photos and words. A graveyard index of the dead and their spaces.
June 19 – St. Louis Cemetery, New Orleans, LA.
The “City of the Dead’s” earliest existing cemetery, founded in 1789, is located just beside (and almost beneath) Highway 10 as it winds through downtown New Orleans. Home to Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen and most widely-known practitioner of the Mystic Cult.
St Joseph Cemetery #1, New Orleans, LA.
The much less visited and slightly run-down St Joseph Cemetery #1 opened in 1858, and had filled its allocated dead space by 1878. The Tombstone Index shows Yellow Fever as the No. 1 kiss of death for souls laid to rest here.
June 22 & 23 – Bonaventure Cemetery, Savannah, GA
Located just off Highway 80 on a scenic bluff overlooking the Wilmington River, the famed Bonaventure Cemetery is as beautiful and haunted as you’d imagine. So nice we visited it twice (until we eventually got run out for good by the evil El Mosquitos Zika). Final resting place of Johnny Mercer, lyricist, oddly enough, of ‘That Old Black Magic’.
June 24 – Rock & Roll Graveyard, Frederick, MD
A google search on Frederick, MD graveyards turned up this local record store that, not coincidentally, is located underground in downtown Frederick. Rock & Roll Graveyard’s owner Chris confirmed the confusion of being the top result under local tomb searches, but since we were in town to play the second annual Maryland Doom Fest down the road, it seemed a fitting place to be. Great shop – and not just because they had the first two Castle LPs on hand.
June 25 – Grave Creek Mound, Moundsville, WV
Just south of Wheeling, WV – home to Brimstone Coven, our tour-mates for part of the second leg of the upcoming Welcome to the Graveyard US Tour – and a few miles off Highway 70 is Moundsville and Grave Creek Mound, the largest Native burial mound in the United States. Located across the street from the now defunct West Virginia Penitentiary, the 2000-year-old edifice of hallucinatory shapeshifting mound builders, the Adena, was once surrounded by a moat, and in more recent times, housed a tavern at its crest and a burial chamber museum inside its hollows, until a collapsed tunnel once again sealed its secrets.
Castle release Welcome to the Graveyard on July 15th via Ván Records worldwide. Listen to the CVLT Nation premiere of the ‘Down in the Cauldron Bog’ single here. Preorder limited edition colored vinyl from the band here. Castle’s Welcome to the Graveyard US Tour resumes July 17th.
7/17/2016 Slidebar – Fullerton, CA #
7/19/2016 The Vibe – Riverside, CA #
7/20/2016 Elbo Room – San Francisco, CA #
7/21/2016 Hi Water Mark – Portland, OR #
7/22/2016 Funhouse – Seattle, WA #
7/23/2016 The Palace Lounge – Missoula, MT #
7/24/2016 Railyard – Billings, MT #
7/25/2016 Reverie – Minneapolis, MN
7/26/2016 Reggies – Chicago, IL *
7/27/2016 High Noon Saloon – Madison, WI *
7/28/2016 Franks Power Plant – Milwaukee, WI *
7/29/2016 Shakespeare Pub – Kalamazoo, MI *
7/30/2016 Corktown Tavern – Detroit, MI *
7/31/2016 Howlers – Pittsburgh, PA *^
8/01/2016 Now That’s Class – Cleveland, OH ^
8/02/2016 Rockin Buffalo Saloon – Buffalo, NY ^
8/03/2016 Geno’s – Portland, ME ^ w/ Hessian
8/04/2016 Ralph’s – Worcester, MA ^ w/ Pilgrim
8/05/2016 Acheron – Brooklyn, NY ^ w/ Pilgrim
8/06/2016 The Fire – Philadelphia, PA ^ w/ Pilgrim
8/07/2016 TBA – Wilmington, DE
8/08/2016 Riffhouse Pub – Chesapeake, VA
8/09/2016 Pilot Light – Knoxville, TN
8/10/2016 The End – Nashville, TN
8/11/2016 Vino’s – Little Rock, AR
8/12/2016 The Grotto – Ft. Worth, TX
8/13/2016 The Lost Well – Austin, TX
8/14/2016 The Elbow Room – Wichita, KS
8/15/2016 The Blue Note – Oklahoma City, OK
8/16/2016 The Underground – Santa Fe, NM
8/17/2016 The Launchpad – Albuquerque, NM
8/18/2016 Flycatcher – Tucson, AZ
8/19/2016 The Merrow – San Diego, CA
8/20/2016 The Complex – Los Angeles, CA
8/27/2016 Doom Over T.O. Fest – Toronto, ON
9/07/2016 Katacombes – Montreal, PQ
9/08/2016 Envol at Macadam Fest – Quebec City, PQ
9/09/2016 Panic Room – St. John, NB
9/10/2016 Gus Pub – Halifax, NS
9/11/2016 Baba’s – Charlottetown, PEI
9/12/2016 Capitol Complex – Fredericton, NB
9/13/2016 Ti-Petac – Trois Rivieres, PQ
9/14/2016 House Of Targ – Ottawa, ON
9/16/2016 Black Pirates Pub – Thunder Bay, ON
9/17/2016 King’s Hotel – Winnipeg, MB
9/18/2016 TBA – Saskatoon, SK
9/19/2016 Starlite Room – Edmonton, AB
9/20/2016 Fernando’s – Kelowna, BC
9/21/2016 The Office Pub – Kamloops, BC
9/22/2016 Funky Winkerbeans – Vancouver, BC
9/23/2016 Logans Pub – Victoria, BC
9/24/2016 Palomino – Calgary, AB
9/26/2016 The Club – Regina, SK
9/28/2016 New American – Sault Ste. Marie, ON
9/29/2016 Call The Office – London, ON
# w/ Disenchanter
* w/ Brimstone Coven
^ w/ Blizaro
