The Haunting and the Powerful

***The Haunting and the Powerful*** (or simply ***The Haunting***) is the debut album by October Noir, released on October 19, 2017. The remaster version of this album was released on January 14, 2022.

## Background

*The Haunting and the Powerful* is noted by many as the first album having Type O Negative-like sounds since their last Type O album *Dead Again* was released ten years prior, before Peter Steele's untimely passing at 48 in April 2010 and resultant breakup of the band. Tom Noir, a Type O fan from Pensacola, Florida, was so upset that he wanted to bring back those sounds, so he formed the band October Noir and play every instrument in his residence to produce the songs, which he did on this album. To reduce the time and effort, he copied pieces of Type O Negative songs into half of them tracks, which is heard several times in the album, such as a piece of "These Three Things" in the track "Volatile", "Stay Out of My Dreams" in "Silicon", and "Die with Me" in "Vertebra Seraphim". It took him seven months to record the album. Another reason why he added Type O nods was to give them taste and introduce fans to the band, and fans reactions are unexpectedly positive.

## Title and cover art

The title of the album refers to Tom's life being full of powerful emotions like fear, grief, and love. When he was dating, he was worried about her living in a house being haunted by evil spirits. She was afraid of getting attacked by a spirit.

The album cover shows the haunted house seen between the trees with the entrance gate below. The cover image was chosen based from the nature of the album and of the band, including the name. The texts displayed on the cover is tiny compared to subsequent albums by the band.

## Musical style

*The Haunting and the Powerful* has a lot of Type O Negative influences on them, plus it contains some influences from some other bands as well, including Danzig (as heard in "The Haunting" and "Trinity"), Tool (as heard in "Alpha Omega"), Moonspell, The Cure, and even '80s hair metal could be heard in them.

### Songs

The album has nine songs and lasts a grand total of 69 minutes, averaging 7m40s per song. The first track of the first album is near-instrumental "The Haunting", which has low-tuned piano made to give them feelings of being in a haunted place. "Volatile" is one of the fan favorites of the album that features an organ. "Trinity" references these three souls (which is served as the alternate title of this song and is parody of "These Three Things")—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. "Alpha Omega" is about recounting his experiences based from William Blake's poems and is also titled "An Veritas an Nihil", Latin for "The Truth, or Nothing". "Exhume" is a haunting piano fested track about removing bodies from the graves and incinerating them. The track title "Silicon" is taken from computer chip manufacturer monikered 'Silicon artist' and is about them having a brain disease. "Deep Woods" is the longest song by October Noir to date, lasting 14½ minutes, and is split into three cantos—"Deep Woods", "Pray for the Rain", and "Let the Rain Come Down". "Vertebra Seraphim" has acoustic parts taken from Type O song "Die with Me". "Feel Heart Love" is an 8-minute repetitiveness that ends with the recording of a choir chanting 'Feel heart love'. A track exclusive to the remaster of the album is "Beautifool" as a commemoration to Peter Steele.

## Tracklist

Original
1. "The Haunting" – 4:00
2. "Volatile" (alt. titled "Incinerate (Hate)") – 6:37
3. "Trinity" (alt. titled "These Three Souls") – 7:20
4. "Alpha Omega" (alt. titled "An Veritas an Nihil") – 7:37
	* I. "The Lamb and the Tyger" – 3:34 (0:00–3:34)
	* II. "An Veritas an Nihil" – 3:03 (3:34–7:37)
5. "Exhume" – 6:13
6. "Silicon" (alt. titled "Silicon Artist") – 6:58
7. "Vertebra Seraphim" (alt. titled "Backs of Angels" or "Angels") – 7:01
8. "Deep Woods" – 14:58
	* I. "Deep Woods" – 6:21 (0:00–6:21)
	* II. "Pray for the Rain" – 4:03 (6:21–10:24)
	* III. "Let the Rain Come Down" – 4:34 (10:24–14:58)
9. "Feel Heart Love" – 8:12

Remaster
Notice that "Vertebra Seraphim" and "Deep Woods" were swapped from that of original.

1. "The Haunting" – 4:00
2. "Volatile" (alt. titled "Incinerate (Hate)") – 6:37
3. "Trinity" (alt. titled "These Three Souls") – 7:20
4. "Alpha Omega" (alt. titled "An Veritas an Nihil") – 6:58 (39 seconds shorter than original)
	* I. "The Lamb and the Tyger" – 3:02 (0:00–3:02)
	* II. "An Veritas an Nihil" – 3:56 (3:02–6:58)
5. "Exhume" – 6:13
6. "Silicon" (alt. titled "Silicon Artist") – 6:36 (22 seconds shorter than original)
7. "Deep Woods" – 14:31 (27 seconds shorter than original)
	* I. "Deep Woods" – 6:00 (0:00–6:00)
	* II. "Pray for the Rain" – 4:03 (6:00–10:03)
	* III. "Let the Rain Come Down" – 4:28 (10:03–14:31)
8. "Vertebra Seraphim" (alt. titled "Backs of Angels" or "Angels") – 6:46 (15 seconds shorter than original)
9. "Feel Heart Love" – 8:12
10. "Beautifool" – 7:26
	* I. "Beautifool" – 3:11 (0:00–3:11)
	* II. "Life Is Unfair" – 3:03 (3:11–6:14)
	* III. "No Love" – 1:12 (6:14–7:26)

## Personnel

* **Tom Noir** – vocals, guitar on original tracks, bass, drums on original tracks, keyboards, organ on "Beautifool", writing, engineering, mixing, mastering, production
* Doug Lane – guitar on remastered tracks
* Tyler Fleming – drums on remastered tracks