We spoke with author Roy D Hacksaw, contributor to Earth Island Books’ Hardcore Horror anthology and creator behind titles like Bugger Banksy, Worst. Eurovision. Ever., and Ken Dodd’s Drummer. In this conversation, we dive into all things horror, exploring his core inspirations, key themes, creative process, and the natural crossover between punk rock culture and dark fiction.
Order Hardcore Horror HERE
Purchase Roy D Hacksaw’s books HERE
How did you first get into horror? Do you remember the very first horror book or movie that truly terrified you?
Like most people of my generation it was probably Doctor Who that first gave me the proper jibbers. My dateable memory just about coincides with the start of the Pertwee era, and stories like Spearhead From Space, Carnival of Monsters and The Green Death have always stuck with me. When I rewatched the entire classic series recently I was rather surprised how many Troughton storylines I remembered too, so I was obviously watching them in the crib, and that must have set me on the path of gnarly before I even realised it.
Over the years, which horror authors, directors, or artists have had the most tremendous impact on your creative sensibilities?
I was born smack in the middle of the classic Hammer era, and I always had a thing for the portmanteau horrors that Amicus used to churn out that always seemed to be on the telly after Match of the Day. Among the tales, there was always a Gothicky one, a serious one, one that started funny and ended up pretty grim, and then one at the end that linked them all together somehow when they discovered that they were all dead already or something like that. They were all terrific romps with a little bit of something for everyone. But in among them there were some real shockers featuring familiar faces that made the horror bits seem even worse. Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors and Tales from the Crypt are probably the most famous ones, but I think Torture Garden is my quiet fave – Burgess Meredith is quite magnificent as Dr Diablo. Strangely for someone who writes for a living I’ve never really been a big reader, so it was the films and telly of the era that really gave me my lead into horror.
Hardcore Horror brings together voices from the punk, hardcore, and alt-rock communities. What do you think is the connective tissue between the underground music scene and the horror genre?
It’s probably a variety of things, to be honest with you. Many of us were the odd ones at school. Not quite the outcasts, but the ones that didn’t quite fit in. And for a lot of us, before we had music to make or talk about it was the films that we’d seen that we could all connect with. So I guess those kinds of transgressive bonds that go hand-in-hand with noisy and angry music kind of followed on from there. And I guess that as music makers we’re attracted to the loud and the grim and the dirty, so perhaps those sinews all kind of weave together.
Turning to your specific contribution to this Earth Island Books anthology, where did the initial spark or inspiration for your story come from?
Now, this is going to sound a little uncool, but it’s quite true. We took the in-laws to see Ken Dodd at the Wolverhampton Civic Hall a few years back, not long before he passed. It was unexpectedly incredible, and the legends about the length of his shows proved to be true. It was probably five-and-a-half hours from start to end, with the occasional break and speciality act thrown in for good measure. Doddy was terrific, but I became fascinated with his backing musicians – a keyboard player and a drummer – who sat there in a tired daze until they were called upon to provide a badum-tish at the end of a joke, or heard the cue in to a song. The drummer looked like a reasonably young fella who might have been in a half-decent band at some point, but who was doing this to pay his rent. So I half developed an idea to do a documentary film about him and what he was thinking about in the long gaps between gags. But then old Ken finally carked it and the opportunity was gone. But the title, Ken Dodd’s Drummer, stuck in my head, and when I got asked to contribute to Hardcore Horror the story appeared instantly. I always wondered what happened to that drummer, so I wrote an alternative universe story about him to fill in the gaps in my imagination.
Without giving away any major spoilers, what are the core themes or underlying fears you wanted to explore in this piece?
I think at the heart of the story it pokes the fear of most creative types of getting stuck in a boring dead-end job to help fund your coveted showbiz life and put food on the table. Then somehow that job takes over your life, and before you know it you spend the long, boring hours of toil fretting over all the near-forgotten misdeeds of your life, and the creative side of your very being starts drifting off into the distance. Ooh, I’ve made myself shudder there just thinking about it!
How did your story evolve from the first draft to the final version, and what was the experience like working on it?
I’m quite a quick writer, as having been a journo I’ve got used to knocking out a six-page magazine feature in an afternoon. And once the idea popped into my head it sort of came fully formed, and I just had to type it out over a couple of hours. I left it a couple of days before I skimmed through it to check for spelling, tense changes and consistent naming, but that was about it really. I’d like to be able to say that it was an artistic struggle, but once an idea comes into my head it all kind of spews out in one go.
What was the most challenging aspect of writing this particular story? Was it nailing the ending, writing a specific terrifying scene, or something else entirely?
There wasn’t a lot of a challenge to be honest with you. Keeping the antagonist’s backstory consistent from start to end was the only thing that really troubled me, but as long as I got the Amicus-style gear-change in at the end it was pretty simple, really.
When it comes to your writing process, how do you approach crafting a short horror story? Are you a detailed outliner, or do you let the narrative unfold organically?
If I’m writing a novel, I’ll write for a full day, then set myself a problem for the heroes to solve when I start writing the next day. Then I’ll take notes and write character outlines as I go along. But with a shortie it’s a bit different. It’s more like remembering a long joke. You’ve got the set up, the intriguing bit in the middle that gets the reader trying to guess the punchline, and then either the nasty twist or the comedy switcheroo at the end. So it’s all pretty organic for me, really. Like I said before, if I have an idea for a short story, the whole thing just seems to form in my head straight away from start to end, and I just meander my way through that root storyline adding some fancy language here and there as I go until I get to the end.
Horror relies heavily on pacing and atmosphere. What techniques do you use to build tension and a sense of dread on the page?
Rather prosaically its the hoary old standard of start, middle and end. If you know where you’re aiming to at the finish, and establish an intriguing start that gets the reader wondering where this is going, your only real job is keeping them interested enough to go along for the ride in the middle. Build the tension, keep ’em guessing, then whip the rug out from under their feet at the end.
How do you approach character development in a short format, ensuring that the reader cares about the protagonist before the horrific elements take over?
My novels tend to be very character heavy, with all sorts of varied paths leading here, there and all over the place before they finally weave together at the denouement. But I’m very aware that a shortie has to be a bit more route one, so I like the reader to view the story from the eyes of the protagonist – learning about the situation that the character finds themself in alongside them. That way you can bath reach the reveal with the same level of alarm and doomed astonishment. Well, that’s the hope, at least.
Horror as a genre is incredibly vast and constantly evolving. What are your thoughts on the current state of horror literature and cinema?
To be absolutely honest with you, I’ve got a bit bored of gore and jumpscares and pointless brutality to women. Most of the things that have given me the heebies lately have been the more psychological and cerebral horrors, rather than the cookie-cutter man in a rubber head with a sharp tool affairs. There will always be a market for the latter, and it kind of got creative again for a bit back in the early 2000s. But it’s all got a bit formulaic again, so I’m hoping for a new wind of original and creative nasty messy stuff soon. The dumb-Americans-going-on-holiday-somewhere-strange-and-getting-involved-in-the-most-terrible-folk-horror trope started brightly but got pretty boring pretty quickly, and I’ve never been much of a one for the haunted doll or frat kids in a horror house oeuvres that seem to be making a comeback right now. One of the best survival horrors I’ve seen in years was Green Room, and that wasn’t even officially a horror. But having been in punk bands playing in random places where you don’t know anyone it scared the absolute bejabers out of me!
If you had to recommend one essential horror book and one essential horror movie, what would they be?
Ooh, tricky. Like I said before, I’m not a big reader, so I’m no real help for an answer there. But film wise, there’s an incredible 2020 Polish film called The Hater that follows a young man as he rises through the ranks at a clandestine internet disinformation agency. It’s not horror in the traditional sense – more of an existential angst kind of thing that builds to terrifying levels of real world unpleasantness and leaves you desperately unsettled and hopeless by the end. I’ll have to dig that one out again for another watch. That’s more my kind of horror right now.
What is next for you? Are there any upcoming books, projects, or other creative endeavours we should keep on our radar?
I’m usually pretty busy with bits and bobs and the weird shizz that life seems to throw at me, but hopefully I’m approaching a bit of a lull, so I’ll be able to finally finish off the autobiography of Wakey, the original and best singer from the English Dogs. He’s been sending me stories and random recordings for a couple of years for me to cobble together into some kind of an order, but we’ve both been experiencing flakey moments in real life just lately, so it’s taken longer than we both anticipated. But it’s going to be worth the wait, as it’s packed with some great tales from the early days of the second wave of punk, his life as a new age traveller, and more than a few more scatalogical tales. And once that’s finally out, I’ve got a bunch of new novels straining at the leash to get on paper.
Music wise, it’s the 40th anniversary of my proper band Hacksaw in 2027, so we’re planning a few small tours and grand events throughout the year. And I’ll still be trying to sneak punk rock band names and oblique rock’n’roll in-jokes into the questions that I write for television quiz shows while I’m doing the day job. I always feel a sense of achievement when I do that.
Aside from all that, I’m sure that something quite unexpected and ridiculously fun will pop along somewhere in between all that. It always seems to.
Finally, what is the one wavering thought or feeling you hope readers take away after finishing your story in the anthology?
Are you ever really sure that your reality, right now, is the real reality? Or is it something else?
(Ooh, I think I’ve just mildly soiled myself thinking about that one!)
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