Interview with Joseph Vargo of Nox Arcana - Monolith Graphics

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Legends Magazine 

INTERVIEW: Nox Arcana (Joseph Vargo) 

By Marcus Pan 

Artist, occultist and musician Joseph Vargo gave me a 

chance to talk to him about some of his projects. From the 

theme-laced Halloween favorites of Midnight Syndicate 

to the orchestral scores of Nox Arcana, Joseph Vargo’s 

music is widely known and has forever blasted away the old 

school Halloween “sound effects” CDs and replaced them 

with scores worthy of feature films. His work with horror 

fiction is likewise known as is his amazing artwork that has 

graced everything from books to CDs to one of the most 

beautifully crafted Tarot decks ever before seen. In this 

exclusive interview Joseph answers my questions about all 

this and more. 

1) Nox Arcana and Midnight Syndicate, at my first 

impression of receiving work by both, was that the 

former was more of a side project of Joseph Vargo 

rather than a new band. Were you involved with their 

latest release this year, The 13th Hour, at all? 

Actually, the gothic incarnation of Midnight Syndicate was 

originally started as a side project of mine. I was approached 

by Ed Douglas at my art gallery in Cleveland in 1997. He 

had just released the first MS cd, but was having trouble 

finding an audience for its assorted styles of music. The cd 

went in a lot of different directions and contained rap songs, 

country music, easy-listening and new wave music. He told 

me how much he admired my art and asked if I’d like to 

work with him on a future project. I explained that my forte 

was in the gothic field, and that if he would be willing to 

drastically change his style, I could streamline his sound 

to appeal to a gothic audience. We began to work together 

and I agreed to produce his next cd through my company, 

Monolith Graphics. I directed the music, wrote the storyline 

and recited the creepy intros to the songs, created the cover 

art and new band logo and paid for the entire project. The 

new music was such a departure from his first cd that, for 

awhile, I was considering changing the name of the band 

so that it wouldn’t be associated with Ed’s initial effort, but 

eventually he stopped selling the first cd and now it remains 

a skeleton, buried deep in his closet. 

Although I had been in several rock and metal bands 

throughout the years, I always had a love for dark soundtrack 

music. I had compiled my own soundtrack for my art gallery, 

comprised of music by John Carpenter, Danny Elfman, 

Wojciech Kilar, Enya and various others. The sound I was 

going for was a combination of the best of these artists. 

I worked with Ed for a while as director and producer to 

keep the new project along these lines. The cd was titled 

Born of the Night, after a series of art prints and calendars I 

had previously produced. Gavin, the third contributor to the 

project came on board late in the game after most of the 

songs were already written. 

Once the cd was finished, the hard part began. We 

had to try to market a band that never played out and got no 

radio play. My partner Christine Filipak, who photographed 

the band and did the album layout, designed several 

promotional campaigns to market the cd. Among the long 

list of things she did, she designed and assembled hundreds 

of original point-of-purchase displays for the band, and 

she negotiated a deal with the Hot Topic buyers so that all

Issue 156, February, 2006 

their stores would put stickers on their poster bins (which 

displayed several of my posters) advertising the Born of 

The Night cd. We did this again the next year to advertise 

the Realm of Shadows cd. We also began marketing the 

cds through local Halloween stores and attractions. I even 

custom built and hand-painted a huge illuminated trade 

show display to advertise the band at various events. 

As far as their latest release is concerned, no, I was 

not directly involved, but it seems I was indirectly involved 

in a very big way. The storyline that MS has posted in 

their press releases and on their website seems to have 

been patterned directly after Nox Arcana’s 2003 release, 

Darklore Manor. It appears that they are still looking to me 

for inspiration and creative ideas, however, whereas our 

cd and website contain a detailed story and back history 

of Darklore Manor, the MS release offers nothing of the 

sort. I also recently discovered that my profits from Born of 

the Night and Realm of Shadows have been used to pay 

for portions of advertising their new cds. Our attorney is 

currently working on setting everything straight. 

2) On the top, Nox Arcana and Midnight Syndicate are 

strikingly similar in music. What’s the differences 

between the two bands and what lead you to form Nox 

Arcana? 

Yes, they are both in the same vein, a style that I had originally 

envisioned several years prior to working with MS. Anyone 

who has ever heard Midnight Syndicate’s debut, self-titled 

release, can easily ascertain that they were a band without 

direction, and certainly not a gothic band by any stretch of 

the imagination. The album was a jumbled mish-mosh of 

musical styles and went in every musical direction possible 

with rap songs, country songs and easy listening music. 

Ed Douglas changed his style at my insistence in order to 

make his music more marketable, but they seem to have 

lost their direction once again and I think their music has 

suffered greatly with their last few releases. The music of 

Nox Arcana is exactly what I had originally envisioned. My 

partner, William Piotrowski and I work very closely together 

with each composition. It’s a much more creative working 

environment. As for differences in the musical styles of 

our two bands, our songs are more melody-driven, some 

have lyrics, singing, chanting, and creepy little narrations, 

making them more than just background ambiance. We 

also incorporate a much wider range of instruments and 

vocalists and we also cover concepts that we have very 

deep interests in, giving detailed background stories for our 

themes. Each of the Nox Arcana cds comes with a 12-page 

booklet filled with artwork, lyrics and background stories 

about each specific concept that we cover. 

3) Nox Arcana releases have been coming out pretty 

steadily. Is there a reason for the prolific nature of this 

new project? 

We released our first album, Darklore Manor in 2003. Our 

second album, Necronomicon, was released in 2004. We 

put out two albums in 2005 with the releases of Winter’s 

Knight and Transylvania, mainly because Winter’s Knight 

was a slight departure from our horror-based themes, so 

we also gave our fans Transylvania to appease their darker 

desires. William is just as driven as I am and we never stop 

writing music. We put in about 60 to 80 hours a week in the 

studio when we are working on each new album. Currently 

we are about halfway through our next cd, Carnival of Lost 

Souls, but we already have some great tracks written for the 

following release. 

4) All of Nox Arcana’s releases take on a theme: haunted 

mansions, Christmas, vampire myths and one of my 

favorites, the Necronomicon itself. Do you choose 

your themes first or do you begin writing a score and 

determine what it resembles in your mind? 

We select the themes in advance, based on our own 

personal interests. Once we have the theme set in stone, 

we begin outlining the type of music and instruments that 

will fit the concept and convey it to the listener. For example, 

to convey a Victorian theme on Darklore Manor, we utilized 

pianos, harpsichords, violins and pipe organs, whereas with 

Necronomicon, we achieved a more mystical feeling with 

sitars, flutes, primal drums and big creepy choirs. We have 

full concepts set for our next five releases, but because 

we’ve had the aforementioned problems with other bands 

copying our concepts in the past, I’m sworn to secrecy as to 

what dark themes our future albums will explore. 

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5) How did you come about writing scores for the 

Necronomicon and was this just in passing or are you 

a Lovecraft fan? What’s your favorite story from the 

mythos if so? 

I’m a huge Lovecraft fan and I think that the Cthulhu Mythos 

is a great source of material. The album booklet art and 

liner notes of Necronomicon were designed to initiate those 

who were unfamiliar with Lovecraft’s genius. Over the 

years, many writers took their own liberties with Lovecraft’s 

concepts, but our album strictly adheres to Lovecraft’s 

original vision of The Great Old Ones and The Elder Gods. 

The Necronomicon album is also marketed by Chaosium 

Games as a soundtrack to its Call of Cthulhu RPG, and has 

been their top-selling soundtrack since its release in 2004. 

I have several favorite stories by H.P. Lovecraft. I can’t 

narrow it down to just one, but my top five would have to 

be “The Shadow Over Innsmouth,” “The Dunwich Horror,” 

“The Hound,” “The Haunter of the Dark,” and of course “The 

Case of Charles Dexter Ward.” 

6) Have you felt any backlash at all when you put out 

albums like Transylvania in as far as being called or 

considered cliché at all? I’d think it might be difficult 

to touch upon such a continuously visited subject 

without fearing that sort of thing especially within the 

goth subculture. 

Quite the opposite. Fads come and go, but Dracula is a 

classic. The novel and main character have been around 

for over 100 years, and now they’re more popular than ever. 

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We have received stacks of letters from people who have 

applauded us for creating an album that adheres to Stoker’s 

novel. Our Transylvania cd combines those classic elements 

of romance and horror. This wasn’t just a random collection 

of spooky sounds and background music that was slapped 

together with no reverence for the source material. Our 

fans are quite discriminating and they know the difference 

between class and cliché. Also, I’ve amassed a large and 

loyal following throughout the years by painting vampires, 

gargoyles, ghosts and other creatures of the night. We 

always choose topics that are close to our hearts and our 

audience knows that when we tackle any subject matter, 

we take it very seriously and do our research. Transylvania 

has also been used to score the 1922 silent film, Nosferatu, 

which premiered on New Years’ Eve. 

7) Aside from your music, I understand that you also 

delve into the occult. Tell us a bit about The Gothic 

Tarot and the imagery you chose for these cards. 

The Gothic Tarot contains many of my most popular images 

previously featured in calendars and posters as well as other 

paintings from my private collection. Several new works 

were created specifically for the deck. The original concept 

was to only create full illustrations for the 22 cards of the 

Major Arcana and to utilize repetitive design elements of the 

four suits to illustrate the Minor Arcana. However the more 

research I did into the symbolic representations of classic 

Tarot decks, I decided to commit to a full-scale project of 

creating individual illustrations for each of the 78 cards.

Issue 156, February, 2006 

In some instances existing paintings were altered to 

fit the concept of a specific card, but in other cases new 

artwork had to be created to express the card’s traditional 

meaning. I had seen other Tarot decks by popular fantasy 

artists that were simply a collection of random images 

unrelated to the meanings of the specific cards. These 

decks, though aesthetically pleasing on the surface, were 

completely impractical. I didn’t want people to look at my 

deck and say, “Cool art, but this guy doesn’t know a thing 

about the Tarot.” I wanted people to be able to use the cards 

for their intended purpose. 

Since there are so many decks in existence and each 

has its own subtle variations, there are some options in 

naming the suits. You have to decide wands or staffs, coins or 

pentacles. I chose to go with wands and pentacles because 

they best represented the Old World mysticism that I was 

striving to capture. The Rider-Waite deck is probably the 

most widely used deck of the modern day. The instructional 

text was researched and written by Arthur Edward Waite, 

and the black and white illustrations were drawn by Pamela 

Colman Smith, based on Waite’s descriptions. This deck 

was fairly consistent with earlier Tarot decks like the Tarot 

of Marseilles and was the first one to illustrate the Minor 

Arcana with artistic depictions as opposed to symbolic 

designs. I used the Waite deck as a preliminary guide in 

order to stay true to the established divinatory meanings of 

the Tarot. I utilized vampires, gargoyles, ghosts and dark 

angels for my main characters in order to convey a gothic 

mood, and tried to incorporate the designs of the suits into 

the artwork whenever possible to make the work more 

cohesive. We’ve had great success marketing the deck 

throughout the world. 

8) Tales from the Dark Tower and Born of the Night 

are books recently released featuring your writing and 

artwork. How did you find the authors and stories 

for the Dark Tower collection and how did you go 

about choosing which to include in the thirteen that 

appeared? 

Tales from the Dark Tower began when my writer friend 

James Pipik approached me with the idea to write a book of 

short stories based on my gothic art. I knew several other 

writers and offered each of them the opportunity to write a 

story for the book and gave the interested parties an image 

to work from. I worked on the main story with James, then 

outlined a series of stories and worked closely with the 

other writers to maintain continuity throughout the book. 

Christine Filipak and I wrote and co-wrote several of the 

stories ourselves, and as time went on, the responsibilities 

of editing this project fell upon us as well. 

The 13 gothic tales of vampires, ghosts and other things 

that go bump in the night are set in and around a haunted 

gargoyle-encrusted castle known as the Dark Tower. Each 

of the stories stands alone, yet they all fit together, weaving 

back and forth throughout the centuries to create the saga 

of the curse that overshadows the Dark Tower. The tales 

add a new dimension to the artwork, bringing some of my 

most sinister and haunting characters to life, so to speak. 

Tales from the Dark Tower is currently in its third printing 

and we are beginning work on the sequel, Beyond the Dark 

Tower. 

As far as my art book, Born of the Night, is concerned, 

the book features over 100 of my most popular paintings 

as well as dozens of sketches and previously unpublished 

works. Born of the Night only contains about half of my work 

to date. A second art book will be released within the next 

few years that will feature a lot of my early fantasy paintings 

of sensuous women, dark warriors, dragons and other 

mythical creatures as well as my newest gothic pieces. I 

still have a large body of personal work that has never been 

published. 

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9) Monolith Graphics has shunned many forms of 

distribution and has built up an impressive distribution 

network of its own. How did you go about convincing 

shops like Hot Topic to carry your work and why did 

you decide to go it alone in the first place? 

Many traditional distribution channels do not provide the 

personal attention or care to the customer, and the artist 

gets a very small portion of each sale. We heard about Hot 

Topic in 1997 when they opened a store in Cleveland, and 

just sent them some samples of my work. I had amassed a 

substantial portfolio of gothic artwork by then, and we were 

selling calendars, prints and t-shirts of my art at local stores 

and events, as well as through our mail-order catalog. The 

buyers at Hot Topic loved everything they saw and we’ve 

developed various gothic products with them over the 

years. 

I work very hard at all aspects of my craft, but I feel very 

fortunate to have enjoyed the success that we’ve had with 

all our merchandise. I am a firm believer in the old saying 

that success is hard work meeting with opportunity. Many 

people who want to pursue careers as artists or writers think 

that they’ll strike it rich with one big break. Inevitably they 

fail because they aren’t determined to put all the effort into 

polishing their work, nor doing all the marketing to get their 

work out there. If publishing companies haven’t ever seen 

your work, they’re not going to come knocking at your door. 

You have to make all the contacts yourself, or hire an agent 

who you can trust to do it for you. 

Occasionally we license some artwork out to other 

companies, but we’ve been burned by dishonest distributors 

in the past, so now we insist on writing our own contracts. 

Still, I feel that experience is the best teacher. It was a long, 

hard road, but looking back, I wouldn’t have done it any 

other way. It gives you a real sense of accomplishment to 

know that you created something substantial by following 

your dreams and doing things your own way. 

10) You’ve done quite an impressive amount of media 

from music to books and art. Is there a favorite out of 

these, if any? 

That’s a tough one. I’m very proud of all of my work. It’s like 

asking someone with kids who their favorite child is. I love 

creating things from my own imagination, be it art, music 

or literature. Whereas writing is more of a hobby to me, I’m 

much more serious when it comes to my career as an artist 

and musician. Although I’ve been putting a lot more time 

into my music over the past few years, art has always been 

my primary passion. 

11) Of course the final question of most interviews is a 

“what’s next” sort of line. In your case it can go down 

any number of trails. What can we expect from Joseph 

Vargo in 2006 and beyond? 

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We are finishing up the next Nox Arcana cd, Carnival of 

Lost Souls, which will explore a creepy old-time carnival 

that harbors living nightmares and sinister secrets. We also 

have plans to shoot a video for the album. Recently, Nox 

Arcana’s music was used exclusively to score the 1922 

silent film classic, Nosferatu. The editing for this was done 

by horror movie host, Dr. Gangrene. The audio enhanced 

version of Nosferatu premiered on New Years’ Eve on the 

WB Creature Feature. We are discussing the possibility of 

marketing a dvd of the film with our music. Eventually, we’ll 

begin production on some original gothic horror movies 

as well. We also have a new line of posters that will be 

available through Spencers, and writing for the second Dark 

Tower book will begin later this year. In the meantime, I’ll be 

busy creating new cover art for Dark Realms magazine. My 

dream project would be to build a gothic manor that would 

act as a weekend retreat where the guests would become 

involved in a live-action supernatural mystery. It may take a 

few years, but it’ll happen someday.

Interview with Joseph Vargo of Nox Arcana - Monolith Graphics

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