The Ghosts of Futures Past at the Stanley Hotel
A Flock of Seagull's and the Shining Ball at The Stanley
Author’s Note: Before diving into the music, I just want to say thanks to everyone who’s supported my writing lately — it means more than ever. I’ll have a personal update and a note about my new book in tomorrow’s post.
The Ghosts of Futures Past at the Stanley Hotel
By Jason Van Tatenhove
The air was cold enough to bite as my photography assistant and I made our way up the hill to the Stanley Hotel. To most of America, it’s one of the most haunted places in the country. To those of us who live here, it’s also where you can catch a great show without having to drive down the hill to the Front Range. The music hall sits apart from the main building, glowing with a kind of supernatural haze (and flood lights) that fits Estes Park in November.
It was the night after All Hallows’ Eve, a week since I’d been at the hotel for the annual Shining Ball, that strange, glittering ritual inspired by our town’s claim to horror fame.
Legend has it that back in 1974—when the Stanley’s grandeur had faded and the hotel was closing for the season—a young horror writer named Stephen King checked in with his wife, Tabitha. Sources place the date at October 30, 1974. The couple were reportedly the only guests in the building, wandering its long, empty halls. King later said, “When we arrived, they were just getting ready to close for the season. We found ourselves the only guests in the place—with all those long empty corridors.”
That night, he dreamed that a firehose came alive and chased his son down the hallway. It became one of the most haunting images in The Shining. By 1977, the book hit shelves, and the Stanley Hotel—and by extension, Estes Park, fictionalized as “Sidewinder”—was written forever into American myth.
Before that Shining Ball, Stanley shows were more legend than lived experience to me. But they’ve nailed the transformation—turning their ghostly reputation into something almost fantastical. The hotel has changed hands again and, as always, seems to be reinventing itself.
In May 2025, the 41-acre property was sold in a roughly $400 million public-private deal. The new entity—The Stanley Partnership for Art, Culture and Education (SPACE)—is backed by the Colorado Educational and Cultural Facilities Authority (CECFA) and private bond investors. Former owner John W. Cullen IV remains on as chair and CEO, while Sage Hospitality Group now runs hotel operations. It’s one of the only resort hotels in Colorado under quasi-public ownership, its mission centered on culture and education.
The agreement includes construction of a film and event center, funded in part by the state. A Blumhouse-curated horror museum and partnerships with the Sundance Institute promise to make this hill a cinematic haunt for decades to come.
But that night, all the civic reinvention faded away. I was there to see one of the musical ghosts of my own youth—A Flock of Seagulls.
The crowd was smaller than the wild, costume-packed Shining Ball, but that worked in its favor: intimate, personal. Before the show, a guy followed me and my photographer downstairs, asking if we were musicians. We weren’t—but I told him I was a music writer. We hit it off. Turned out he was Kevin Rankin, the band’s drummer. He’d been sick the day before (not just a Halloween hangover, he swore), and we swapped stories about music and writing before the show.
A Flock of Seagulls formed in 1979 in Liverpool—frontman Mike Score, once a hairdresser, his brother Ali Score on drums, Frank Maudsley on bass, and Paul Reynolds on guitar. Their 1982 self-titled debut, with the hit “I Ran (So Far Away),” carved them into synthpop history. Dreamy guitars, space-age melodies—the sound of an era imagining the future.
For me, their music carries a different ghost story. I first heard “I Ran” as a teenager at an all-ages nightclub in Fort Collins. I was thirteen, standing in a warehouse that thumped with bass and smelled of fog machines. It was the first time I felt music move through my chest, light flashing off smoke and sweat. That song stuck with me my entire life—and, fittingly, I met my future wife and creative partner on that same dance floor years later. I wrote about it in her eulogy.
So standing there at the Stanley, listening to Mike Score—hair long gone but still sharp behind the synths—it felt like time folded in on itself. The ghosts of my own youth joined the ghosts that haunt those halls.
The current lineup includes Score on vocals and synths (the last founding member), Pando on bass and backing vocals, Kevin Rankin on drums, and Gord Deppe on guitar and vocals. The set started slow, but by the end the walls were vibrating as the entire crowd sang along to “I Ran.”
And just like that, the ghosts turned joyful.
The Stanley has been through countless reincarnations—grand hotel, haunted landmark, fading relic, and now, cultural hub. I’ve watched staff leave and return, policies rise and fall, visions flicker in and out of focus. But this one feels different. With its film center rising and its musical legacy reborn, the old hotel seems to be stepping into a new kind of afterlife.
One bright enough that, yeah—its future might require shades.
If you enjoyed this piece, check back tomorrow — I’ll be sharing a more personal reflection about the hard times so many of us are facing, and how my new book, AI Ink, ties into it. (It hit shelves today!) Including a short unboxing video.
~JVT
