You know what day it is. It’s Halloween! Well, tomorrow’s Halloween, but this column runs on Wednesdays, so I’m making do with what I’ve got. Halloween is undoubtedly my favorite holiday. It’s not a government holiday, nor is there any real reason we need to celebrate it. It’s just an opportunity to dress up in fun costumes, enjoy being spooky with your friends and maybe go into a haunted house if you’re into that. So without further ado, here are my favorite Halloween songs:
- “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” by Blue Öyster Cult
- “People Are Strange” by The Doors
- “Dead Man’s Party” by Oingo Boingo
- “This Is Halloween” from “The Nightmare Before Christmas” (1993)
- “Psycho Killer” by Talking Heads
- “Monster Mash” by Bobby "Boris" Pickett
- “Spooky, Scary Skeletons” by Andrew Gold
- “Werewolf Bar Mitzvah” from “30 Rock” (2006-13)
- “The Time Warp” from “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” (1975)
- “Weird Science” by Oingo Boingo
- “bury a friend” by Billie Eilish
- “Halloween” by Siouxsie and the Banshees
- “O Superman” by Laurie Anderson
Anyways, my favorite Halloween-ish band on here is Oingo Boingo. Weirdly, I’ve been listening to them since fifth grade, and I have absolutely no clue why. They make great spooky-themed songs like “Dead Man’s Party” (1985), which adds a not-asked-for-but-very-appreciated new wave twist to Halloween. More interestingly, the founder of Oingo Boingo, Danny Elfman, is also the composer of many great Halloween movies, including "The Nightmare Before Christmas," "Beetlejuice" (1988) and "Edward Scissorhands" (1990). He is also a frequent collaborator with Tim Burton, who directed/produced all three of those movies.Elfman and Burton are the Halloween dynamic duo, who seem to be living perpetually on Oct. 31, and honestly, I’m a little jealous. What a life that’d be.
The last song on the list,“O Superman” (1982), isn’t necessarily a Halloween song, but in the Halloween spirit, it absolutely terrifies me. I first heard a segment of it in "Black Mirror: Bandersnatch" (2018) where I thought it was pretty cool, but then I listened to the full version at 2 a.m. on a winter break Saturday, and I was deeply disturbed. It’s not quite scary as much as it is eerie. The song starts with a looping “ah” noise that persists throughout all eight minutes of the song, and after the first minute, a voicemail recording comes in that made me jump when I first heard it. The lyrics are also super creepy, and conspiracy theorists say that she predicted 9/11. I’m probably overhyping it, but I definitely wouldn’t listen to it alone at night. Anyways, Happy Halloween!
Link: https://spoti.fi/2JtK0nI.
