Talking Heads – “Psycho Killer”
Kids who have been socialized by their parents’ post-punk records are choosing these lines from the Talking Heads instead of “Trick or treat?” at the front door tonight: “We are vain and we are blind / I hate people when they’re not polite / Psycho Killer, / Qu’est Que C’est / Fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa far better / Run run run run run run run away”. Then there will definitely be all the valuables on top of the sweets. This works even better when there is David Byrne in the background with the prosthetic chin from the “Love This Giant” cover.
Michael Jackson – “Thriller”
A classic in music video history – and actually pretty scary. Michael Jackson pulls out all the stops in the clip for “Thriller”, allowing himself to be mutated into a fluffy werewolf in close-up and later teaching a horde of zombies his sexy hip swing – which distracts a little from the fact that they actually look quite bloodthirsty.
Nick Cave – “The Curse Of Millhaven”
If you like it bloodthirsty and like literary sophisticated murder and manslaughter, you are guaranteed to find your favorite song on Nick Cave’s “Murder Ballads”. It’s hard to pick just one for this playlist. We have chosen the story of little Lottie, who retells in great detail how she brought death to Millhaven and halfway through exclaims with relish: “Oh fuck it! I’m a monster! I admit it!”
Warren Zevon – “Werewolves Of London”
Speaking of monsters: The London werewolves of the great Warren Zevon cannot be missing from this list. “I saw a werewolf drinking a pina colada at Trader Vic’s / And his hair was perfect.” If this idea doesn’t make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, you have to be tough. Does this actually mean the Trader Vic’s branch in the financial district of Canary Wharf? Would fit – and mean that this line of text is not pure fiction.
Rolling Stones – “Sympathy For The Devil”
If you’re into this Halloween stuff, you obviously have to have a certain basic sympathy for the devilish. This Stones classic in which Jagger helps “just call me lucifer” and admits, not without charm, that he was a bad boy – or rather THE bad boy par excellence. “I rode a tank / Held a generals rank / When the blitzkrieg raged / And the bodies stank”he sings, for example – and you would still like to shake his hand and have a drink with him when he says: “Pleased to meet you.”
Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band – “Death Cab For Cutie”
“Death cab for Cutie / Death cab for Cutie / Someone’s going to make you pay your fare.” No, this is not a threat to the friendly, melancholic indie band around Benjamin Gibbard and Chris Walla, but rather a line from the song “Death Cab For Cutie” by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. And the moral of the story: As a cute person, you should only get in the car after the Halloween party with taxi drivers with a trustworthy driving style. Otherwise it ends like Cutie: “The traffic lights change from green to red. / They tried to stop but they both wound up dead.”
Cat Power – “Werewolf”
And another werewolf. This song is of course originally written by Michael Hurley. But we think that this less growly version of Cat Power comes much closer to the light-footedness of the monster sung about here: “Oh the werewolf, oh the werewolf / Comes a-stepping along / He don’t even break the branches / Where he’s been gone”. And when Chan Marshall breathes these lines, the whole thing takes on a completely different, er, sexually charged twist: “Nobody, nobody, nobody knows / How much I love the maiden as I tear off her clothes”.
The Cramps – “I Was A Teenage Werewolf”
In the late ’70s and early ’80s, the best way to scare your parents was to tell them you had a Halloween date with one of the Cramps. Or the band couple Lux Interior and Poison Ivy are invited to dinner. They also bought their confession “I Was A Teenage Werewolf” without question…
Blue Oyster Cult – “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper”
Donald Roeser may whisper ever so gently: The Grim Reaper should be feared – especially if he wears the same jacket and the same beard as the men from Blue Öyster Cult. Nevertheless, this classic about the “Reaper” should of course not be missing here. And another tip for the little ones: If you dress up as Roeser anno ’76 tonight, it might seem almost scarier than the typical scythe-plus-cape outfit.
Randy Newman – “Last Night I Had a Dream”
Unfortunately, you know the type of person that Randy Newman sings about in this song far too well – and unfortunately you don’t just meet him on Halloween but all year round: “Last night I had a dream / You were in it, I was in it with you / Everyone that I knew / And everyone that you knew was in my dream / I saw a vampire / I saw a ghost / Everybody scared me but you sacred me the most.”
Alice Cooper: “Welcome To My Nightmare”
The horror directed by Alice Cooper is of course not really intended to scare, but rather to entertain in a colorful and bright way – which in turn fits well with this strange event called Halloween. On the other hand, it should also be pointed out at this point that Mr. Cooper is singing quite universal lines here that fit damn well into our “Generation Burnout”: “Welcome to my nightmare whoa, ho, ho, ho… / Welcome to my breakdown. / I hope I didn’t scare you. / That’s just the way we are when we come down.” So then: See you in the hatch!
The Cure – “Lullaby”
Did Marvel actually comment on that big, dark, child-scaring song by The Cure back then? “And there is nothing I can do / when I realize with fear / that the spiderman is having me for dinner tonight!” That actually doesn’t really fit with the teachings of Peter Parker, who was bitten by a radioactive spider and blah blah blah… But he also goes by the name “Spider-Man”. We digress: The Cure cannot be missing from this list. And, we have to admit: If a little boy dressed as Robert Smith were to ring our editorial doorbell this evening and demand trick or treat, we would be moved to empty out our entire snack bear for him…
Frank Zappa – “Invocation And Ritual Dance Of The Young Pumpkin”
No Halloween without pumpkin! So finally this brain-busting jam from Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention. We haven’t tried it, but we suspect that you can hollow out a (young) pumpkin by placing it between two speakers and crank this song up to full blast.