Hey, kids! It’s almost Halloween! In years past, you may remember, I pulled together lists of seasonally-suitable songs to be creeped out by for the evening in question. Last year, I expounded in greater depth upon my choices (if you give a dang, click over to archives and click on previous Octobers). This year, frankly, has been a bit busy, so I haven’t had time to painstakingly compile a new selection of terrifying tracks. That said, I do have a couple in mind that ought to handily suffice. Amplify any of the following from your front porch for the aural benefit of prospective trick-or-treaters and I doubt you’ll be disturbed by anyone all night … except maybe the local authorities.
First up is one I’ve extolled the disquieting merits of in the past, but it quite simply has to be heard to be believed. This almost-twelve minute passage from Diamanda Galas’ Plague Mass album from 1991 ought to sufficiently get your heart-thumpin’ and your blood pumpin’, especially when Miss G starts warbling like possessed car alarm around 1:51 into the proceedings. If you can make it through the whole track, I’ll be impressed. Prepare thyselves for “This is the Law of the Plague.”
Equally versed in the art of creeping the daylights out of listeners came Coil. Even at their merriest – if such a thing can be imagined -- there was always something that sounded subtly sinister about their music. There’s precious little that is subtle, however, about the tracks featured in the clip below. “The First Five Minutes After Death” and “The Golden Section” date back to the band’s deeply chilly Horse Rotorvator album and come steeped in the gloriously morbid atmosphere of unearthly dread that is vintage Coil. KC & the Sunshine Band they were not.
The last one is an odd choice, I’ll admit, but I vividly remember the first time I heard it and being shaken to the core. I was probably about ten years old and out in Quogue for the summer. My mom had to run some evening errand or something and asked if I’d be okay by myself for about an hour (my older sister was out somewhere). I’d been in the living room, listening to a local rock station on the family stereo. I said sure, and helped my mom carry some stuff down to the car. She drove off and I turned to go back inside. Upon entering the dark house, I heard the strangest music emanating from the living room upstairs. As I got closer, the music got stranger, and I found myself unable to walk back up the stairs to where the music was playing – now augmented with discordant strings and a strange garbled voice. It sounded as if the living room had become a portal to a frightening netherworld. The song in question, it turned out, was called “Fire on High” by Electric Light Orchestra.
Now, honestly, unless you’re deeply disturbed by the thought of pasty British fellas with way too much hair (not an unreasonable reaction, now that I consider it), there isn’t much to be afraid of in the music of E.L.O., but take a listen to the opening of this track. Only the creepy intro is represented here (and then played backwards). The rest of the song, honestly, isn’t much to crow about – a sorta string-laden, prog-disco-rock pastiche that always reminds me a bit of Elton John’s “Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding.” But once again, imagine hearing the below for the first time as a young boy suddenly alone in a dark house. Happy Halloween.
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