Music for Grownups: Best Halloween Songs

Richard Gehr selects his top 10 Halloween songs for adults.

By: Richard Gehr | Source: AARP.org | 2008-10-22

"Monster Mash" has had a stranglehold on Halloween for far too long. Singer Bobby "Boris" Pickett decided to record his perennial hit after spontaneously impersonating Boris Karloff one night while his band, the Cordials, performed the Diamonds' "Little Darling." Released in October 1962, Pickett's "Monster Mash" today sounds about as dated as the Transylvania Twist. And is it scary? Hardly.

These songs, on the other hand, range from the harrowing to the entertainingly creepy. And don't be afraid to disturb us with your own frightening favorites in the comments section.

10. Led by singer Lux Interior and guitarist Poison Ivy, primitive punkabilly band the Cramps were more gruesome than any single song they performed. However, "Human Fly," a 1978 single, did its movie and rock inspirations justice with the help of a buzzing guitar, a dumb thumping beat, and lyrics like, "I got 96 tears in my 96 eyes."

9. A sentimental favorite whose video dance steps have been performed by everyone from my kids' dance class to 1600 Philippine prison inmates, Michael Jackson's funky 1984 megahit, "Thriller," remains both a great song and a hauntingly prophetic commentary on its creator.

8. Some heard Blue Oyster Cult's 1976 hit, "(Don't Fear) The Reaper," as a seductive endorsement of teenage suicide pacts. Songwriter Donald "Buck Dharma" Roeser, however, claims it's merely a love song with a most awesome riff. You decide.

7. Think you've got it bad? War, pestilence, and plague pervaded 14-century Europe. Artists and playwrights responded with the "Danse Macabre," the so-called Dance of Death that became a ubiquitous theme for composers and artists ranging from Franz Liszt, Modest Mussorgsky, and Gustav Mahler to the Kingston Trio ("Zombie Jamboree") and Rolling Stones ("Dancing With Mr. D").

6. There are two kinds of people: Addams Family fans and Munsters fans. Of these two awesome shows with memorable theme songs, I always prefer Vic Mizzi's innovative creepy-kooky-mysterious-spooky tune to Jack Marshall's more corporate instrumental effort. (Mizzi also gets bonus points for his "Green Acres" theme.)

5. One of the great cautionary tales of all time, Stan Jones's 1948 masterpiece, "(Ghost) Riders in the Sky: A Cowboy Legend," has been covered by dozens of artists without ever shedding its chill. Based on Europe's Wild Hunt myth, the song warns cowboys to either change their ways or spend eternity "trying to catch the Devil's herd across these endless skies."

4. Has any rock singer ever sounded as sanguine about end times as John Fogerty does in Creedence Clearwater Revival's 1969 hit, "Bad Moon Rising"? The answer is no.

3. Creedence also covered Screamin' Jay Hawkins's 1957 horrorshow-blues classic, "I Put a Spell on You." But they never emerged from an onstage casket in a cloud of smoke like Hawkins, whose tortured original rendition has yet to be surpassed.

2. The song that launched a thousand bad trips, thrash-metal band Slayer's best-known track, "Raining Blood," conveniently distills an entire genre's worth of senseless rage into four minutes. Released in 1986, the song's thunder and lightning are still very, very frightening.

1. Conventional wisdom long held that blind country songwriter Leon Payne's "Psycho" was based on Charles Whitman's 1966 Texas murder spree. But according to Payne's daughter, the 1968 song was actually inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's film of the same title. Either way, this chilling ode to killer's remorse, with its shock ending, is indeed the spookiest song ever recorded. Just ask Elvis Costello.