Halloween Songs

HAPPY

Halloween!

with Spooky Festive Tunes

Halloween has origins in both pagan and Christian traditions, including:Samhain A Celtic festival that marked the end of summer and the beginning of winter, and was celebrated on October 31. The Celts believed that the boundary between the living and the dead was thin on this night, and that ghosts could roam the earth. To ward off unwanted spirits, people would darken their faces with ashes, a practice that eventually evolved into wearing masks and costumes. All Saints' Day A Christian feast day that was established in the 7th century to honor saints who had reached heaven. In the 8th century, the feast day was moved from May 13 to November 1. All Souls' Day A Christian feast day that was celebrated on November 2 to remember the souls of the dead. Jack-o'-lanterns The Irish and Scottish may have carved faces into turnips to ward off evil spirits. When they came to America, they discovered pumpkins, which were easier to carve and even better than turnips. Candy corn Originally called "Chicken Feed," candy corn was an autumnal candy that became associated with Halloween when trick-or-treating became popular in the 1950s.

Witchcraft

Witchcraft

Frank Sinatra recorded "Witchcraft" three times in a studio setting. The first recording was in 1957, for his single release, and was later released on his compilation album All the Way (1961). Sinatra re-recorded "Witchcraft" for 1963's Sinatra's Sinatra, and finally recorded it as a duet with Anita Baker for Duets (1993). Elvis Presley sang this song in The Frank Sinatra Timex Show: Welcome Home Elvis. A portion of the Frank Sinatra rendition is played during the climax of the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit and is included in the soundtrack for the film Fifty Shades of Grey. A portion of the Frank Sinatra rendition is sung by Nick Bakay on Sabrina, The Teenage Witch in his voice role as warlock-turned-black cat Salem Saberhagen, before his character hacks up a hairball. In Hocus Pocus (1993 film), the band performed this song at the Town Hall Halloween Party.

The Addams Family

The Addams Family

The Addams Family is a fictional family created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. They originally appeared in a series of 150 standalone single-panel comics, about half of which were originally published in The New Yorker between 1938 and their creator's death in 1988. The Addamses are an eccentric old-money clan who delight in the macabre and the grotesque and they are seemingly unaware or unconcerned that other people find them bizarre or frightening. The family members were unnamed until the 1960s. Mother Morticia and daughter Wednesday received their names when a licensed doll collection was released in 1962; father Gomez and son Pugsley were named when the 1964 television series debuted.

Ghostbusters

Ghostbusters

Parker was approached by the film's producers to create a theme song, that shouldn't be that what it is today, although he only had a few days to do so and the film's title seemed impossible to include in any lyrics. However, when watching television late at night, Parker saw a cheap commercial for a local service that reminded him that the film had a similar commercial featured for the fictional business. This inspired him to write the song as a pseudo-advertising jingle that the business could have commissioned as a promotion. The theme is estimated to have added $20 million to the film's box-office gross.

Monster Mash

The Monster Mash

Pickett and Capizzi recorded “Monster Mash” with an all-star band (credited as The Crypt-Kickers) including pianist Leon Russell and The Ventures’ drummer Mel Taylor. In the US, it was released through producer Gary S. Paxton’s Garpax label, while London Records issued it in the UK. Seeing the light of day in the autumn of 1962, “Monster Mash” seemed the ideal Halloween single, but it spooked the BBC who banned it, feeling the song was “too morbid” for the airwaves. Inevitably, the ban only added to the frisson of danger surrounding “Monster Mash,” which – with help from a Mashed Potato-style dance involving Frankenstein-esque monster gestures – topped North America’s Billboard chart in time for Halloween 1962. The BBC stood firm, but were forced to relent when this enduring “graveyard smash” got a second jolt from its mad scientists’ electrodes and shot up to No. 3 in the UK in 1973.

Purple People Eater

Purple People Eater

The enduring popularity of the song led to the nicknaming of the highly effective "Purple People Eaters", the Minnesota Vikings defensive line of the 1970s, whose team colors include purple. From 1982, major British toy manufacturer Waddingtons marketed a children's game inspired by the song. Players competed to remove tiny "people" from the rubber Purple People Eater shell, using tweezers on a wire loop which activated an alarm if coming into contact with its metal jaws. In Winter 2022/2023, the USDA Agricultural Research Service held the “Name that Holiday Pepper - Violet to Red” contest on Challenge.gov to name new varieties of ornamental peppers they had developed. The winning name for a purple pepper with Cayenne pepper spiciness level was "Purple People Heater". In 1988, a film of the same name based off the song was released.

Superstition

Superstition

Wonder wrote this about the dangers of believing in superstitions. Some of the bad luck superstitions he alludes to include walking under a ladder, breaking a mirror (said to bring seven years of bad luck), and the number 13. "Superstition" was intended for Jeff Beck, who was brought in to play some guitar parts on the album in exchange for a song - his work can be heard on the track "Lookin' For Another Pure Love." At one of the sessions, Stevie came up with the riff and wrote some lyrics, and they recorded a rough version of the song that day for Beck. It took Beck a while to record the song, and by the time he released it, Wonder's version had been out for a month and was a huge hit. Beck felt shortchanged, and made some statements in the press that Wonder didn't appreciate. In 1975, Beck released an instrumental version of Wonder's "Cause We've Ended As Lovers" on his album Blow By Blow. The album was a hit and helped solidify Beck's reputation as an elite guitarist.

Season of the witch

Season of the Witch

"Season of the Witch" was recorded at the CBS studios in Hollywood, California, where most of Sunshine Superman was recorded. According to Donovan, he and Phillips wanted a "rock-combo sound" for the song and chose some local musicians from the local clubs. They included Lenny Matlin on keyboards, Don Brown on lead electric guitar, Bobby Ray on bass and "Fast" Eddie Hoh on drums. Donovan played the second guitar part, as he explained in his autobiography: I played a white Fender Telecaster Electric Guitar on "Witch," chunking down on the chord pattern, wailing a chilling chorus. A major seventh with an open G, to D 9th with a G-flat bass (Bert Jansch chord). The riff is pure feel.

Thriller

Thriller

The music video is considered the most famous music video of all time, at least by the Library of Congress, which added it to its National Film Registry in 2009, the first music video in their registry. The video was a cultural milestone, introducing elaborate choreography, costumes and dialogue into the format. It also introduced the concept of the long-form music video, where a mini-movie was made for a song, then edited down for the short version. The long version of "Thriller" runs nearly 14 minutes, but had remarkable longevity, easily racking up over 100 million views when it showed up on YouTube. MTV usually ran the short version, which ran a little under five minutes but still contained about a minute of non-song content in a storyline that omits most of the movie the couple is watching at the beginning.

Devil in Disguise

Devil in Disguise

"(You're the) Devil in Disguise" is a 1963 single by Elvis Presley. It was written by Bill Giant, Bernie Baum, and Florence Kaye and was published by Elvis Presley Music in June 1963. The song peaked at No. 3 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 on August 10, 1963, and No. 9 on the Billboard Rhythm and Blues chart, becoming his final top-ten single on the Rhythm and Blues chart. The song also topped Japan's Utamatic (Nihon Goraku Bussan) record chart in the fall of 1963. The single was certified gold by the RIAA for sales in excess of 500,000 units in the US. In June 1963, when the song was debuted to a British audience on the BBC television show Juke Box Jury, celebrity guest John Lennon voted the song "a miss", opining that Presley had become "like Bing Crosby". The song subsequently peaked at No. 1 on the UK singles chart for one week.

I Want Candy

I Want Candy

"I Want Candy" is a song written and originally recorded by the Strangeloves in 1965 that reached No. 11 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. It is a famous example of a song that uses the Bo Diddley beat. The Bo Diddley beat is a syncopated musical rhythm that is widely used in rock and roll and pop music. The beat is named after rhythm and blues musician Bo Diddley, who introduced and popularized the beat with his self-titled debut single, "Bo Diddley", in 1955. The beat is essentially the Afro-Cuban clave rhythm or based on the clave or a variation thereof.

Somebody's Watching Me

Somebody's watching me

Rockwell is Kennedy Gordy, son of Motown founder Berry Gordy from a relationship with Margaret Norton. Kennedy wrote the song and put the demo together with the help of a Motown producer named Curtis Nolen. Berry Gordy didn't have much faith in his son as a recording artist, but when he heard "Somebody's Watching Me," he knew it was a hit and agreed to release it. Michael Jackson sang backup. Rockwell's sister Hazel was married to Jackson's brother Jermaine. Michael Jackson was at the height of his powers and Rockwell knew he could get the song released if he could convince Michael to sing on it. This was on the charts at the same time as "Thriller," which was the last single from Michael Jackson's famous album; both songs peaked in the US ("Thriller" at #4, "Somebody's Watching Me" at #2) in March 1984. By that time, Jackson had been saturating the airwaves for over a year, but he was still red hot. Rockwell used him brilliantly, with Jackson carrying the chorus with just one line suited to his voice: "I always feel like somebody's watching me."

Psycho Killer

Psycho Killer

This song takes us inside the head of a deranged murderer. It started when lead singer David Byrne decided to write something in the vein of Alice Cooper, whose shock rock was all the rage. Byrne started with the first verse, which establishes a dangerous paranoia: I can't seem to face up to the facts, I'm tense and nervous and I can't relax, I can't sleep 'cause my bed's on fire, Don't touch me I'm a real live wire This was the first Talking Heads song. It was written in 1973 at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where David Byrne and drummer Chris Frantz had a band called The Artistics. When Byrne presented the song, he explained that he wanted a Japanese section in the bridge, but when he asked a girl who spoke the language to come up with some murderous words, she understandably freaked out. Frantz' girlfriend, Tina Weymouth, spoke French, so they had her write a French part for the bridge instead. She drew inspiration from the Norman Bates character in the 1960 Alfred Hitchcock thriller Psycho, which influenced the next verse: You start a conversation you can't even finish it, You're talking a lot, but you're not saying anything, When I have nothing to say, my lips are sealed, Say something once, why say it again? Byrne incorporated a French line into the chorus: "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" (meaning "What is this?") and followed it with a stuttering warning: Fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-far better, Run, run, run, run, run, run, run away The end result is one of the most famous songs about a psychopathic murderer, influenced by two touchstones of the genre: Alice Cooper and the movie Psycho.

The End

Happy Halloween