Marina
Second only to the dreadful sound of my alarm at an unhealthy hour, I find Lullaby by The Cure to be a go-to staple of any Halloween playlist. Despite its apparent lullaby-ness, the tune tells a tale of a night, eerie and restless, when a narrator’s nightmare comes true: a giant spider creeps into the room to have its dinner. Right off the bat, it nails a spooky vibe down to a T – with its bone-chilling themes, pulsating beats, mumbled lyrics, and a killer video to go all creepy.
Kseniia
Sorry for taking the task too literally, but my eerie song of choice is actually the OST to my favorite horror movie, Suspiria, by the great Italian prog rock band Goblin. There are very few film scores I’m willing to listen to on their own, which says something. With all these whispers and trembles, it’s as spooky as it gets.
Catherine
Right on time for Halloween and this spooky songs edition, I started watching Nancy Drew, the series that was supposed to be about a young detective merrily solving cases and actually is a screamer-packed horror-like drama. Do I have trouble falling asleep? Possibly. Do I keep one eye open, gripping my pillow tight? Absolutely. Now every sound in my flat seems creepy and the song I was originally planning to use makes, unfortunately, much more sense. Here’s to everyone still afraid of the dark – and I hope you get the good version of Sandman to bring you some beautiful dreams one day.
Vadim
As soon as I heard we’d be talking about spooky tunes, my choice was clear – the haunting What’s He Building? by the inimitable Tom Waits. Straddling the line between a song and a spoken-word poem, the track is a chilling snippet of suburban horror. Building (no pun intended) a paranoid soundscape through a variety of seemingly ordinary sounds – along with his trademark breed of eerie Americana – Waits masterfully weaves a story that draws you in and never lets you be too sure who’s the real threat: the titular homeowner or his overly vigilant neighbor?
Elizaveta
Is there anything creepier than a lullaby about miscommunication and loneliness? For Halloween and any other time of the year, The Sound of Silence by Simon & Garfunkel is a perfect song for experiencing some good old existential fear. It reminds me that there are some days when reality is twice as scary as all the horror movies I’ve watched with my eyes half-closed.
Maria
From the first exciting and alarming sounds of My Dark Disquiet by Poets of the Fall, I always feel the atmosphere of a dark dangerous masquerade. I like that this song is very groovy, but it doesn't sound cheerful, more like disturbing – but certainly very stylish. It seems to me that it can create a spooky atmosphere even without any costumes – just put on this song, and that's more than enough.
