Dan DaranciangHalloween has traditionally been a holiday perpetuated out of fear: fear of the dead, the demonic, the “other.” The Celts wore masks and carved pumpkins to ward off unwelcome spirits, while the Norsemen made ritual sacrifices to protect against evil forces.
But in the last half-century, things have changed. Halloween has become less about fear and more about ridiculous costumes, public intoxication and weeklong sugar highs. The music has followed suit: traditional Halloween songs like Bach’s “Tocatto & Fugue in D minor”-considered to be the first truly disturbing Halloween tune-have been forgotten in favor of fluff like “The Monster Mash.”
It’s about time for that to change. Cadenza has a few suggestions for creating a Halloween playlist true to the holiday’s grotesque roots.
Aphex Twin-“Radiator”
Anyone who’s seen the music video for “Windowlicker” knows that Richard D. James is a pretty creepy dude. But long before “Windowlicker” and “Milkman,” he was making equally bizarre and unsettling ambient music. This track, the second off of his “Selected Ambient Works, Vol. 2,” has always managed to get under my skin more than any of his amphetamine-fueled dance numbers. It starts out with a circular electronic bell sound that gradually swells and distorts as the track progress. Squeals of static punctuate the song at random intervals, reminiscent of the dying gasps of some prehistoric lizard creature. This is the ideal soundtrack for a cocktail party where everyone suspects everyone else of poisoning their drink.
Mu-“I Hate U”
I’ll be honest: I really have no idea why this CD is in my collection. Filled with tribal chanting, 300 BPM drum & bass, lounge-piano figures and, indisputably, the most grating vocals ever set to tape, it is nothing less than a calculated attempt at coercing the listener to set fire to his/her CD player. In other words, it’s the perfect album for a house party! This track finds vocalist Mutsumi Kanamori replaced by electronically manipulated samples of Jerry Springer guests screaming obscenities at each other. Interspersed between these shouting matches are strings of double-kick-drum sixteenth notes straight out of a thrash-metal band’s repertoire. If this song went any longer than its 2:05 runtime, it would probably be responsible for numerous riots and murder-suicides (assuming people actually listened to it).
Boards of Canada-“The Color of the Fire”
A quick Google search of “Boards of Canada” will yield a number of sites that reference the Scottish duo’s well-documented interest in subliminal messages, mathematical patterns and the occult. I had trouble hearing it until I picked up this track off of their album “Music Has The Rights To Children.” The song basically consists of a bunch of modulated samples of a child’s voice offering various inflections of the phrase “I love you” over a sparse electric piano part. While not nearly as jarring as some of the previously mentioned tracks-in fact, the song is downright melodic-there’s something undeniably creepy going on here.
Nurse With Wound-“Homotopy to Marie”
This, dear reader, is the piece de resistance. Nurse With Wound pretty much wrote the book on making disturbing, soul-rending sound collages back in the early ’80s (which, thankfully, no one seems to have read since), and this track, off the album of the same name, stands as one of their best examples. Most of the “song” is nothing but dead air space, peppered by the startling crash of some resonant metal object. Creaking door hinges and footsteps off in the distance further the gothic atmosphere. Thrown in for good measure is the disembodied voice of an eerily calm British child spewing out such gems as “When I woke up, I didn’t know where I was. I didn’t know anybody, and there was a funny smell,” and “When they want to see what your blood’s like..” At 13:37, the track seems to stretch on to infinity, leaving nothing but you and the music suspended in a void of gloom and despair. Enjoy!