50,000 Walking Corpses Can't Be Wrong - A Zombie Music Mix
Oct 28 '05
The Bottom Line It was a graveyard smash...
A quick glance at the calendar reveals that Halloween is just around the corner. I can't speak for everyone, but as for me, I'm just not getting that Halloween vibe. I can remember back when I was younger, there was a spark of excitement in the air. Everyone thoughts were split between what they would find for their costumes, the mountains of candy they'd collect, and any Halloween pranks that they could get away with. These last few years, though, the season has felt flat and lifeless. Maybe it's just that I'm getting older and starting to turn into a crotchety old man, but I think the stores are more to blame. Every yeah the Christmas displays have been set up a little earlier, and it looks like this year's start date for the big commercial Christmas push was around September twenty-fifth. Halloween get squeezed back to a roughly three day window in the preceding week, only to be quickly forgotten about.
But some friends and I are fighting back for Halloween this year. We're all too old to go trick-or-treating and we're all too self-conscious to throw a full-blown costume party, so we're doing the best thing and celebrating with Zombie Movie Night. We've got some zombie food and some zombie games to flesh out the evening, but I've taken it upon myself to round out the evening's entertainment with a suitable mix of zombie-themed music to set the mood for dinner.
Now, when searching for music related music, you'll run across plenty of musicians and bands that have the word "zombie" in their name. It didn't take me long to discover that, with the exception of The Zombies, most of these groups put out pretty bad music. Most groups that put "zombie" somewhere in their title lean towards the repetitive death metal side of the music spectrum - definitely not the sort of thing I and my indie rock/pop lovin' friends would actually sit through and listen to for any sort of rational enjoyment. And these groups tend to be pretty prolific, too (not to mention repetitive and derivative), making it pretty frustrating to wade through all the aural waste that floats to the surface of any online search when you're looking for the hidden gems.
But I'm nothing if not persistent, and I did manage to find a more than a dozen interesting, worthwhile zombie themed songs to enhance the evening's festivities. Should anyone out there feel the need to benefit from my hard work, track down the songs listed here and fire up the stereo for some indie-rockin' undead fun:
Dead Man's Party by Oingo Boingo
Not specifically a zombie song, but one that mustn't be overlooked when you're having any sort of death-themed party. With its dark minor-key electro-synth pop rhythms ounctuated with a wall of horns and its sharp, angular lyrics filled with a mixture of celebration and paranoia, there's no better way to start an evening of undead celebration.
♬ I'm all dressed up with nowhere to go
walking with a dead man over my shoulder
waiting for an invitation to arrive
going to a party where no one's still alive ♬
The Living Dead by Phantom Planet
Darker and more sinister than the opening song of the mix, The Living Dead finds Phantom Planet flirt with aggressive noise rock to tell their apocalyptic tale. With a slow, plodding pace like the relentless footsteps of the titular living dead and vocals that rise to an intermittent fever pitch like the screams of hapless victims, the song is destined to be an underground Halloween classic.
♬ here's some advice, don't lose your head
that's what you get for sticking out your neck
I got myself together that's what you said
I'm conquering the city with the living dead ♬
Zombie by David and Jad Fair
And we move from the dark and creepy to the just plain odd. Zombie has that do-it-yourself, homemade feel of outsider music, sort of like Wesley Willis, but it's aimed at more of a children's audience. It's a simple song of one-note-at-a-time guitar rhythms and deep, drawn-out bass vocals that make it feel as if the song might have been simply made up as it was recorded. Imagine some sort of voodoo themed Hokey Pokey, and you're close to what the Fair's have created.
♬ voodoo master says jump
jump to the music shake your body now
shake to the music, shake around and around
voodoo master says stop ♬
Exquisite Dead Guy by They Might Be Giants
Again, not strictly a zombie song, but one that fits well with the theme nevertheless. After the sheer oddity of Zombie, the surreal goofiness of Exquisite Dead Guy seems only natural. Bouncy guitar riffs and sharp cymbal rhythms. Neoclassical cello and harp fills. Poppy scat vocals in the chorus. They Might Be Giants find just the right absurdist tone for a celebration of the morbid and the macabre.
♬ exquisite dead guy
rotating in his display case
exquisite dead guy
swear I saw his mouth move ♬
Zombie (Camel's Hump Remix) by The Cranberries
Did you know that there's a techno dance club remix of The Cranberries seminal political protest song Zombie? As might be imagined, it's god-awful. Fortunately, there's a completely different remix that's actually worth listening to. The Camel's Hump Remix takes a page from the great horror movie soundtracks and mixes the song's haunting, echoes vocals with some equally haunting arrangements. Dissonant chimes and simple piano loops bring a sense of paranoia and unease the song while occasional flashes of piercing synthesizer rhythms keep listeners ill at ease, all blending together to a creepy whole.
♬ with their tanks and their bombs
and their bombs and their gun
in your head, in your head
they are dying ♬
Zombie Jamboree by Harry Belafonte
From the dark and brooding to the light and jubilant. It's a bit of a jarring transition, but this is supposed to be a party mix, so there need to be some mirth. With the song's topical timbales and the trumpet and flute rhythms, Belafonte whisks us away the sandy shores of the Caribbean to forget all of our troubles with a little calypso fun, even if the dead may be rising from their graves all around us.
♬ one female zombie wouldn't behave
see how she jumpin' out of the grave
in one hand a quart of rum
the other hand she knockin' conga drum ♬
She's Not There by The Zombies
It's the one song in the mix that doesn't have any sort of connection with death in the title, but I just couldn't resist including something from the one band with "zombie" in their name that's actually worth listening to. Besides, with the song's foundation of minor key electric piano rhythms and the pleading sense of desperation in the vocals, the old sixties classic has a sinister tone about it that lets it stand shoulder to shoulder with some of the creepier songs in the collection.
♬ but it's too late to say you're sorry
how would I know, why should I care?
please don't bother trying to find her
she's not there ♬
Eye of the Zombie by John Fogerty
Electric guitar riffs sharp enough to cut glass? An intensity in the vocals that borders on desperation? A solid drum beat to push us through the song at a pace just a little to fast for us to get comfortable? A nagging feeling that there's something sinister buried in the song's subtext? Yes to all of those. Eye of the Zombie may sound almost exactly like every other John Fogerty song, but it's a sound that's kept listeners satisfied for years, and since there's a zombie thrown into the classic southern rock mix in this case, it's a perfect fit for this mix.
♬ from out of nowhere he's there, flashing hideous teeth
panic in the crowd, helter-skelter, we're brought to our knees
back to the darkness, back on the mountain he stands
you can't fight a shadow, you can't kill a dead man ♬
Zombie Girlfriend by SNMNMNM
And we're back at another of the goofy moments for the mix, but when you've got a band that bases their musical arrangements around electric guitar, accordion, and tuba, you should know enough to to expect something deep and weighty. No creepy darkness here. No minor key arrangements or haunting melodies. Just a very energetic, tongue-in-cheek musical intervention, trying to get a friend who happens to be dating a life-challenged girlfriend to see the error of his ways.
♬ hideous, your girlfriend is so hideous
her stringy hair is falling out
she's got dead skin around her mouth
in fact she's got dead everything
your girlfriend is a zombie ♬
Zombie Zoo by Tom Petty
The song may sound a bit dated with its classic rock feel, but it's hard to go wrong with Tom Petty. From the brief minor key organ riff that opens the song to the mixture of acoustic guitar and piano that forms the foundation of the song's rhythm to the shaker percussion line to Petty's signature guitar fills - it's a song that rocks by anyone's standards. Sure, Petty may be using "zombie" more as a metaphor for conformity than in the sense of actual living death, but we can forgive his lyrical choices for the moment.
♬ all down the street they're standing in line
with white lipstick and one thing on their mind
hey little freak with the lunch pail purse
underneath the paint you're just a little girl
dancing at the zombie zoo ♬
They Are Night Zombies!! They Are Neighbors!! They Have Come Back from the Dead!! Ahhhh! by Sufjan Stevens
Go ahead. Try to convince me that this isn't the greatest song title ever. You're not going to change my mind. The song itself, though, is much more somber than the title suggests. Subtly arranged layers of minor key strings, a simple electronic guitar riff, moodily drawn-out keyboards, and a large chorus of singers spelling out "Illinois" in a vague approximation of the melody of O Fortuna from Carmina Burana. It's a weird mixture, but for anyone familiar with the outer fringes of indie rock, its feels right at home. Steven's creepy delivery for the apocalyptic nightmare in the lyrics makes for a perfect backdrop for an evening's creepy entertainment.
♬ we are awakened with the axe
night of the living dead at last
they have begun to shake the dirt
wiping their shoulders from the earth ♬
Night of the Living Dead from G. Love and Special Sauce
We're still treading the indie rock trails, but G. Love is much less interested in the dark and creepy, contenting himself instead with a laid-back bluesy groove mixed with just enough of a hint of tropical rhythm. It's not the sort of song you spin on the stereo to frighten the kids who ring the door looking for candy, but more the sort of song to play when it's time to kick back and unwind after a long creepy day when you've had your fill of intensity, but aren't quite ready to give up the spooky vibe entirely.
♬ before I lay my head I say my prayers
my future starts when I see the first light of day
when I woke up today, I didn't really feel okay
I wasn't myself, I couldn’t be no one else
night of the living dead, that's what my mama said
that's what she said, don't let them in your head ♬
Dead Man's Party by Hillbilly Hellcats
No, it's not a cover of the Oingo Boingo song, but an entirely new rockabilly entity all unto itself. With its slap bass rhythms pounding through the speakers, Gretsch guitar riffs drenched in reverb and echo, and splashy snare drum and cymbal lines, it's a faithful re-creation of the old fifties sound, much in the vein of rockabilly revivalists The Stray Cats. The song doesn't even try to aim for creepy of spooky, instead focusing it's efforts on hip and slick, and in that regard it's a complete success.
♬ well I've got my suit and I've got my tie
shiny little pennies on each eye
the devil laughs and opens the door
there's always room for just one more ♬
Zombie by Fela Kuti
Lest things get too relaxed and too far off the spooky track, it's time for a few last moments of spookiness. Kuti's mostly instrumental Zombie takes us through the world beat jazz scene of New Orleans, Haiti, and other noted voodoo haunts, capturing the dark and mysterious rhythms that make their music so mysterious. The song runs a little long, but it captures the creepy spirit of the home of the zombie legends like no other.
♬ zombie no go unless you tell am to go
zombie no stop unless you tell am to stop
zombie no turn unless you tell am to turn
zombie no go unless you tell am to think ♬
Imagine the Thriller by John Lennon and Vincent Price
No, there wasn't some sort of secret recording session between Price and Lennon that no one ever heard of. The mix's last offering draws things to a surreal curtain call with a mash-up that pairs Lenon's piano riff from Imagine with Price's unforgettable spoken dialogue from Thriller. And the two blend together so seamlessly that it's scary, perhaps the scariest moment of the entire mix.
♬ and whosoever shall be found
without the soul for getting down
must stand and face the hounds of hell
and rot inside a corpse's shell ♬
And there you have it. Fifteen songs to set the mood for our zombie festivities. Rock to jazz to pop to the just plain unclassifiable. Light and goofy to dark and haunting. It touches every base.
And whatever you end up doing to celebrate the holiday, here's hoping it's suitable creepy for all your fright needs.
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