Halloween '13

No one has influenced my mix-making more than Ellen, who gave me first ever mix CD. For years, she made one mix every Halloween season, each of which soundtracked much of my high school and college years. Ellen's mixes were the first place that I heard Screamin' Jay Hawkins, Nina Simone, Joanna Newsom and others.

It's been a few years since she's made a Halloween mix, but I'm hoping to get her back into the habit this year.



Halloween '13

1. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, "Papa Won't Leave You, Henry"
2. Daikaiju, "Attack of the Crab Women"
3. Fantômas, "Night of the Hunter"
4. Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs, "Lil' Red Riding Hood"
5. Johnny Cash, "(Ghost) Riders in the Sky"
6. My Bloody Valentine, "Feed Me With Your Kiss"
7. Link Wray, "Jack the Ripper"
8. Danzig, "Mother"
9. Guns N' Roses, "You're Crazy"
10. Screamin' Jay Hawkins, "Frenzy"
11. Black Sabbath, "Supernaut"
12. Jarvis Cocker & Beth Ditto, "Temptation"
13. The Specials, "Ghost Town"
14. Public Image Ltd., "Flowers of Romance"
15. The Edgar Winter Group, "Frankenstein"
16. The Five Blobs, "The Blob"
17. Thom Yorke, "Black Swan"
18. Fiona Apple, "Dull Tool"
19. Bauhaus, "Bela Lugosi's Dead"
20. Pixies, "In Heaven (Lady in the Radiator Song)"

Rather than compete with Ellen's mixes, which came with the aura of pumpkin-carving and costume-donning, mine are meant to sound a little more sinister. Black Sabbath's most underrated song gets a spot, as do the reliably creepy Hawkins and Sam the Sham. I'm also to playing Ellen's love for movies with Bauhaus' "Bela Lugosi's Dead," Fantômas' tribute to Night of the Hunter, the Pixies' take on Eraserhead's "In Heaven" and the original Blob theme, which, amazingly, was written by Burt Bacharach.

Ellen is also a big Fiona Apple and Jarvis Cocker fan, so I've included non-album tracks from both of them. I'm hoping she'll appreciate the cabin fever horror of "You're Crazy" and the beautifully bleak "Black Swan," and I'm pretty sure she'll find Danzig hilarious. But if she doesn't, she can always rock out to "Frankenstein."