Spooky Season Smashes

Happy halloween. Unlike Christmas, the catalogue of Halloween music is not over inundated with material. There’s the “Monster Mash,” “This is Halloween,” and, of course, Bette Midler’s performance of “I Put a Spell on You” from Hocus Pocus. Still, the smash hits from Halloween are few and far between. 

The only artist who has capitalized on this verifiable lack of Halloween-core hits is Kim Petras. Her 2018 release TURN OFF TH LIGHT, VOL. 1 and its 2020 sequel TURN OFF THE LIGHT successfully fill up a gap that the music industry at large as failed to address. Her songs have campy titles (Boo! Bitch! And Party Till I Die) and have an unhinged sexuality (Death by Sex) fit for the campy, costumed holiday. The records have accumulated over 100 mil streams across platforms. 

In strictly capitalist language, Petras identified a problem in the market and provided a solution for it. There exists such a lack of Halloween-core hits that I think other artists should continue trying to fill the void until - like Christmas - we can enjoy a huge catalogue of Halloween tunes during Spooky season.

While you’re out there tonight trick-or-treating, partying at the club, or handing out candy to the kids, think deeply about what ideas you could fit into a Halloween song. Use the rest of the week of the pen something that could be next year’s Spooky season smash.