Joe Holyoake picks a tenuous, and we mean properly Tena-Lady TENUOUS, soundtrack for your Halloween.
Clowns: Goldfrapp
So, 2016 has been the year of the killer clowns. We’ve not actually seen one. I’m not sure anyone has, especially in London. It seems to be a provincial thing; people putting on masks and scaring passer-bys in lieu of Pret A Mangers and publicly-funded culture. So, anyway let’s pick a song to commemorate this trend. Obviously not Insane Clown Posse, as we’re not junior Trump voters. How about the opening track of Goldfrapp’s ambient-electronic album ‘The Seventh Tree’? Don’t look at us like that. It was this or an Emilie Sande album track called ‘Clown’.
Don’t Go Breaking My Heart: Katie Price and Peter Andre
Not strictly a Halloween song, but the upcoming 10-year anniversary of Peter Andre and Katie Price’s album next month is as good a time as ever to re-visit this. We love Katie Price at QX: prolific writer, parliamentary candidate, and most recently, she broke out of an egg to promote her 6th (!) autobiography. Iconic. There’s an added poignancy to the song 10 years on, as they did go breaking each other’s hearts, as well as each other’s bank balances with a divorce hearing that dragged on and on. There’s a valuable lesson to be learnt though: don’t record an album with your bae as it may be referenced a decade on in the QX music pages.
Hey Girl: Lady Gaga ft. Florence Welch
As well as clowns, 2016 will be remembered for pop-stars dying: Prince, David Bowie, and now Lady Gaga. Ooft. Bit cruel. ‘Joanne’ didn’t go down too well in the QX office, though. The highest praise mustered was that it was a ‘Sunday album’ and that ‘it might be a grower’. We don’t mind her going country, but she isn’t having any fun with it. We’ve chosen the Florence featuring ‘Hey Girl’ for our Halloween soundtrack. It’s one of the album’s more funky numbers, but at times, it feels a slightly misjudged pairing, as neither of them is particularly renowned for their restraint. Together, it can veer into the sort of domestic you can hear echoing through the thin walls of your old council block. Are we expected to get involved, or do we just let them scream it out?
Teenagers: My Chemical Romance
People born on 31st October: Christopher Columbus, Jimmy Savile and Frank Iero, the guitarist of My Chemical Romance. We used to love MCR and their costumed theatricality fits pretty swimmingly in with the Halloween theme. Teenagers is a bit of a yell-the-chorus, rock n’ roll, stomper. We went to see them live as a teenager when our emo friend invited us after his emo girlfriend dumped him. We remember going to the toilet halfway through and then they started playing this. That wee went straight into our all-time top-5 wee list and cemented its place for years to come.
