Ominous Songs

Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" is my (rather obvious) choice.

Obvious, too: "Every Breath You Take."

Every song from LES MIZ sounds like a dirge.

After The Sopranos...Don't Stop Believing. It always makes me think of death when I hear it.

Another vote for "Don't Fear the Reaper".

Also, Gary Wright's "Dream Weaveer" has always given me the willies, as has The Smith's "How Soon is Now". Credence Clearwater Revival's "Bad Moon Rising" is also another song that brings the creep factor.

Riders on the Storm owns this thread.

How strange the change from major to minor

Thought of another: Annie Lennox's "Don't Let it Bring You Down" is chilling with it's lyrics about castles burning and dead men laying by the side of the road. All very bleak and post-apocalyptic.

Stop! What's that sound, everybody turn around. . z

Every song on Synchronicity is so creepy. To me, the creepiest Police song is "Spirits in the Material world." I was very young when it came out & thought it was about actual ghosts.

"Don't Fear the Reaper" is so eerie, even cover versions don't destroy its power. "Another 40 000 every day/ we can be like they are..."

Good choice, R8. It's funny because the Neil Young version doesn't have the creep factor - it's the chill of Annie's voice.

Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat"

10cc's "I'm Not in Love"

Any atonal piece. I can't even listen to it, it gives me an anxiety attack.

Annie Lennox does good creepy. I think another creepy element to her verison of "Don't Let it Bring You Down" is the fact that it plays in American Beauty not long before Kevin Spacey's character has his brains blown out. Lots of the Eurythmics's early stuff was weird, and her song "Love Song For A Vampire" from Bram Stoker's Dracula is totally creepy (it's supposed to be, but still...)

You mean Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth", R9?

The Beatles Long and Winding Road creeps me right the fuck out. I don't know why.

Prince's "Annie Christian" from the Controversy album is a really weird, underproduced little number with strange sound effects and bleak lyrics about John Lennon's assassination, the attempted assassination on Ronald Regan and the Atlanta murders of 1979-1981. I wish I could post it, but Prince is so anal about his music being on Youtube.

There's a killer on the road.

His brain is squirmin' like a toad.

Take a long holiday.

Let your children play.

If ya give this man a ride.

Sweet memory will die.

Killer on the road.

This was big when I was in the 7th grade,

My parents would only let us listen to their oldies station when we were little and this song scared the shit out of me.

At one time I would have agreed with R19, wholeheartedly, but once you've seen this, the song loses its edge.

I remember watching one of the early scene's in ZODIAC with Donovan's "Hurdy Gurdy Man" playing. It scared the hell out of me as the scene took place at night and you couldn't see the killer. I'll see if I can find a clip.

Coincidentally, R22, Donovan's daughter Ione Skye plays the victim in that scene you're talking about.

Re Sniff 'n' The Tears --

Two things:

** The band's lead singer, Paul Roberts, painted all the band's album covers and he has a very definite, intriguing style. His website containing his artwork is linked.

** the opening hook or riff on "Driver's Seat" should go down as one of rock 'n' roll's finest and most memorable. The credit for this distinctive riff goes to the band's guitarist Mick Dyche. Bravo, Mick!

"What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?"

Sally go round the roses by the Jaynettes. A eerie little song from the 60's.

The string coda of U2's All I Want Is You. It has an odd, creepy feel to it.

Don McLean's American Pie came out when I was about 7 and it scared the shit out of me but I never knew why, I just know I hated it.

I've got a weird one, George Benson's "Give Me the Night" I love it, but when I was younger it gave me the willies.

R2, the joke is on you. Sting and the police are on record stating that the lyrics to that song were a purposely chosen nonsense string of pop-music cliches. the intention was simply to present a powerful song but without any content

Gang Bang - Madonna - Bang Bang shot you dead. Shot my lover in the head.

Everything by buffalo Springfield sounds intensely paranoid

Hurdy Gurdy Man is all the creepier because Donovan probably thought he was writing a cheery, hippy anthem. But it's the stuff of nightmares even before Fincher got his hands on it!

Blondie's "Angels on the balcony" has some eerie lines: "The children come here and they dare the ghost..."

Thanks for the link, R24. "Driver's Seat" just gets under the skin. The lyrics seem like they should belong to happy Beach Boys music but the fact that it's past tense "Jenny was sweet, always smiled at the people she'd meet..." makes it sound like she's dead now.

Some pop classics with a creepy feel.

Angie Baby - Helen Reddy (it's SUPPOSED to be creepy of course).

Ode to Billie Joe - Bobbie Gentry

You're No Good - Linda Rondstadt

I heard It Through The Grapevine - Marvin Gaye (this always creeped me out when I was a kid).

FM and Josie by Steely Dan.

Pink Frost by the Chills. Had the pleasure of hanging out with them one evening. They weren't ominous, but this song sure is!

I Only Have Eyes For You, The Flamingos. All those echo(y) background vocals.

"Jackie Blue" -- Ozark Mountain Daredevils

Jackie was one fucked up bitch.

Check out the lead singer on the song. How many of you thought it was a chick?

Wrong!

Never heard that one R35 - very creepy indeed and that video makes it moreso.

R36 - was that song used in a Buffy episode? The two ghosts possessing people? Not a cozy love song.

"Cry Baby Cry" by the Beatles is another eerie "Nursery rhyme" song a la "Sally go round the roses."

Hickory Holler's Tramp -

Oh, the path was deep and wide from the footsteps leading to our cabin Above the door there burned a scarlet lamp And late at night a hand would knock And there would stand a stranger Yes, I'm the son of Hickory Holler's tramp

The imagery of the song gave me nightmares, and I didn't realize the real meaning of the words and symbolism as a young kid.

Kinda, maybe -- this one by The Animals, one of my faves by them BTW.

R38, I've never watched Buffy but from what I've heard about it, the Flamingos tune would fit right in.

I was 4 years old when this song came out, and it's the first popular song I remember hearing on the radio -- the lyrics about death made a huge impression on me. As an adult, I recognize it's a bit cheesy, but as a 4 year old it was quite traumatic (perhaps it also made such an impact because my parents got divorced right around this time).

"Joey" by Concrete Blondes:

Mad World ... originally by Tears for Fears, but the remake used in the movie "Donnie Darko" was even more Ominous.

"Blackbird" since I saw (and read) "Helter Skelter".

Great thread, OP.

Another vote for "Mad World."

Can't believe no one's mentioned "Gimme Shelter." Lyrics and tune are ominous as hell itself.

Also: "She Talks to Angels" by the Black Crowes

The Allman Brothers Band's "Dreams."

Most ominous and stomach churning: Blind Willie Johnson's moan, "Dark Was the Night." Chills and tears every time I hear it. It is so primal, mournful and reminiscent of the old folks praying in the African American church of my childhood. It is the very definition of inchoate.

"Ghost Train" by Rickie Lee Jones

Thanks, R46!

A million listens later, Gimme Shelter never becomes safe & familiar. Merry Clayton wailing in the background, that foreboding basket weave of guitars.

The Mad World remake is much creepier than the TFF original (which is also a good song.)

All the White Album songs have an odd echo to them now.

The intro to Eye in the Sky is the most famous bit but it's the lyrics that are eerie & obsessive.

Hypnotized, Fleetwood Mac. The lyrics/music scared me.

"Smiling Faces", The Undisputed Truth.

When I was a kid when this song was a hit, I had no idea that people could be outwardly friendly and smiling at you but actually hating your guts and it scared the hell out of me and made me stop trusting people as much.

I love the song but "California Dreamin'" by the Mamas and the Papas is really dark and mysterious. It certainly doesn't seem to be a happy dream they're singing about. Is the singer confessing a crime to the preacher when he stops into the church?

"Carol of the Bells."

Summer, the First Time, Bobby Goldsboro.

Human Behavior = Bjork

How about "Timothy," that song from 1971 about cannibalism?

Rupert "Pina Colada Song" Holmes wrote it.

I would argue that "Monkey Man" is more ominous than "Gimme Shelter."

This song scared the fuck out of me when I was a kid---"Fire" by Crazy World of Arthur Brown

Darkness Falls - Josephine is very creepy but I love the way it sounds.

It Was A Very Good Year (Sinatra) -- that song always gave me borderline creeps. I always pictured it being sung by a ghost, a quavering male apparition in formalwear, standing halfway on a staircase.

"Cursum Perficio," "Boadicea," and "Pax Deorum" by Enya

Wow! I can't believe no one has mentioned. "Eve of Destruction". It defines (ominous song).

Your all missing the obvious: Funeral for a Friend/ Love Lies Bleeding - Elton John

Another creepy song from Terry Jacks ( with his band the Poppy Family)

Where Evil Grows from 1971

BYW--LOVE Susan Jack's fringy dress and boots! Work it, honey!

No one mentioned "Hotel California"? Really?

I'm surprised no has yet mentioned "Nights In White Satin" by the Moody Blues. The singer vocalizes as though he's in the midst of a clinical depression ("gazing at people, some hand in hand...just what I'm going through they can't understand"). The music is eerie and unsettling, as are the background vocals, which sound like the wailings of the damned. And the long version of the songs ends with the singer speaking these dark words:

Breathe deep

The gathering gloom

Watch lights fade

From every room

Bedsitter people

Look back and lament

Another day's useless energy spent

Impassioned lovers

Wrestle as one

Lonely man cries for love

And has none

New mother picks up

And suckles her son

Senior citizens

Wish they were young

Cold hearted orb

The rules the night

Removes the colors from our sight

Red is gray and yellow white

But we decide

Which is right

And which is an illusion

The British singer Nick Drake, who committed suicide in his twenties, left behind a lot of ominous musisc. His song "Day Is Done" seems almost like a suicide note:

When the day is done

Down to earth then sinks the sun

Along with everything that was lost and won

When the day is done

When the day is done

Hope so much your race will be all run

Then you find you jumped the gun

Have to go back where you begun

When the day is done

When the night is cold

Some get by but some get old

Just to show life’s not made of gold

When the night is cold

When the bird has flown

Got no-one to call your own

Got no place to call your home

When the bird has flown

When the game’s been fought

Newspaper blown accross the court

Lost much sooner than you would have thought

Now the game’s been fought

When the party’s through

Seems so very sad for you

Didn’t do the things you meant to do

Now there’s no time to start anew

Now the party’s through

When the day is done

Down to earth then sinks the sun

Along with everything that was lost and won

When the day is done

"Dead Man's Party' by Oingo Boingo.

I'm all dressed up with nowhere to go Walkin' with a dead man over my shoulder Waiting for an invitation to arrive Goin' to a party where no one's still alive

EVERYBODY KNOWS by Leonard Cohen

"Dead Man's Party" by Oingo Boingo.

My favorite lyric: Got my best suit and my tie And a shiny silver dollar on either eye

Nobody has mentioned 99 Red Balloons/ 99 Luftballons? Nuclear destruction cause by children's toy balloons.

R57, I was just going to post that. You never got any warning with that song. I used to wake up to my clock radio, and one morning those first words just BLASTED out as the alarm clicked on, and I nearly had a heart attack.

I find a lot of Oingo Boingo's stuff to be creepy ("Only a Lad") but I think "Dead Man's Party" is bouncy and fun, lyrics notwithstanding.

My creepy/ominous hit list:

Norwegian Wood

I Am The Walrus

New York Mining Disaster 1941 (RIP Robin Gibb). The title alone is enough to freak me out.

"Imaginary Lovers" by the Atlanta Rhythm Section, a song about someone who seems dangerously delusional "imaginary lovers never let you down...when all the other turn you away, they're around."

"Unwell" by Matchbox 20, a song about someone who insists that "I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell" when it's obvious he IS crazy (he hallucinates, hears voices and assumes everyone is "talking about me"). The disturbing lyriss are set to a catchy, incongruously cheery melody.

I Want You -- Elvis Costello, sort of like Every Breath You Take but more...ominous.

Prison Sex (Tool) is sad but ominous? I don't know

Wishing You Were Here by Chicago.

The intro to "Seasons in the Sun" sounded pretty ominous to me as a kid!!!

David Bowie's "Julie"

Not one of his better known songs, but one of my favorites. And it's got some creepy lyrics.

"I saw you kneeling 'neath a garden/I saw the grim and stood above."

Me too R76, when I first heard it back in '74, I thought it was a creepy song just because of that opening alone, even without knowing that the theme was death.

Everything Hope Sandoval has ever sung, including the entire Mazzy Star catalogue and her solo efforts.

The entire Jesus and Mary Chain "Darklands" album.

"Kiss you all over" by Exile

"Breathing" by Kate Bush

"The Air That I Breathe" by the Hollies

If we're going to talk about the Doors, who was all blues until they became exclusively psychedelic/ominous then you must discuss "The End" before "Riders on the Storm".

Elton John's "Levon".

Blondie - Fade Away and Radiate

There are some great suggestions in here. I'd add CCR's "Run Through the Jungle."

Don't Dream It's Over - Crowded House

A friend of mine who is older than I am (came of age in the 80s-90s) said when Arthur Brown played in small-town Sacramento in the late 1960s, he so enraged the crowd, he and his band were chased out of town with rifles and pitchforks. Well, maybe just the rifles.

So many inspired choices here.

"I Only Have Eyes For You", "California Dreaming" "It Was A Very Good Year" I've always found unsettling for exactly the reasons cited.

I'd add The Mommas and the Poppas "Monday, Monday" and "Baker Street" by Gerry Rafferty.

The Motels:

Take the L

Only the Lonely

Suddenly Last Summer

Thanks, everyone! Having fun googling the songs I don't know.

I find Baker Street very sinister, even though the lyrics aren't really. It's the "But you're cryin' You're cryin' now" part.

Great choice, R81. Blondie's cover of "Follow me" is also very eerie. "Only you, Only I; World farewell, World goodbye."

Yes, I agree R85, Baker Street and Monday Monday fit right into the ominous slot.

I'll add the intro to Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In by the 5th Dimension, it used to freak me out.

Alone Again Naturally is depressing & ominous...

Hotel California used to scare me when I was a kid

Pretty much anything in the key of F minor sounds kind of ominous. My favorite key.

OP, while you're looking at Blondie songs, check out this UBER creepy forgotten track from 'AutoAmerican'.

[quote]"But you're cryin' You're cryin' now" part.

Yeah, same for me OP.

Creepin', Stevie Wonder. Strange love(?) song.

Hi R57, I'm R19.

"Check it, chinch bug."

Kristin Hersh, Flooding

That's an awesome track, R92. "The door swings open and the lights are cold..." The chill of Debbie's voice + the chill of the music.

"Run through the jungle" is so effective it even worked when Fogarty renamed it "Old Man down the Road"!

Dylan's "Man in the Long Black Coat" is very evocative: "There's smoke on the water, it's been there since June. Tree trunks uprooted 'neath a high crescent moon."

I remember first hearing "Don't Fear The Reaper" in Halloween and Stephen King's tv movie of The Stand, I didn't know the lyrics then and it just sounded odd, a bit off-kilter.

Season of the Witch: Donovan.

Loverman by Nick Cave is ominous in a sexy ominous way - but it's still unsettling.

"I Am the Walrus" was genuinely ominous to me as a child...

Hearing "Wizard of Oz" ish background vocals freaked me out!!!!!!!!!

Did "Revolution #9" freak you all out when listening to The White Album back in 1968!!!! ???????????????

One from this decade:

Mike Wexler - Pariah

"Shoo Be Doo" by The Cars was scary and ominous to me!!!!

Just thought of another: Pretty Ballerina by The Left Banke. That dissonant piano is so creepy and beautiful at the same time.

"Out Of Time" - Blur

Oh no R105! I don't want to think of that song as creepy, I love it so much. I just think "melancholy" with that one.

Me too, R104!

"Lux Aeterna" from Requiem for a Dream- Kronos Quartet, composition by Clint Mansell.

Any production music by Two Steps From Hell.

Love My Way by the Psych Furs -- again, the lyrics are fluff but the music itself quite chilly and ominous.

There are a hundred songs I could list where the lyrics are deliberately ominous (including Reaper, Riders on the Storm, the Cure's Lullaby, and most death metal songs, etc) -- I think the more interesting ones (for this thread) are the songs where the lyrics are not very ominous by themselves, but the music and vocals *feels* sinister somehow to the ears and mind.

The flip side of that is a song like "Bad Moon Rising": ominous lyrics, but if you didn't speak English you'd think it was just another pleasant feel-good rock song. Somebody ought to do a creeped-out, slower paced, minor key cover of that tune.

"Under the Bridge" by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers

Another vote for Concrete Blonde's "Joey"

Almost everything on Courtney Love's "America's Sweetheart" ... "I slashed his tires, I bled his brakes"

Pretty much all of Modern English's catalogue, EXCEPT their hit "I Melt With You".

A great example...

Sisters of Mercy: Temple of Love

Joy Division anyone?

R28, your post made me LOL. I LOVE the funky "Give Me The Night" too, but Patti Austin's high-pitched backing vocals are kind of ethereal. Also, that deep bass male backing vocal that comes right before Patti's vocal is kind of creepy too.

It was produced and written by '70s/'80s mega-songwriter Rod Temperton (MJ's "Thriller", Michael McDonald's "Sweet Freedom"). Coincidentally, the girl in the "Give Me THe Night" video is Ola Ray, who's also in MJ's "Thriller".

Speaking of Rod Temperton, he was in the '70s group Heatwave, and he wrote most of their hits. Their songs always had that creepy-moody synth/moog organ thing going that gave me the willies as a kid. I used to think "Boogie Nights" was talking about the boogeyman.

Excellent choice r114

I would add the entire Disintegration album from The Cure.

Plainsong...especially at the 20-second mark. Sofia Coppola used this in Marie Antoinette at the wedding. Marie Antoinette is one of the best movie soundtracks out there.

Living Next Door To Alice by Smokie

Whiter Shade of Pale by Procol Harem

Paint It, Black by the Rolling Stones

Janet's "Velvet Rope" is kind of ominous with its "Tubular Bells" sample and the children's choir in the background.

Supernature by Cerrone seemed to preternaturally sense the oncoming AIDS holocaust.

This makes me think a guy is about to abuse or kill his woman.

More creepy Prince tunes:

"Bob George" from the "Black" album is weird and violent. Prince's voice is deepened to unrecognizable with sound effects, and he speaks the entire song. The titular character ends up killing his girlfriend at the end of the song.

"Darling Nikki" has always been a creepy song to me, particularly the end with the weird laugh and backward vocals.

"Others Here With Us" was from the "Parade" album sessions. It's lyrics speak about death and suicide, and there are spooky noises all throughout it.

OMD's instrumental title track, "Architecture and Morality." A perfect song for the Reagan/Thatcher years, when Rust Belts were being born across the "First World" industrial regions.

Blue Oyster Cult's best song, "Veteran of the Psychic Wars." Nothing spoke better to my suicidal 18-year old self than that song. Currently battling depression again, and that track still speaks to my 48-year old self.

You ask me why I'm weary, why I can't speak to you/ You blame me for my silence/ Say it's time I changed and grew

But the war's still going on dear / And there's no end that I know / And I can't say if we're ever... I can't say if we're ever gonna to be free /

Don't let these shakes go on/ It's time we had a break from it n It's time we had some leave / We've been living in the flames / We've been eating out our brains /Oh, please don't let these shakes go on

You see me now a veteran of a thousand psychic wars / My energy's spent at last And my armor is destroyed/ I have used up all my weapons and I'm helpless and bereaved /Wounds are all I'm made of /Did I hear you say that this is victory?

Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town - Kenny Rogers & First Edition. This song always made me feel uneasy.

Several Tears for Fears songs come to mind:

Pale Shelter

Elemental

Suffer the Children

Even the big hit "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" still holds up as an ominous and beautiful piece, despite its massive popularity.

Shriekback - All Line Up

Dillon Dixon's "I Don't Care", which plays during the end credits of the first "Scream" film.

I bet the lead singer of this ditty has big Russkie Rod.

Ominous!

Hazy Shade of Winter and Sounds of Silence

Eleanor Rigby

Ah, how could I forget Scarborough Fair, Simon and Garfunkel. Always reminds me of a dense forest in the fog or someplace where you could disappear without a trace.

Here's a song no one on DL probably knows, Egyptian Song by Rufus and Chaka Khan, really creepy, scared me to death in the 1970's.

Reba McEntyre's remake of "Fancy" is kind of ominous--particularly the video which is set in a creepy old house with a tombstone out in the backyard. Plus, it's mentioned in Stephen King's Duma Key novel.

Ohio Players, Love Rollercoaster. Remember the Urban Legend, the scream was real? Scared me as a child.

"See Emily Play" by Pink Floyd

"Total Eclipse of the Sun" by Syd Barrett

"Nathan Jones" by the Supremes

OP, have you ever heard Abba's live version of "Summer Night City" with the extended, nearly a capella intro? Talk about ominous! Miles better than the studio version that was released as a single.

Thanks R136! That is very creepy (in a good way.) "Can't resist the strange attraction from that giant dynamo...in the daylight of the morning nothing's worth remembering."

Shakespeare's Sister...Stay.

"You better hope and pray that you wake one day in your own world. Cause when you sleep at night they don't hear your cries in your own world. Only time will tell if you can break the spell back in you own world."

"Zou Bisou Bisou" obviously.

The Jacksons "This Place Hotel" (aka "Heartbreak Hotel"). The ominous violin opening, followed by LaToya's scream, and the dark lyrics:

"As we walked into the room There were faces staring glaring tearing through me Someone said 'Welcome to your doom' and they smiled with eyes that looked as if they knew me This is scaring me..."

Maxwell's Silver Hammer

Boomtown Rats, "I Don't Like Mondays"

Shannon Wright - Dirty Facade, the sound of an ink black could rolling in over a derelict city.

Could This Be Magic - Barry Manilow/Donna Summer

S.O.S. - Abba

Not the lyrics in these songs, but the tune & singing

The classical (I think?) composition by (Carl Orff?): "Carmina Burana." Very powerful stuff. Was in "The Omen" which I saw at a VERY young age (okay; was 22; yes; makes me OLD now!) and scared the shit out of me! To this day, I associate that piece of music with absolute terror, so much so that I: (a) refused an audition with a choir 'cause they were doing in that season, (b) turned down a date to SF Symphony when it was on the program.

(Did I mention I'm old? Should know better; what a wimp!)

Heirate Mich (Marry Me) by Rammstein

Eerie goth metal stuff...

Then you Google the lyrics...

"They're Coming To Take Me Away" by Napoleon XIV...from the summer of '66.

When I was a kid the Perry Mason Show would come on and my parents would watch it in their room. The theme song of that show filtered down the hallway and scared the shit out of me.

.

Most of these songs are creepy -- many are just icky -- but "ominous" means giving one a sense of fear about the quickly approaching future.

So the Buffalo Springfield song mentioned above is the only truly ominous song listed.

"Misery's comin' around" from "Showboat". Very forboding of the trouble mulatto Julie is going to have with the redneck sheriff.

The Viacom logo.

Well R150, if the lyric "rape, murder...it's just a shot away" doesn't give one a sense of fear about the quickly approaching future, I don't know what does.

But I don't think the OP just meant songs that are lyrically and literally about gloom and doom or imminent disaster. Sometimes the arrangement and production of a song can evoke a sense of dread and eeriness even if the lyric isn't directly ominous.

"O Fortuna" from the [italic]Carmina Burana[/italic] wasn't actually on the [italic]Omen[/italic] soundtrack, R144. You're thinking of "Ave Satani," which was composed by Jerry Goldsmith for the movie.

[quote]Sometimes the arrangement and production of a song can evoke a sense of dread and eeriness even if the lyric isn't directly ominous.

For me, Jose Feliciano's version of Light My Fire fits this description.

Nights in White Satin-- (Very) Moody Blues

Overkill-- Men at Work

"O Wllow Waly" from The Innocents.

[quote]Sometimes the arrangement and production of a song can evoke a sense of dread and eeriness even if the lyric isn't directly ominous.

Another good example: "What Makes a Man (Comme Il Disent)" by Charles Aznavour.

R149, the conclusion you make only refers to your taste and opinion. Get it? Many of these songs apparently instill that same chill that you are talking about with the BS song. OP has chimed in multiple times in satisfaction over the posts.

Therefore, you are a tool.

Warm Leatherette & Walking in the Rain by Grace Jones.

Primary by the Cure.

Well, thanks for that, R149...

Your suggestion...oh, you didn't make a suggestion. You just whined.

"Eighth Day" by Hazel O'Connor

I don't get r138's joke. Who is MB?

Broken English, Marianne Faithfull.

MD, not MB. MD is Megan Draper, Corporate Spy from Mad Men.

MB is Tyler Clementi's lover. Do keep up.

"We Will Become Silhouettes" - The Postal Service

R149, the joke's on you. There are plenty of ominous (your definition of the word) songs in this thread. CCC's "Bad Moon Rising" is just one of many. Buffalo Springfield didn't corner the market.

Deftones "Change (In the House of Flies)" is another creepy one

I love this thread.

"The Electrician" by The Walker Brothers. I first heard it when it was used very effectively in the Tom Hardy film Bronson, and I was surprised to learn that it's actually rather vintage (1978).

'If I jerk the handle, you'll die in your dreams...'

"Walk The Night" by the Skatt Brothers, which I'm sure some of the eldergays are familiar with it. Eerie.

Gonna Get Close to You by '80s hair band Queensryche, originally done by Lisa Dalbello (well-known for her background vocals for Boz Scaggs). A stalker song. 'Are you terrified of me?'

R167, I loved that.

Here's one that I think fits this thread.

R170, that song is a little on the romantic side, too.

"Invisible Sun" by The Police because I heard it on the radio today and thought of this thread.

And - Nick Drake's "Black Eyed Dog" which was one of the last things he recorded before his death. When I first got into him about a decade ago I couldn't listen to it because he sounded so fragile, predicting his fate. I'd hit skip every time it came on. "A black-eyed dog he called at my door..."

Enjoying all the song suggestions - haven't heard most of the songs on this page before. Is Scott Walker one of the Walker Bros who sang "The Sun ain't going to shine any more"? That's quite a musical transformation!

R170 I love the top comment on that video.

As a kid, "Subdivisions" by Rush seemed very sinister "Lose the race to rats, get caught in ticking traps." It's another example of music making lyrics more foreboding.

"Light flight" from Pentangle has a beautiful melody and ominous lyric: "Swirling, the waters rise up above my head..."

R152 is dead on. I work at a large university, and at certain times of day music is piped across campus from the Campanile. In December they play Christmas music. One of the songs is the cheery "Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town."

Only the Campanile's version is in a minor key, and slowed waayy down. You haven't known ominous until you walk across a dark deserted campus hearing that tune and remembering the lyrics. "You better watch out/ Better not pout / Better not cry / I'm tellin' you why" sounds like a straight-up threat.

Oddly enough I now prefer that dirged-up version.

[quote]Is Scott Walker one of the Walker Bros who sang "The Sun ain't going to shine any more"?

OP, it is indeed the same Scott Walker.:)

Another one - Massive Attack, 'Live With Me'. There are probably a lot of trip-hop songs that fall under the ominous umbrella, but this one in particular gives me a little chill...something about that dark, percolating bassline, I think.

In the Air Tonight -Phil Collins

The keyboards are ominous, but the lyrics are also menacing.

I second The Season of the Witch by Donovan and the Deftones, too.

I also thought Deftones' Passenger with James Keenan was creepy as fuck.

"Ghosts" by Ladytron

"Spring in Fialta" by Slow Children

David Essex, Rock On.

Used to scare the hell out of me.

Here's the Keenan/Deftones

Talking Heads "Burning Down the House"

This video and song used to scare the shit out of me, and MTV played it a few times a day.

It was a private torture to hear the first few seconds of it, like gasping for air or being suspended upside down.

It is the sound of turning the channel, turning the volume down, turning off the tv, and leaving the room.

The ultimate ominous Abba song - "The Day Before You Came." In theory it's a love song about how dull a woman's life was before someone special came into her life. But the music is SO dark and haunting it seems to me the singer is actually recalling how much better her life was before this person came along, motonony be damned.

This was the last song Abba ever recorded together and Bjorn's lyrics are really outstanding, but god what a bleak note to end on. It's a shame they chose not to continue recording because their personal relationships ending inspired some of the best music of their career.

'In Dreams' - Roy Orbison

'Venus In Furs' - Velvet Underground

'Sympathy For The Devil' - Rolling Stones

'Teddy Bears' Picnic' - Henry Hall Orchestra

sweet baby cheeses! Half of these songs are on my Ipod! Great thread OP

I will just add Wichita Lineman, which I first heard Glen Cambell sing as a kid...spooky , but here's a better version

Glenn Gregory BEF

and an even better version, I think, of wichita lineman by maria mckee

Didn't go through all 184 items on great thread -- but here was mine from childhood (as well as others mentioned):

"How he makes me QUIver How he makes me smile..." The Bells, "Stay Awhile" and, man, that girl's voice creeped me out for some reason. Now it just sounds like another hippie love song but then... I thought she was a Manson Family girl on major drugs. (And I had to turn off the radio when Zeppelin's "Black Dog" would come on).

P.S. For those creeped out by Terry Jacks' classic "Seasons in the Sun", check out his version of "If You Go Away". Amazing and just as spooky.

The Jaws theme.

Stina Nordenstam_The Man With The Gun is actually terrifying yet extraordinarily beautiful. A story where the protagonist imagines herself being murder by a hit man.

Red Rider - Lunatic Fringe

The sound is a bit dated, but still...

187 wins the ominious and forboding category.

R188, I loved that.

Me too r191, that was pretty dark. I'm guessing she doesn't have much commercial success.

Black Hole Sun by Soundgarden-I was in junior high when this came out. It scared the shit out of me and whenever I watched MTV or listened to the radio I was on alert. If I thought I heard the opening chords I would literally run to change the station.

Oh Death by Ralph Stanley-On the soundtrack to "o Brother Where Art Thou".

Angie Baby, Helen Reddy

The Night the Lights When Out in Georgia, Vicki Lawrence

Now they just sound campy. But back when they were played on the radio they were scary. Maybe because I was about 6 then.

"Bad Moon Rising" always sounded ominous and any of the Beatles songs which were used as examples to prove that Paul was dead, it was all too weird. A lot of people ruined their vinyl LPs back then by playing them backwards.

The Led Zeppelin songs played backwards, they were also creepy. Basically a person can find creepiness in any song if it's played backwards!

As far as the Zep songs, Jimmy Page was the one into Aleister Crowley, not all of the band, it's doubtful that Robert Plant and the rest of Zeppelin would have approved adding messages about Satan to their music.

Plant was always a flower power hippy type, it seems unlikely that there were actually hidden Satanic messages in those Zep tracks.

The Stone Roses - I Wanna Be Adored.

The opening to this is just so chill-inducing. The slight reverb and spacy feedback - then the guitar piercing the ambient background noise and that drum that kicks in.

And let us not forget the lyrics: I don't have to sell my soul, he's already in me. I wanna be adored.

More:

Gary Numan's Metal:

We're in the building where they make us grow And I'm frightened by the liquid engineers Like you

One Last:

Debussy's Nuages. It plays like the opening theme to a Hitchcock movie. Beautiful, foreboding, undulant.

Violent Femmes, Country Death Song

Speaking of Stone Roses, "Love Spreads" I always thought it was creepy and strange.

Here's another from Stina Nordenstam, this time a song called, Dynamite. A song where she blows up her ex-boyfriend and herself.

"Funeral March of a Marionette" by Charles Gounod otherwise known as the theme from Alfred Hitchcock Presents

"Gold" by John Stewart

The Stone Roses have that dark undercurrent, even in a great dance song like Fool's Gold.

R182 , totally agree about The Day Before you Came - however Abba intended it, it leaves you wondering if the stranger ended up destroying her peaceful, ordered life. Was it Elvis Costello who said that the later Abba songs are mini-Ingmar Bergman movies?

Lunatic Fringe - the part where the sirens, keyboards and voices all going at once is eerie.

R197 made me remember this ominous gem, Down In The Park by Gary Numan. I first heard it in the movie Times Square...perfect. None of the remakes can compare:

Isaac Hayes' take on The Look of Love...the full 11 minute version, of course. Dark and trippy. 'Doooooon't goooooooooooo...'

For What It's Worth by Dusty's brother Buffalo Springfield.

Has anyone mentioned "Poppa Was A Rolling Stone"?

That long orchestral intro is very disturbing even without those dark lyrics.

"Cause that was the day that my daddy died..."

Tanita Tikaram gave The day Before You came, a really spooky ambiguous version, I think it's the best version of the song, I even think it's better than Abbba's original version.

Sycamore Trees, from Twin Peaks

PJ Harvey - Rid Of Me

Dear Diary by the Moody Blues (I think that is the title); in fact, almost everything by the Moody Blues is a little creepy.

Moody Blues "The Other Side of Life". The video is just as weird and creepy (on the plus side, the male lead is a dimpled hottie).

Pink Floyd "Learning to Fly". Creepy vocals.

I was gonna say Aphex twin - come to daddy, then realized it wasn't so much ominous as fully arrived dread.

I agree on Elinor Rigby and This Place Hotel (Heart Break Hotel) by MJ I'd also put Billie Jean in there particularly the opening bars of it and Smooth Criminal.

Another ABBA that always got to me is Lay All Your Love On Me.

Summer In The City

Witchy Woman

Spooky or (Spooky Little Girl Like You)

Into The Night

Another Blue Oyster Cult song, "Dancin' in the Ruins." I don't remember this weird-ass video though!

Rockwell-Somebody's Watching Me

The folk song "Pretty Polly." Unfortunately the field recording Alan Lomax captured is not on YouTube, but this version and accompanying video perfectly capture the dread you feel in your guts when things just start going off the rails, and you think "This won't end well":

Two songs I that always get me in the gut around Memorial Day: "Taps" and the Doors' severely underrated "Unknown Soldier."

I prefer the.studio version of Unknown Soldier, with the mournful pealing bells as Morrison sings "It's all over / The war is over." He and we both know it's not. I love Densmore's martial drumming; it heightens the sense of certain death/maiming/emotional calamity.

Taps has made me cold and weepy since I was a child. For over fifty years my tough-as-nails Korean War vet father has sung that song over every grave of every one of our family pet.

Day is done

Gone the sun

From the lakes,

From the fields,

From the sky

All is well

Safely rest

God is nigh.

THE SADDEST THING IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD IS TO SEE YOUR BAAAAABY WITH ANOTHER GIRRRRRRL

The Evil Woman by ELO

THE SUN AIN'T GONNA SHINE ANYMORE, WHEN YOU'RE WITHOUT LOVE

R221, yep, I mentioned Sally Go Round the Roses upthread, I should've posted the YouTube clip of it, very creepy song.

Why is Sally Go Round The Roses creepy? Is it alluding that the singer killed "Sally" for stealing her man, hence "roses on her grave"?

Waiting For The Night - Depeche Mode

Fills me with dread...

The opening theme music to Kraft Suspense Theatre.

I was three years old when this show was on the air. My bedroom was right next door to the living room and my parents watched this late at night with the volume very loud.

At the end of the opening credits you see the tiny figure next to the wall and for some reason that image stuck in my head. So whenever that music came on and I would have nightmares that I had shrunk to insect size and no one could see me.

Carla Bozulich, Evangelista I. from her awesome Evangelista record. A intense and difficult song, I'm sure most people will turn if off within the first few seconds, this isn't Adele kids so turn back ye of faint heart.

"I find Baker Street very sinister, even though the lyrics aren't really. It's the "But you're cryin' You're cryin' now" part."

What's sinister about it? I interpreted it as simply a song about loneliness. And it ends on a hopeful note: "and when you wake up it's a new morning, the sun is shining, it's a new morning, and you're going, you're going home."

I don't see anything "scary" about "American Pie", either. I find it sad (it's a song about loss) but not scary. I thought the saddest part was at the end where he sings "I met a girl who sang the blues and I asked her for some happy news...she just smiled and turned away." Supposedly the "girl who sang the blues" is Janis Joplin, a girl who REALLY sang the blues.

Pfffffttttt by Depeche Mode.

Ashes to ashes, by David Bowie.

Tales From the Darkside

Rolling Stones 'Just a Shot Away"

Another vote for 10cc's "I'm not in Love"

Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth."

Brighton Rock by Queen.

Eleanor Rigby (the "face she keeps in a jar by the door" reminded me of Ed Gein, the serial killer, who kept woman's faces and body parts around his house, even made lampshades out of skin )

Tubular Bells (from the 70's movie The Exorcist, I was 12 years old when it came out, scared me half to death)

Carnaval by Natalie Merchant, because I read somewhere it was the last thoughts of someone before they were murdered by some psycho in a side alley in the midst of festivities of the carnaval.

Sadly under rated group And Also The Trees--- "Rive Droite"

Sunday bells float through my house On the steady wind that's blowing to the south Trails of smoke rise in the air From the bonfires in the orchards I see you standing on the stairs And the house it roars like a shell...

On The Dark Side - Eddie And The Cruisers

This one really, really creeps me out in an icky pedo way.

Everybody knows The Divinyls for their song "I Touch Myself." Try listening to "Elsie" sometimes; it's one of the most maudlin works out there. Very dirge like start and it only gets more depressing.

Sniff 'n the Tears were amazing. "What Can Daddy Do", about an ambitious, out-of-control rich bitch is another creepy classic. I believe that Atlantic records scotched Roberts original cover for the album it appears on, as I recall, it featured a terrified woman backed up against a door, appearing to have narrowly escaped someone..or something.

I've been to that site before, R24. Thanks for mentioning it. Time for another visit.

This video is horribly out of sync, but no matter, the audio is fine.

R237, I've really just gotten into "Lullaby" recently, particularly the awesome extended mix. The video is uber-creepy with the all the cobwebs and spiders. I've read where others say the lyrics lean toward pedophilia, and when I actually read them, they really do.

"While I'm Still Strong" - Weeping Willows

Fleetwood Mac's Beautiful Child.

Madonna's cover of "I want you" from Something to Remember.

Bela Lugosi's dead

Walk Away Renee Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash Hello It's Me by Todd Rundgren Space Oddity by David Bowie

"In the year 2525"

"Ghost Town" by the Specials. You had to be there.

The last 3 songs of Joy Divisions' album Closer(Twenty Four Hours, The Eternal, and Decades) are the 3 darkest songs I've ever heard. VERY disturbing and incredibly dark. Sad, painful, and haunting.

Grace Jones "I've Done it Again"

Genesis "Fly on a Windshield"

Roxy Music "The Bogus Man" The Mellotron parts are chilling.

Steeleye Span "Cam Ye O'er Frae France"

Dolly Parton "Down from Dover"

Ha anyone posted that Mama song by Genesis? Creepy as fuck.

I always thought this song was inpsired by the movie Psycho. I used to play it on Halloween.

Always loved "Mama". There are many creepy Genesis songs, from the Peter Cetera era and the Phil Collins era.

[quote]Grace Jones "I've Done it Again"

This isn't a creepy song at all. If anything, it's soothing and quite "normal" for a Grace track.

Ultravox. Just about anything from the "Quartet" album, but "Cut and Run" and "We Came to Dance" fit the category well.

"We Came to Dance" The original with the spoken interlude. The effect isn't the same without it.

When I saw that you'd written "creepy" R252, it made me think of Alec Mapa impersonating Bette Davis. Thanks for the chuckles.

Ominous is the category, and the narrative in the lyrics is prescient, they've always left me with the impression that the narrator isn't amongst the living, and has had several lives. Karmic, maybe?

And I LOVE the arrangement of the song, it's splendid. I don't find it soothing, I find it evocative. The liquid electric piano and the sucked-out (envelope filtered?) guitar sound like what stepping into a candle-lit tub with a brandy FEELS like.

Creepy? No. But disconcerting to my ears, in the most pleasant way imaginable.

"Always loved "Mama". There are many creepy Genesis songs, from the Peter Cetera era and the Phil Collins era."

Peter Cetera was NEVER in Genesis, he was in Chicago. He might have recorded a song with them, but he was never officially in the band. If he was, I must have blinked and missed it.

The original lead singer in Genesis was Peter Gabriel. When Gabriel left, Collins, the drummer, became their singer because they had similar voices.

Whoops, I meant Peter Gabriel, R256.

[quote]Ominous is the category

Correct, but they (ominous/creepy) both mean a sense of fear, uneasiness and/or dread.

I love your quote boxes and your way with words, R252,R258. Let's get marriaged.

[quote]"Driver's Seat" by Sniff'n The Tears

[quote]Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat"

10cc's "I'm Not in Love"

Wow. So it's not just me. Those are the big 3 for me. As soon as I hear the opening chords of any of the above, I get goosebumps. I got em now!

Runners up on my list: Lee Hazelwood - Some Velvet Morning Alan Parson - Games People Play Smiths - How Soon is Now America - Tin Man Zebra - Who's Behind the Door ELO - Can't Get it Out of My Head Steely Dan - Do it Again Fleetwood Mac - Big Love Rolling Stones - Gimme Shelter Boz Scaggs - Low Down

Art Bell used to play some of these in his bumper music. It perfectly complimented the late night early morning atmosphere.

this used to be my playground

The most obvious one of all, Don't Pay the Ferryman by Chris de Burgh, one I always associate with the beginning of the HIV epidemic.

"Joey" made it but not "Tomorrow, Wendy"?

Sound of Silence

Wild Horses

Rather on-the-nose for ominousness is Queen's "The Prophet's Song".

Oh and all who mentioned "Driver's Seat", yes. It kind of creeped me out when I was little but it really did after I saw "Boogie NIghts" it was one of the songs in that and just made me feel depressed, they all started out innocent and had high hopes and then many crashed and burned.

When I was little Steve Miller was really big and I was probably about 6 or so at the 7-11 with my mom and some fucking weird stonery guy was singing, "Abracadabra, I wanna reach out and stab ya". That song was sucky to begin with but then it was scary after that.

1960 was the year of sad songs. It started with two No.1 selling records: Teen Angel - Mark Dinning

Running Bear - Johnny Preston.

Then, other acts came out with tragic songs:

Ebony Eyes - The Everly Brothers.

Tell Laura, I Love Her - Ray Peterson

Patches

Last Song

There were so many top ten hits of this genre, that Bob Luman answered them with his own big hit: "Let's Think About Living".

Take a Message to Mary - The Everly Brothers

Sylvia's Mother - Dr. Hook

Leader of the Pack - The Shangri-La's

Death of an Angel - Donald Woods

I can't believe no one's listed what has to be the most ominous sounding song ever played on the radio:

This Corrosion

aww r369. I love SOM and all their songs (and none) are ominous.

Some more that haven't been mentioned:

Walt #2 - Elliott Smith

7 - Prince

Space Oddity - David Bowie

#1 Crush - Garbage

Kashmir - Led Zeppelin

Last in Line - Dio

Through the Living Years - Mike and the Mechanics

Anything by Bob Marley

The Walking Dead has quite a few ominous sounding songs on it's soundtrack.

That music from 28 Days Later.

The way I see it ,Peter Gabriel`s `Family Snapshot` is about a frustrated anonymous individual who assasinates someone world-famous in order to become famous himself-and it was released more than six months before John Lennon`s murder.Brrr. Also-for a totaly different artist- in ABBA`s `Lay All Your Love On Me` the narrator`s been asking her lover to stay true to her,not to go `wasting his emotion and sharing his devotion`i.e. she`s been pleading him to stay monogamous ,as if the song predicted AIDS in a way ,and its parent album (Super Trouper)was released in late 1980 when nobody`s heard of it yet.(And on the bonus spooky note,the LAYLOM single was released I think in the same week in which the New York Times ran the first-ever article about AIDS Brr once again.)

Nice thread. :)

The Beast-Austra

Harrowdown Hill-Thom Yorke

I'm Deranged-David Bowie

I Can't See Your Face in My Mind-The Doors

I Had Too Much To Dream Last Night-The Electric Prunes

Not Dark Yet-Bob Dylan

The Day Before You Came - ABBA.

I always had the impression that something bad happens to the narrator after her mundane, monotone existence is shaken up by the arrival of the man she sings about.

Revolution#9-Beatles White Album Comfortably Numb-Pink Floyd

Austra!

I always thought the theme song from Twin Peaks was vaguely creepy.

R42 R76 R78 R186 Other versions of "Seasons in the Sun" are sadder -- I'm not sure I find the song "ominous" -- than Terry Jacks' rendition. The original song is "Le Moribund" by Jacques Brel, and it's not merely a leave-taking by someone who's dying. In addition to saying goodbye to his father and his daughter, the singer bids adieu to his wife and his best friend, whom he caught having an affair with each other.

Heartbreaking more than ominous, I think.

If you want to hear an angry, no nonsense translation into English, the Kingston Trio do it justice. Listen to the "Francoise" verses (link).

Muscrat Love, it had an ick factor to it.

Synchronicity 2.

"Many miles away theres a shadow on the door of a cottage on the Shore of a dark Scottish lake..."

Used to give me the creeps... still kinda does.

And the Diamond Dogs album by David Bowie.

Chris Rea, "The Road to Hell"

Stood still on a highway,

I saw a woman, by the side of the road, with a face that I knew like my own, reflected in my window.

Well she walked up to my quarterlight, and she bent down real slow.

A fearful pressure paralyzed me in my shadow.

She said "Son, what are you doing here?"

"My fear for you has turned me in my grave."

I said "Mama, I come to the valley of the rich,

myself to sell".

She said "Son, this is the road to Hell",

Speaking of "mother" songs, "No Mother" by the Old 97s is kind of ominous.

In the valley of the shadows, I’m waiting For mother and the other ones I love So know I’ll always love you Until we meet above

In the battle of the bottle I’m an innocent And the breaking of glass I’m lost In the shadow of a downtown overpass My last I did exhaust

No, no, no mother Should ever have to lose a son No, no, no never Especially not such a handsome one

'John's Music Box', an uber-creepy instrumental that closes out The Mamas & The Papas 'Deliver' has spooked me since childhood.....

Rollercoaster in the 70's. Big rumor the screams were real.

Mother - Pink Floyd

When Aretha Franklin (at her heaviest) sang Mimi Carey's "Touch My Body" with lyrics including stuff like "throw me on the floor, wrestle me around", the end was near. You knew that the guy Aretha was doing it with would never live to tell his tale.

I agree with "In the Year 2525". Creeped me out when I first heard it and creeps me out now.

"The Night Chicago Died" by Paper Lace. The beginning with those sirens.

"Wreck on the Highway" by Bruce Springsteen of "The River". Little known song, very quiet but gives you a feeling of unease. One of The Boss's best.

"Don't You Want Me Baby" by the Human League

'Monster Mash' by Bobby Boris Pickett & The Cryptkickers

Hehehe...

The Rains of Castamere. Trust.

Everybody Wants to Rule the World, Tears For Fears

Under Pressure, Bowie and Mercury

Gimme Shelter, Stones

After 9/11 I found Paul Simon's "American Tune" to be ominous

"Patches" by Dickie Lee (1962). After the boy's family wouldn't let him date Patches, she was found "floating face downward in that dirty old river that flows by the coalyards in Old Shantytown."

At the end of the song he says, "It may not be right, but I'll join you tonight. Patches, I'm comin' to you."

"Moody River" by Pat Boone (1961). "Moody River more deadly, than the vainest kinife. Moody River your muddy waters, took my baby's life."

She killed herself and now he's looking into the river, holding the glove of his lost love at his fingertips.

"Tell Laura I Love Her" by Ray Peterson(1960). A teenage tragedy song. Tommy enters a stockcar race to win the money to buy Laura a wedding ring. He crashes and is killed. His final words are the song title.

"Laura and Tommy were lovers. He wanted to give her everything. Flowers, presents, But most of all, a wedding ring. He saw a sign for a stock car race ..."

Self Control, Laura Brannigsn

Time of the Season, the Zombies

She's not There, the Zombies

Zombie, the Cranberries

Lola, the Kinks

While My Guitar Gently Weeps, George Harrison

For the Benefit of Mr Kite, the Beatles

Underture from Tommy, the Who

I Can See for Miles, the Who

Paint it Black, Rolling Stones

When the Levee Breaks, Led Zeppelin version

Immigrant Song, Led Zeppelin

Fresh Garbage, Spirit

Mechanical World, Spirit

Uncle Jack, Spirit

Great Canyon Fire in General, Spirit

Pretty much anything by Spirit

"Teen Angel" by Mark Dinning (1960). A teenage tragedy song. His car stalled on the railroad track. A train was coming. He pulled her out and she was saved, but she went running back. He didn't know why until they told him they found his high school ring clutched in her hand.

"Teen Angel, can you hear me? Teen Angel, can you see me? Are you somewhere up above and am I still your own true love?"

It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty, Delta day....

Led Zeppein -- Immigrant Song, Hangman and their version of When the Levee Breaks

Castaways -- Liar, Liar

Nothing Can Change the Shape of Things to Come -- recorded by a gazillion bands

96 Tears, ? And the Mysterians

White Room by Cream. The most dramatic song I've ever heard about waiting for a train

"Padre" a million seller by Toni Arden (1958). In total despair, she goes to see the priest who performed the marriage to her love.

"Padre, Padre, what happened to our love so true? Padre, Padre, in my grief I turn to you. / Then she came along and sang him her song and won him with honey-lies. She of the golden eyes. Now it's my heart that cries... Padre, padre, please tell me how such things can be ..."

When the Levee Breaks by A Perfect Circle fits too.

Duran Duran-- Save A Prayer.

Aside from the ominous sound in general, the song has a creepy personal association for me. My partner and I came home late one night (song playing on the way home) and found our house filled with gas. Called the gas company who took one step into the house and walked right back out. Turned out the pipes leading to the house had corroded and were leaking gas everywhere. We were only a couple hours away from blowing up and taking who knows how many neighbors out with us. Spent the rest of the night sitting on the curb across the street watching them dig up our yard in the wee hours of the morning.

I can never hear that song without thinking of that night. Ominous indeed.

"Dark Moon" - Bonnie Guitar

Dark moon, what is the cause your light withdraws? Is it because I've lost my love?

Scout Niblett - "Gun"

King Crimson - "Epitaph"

The album cover is as disturbing as they come.

Time of the Season - Zombies

Slint - Good Morning Captain

Bloodrock's "D.O.A." (1971) creeped me out. It is about a plane crash (although the lead singer rereleased the song years later with a video making it a bizarre car accident).

Dust in the wind . . . All we are is dust in the wind " suicide music for sure .

One Tin Soldier, Billy Jack Soundtrack

Changes(In the House of Flies)-Deftones

Sour Times, Only You- Portishead

Unfinished Symphony- Massive Attack

Rabbit in Your Headlights- UNKLE

White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane.

This made me remember the Surrealistic Pillow album -- virtually forgotten today. I remember driving the back roads of the North Country in NH listening to Embryonic Journey with my friend, who found the mountains exhilarating. I found it disappointing. Where I lived it was still early fall with the leaves hardly changed, but up in the North Country it was winter. All bare trees, gray skies, brown, shrivelled leaves all over the road. I'd been robbed of autumn.

"Today" was a love song, but was a little creepy. "Plastic Fantastic Lover" was a crude, proto rap song.

bump!

Nearly all of these mentioned, so won't list the artists:

Smooth Criminal So Happy Together (delusional stalker) Famous Blue Raincoat The Future Maxwell's Silver Hammer Midnight Rambler Moody River Eleanor Rigby (face-by-the-jar was make-up) Don't Cry Out Loud Wichita Lineman The Man Comes Around Barrel of a Gun

Eeriest: The musical version of "She's Always A Woman to Me" playing loudly as the jumpers' bodies thud and crash in the background on 09/11.

Senor by Dylan

Delighted to see this thread back from the dead - OP.

Holy cow, what a story R305!

Recently heard "Back Street Luv" by Curved Air (1971) Lead singer has a gorgeous voice and the song is wonderfully sinister.

Me and Little Andy by Dolly Parton, in which she kills off a small child and puppy dog, which is one of her lyrical mainstays.

Please note the whispering ghost of Sandy at the end. I used to get high just to hear that line.

The Sign of The Southern Cross-Black Sabbath

Planet Caravan-Black Sabbath

One-Metallica

Immigrant Song-Led Zeppelin

Games Without Frontiers - Peter Gabriel Kids - MGMT The Mother We Share - Chvrches Exit Music for a Film - Radiohead Don't Lie - Vampire Weekend

"Eve of Destruction", from the 1960s. Check out the videos on YouTube.

"Go Ask Alice", I think Jefferson Airplane

"Blackhole Sun", Soundgarden

"Salisbury Hill", Peter Gabriel ' When the Man Comes Around", Johnny Cash

"Jealousy", The Pet Shop Boys

"Teenage Wasteland", The Who

"Lonely People", America

"No More I Love Yous", Annie Lennox

"Vincent/Starry Starry Night" & "Empty Chairs", Don McLean

"I Dreamed a Dream", Randy Graff (Les Miz)

"Only a Dream", Mary Chapin Carpenter

"A Volte il Cuore" & "L'Attesa", Andrea Boccelli

"The Promise", When in Rome

"88 Lines about 44 Women", Lou Reed

"All Out of Love", Air Supply

"Cruel to be Kind", Nick Lowe

"I Know There's Something Going On", Frida (from ABBA)

This Night Has Opened My Eyes by The Smiths

"Time" by Alan Parsons Project

"Who knows if we will meet again, if ever...."

Jeff Buckley-Last Goodbye

Jeff Buckley-Grace

There is always some butthole like R322 who ruins a perfectly fine thread.

R326, Really cunt?

What did I ruin? They're all valid, far as I'm concerned.

Fucking loser.

Thread annihilator, begone.

At least you spelled annihilator correctly. So some of your brain cells still work.

I went to highschool just like EVERYBODY ELSE.

This House by Alison Moyet

Fade to Grey by Visage....

[quote]Sally go round the roses by the Jaynettes. A eerie little song from the 60's.

Perhaps it's "eerie" because it's based on an old English folk song. Very much in the tradition of rock bands ripping off blues artists, the person who 'wrote' this song ripped it off. Grace Slick also performed this song with her first band The Great Society.

For pure eeriness kids.....try Patty Waters version of "Black Is the Color" , she's an obsure avant-garde US jazz singer. Patty was screeching on her records way before Yoko and the B-52s.

The Object of My Affection

btw, lot's of wrong song titles and wrong performers are listed in this thread:

"88 Lines about 44 Women" is not by Lou Reed, it's by a band called The Nails.

The Led Zeppelin song is "Gallows Pole" not "Hangman".

The Who song is not called "Teenage Wasteland" it's called "Baba O'Riley".

The Jefferson Airplane song is "White Rabbit" not "Go Ask Alice".

"Eve of Destruction" was by sung by Barry McGuire, it was written by PF Sloan.

The Peter Gabriel song is "Solsbury Hill".

Eli's coming

ABBA seems to be making a new name for itself on this thread. I would like to add On and On and On. The synth lines spell doom along with the disembodied vocals, only to switch to party mode for the chorus and then back again.

No love for the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald?

A lot of the Waiting To Exhale soundtrack sounds like an album about surprise anal.

Exhale Why Does It Hurt So Bad? Let It Flow It Hurts Like Hell Not Gon' Cry This is How It Works

So my vote for ominous songs goes to Queen Aretha's warning, "It Hurts Like Hell".

To me, Royals by Lorde has a really ominous feel. Hot guys in the video too.

10) "From The Air" by Laurie Anderson. 9) "Excitable Boy" by Warren Zevon. 8) "Smackwater Jack" by Carole King. 7) "Gimme Shelter" by The Rolling Stones. 6) "Pretty Polly" by Judy Collins. 5) "Turn It On, Turn It On, Turn It On" by Tom T. Hall. 4) "The Wreck Of The Barbie Ferrari" by John Hiatt. 3) "Down In The Willow Garden" by Art Garfunkel. 2) "Delia's Gone" by Johnny Cash.

And the absolute, hands-down, all-time creepiest of the creepy, believe it or not:

1) "Experiment In Terror" by Henry Mancini. Also known in some markets as the "Theme From Creature Features," and totally worth going to YouTube to hear.

Rhymeless by Mick Harvey, hot daddy extraordinaire.

'I Got You' by Split Enz.

'Song To The Siren' by This Mortal Coil.

'Title Music From A Clockwork Orange' by Wendy (formerly Walter) Carlos.

Also some TV themes: 'Armchair Thriller' by Andy Mackay from Roxy Music, 'Survivors' (the original series from the 1970's) and 'Tales of the Unexpected' (the UK version) and 'Unsolved Mysteries'.

Also, the opening to 'Seven Wonders' by Fleetwood Mac has an ominous tone, but picks up when Stevie Nicks starts singing.

Also, two numbers from 1979: 'Are Friends Electric?' by Tubeway Army, and even though it's not really an ominous song per se, 'Hot Summer Nights' by Night (sung by Stevie Lange, sister of Robert "Mutt" Lange). It has a "far away" quality that I like.

Funny this thread was bumped. I was just listening to a few ominous songs earlier, including The Smiths' "How Soon Is Now?" and CCC's "Bad Moon Rising".

Hurt by NIN

And this one. I don't know if I would find it ominous without the lead singer's history, but when you listen to the lyrics, you can guess the ending.

'Fear of Ghosts', 'The Same Deep Water as You', The Cure

'Rhiannon' by Fleetwood Mac.

'Intruder', Peter Gabriel

'Draw Of The Cards' by Kim Carnes. Russell Mulcahy directed the video. What once was spooky, now is campy!

walking on thin ice

Strange Fruit

Gloomy Sunday

'Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun' by Pink Floyd. The live version from "Live at Pompeii" is ominous yet strangely soothing.

"When the Night Wind Howls" from Ruddigore

Pretty much anything Diamanda Galas recorded in the 80s.

[quote]To me, Royals by Lorde has a really ominous feel. Hot guys in the video too.

Fuck yes about the hot guys. That song gets in your head and can't get out.

"You Are My Sunshine"--Shooter Jennings & Jamey Johnson

From "Sons Of Anarchy" Season 6 soundtrack

"Not To Touch The Earth"--The Doors. Though pretty much anything by The Doors can be considered ominous.

From the album "Waiting For The Sun"

Everybody Wants to rule the World - Tears for Fears

I Can See For Miles - the Who

Gimme Shelter - Stones

Sympathy for the Devil - Stones

Dance the Night Away - Cream

Dreams (I'll Never See) - Allman Brothers

"We Love You" by the Rolling Stones opens with the sound of chains and a cell door being slammed.

It was written in protest of their drug arrests

Trivia -- John Lennon and Paul McCartmey contributed vocals to the song.

Hello It's Me - Todd Rungren

John Cale's version of 'Heartbreak Hotel'.

'The Wind Cries Mary' by Jimi Hendrix. He wrote it after having an argument with his then girlfriend Kathy Etchingham about her cooking.

Her cooking made him fart?

Sinner, Neil Finn. Into Temptation, Crowded House

[343] Oops, Stevie Lange is Robert Lange's ex-wife, not his sister! Good song anyway.

'Emma' by Hot Chocolate.

The sinister bass and Hammond organ makes this song, as well as the lyrics.

'The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan' by Marianne Faithfull.

The synthesizer sounds and Marianne's cracked voice give this song its profound sense of unease. She sounds a million miles away from 'As Tears Go By'.

"Faithless Heart" by Amy Grant.

"The Sun is Burning" by Simon and Garfunkel

hotl california. and mr, sandman. kiesha night shllaman did a great job directing prt 2 and 3 of halloween. never understood why carpenter didnt do them

'Die Stimme der Energie', Kraftwerk

Also, 'Mitternacht', and, 'The Hall of Mirrors', but what's linked below is the giver of goosebumps...Oh, to see it performed live..

OP loves when this thread comes back from the dead!

Couldn't agree more about "Lucy Jordan" R366. Even hearing it the first time, you can tell that song isn't ending happy.

My current ominous fave is "Five Miles Out" by Mike Oldfield. "What do you do when you're falling?"

Gosh, apologies for shoddy linking.

Wings by Birdy

And I agree with the earlier suggestion: Lorde's Royals. Eerie minimalist sound.

O Superman by Laurie Anderson. This scared the shit out of me when I saw it on Night Flight as a kid.

'Stand By Me' - Ben E King

'Stormy' - Classics IV

Billie sings the song that brings your death

Space Oddity (Bowie) / Major Tom (Schilling)

White Rabbit (Jeferson Airplane)

Deutschland über Alles

Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

John Lennon's "I Don't Want To Be A Soldier": not so much the song as the creepy generic UFO sound effects tagged on to the very end (thanks, Phil Spector).

Richard Thompson's "The Calvary Cross" (live in 1983, from his box set "Watching The Dark"): the song always had an air of foreboding, but the extended guitar coda added here takes that much further, climaxing with a genuinely cathartic crescendo that makes me shiver almost every time I hear it.

"Seeing" by Moby Grape: Written and recorded by Skip Spence while engaged in a (presumably) drug-induced permanent mental breakdown. A scarily accurate recording of a man whose mental landscape is becoming torturous.

Neil Young's "Revolution Blues": Neil, having encountered Charles Manson and the Family at Dennis Wilson's in the late sixties (and having pitched the idea of recording Manson to his label head) evokes his old acquaintances several years later. Neil's fictional revolutionary is every bit as bat-shit as Charlie (he shoots the guard dog, he envisions an army of dune buggies and fountains spewing blood). Ends with Neil's infamous lines "Well, I hear that Laurel Canyon is full of famous stars, but I hate them worse than lepers and I'll kill them in their cars." Despite having played rhythm guitar on the studio track, David Crosby refused to play this live with CSNY. Pussy.

The Philadelphia Orchestra/Mormon Tabernacle Choir version of the LDS hymn "Come, Come Ye Saints"

Mad World by Tears for Fears

Tomorrow Belongs to Me

I expect very few here ever heard this. As a kid I once called into a local radio show to request it be played. The DJ had seen the band in concert and liked the song as well but told me the station absolutely wouldn't let it be played.

Way too grim for even old time FM.

Baby it's slow....

Steely Dan- Do It Again

[quote] My current ominous fave is "Five Miles Out" by Mike Oldfield. "What do you do when you're falling?"

In some old interview Mike said that song was a an actual experience where he nearly killed himself as a young and not very skilled weekend pilot.

[quote]It is the very definition of inchoate.

Since "inchoate" doesn't mean what you seem to think, I'd check your dictionary again.

I've always found "Save The Last Dance For Me" sinister, hinting at a controlling, abusive relationship.

The Mamas and the Papas had quite a few hits in minor keys; a lot of them seem creepy to me.

The Knife - "We Share Our Mother's Health". Ominous and supremely catchy at the same time.

"Sad" is not synonymous with "ominous." (Good rhyme, eh?) Some people need to consult their dictionaries. And David Gilmour's vocals on "Learning to Fly" are creepy? Yeah, right. Get out more.

For your consideration, based on an actual murder case :

I always thought that "The Codfish Ball" from the movie Captain January" a little ominous.

"Next Friday night your all invited

To dance from eight to five

All the fishes still alive

Are having a ball..."

"...Come along and follow me

To the bottom of the sea..."

Harry Styles ode to the end of the world:

Every time I hear Terry Jacks' "Season in the Sun", I want to yell "Don't do it!"

Speaking of Terry Jacks, what about Where Evil Grows

Bonus intro with young Kenny Rogers

[quote]Tomorrow Belongs to Me

The 100% unironic Anita Bryant cover

Ominous as fuck.

Sun is Shining - Bob Marley

OP, it would be better if your song was called "Sniffin' The Driver's Seat".

Lots of good music listed that isn't itself particularly "ominous". A lot of it is either depressive or contemplative.

There is a split of opinion on "Timothy" by the Bouys. The cannibalism theme is in you face but somewhere along the line I've read it was a put-on and they only were referring to a mule in the mine.

Pretty much anything the Doors did was ominous. Morrison must have been hell to live with.

If it hadn't already been posted I'd have added Bloodrock's "DOA". As a kid I once called in to a local FM station and asked it be played and he told me isn't even allowed on the air. I wonder if that's still true.

Bloodrock being taken, how about Richard Wagner as his music accompanies the death pf gods and heroes.

If we WW a post from 2012, will the poster get a notification? Or is that just too long ago?

The lyrics to this song are very ominous and gothic.

Mr. Mister, "Broken Wings". The bass line gives it a feeling of tension.

Shit... listen to Ghost or some doom metal. That’s ominous. The examples in these replies are laughable.

R399 Not if they are dead.

R402 Doom metal lyrics are too over-the-top to be ominous. “Ominous” to me implies that something is creepy or disturbing, but you can’t really explain why.

[quote]Doom metal lyrics are too over-the-top to be ominous.

Exactly. It's that element of mystery or uncertainty which creates that unsettling feeling.

Because I only heard it first in the series it’s hard to separate it from that plot relevance, but I think it still would be based on the line “haunted by the ghost of you.”

Nico - Evening of Light (1968)

More ominous and avant-garde than anything by The Velvet Underground.

Many of Orville Peck’s songs carry this for me and it hits an intense emotional chord. The steel guitars and theme of runaway boy hustlers living fast and dying young and that wailing note make this one a stand out.

The steel guitars and the wailing notes again add to the ominous feel boosted by the slow rhythmic drum beats that are like a dirge. The phrase “Take me back” appears here like in the song above “Night We Met.” It is a phrase that seems to open up to a feeling of being trapped in nostalgic and repeating and reliving something that is both hellish and weirdly comforting at the same time, a feeling you can’t escape, which would be part of the definition of ominous to me.

Belinda Carlisle's Remember September ('96)

It was tailor made for 9/11 & I don't know why radio didn't embrace it as a rallying cry.

If UB40 & Sheriff can have half decade old songs return to the charts, then the same can be true for BC =

He Decides - Ace Of Base

The video for this song could easily have one or both of the band's gals playing a scary game with the grim reaper =

The entire album of Concrete Blonde's "Bloodletting" could fit the OP's desires but I choose this one =

Nothing's Changed - Chris Isaak

Great Crush Collision March by Scott Joplin. It doesn't help matters that Scott Joplin wrote this song for a staged train wreck in Katy, Texas where two people were killed and others were maimed.

Nothing more ominous than a song about dangerous forecasts =

Tubular Bells, the score from The Exorcist. Still scares the hell out of me.

Jane Wiedlin's "Goodbye Cruel World"

An ominous tune about monsters =

Possum Kingdom by The Toadies.

This Lita & Ozzy masterpiece =

R.I.P. Roxette =

This 1 might be the winner =

"Eight Miles High" always seemed sinister to me....

A number of people have mentioned "White Rabbit," and I totally agree. That evil bolero.....gets me every time.

Many Tori Amos songs, many PJ Harvey songs, several Hole songs, many Sonic Youth songs, several Ladytron songs.

"Walking on Broken Glass" -- Annie Lennox. So upbeat, so peppy, and yet, the lyrics are so dark and dreary about heartbreak. Kind of makes her seem manic, especially if you listen to the laugh at the end of "No More I Love Yous," her Lover Speaks cover in the 90s.

This song sounds like time has run out for the poor girl =

Comus - Song to Comus (1971)

Morgen - Of Dreams (1968)

The silicon chip inside her head

Gets switched to overload;

And nobody's gonna go to school today,

She's gonna make them stay at home.

Very old but The Court of the Crimson King.

Rip Her To Shreds - Blondie

Welcome to my nightmare I think you're gonna like it I think you're gonna feel you belong A nocturnal vacation A necessary sedation You wanna feel at home 'cause you belong Welcome to my nightmare Welcome to my breakdown I hope I didn't scare you That's just the way we are when we come down. We sweat and laugh and scream here 'Cause life is just a dream here You know inside you feel right at home here You're welcome to my nightmare, yeah Welcome to my nightmare I think you're gonna like it I think you're gonna feel you belong We sweat and laugh and scream here 'Cause life is just a dream here You know inside you feel right at home here Welcome to my nightmare, ooh Welcome to my breakdown Yeah! Alice Cooper

Paul Whiteman - Jeepers Creepers.

Jim Stafford - Swamp Witch

(R436) Good one! Thank you.

"Here Comes The Bride."

Siouxie Soux

Always Feel Like Somebody's Watching Me

R388, good choice! In fact that entire album falls under that description: "ominous yet catchy". Definitely worth checking out.

[italic]Yes, in a dream, all my teeth fell out / A cracked smile and a silent shout[/italic]