Halloween Music For Your Playlist

 

With us getting so close to the big night, you may be planning your Halloween party right now. What will you do for music? Here are a few suggestions for your playlist!

OK, maybe not those three. You can just enjoy those here at the blog. :)

Here's two that I want to highlight. Broken Peach is a vocal and rock band from Spain that records great covers of English-langauge rock and pop classics. Every year, they do a cover of a song in full Halloween makeup with choreography that they post on their socials, and they're always phenomenal. Here is this year's video, a mashup of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" with a pinch of Rockwell's "Somebody's Watching Me." Amazing! Check out their Web site here!

Finally, Alanis Morissette has released a brand-new version of the Donovan classic "Season of the Witch." It's being used as the theme music for the new horror series Yaga, premiering Friday, October 23rd on AMC+ in the US and on Crave in Canada. It's pretty cool! Check it out!

Thanks!

Laverne & Shirley, "Haunted House," ABC-TV, March 22, 1977

 

Welcome to Week 3 of the Countdown to Halloween. We're waist-deep in spookiness!

Believe it or not, so are the two protagonists of today's feature, Laverne & Shirley! In this episode that aired March 22, 1977 on ABC, the girls are in the market for a new couch for their apartment. They learn that a nearby house is selling its furniture for cheap! The problem is--the house might be haunted.

Don't you hate when that happens?

Enjoy below or on YouTube. And don't fast forward through the theme song; it's one of the greatest in television history.

Thanks!

Halloween On Ice, TNT Cable Network, October 8, 1995

 

Fridays at the Countdown mean long-form programs, and this week, it's the 1995 TV special Halloween On Ice!

In this special that aired on the TNT cable network on October 8, 1995, figure skating superstars Nancy Kerrigan, Todd Eldridge, Scott Hamilton, and more skate in full costume in outrageous Halloween performances. I wouldn't think of figure skating and Halloween going together, but this special is quite convincing! Plus, I've always appreciated figure skating; my mother is a huge fan and watched it frequently during my childhood.

This special must have been a success, as there were several others through the late '90s and even early 2000s.

Enjoy below or directly on YouTube here. Have a great weekend!

Mickey Mouse, "The Haunted House" (1929)

 

For today at the Countdown, I'm keeping it short with a classic cartoon.

Here is "The Haunted House," probably the first "scary" cartoon produced by Walt Disney. Most of my favorite cartoons are from the 1940s and after, but this is a beautiful black-and-white cartoon with rich imagery and a great combination of spookiness and Disney-style whimsy.

Plus, it's in the public domain. No fear of Disney lawyers for me--yay!

Enjoy!

Newhart, "Mrs. Newton's Body Lies A-Mould'ring in the Grave," CBS-TV, November 1, 1982

 

We start another week in the 2026 Countdown to Halloween, and we kick it off with a Halloween-centric episode of...Newhart?

Yep! Well, kind of.

In this, only the second episode in the history of the series, Dick and Joanna Loudon (Bob Newhart and Mary Frann) are disturbed to learn that the lovely Vermont inn they've recently purchased has the 300-year-old body of a woman buried in the inn's basement--a woman who was burned at the stake for being a witch.

This is a surprising plot for a sitcom as good-natured and mild as Newhart, but the episode retains the small-town charm the series is known for despite being about the body of a supposed witch, and therefore, this episode totally fits the vibe I've established with this blog all these years.

This episode aired on CBS on November 1st, 1982, the very same network and night that the M*A*S*H episode I posted last week aired, as well as the Halloween episode of Square Pegs I featured on the blog back in 2022. Watch them one after the other, and you get a partial recreation of CBS's lineup that night!

Enjoy below or directly on YouTube here!

Doctor Franken, NBC-TV, January 13, 1980

 

This Friday's long-form program is the 1980 TV-movie Doctor Franken.

In Doctor Franken (aka The Franken Project), the titular physician is a well-respected surgeon in a Manhattan hospital with a bit of a secret: he's been experimenting with the body of a presumed-dead man, replacing shattered parts of his body with new parts--from other patients.

Franken. Frankenstein. Get it?

When the patient surprisingly recovers, he realizes that his new parts retain the experiences of their former owners--including the eyes he received from a murder victim, making the patient a retroactive witness to the murder.

The movie, which stars Robert Vaughn as Franken and Teri Garr in a supporting role, acted as a pilot for a regular series that never materialized. That's not surprising--this is pretty grim stuff for an ongoing primetime TV series, especially in 1980.

Enjoy below or directly on YouTube here. Have a great weekend!

Halloween TV Commercials 2026 Edition

 

We're back for another haunt in the Countdown. Nest up: this year's batch of Halloween TV commercials!

Well, they're not all Halloween related specifically, but they do all have a spooky, scary, or creepy theme. That's Halloween enough for me!

First up, a fun commercial for Carvel Ice Cream's Halloween cakes. I've featured one before in the Countdown, but this is a different one with a different cake than the previous commercial. Ice cream cakes aren't my favorite type of cake, but Carvel made them seem so fun! Stay tuned for the funky bumper music that appears after the commercial!

Local commercials are often my favorite, because what they lack in production values they make up for in sincerity. I love this House of Bargains ad from 1985 featuring your favorite personality and mine, Discount Dracula! No offense to the actor, but the name suits him!

If you're still looking for a costume this year, look no further than either (or both?) of these Flo and Jamie costumes, courtesy of Progressive Insurance! Well, maybe not this year since this commercial is from 2016, but maybe you can get creative and make your own! Just put on a white shirt and overalls and you're golden!

I still have a working Atari 2600 video game system, so if I come across this Demon Attack game in my retro game shop, I'm picking it up!

Rounding out this year's crop of commercials, I have no less than five brand-new ones airing on TV right now. Xfinity is showcasing how reliable their services can be--even in the heart of a zombie apocalypse. Now THAT'S reliability!

Thanks!