Riske Business: More Songs I Love From Horror Movies and Totally Should

by Adam Riske

These are the terrifying tunes I bump in the night.

Title: “Chanson D’Amour”
By: Art and Dotty Todd
From: I, Madman



I just stumbled upon this song for the first time last Friday with my inaugural viewing of I, Madman. This old-school ditty plays over the Blu-ray main menu, at the film’s opening and over the end credits; immediately it became a song I love. The video itself is nothing special, though Art Todd does look possessed by the devil. This is the type of song that plays in my head whenever I’m happy. P.S. I, Madman is a pretty quirky hidden gem from the late ‘80s. You should check it out if only to witness one of the most bonkers endings I can remember in a horror movie.

Title: “Cannibal Holocaust Theme”
By: Riz Ortolani
From: Cannibal Holocaust



The song that will play at the victory party if Trump gets elected. In all seriousness, this is the song that has become short-hand for me and Patrick to express to each other that one of us is sad.

Title: “Ben”
By: Michael Jackson
From: Willard



I’ve never seen either version of Willard (but plan to during next year’s Scary Movie Month) but I have heard “Ben” many times. It’s one of the few songs that can make me cry. I love it. I can’t believe that Michael Jackson was able to dig this deep for a song about a rat. He would later do the same thing (to even more effect) for a song about a whale. It’s pretty amazing.

Title: “Moonlight Desires”
By: Gowan
From: Wolfcop



Now that we’re totally depressed, how about flipping the script to something awesome? I would like to personally thank Patrick Bromley for introducing this song into my life with a Scary Movie Night screening of Wolfcop. I have nothing snarky to say about this song or video. It’s impervious to sarcasm. I love it genuinely and not ironically. It’s the song you didn’t know you needed until you hear it.

Title: “Saturday Night at the Movies”
By: Ossie D and Stevie G
From: Popcorn



I didn’t realize until just now that this was a cover version of an original song by The Drifters. That sort of mutes my enthusiasm for this pick, but I’ll leave it on the list. I thought it was an original creation by Ossie D and Stevie G for the super weird film called Popcorn. What I think is so funny about the lyrics (including “Saturday night at the movies/who cares what picture you see”) and the montage that accompanies it in Popcorn is that they’re meaning to romanticize going to the movies with both. BUT, as a movie lover myself, this blanket display of affection for “going to the movies” rings really false and sad. It’s like aliens came down and were trying to explain to humans why going to the movies is important. It’s hard to describe but everything about it feels wrong.

Title: “Do You Love Me?”
By: The Contours
From: Sleepwalkers



This is the greatest two minutes you’ll spend all Scary Movie Month. I don’t care what song is playing; watching Madchen Amick dance in a movie theater is the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen in my life. She should be Employee of the Month EVERY MONTH! No tyranny can stand up to this. If I saw Sleepwalkers in 1992 I would have tried to jump through the screen like that little shithead in Last Action Hero. But alas, like all of my sexual fantasies, it gets interrupted by Brian Krause.

Title: “I Think I Love You”
By: Less Than Jake
From: Scream 2



Maybe my favorite ska punk song ever? I think this cover really kicks ass and it plays over the cast credits at the end of Scream 2, which I love because it gives me the opportunity (that all the Scream movies gave us) of playing the “lives/dies/dies/lives/dies” game where you recount to yourself who made it to the end of that particular Scream movie. I remember doing that once and having the sobering feeling of “wow, we lost a lot of people this go around.”

Title: “Hush”
By: Kula Shaker
From: I Know What You Did Last Summer



Pretty much the only good thing to come out of this Jennifer Love Hewitt chiller. Not much to say except I think it’s a pretty fun, catchy song. I picked this one mostly because I want to talk about how much I used to love Sarah Michelle Gellar in high school and didn’t give the time of day to Jennifer Love Hewitt. Nowadays, it’s the complete reverse. Gellar was like the girl who I was attracted to and was always mean to me and Hewitt was like the one I was friends with, who liked me and I ignored. Youth is wasted on the young.

Title: “Silver Shamrock Commercial”
From: Halloween III: Season of the Witch



Self-explanatory. How many times do you think Atkins has nailed a robot to this song?