Listen, we love to blast Slayer’s “Raining Blood” and the Misfits’ “Halloween” on the spookiest of all days just like every other good, self-respecting metalhead. We’re not monsters! They’re classics on par with a Michael Myers costume and TP’ing your annoying neighbor’s yard every year.

But like a strung-out vampire coming off a weekend binge-feasting on junkies, we’re looking for fresh blood. Here’s our list of this year’s best metal tracks celebrating all things spooky, eerie, and downright murderous to celebrate Halloween 2022!

ERIK T

I’m not a big Halloween guy, never have been for some reason. So this is a struggle for me, as it was last year. I could go the obvious route and do something from Acid Witch, who released an album on Halloween this year and with whom I used a song from last year. Or something spooky, satanic, or otherwise witchy But I started thinking “what is scary? and “What has scared me in the past?”. And on thing I keep coming back to the Xenomorphs from the Alien/ Alien movie franchises. The perfect killing machine with a horrifying parasitic life cycle, these beasties, while being watered down and less scary in recent celluloid iterations, remain cult horror icons rife Giger’s Freudian sexuality.

France’s Xenotheory delivered a conceptual 2022 album based on Xenomorphs, Dawn of an Eyeless Realm. I choose the song “Boogeyman”, (which also hits the Halloween criteria), and while I’m not sure what is going on in the song (child abuse? alien sex rape?), it’s creepy as fuck and also heavy as fuck.

The other thing I kept coming back to is real-world stuff. While ghouls and goblins have their place in the pantheons of Halloween, it’s the stuff that really happened that’s scary- the depth of true human depravity is truly terrifying. So when the melodic deathcore act The Convalescence released the song “79 Years”, about The Pennhurst State School and Hospital, where for 79 years mentally and physically handicapped children were abused and neglected. After researching it, it made my skin crawl even more than any Cannibal Corpse tune.

FRANK RINI

Halloween is near and dear to me and while we can think of a bajillion Halloween metal or rock songs, from the past, there were many in 2022 which were released.

Morbid Evils – “Supernatural” (Supernaturals | Transcending Obscurity Records)

Finland’s Morbid Evils Supernaturals album is probably the heaviest album of 2022 and they’re monolithically heavy doom/death/sludge metal is so bludgeoning the album will bury you six feet under in six seconds flat.  The title track is over 11 minutes and may be the most evil sounding song for 2022 and they’re were many – yes I am looking at you Desolate Shrine!  This title track begins so slow and heavy and doomy that you will begin to feel hopeless with the funeral doom styled death metal.  Vocalist, Keijo Niinimaa from grindcore outfit, Rotten Sound, erupts with his vocals at the 57 second mark and he sounds as if he is killing someone.  Interestingly enough Rotten Sound are one of the most brutal and fastest bands out there and Morbid Evils are one of the slowest and heaviest bands around.  This song is the equivalent of taking a sledgehammer and smashing 1,000 skulls and then shoving them down your throat.  Suffocating, heavy and creepy AF.

Nite – “Acheron” (Voices of the Kronian Moon | Season of Mist)

Nite from California hit it out of the park again with their second album this year –  Voices of the Kronian Moon – sure to make my best of for 2022.  Nite screams blackened heavy metal/thrash, but their mystical sound screams Halloween, and even some of the quasi-power metal moments just transport me to the late 70’s/early 80’s Halloween imagery.  The opening song, “Acheron”, for me is perfect for Halloween.  It has the nostalgic metal, but also a horror punk vibe, not unlike The Misfits.  Every time I listen to both Nite albums I can’t help but think of the cloaked character adorning both album covers providing those raspy, blackened screechy vocals.  The main guitar riff, as well as guitar melodies, are just what the pumpkin king has ordered for the Halloween season, as they are ethereal and other worldly in nature.  Plus the album cover is perfect for this time of year.  One of my favorite new metal bands in recent years.

STEVE K

My wife and I actually got engaged on Halloween in 2015. We were at a party, with my wife dressed as Eddie Munster from, you know, The Munsters, and I was dressed as Eddie’s beloved werewolf doll, Woof Woof. We’ve had a number of pretty damn good Halloween costumes over the years, it being both our favorite holiday, but these costumes blew the rest out of the water, hands down.

Only one small thing I hadn’t considered: When I popped the question? There were a lot of pictures. Which is fine – but on the day that, like many women, my wife had dreamed about since she was little, she got engaged while dressed as a small vampire boy. And there are many pictures, of my wife being proposed to, dressed as a small… vampire… boy… Not exactly the image she’s dreamt up in her head.

Whoops… ANYWAY……

Defacing God – “Rise of the Trinity” (The Resurrection of Lilith | Napalm Records)

In a year that’s had a number of really strong debut albums, Denmark’s Defacing God offered one of the best, channeling their demonic forces to deliver a Melodic Death Metal bruiser that’s equal parts Rotting Christ and prime Arch Enemy. Really, any one of the tracks on this album fits the bill here, with the album’s blasphemous central theme surrounding the demon Lilith, amongst others – so I chose “Rise of the Trinity” just for the friggin’ sweet video that only adds to the heretical, demon-loving fun.

Midnight – “Szex Witchery” (Let There Be Witchery | Metal Blade Records)

I mean… Well, obviously, right? If anyone is carrying the modern-day torch of punky horror themes, it’s gotta be Midnight. Midnight fans are the type who get a man or lady boner at the first sight of a Spirit Halloween. They’re the type whose calendar year essentially ends on October 31st. They are the kings of camp, and they deserve your spooky-loving fealty.

J MAYS

Atomic Witch; “70,000 Skulls” (Crypt of Sleepless Malice | Redefining Darkness Records)

“I need more fucking skulls!” “70,000 fucking skulls!” If that doesn’t scream “Halloween,” then I’m not quite certain what does. This is one of the most immediate, hair on fire, sense of absolute urgency and energy albums of the year (review written and submitted). This happens to be the first track released for it, and you absolutely need to hear it for your spooky season and beyond.

Satan; “The Blood Ran Deep” (Earth Infernal | Metal Blade Records)

Okay, so this is a Halloween song for me for a couple of different reasons. First off, it’s by Satan, who only seems to be getting better with age. Secondly, the chorus of “The blood ran deep… into the virgin soil” reminds me immediately of virgin sacrifices, 70s horror, and the great Satanic Panic, despite the fact the track itself is about warfare. Overall, pretty metal.

KRISTOFER ALLRED

Halloween already!?! Hellyeah!!! When it comes to picking tracks to celebrate the season there are no doubt many to choose from, but this year we’re keeping it regulated to current releases, which rules because I get to focus on two of my favorite releases of this year and those are Dark Funeral‘s We Are the Apocalypse and Ravenous Death‘s Visions from the Netherworld.  Both terrific albums and bands. One from Sweden, the other from Mexico, both playing the sounds of Hell…or something like that.

Dark Funeral “Let the Devil In” (We Are the Apocalypse | Century Media Records)

I chose “Let the Devil In”, I mean how could I not? Corpsepaint, leather, spikes,  ripping guitars and wonderful croaking vocals…and Devils, for God’s sake! How much more Halloween-y could you get???

Ravenous Death “Plethora of Blood” ( Versions from the Netherworld | Memento Mori Records)

Ravenous Death‘s “Plethora of Blood” I picked mainly because I really dig this album and want to share it with you, and the title is “Plethora of Blood”. Blood needs no introduction to the concept of Halloween and all associated with it, and plethora reminds me of the movie The Three Amigos, and that’s a win in my book, especially being that the band hails from Mexico. Juvenile? Yes, but I never claimed to be anything else.

JEREMY BECK

VHS “Solange” (Deep Gashesand Long Lashes | Horror pain Gore Death Productions)

Halloween is just a few days away; do you have your costume ready? Sexy witch? Psychopathic slasher?How about a girl who suffered the worst abortion, with a curved knife? A string of horrific murders, her vagina sewed up so she can never have sex again… wait, what?! Yep. Pretty fucked up, right? But when was the last time a song about something as inhuman as forced abortion, made you want to dance
around like a fucking lunatic? “What Have You Done to Solange?” Is that song. Infectious, like this nasty little worm is the best way to describe the keyboard riff that permeates the song. The whispered chorus, haunting and grotesque leading to the epic blood letting of a solo near songs end. VHS know how to scare the piss out of you while delivering a sick as fuck track. The new album is out on Halloween, get it!