# As a kid, did any songs scare you when they came on the radio? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 9, 2006, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774 "2006-11-09T22:17:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2006, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/81 "2006-11-11T18:04:42Z")
Unless you count the narration on the full-length version of _Tubular Bells_ (“Two slightly _distorted_ guitars. . . Mado_lin!_”). ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2006, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/82 "2006-11-11T18:09:33Z")
Sounds like someone is having a cranky day. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2006, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/83 "2006-11-11T19:52:35Z")
[QUOTE=Queen Tonya] There was this creepy Carpenters song about aliens, calling occupants of interplanetary craft or some such. It started with a static blast, like you were dialing thru the AM dial and landed on some secret frequency where someone was pleading with the aliens to come get us. Not realizing it was a song, I really thought my radio had been posessed and we were in imminent probing danger, had to sleep with the light on for weeks. [/QUOTE] It was indeed “Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft” (originally by Klaatu, but based on a telepathic message sent by 1950s “alien contactee/spirit medium” George Hunt Williamson & his followers.) I don’t think my single of the Carpenters version has the static blast. ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/84 "2006-11-12T03:20:35Z")
I’m not very surprised that I get to be the first to mention the following: The Beach Boys’ _Good Vibrations_. Lemme 'splain: My parents were big into oldies music when I was a kid, and for a while I was, too. It wasn’t unusual for me to fall asleep listening to an oldies station. Well, you know that part in _Good Vibrations_ that has no words, and that weird “vibration” sound? To my young ears it sounded just like the sound of the UFO on that episode of _The Brady Bunch_ (you know the one I mean?). I guess that episode scared me, and for a while after seeing it I couldn’t listen to that song – if I heard it start I’d turn the radio off. It doesn’t scare me anymore, but to this day when I hear that song I think about _The Brady Bunch_. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Laughing\_Lagomorph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/6bbea6/32.png) [@Laughing\_Lagomorph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laughing_Lagomorph)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/85 "2006-11-12T04:31:41Z")
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn] The intro to “Face the Music” is backwards- it says “The music is reversible, time is not. Turn back. Turn back. …”, but ELO did a few songs like this. [/QUOTE] I was going to suggest this as the song **capybara** was referring to. ELO is mostly quite Pop-y, but that one song part does sound pretty satanic. (BTW capybara, I think you mean Paint it Black, by the Rolling Stones?) ---
**Author:** ![vertize2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b4bc9f/32.png) [@vertize2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vertize2)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 8:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/86 "2006-11-12T08:43:53Z")
tom petty…video and song very disturbing ---
**Author:** ![vertize2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b4bc9f/32.png) [@vertize2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vertize2)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 8:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/87 "2006-11-12T08:46:19Z")
[QUOTE=vertize2] tom petty…video and song very disturbing [/QUOTE] don’t come around here no more ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Rieux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 8:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/88 "2006-11-12T08:49:37Z")
“Michelle”–The Beatles “It Was a Very Good Year”–Frank Sinatra “Caravan” (the jazz standard) From TV: The themes from “The FBI”, “The Virginian”, “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea” and “The Outer Limits”. ---
**Author:** ![Wisp00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/977dab/32.png) [@Wisp00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wisp00)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2007, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/89 "2007-08-29T23:00:12Z")
Not a radio song, but I’m assuming that’s okay: She Floats by Vanessa Carlton There was a time I was listening to all my music on my crappy laptop speakers, and this wasn’t really one of my favorite songs so I would usually be playing around on the computer and never really paid it much attention. Then one day I was listening to the CD in a portable player with headphones… late at night, of course, drifting off to sleep. All of a sudden comes this piercing, horrifying screaming and scared the ever living beejeebees out of me! I guess the sound quality was better with the headphones and what I thought was just an instrumental part was clearly not. And after that, now that I know the screaming is there, I always hear it and it always freaks me out. Even just now, I played the song to make sure I got the title right, and it made me all nervous listening to it, waiting for the screaming to start. I guess I don’t understand the song, because I don’t think the screaming fits at all. It takes you right out. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2007, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/90 "2007-08-29T23:03:29Z")
The Cranberries’ \*Zombie \* 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Wisp00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/977dab/32.png) [@Wisp00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wisp00)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2007, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/91 "2007-08-29T23:12:20Z")
Oh, no! I’m so sorry… this is such an old thread! I clicked through from another and by the time I finished reading it, I forgot that it was long dead. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2007, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/92 "2007-08-29T23:37:00Z")
Can we make a new thread for scary songs? I’d like to discuss it some more as well, having missed the thread the first time it came around. ---
**Author:** ![Zambini57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4491bb/32.png) [@Zambini57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zambini57)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2007, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/93 "2007-08-30T00:16:17Z")
Some velvet morning when I’m straight I’m gonna open up your gate And maybe tell you 'bout Phaedra How she gave me life How she made it in Some velvet morning when I’m straight. And then it gets REALLY weird. ---
**Author:** ![Shockaholics](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@Shockaholics](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shockaholics)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2016, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/94 "2016-08-10T15:01:08Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > I thought Painted Black was spooky, and the keyboard section in. . Runaway (I wa wa wa wa won-duh, why she ran away! or something) but my older sister had something. . . I have no idea what it was-- I want to say ELO but I realize that’s highly unlikely (she mostly listened to the pop stuff-- Bee Gees, Rod Stewart, Manilow, KISS, etc. . . so I can’t image what this would have been)-- but it was like distorted electronic work-- some sort of oscillating synth stuff that reminds me (in my memory) of more modern ambient techno, but it scared the crap out of me. I’d get hysterical whenever she played it and jump up on a couch since I was afraid of touching the floor. > If someone could guess what it was based on this I’d be impressed. Someone could probably determine the exact date of my birth as well from this post. Summer Madness by Kool & the Gang? ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2016, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/95 "2016-08-10T15:49:01Z")
Good thing you revived both threads. ---
**Author:** ![Shockaholics](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@Shockaholics](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shockaholics)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2016, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/96 "2016-08-31T19:02:50Z")
Still trying to find out what capybara’s sister listened to. Maybe it was something by ELP? ---
**Author:** ![Shockaholics](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@Shockaholics](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shockaholics)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2017, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774/97 "2017-10-31T23:21:24Z")
> [@Shayna;7952829add The Who's \*\[Boris the Spider](#): > > ([AllMusic | Record Reviews, Streaming Songs, Genres & Bands](http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&token=&sql=33:9rq8b594psbe))\* to the list. Creepy Crawly, Creepy Crawly, Creepy Creepy, Crawly Crawly. \ I first heard it today on the radio and it does creep me out. Maybe it’s because it reminds me of the theme to Gigantor/Tetsujin-28, which I CANNOT STAND. (it doesn’t creep me out but STILL.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/as-a-kid-did-any-songs-scare-you-when-they-came-on-the-radio/379774.md?page=4)