Mental Floss

MUSIC

No Halloween party is complete without a spooky playlist.

Your house is decorated for Halloween and your jack-'o-lanterns are lit; now all you need is a spooky party playlist. We have a few song suggestions—and fun facts to drop while you listen.

Tasia Bass


Jim Morrison and his The Doors band mates—Ray Manzarek, John Densmore, and Robby Krieger—pose for their first album cover in 1967.

Jim Morrison was the self-styled Lizard King, a leather-pants-loving rock deity who fronted the Doors and represented the dark and druggy flipside of the utopian ’60s dream.

Kenneth Partridge






We apologize in advance for getting "Macarena" stuck in your head.

Los del Río's “Macarena” became the second longest-running number one in Billboard history, shifted 14 million copies, and sparked a dance craze that spread everywhere from the Olympics to the Democratic National Convention.

Jon O'Brien
Janis Joplin in Columbus, Ohio in the summer of 1970.

Janis Joplin didn’t have a long or prolific career. The freewheeling Texas blues-rock howler recorded just four albums between 1967 and 1970. But in that short time, she left an indelible mark on rock ’n’ roll history.

Kenneth Partridge


A 2018 Kidz Bop performance in New York City.

Unfortunately, there’s no official Kidz Bop version of “WAP.” But there’s no shortage of other comical covers to amuse yourself with.

Ellen Gutoskey


BrAt_PiKaChU/iStock via Getty Images; MTV Networks, Public Domain // Wikimedia Commons

Although MTV has more recently become synonymous with reality TV and cheap clip shows, there was a time when the network truly did live up to its name. And it all began at 12:01 a.m. on August 1, 1981.

Jon O'Brien




Lisa Loeb in 1994.

You may not remember some of these songs from the films for which they were recorded; you may have forgotten about some of these songs (or movies) entirely. But each one captures a very specific moment in the life cycle of the films, the artists, the deca

Todd Gilchrist




Brothers Russell and Ron Mael in Edgar Wright’s The Sparks Brothers (2021).

Over the past 50 years, brothers Ron and Russell Mael—a.k.a. musical duo Sparks—have been on the forefront of popular music trends, from glam rock to power pop to electronic music to new wave and beyond. Now they're the subject of Edgar Wright's first doc

Chelsea Spear




Bruno Vincent/Getty Images

Napster forever changed the way we listen to music. Here are 11 facts about this industry-changing computer software.

Kristy Puchko