Michael Jackson: Thriller

Remarks:

This song came out in 1983, but neither the song nor the video came out in time for Halloween. It went to #3 on the US R&B chart and #5 across the Anglosphere (weighted average). The video features Ola Ray, Playboy Playmate of June 1980. Quincy Jones produced the music, horror film actor Vincent Price narrates.

Happy Halloween!

See also:

• songs, the 1980s
• Michael Jackson
  • Billie Jean – from the same album
• Quincy Jones
• Playboy
• Halloween
  • Megyn Kelly and blackface
  • Halloween at Yale

Lyrics:

[Michael Jackson:]
It’s close to midnight and something evil’s lurkin’ in the dark
Under the moonlight you see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes,
You’re paralyzed

‘Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one’s gonna save you from the beast about to strike
You know it’s thriller, thriller night
You’re fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight

You hear the door slam and realize there’s nowhere left to run
You feel the cold hand and wonder if you’ll ever see the sun
You close your eyes and hope that this is just imagination, girl
But all the while you hear a creature creepin’ up behind
You’re outta time

‘Cause this is thriller, thriller night
There ain’t no second chance against the thing with the forty eyes, girl
Thriller, thriller night
You’re fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight

Night creatures call
And the dead start to walk in their masquerade
There’s no escaping the jaws of the alien this time (they’re open wide)
This is the end of your life

They’re out to get you, there’s demons closing in on every side
They will possess you unless you change that number on your dial
Now is the time for you and I to cuddle close together
All through the night I’ll save you from the terror on the screen,
I’ll make you see

That this is thriller, thriller night
‘Cause I can thrill you more than any ghoul could ever dare try
Thriller, thriller night
So let me hold you tight and share a killer, thriller, chiller
Thriller here tonight

‘Cause this is thriller, thriller night
Girl, I can thrill you more than any ghoul could ever dare try
Thriller, thriller night
So let me hold you tight and share a killer, thriller

I’m gonna thrill you tonight

[Vincent Price:]
Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
Creatures crawl in search of blood
To terrorize y’all’s neighborhood
And whomsoever shall be found
Without the soul for getting down
Must stand and face the hounds of hell
And rot inside a corpse’s shell

[Michael Jackson:]
I’m gonna thrill you tonight…

[Vincent Price:]
The foulest stench is in the air
The funk of forty thousand years
And grisly ghouls from every tomb
Are closing in to seal your doom
And though you fight to stay alive
Your body starts to shiver
For no mere mortal can resist
The evil of the thriller

[Into maniacal laugh, in deep echo]

Source: AZ Lyrics.