Editorials
Kate Bush, Joy Division, Kiss, and the 11 Best Needle Drops of “Stranger Things”
Sorry Eleven, and no shade to Steve “The Hair” Harrington, but the most important character in Stranger Things is arguably the soundtrack. It’s hard to imagine this series would be nearly as ubiquitous as it stands all these years later without its essential needle drops. The music has framed this franchise, not only by offering instant blasts to the past, but by delivering emotional left hooks that bruise the heart as often as they tickle our toes.
This season is no exception. In fact, music is so vital at this point, it’s saving some of our favorite characters’ lives. And by proxy, it’s giving us some of the strongest marriages of sound and screen to date. With that in mind, we thought we’d turn back time — ahem, to borrow from Cher — and sort through the best needle drops to hit Hawkins, Indiana. These are the tracks that made us laugh, made us cry, and made us fall in love with this world.
Like any D&D campaign, though, we’ve got some ground rules: For starters, we didn’t include any of the score by Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein. That’s not to say they aren’t worthy — “Kids”, “Eulogy”, and “You’re a Fighter” alone are top five material — but they’re technically not needle drops. To add to that, we also tried to skew away from the diegetic use of music as this series is flooded with background tunes that we all keep on constant rotation.
No, these are the inescapable drops, the ones that the Duffer Brothers and music supervisor Nora Felder put front and center — and for good reason. As you’ll read below, these songs amplify the greatest moments of each season, capitalizing on their respective familiarity to take us higher and higher, to borrow from Jackie Wilson. So, take inventory of the 11 best needle drops and let us know what we missed in the comments below.
Of course, it goes without saying: Beware of spoilers for all four seasons.
11. Kiss – “Detroit Rock City”
Season 4, “Chapter One: The Hellfire Club”
By 1986, “Detroit Rock City” would already be 10 years old, and Kiss would be glamming it up with new guitarist Bruce Kulick as they continued to support 1985’s Asylum. But the persisting rumors of the Jewish rockers worshipping at the altar of Satan would prevail long after Destroyer began collecting dust. (After all, troubled parents didn’t have Snopes at the time to tell them Kiss doesn’t mean Knights in Satan’s Service.) And yet that’s why this drop works so well in a season that leans heavily on the contagious Satanic panic of the ’80s. History books aside, though, it’s also just a killer anthem that makes D&D look as epic as it reads, turns a high school basketball game into a bonafide rock concert, and — perhaps most importantly — gives Hellfire Club leader Eddie Munson some sizzling swagger.
10. The Scorpions – “Rock You Like a Hurricane”
Season 2, “Chapter One: Madmax”
Every high school has that one asshole who careens into the parking lot blasting some muscle jam. (Full transparency: This writer was that asshole too many times in the early aughts.) For Hawkins High circa 1984, that asshole was Ace Merrill twinner Billy Hargrove. So, it’s perhaps fitting that the first time we meet the new bully in town, he’s adding an exclamation point to his arrival with The Scorpions‘ iconic FM hit. Sure, it’s an on-the-nose track — c’mon, it doesn’t get more literal than “Here I am/ rock you like a hurricane” — but that’s what makes it so fitting for Billy. He’s not exactly the most subtle guy out there as “King Steve” Harrington comes to learn both on and off the court. In lesser hands, this would all be laughable, if not ludicrous, but stud Dacre Montgomery looks too damn sexy being so sinful.
09. Foreigner – “Waiting for a Girl Like You”
Season 1, “Chapter Three: Holly, Jolly”
This one’s so elegantly cruel: On one end, you have Steve Harrington and Nancy Wheeler consummating upstairs to the silky sounds of Foreigner‘s after-hours power ballad. Meanwhile, outside by the pool, Nancy’s wet blanket Barb is being mercilessly dragged into the Upside Down, where she’ll become a midnight snack for the Demogorgon. Again, it’s a terrifically mean juxtaposition, but the best thing about this cold open is how the early ’80s hit bleeds into the ensuing nightmare. Thomas Dolby’s dreamy synths only adds to the surreality of our first otherworldly plunge into the Upside Down. It’s a stylish beat by the Duffers that also serves as a reminder that not everyone’s phoning home in this nostalgic nook.
08. The Police – “Every Breath You Take”
Season 2, “Chapter Nine: The Gate”
We get it: The Police‘s single is creepy. Ever since it first popped up on 1983’s Synchronicity, it’s been analyzed to death, remixed to hell and back, given slow covers by the saddest saps out there with a guitar, hell, it’s even been referenced in a Halloween young adult novel. And yet, no matter how many times critics, listeners, family, or friends call out this dark side, it still doesn’t change the fact that — at face value — “Every Breath You Take” is a balmy, romantic ballad. Alas, that fire and ice, sugar and spice, naughty and nice dichotomy is why it’s such a choice closer for Season 2. So far in the franchise, it’s the only finale that fans can truly say wraps up on a happy note. El gets her dance with Mike, Dustin’s told by Nancy he’s her favorite, and Hopper and Joyce share a nostalgic smoke. Like the song, everything looks fine and dandy on top, but below, the Mind Flayer awaits. You might say, it’s watching them. Get it?
07. Corey Hart – “Never Surrender”
Season 3, “Chapter One: Suzie, Do You Copy?”
Speaking of genuinely happy moments, they’re admittedly few and far between in this series, especially for Eleven. If there’s anything to glean so far from Season 4, it’s that life hasn’t been so peachy for the Hawkins Lab MVP. So, when you consider our reunion with the gang at the beginning of Season 3, this is probably the happiest we’ve seen them, at least when it comes to Mike and El’s relationship. Like so many of the needle drops on this list, there’s duality in the use of Corey Hart‘s Boy in the Box blockbuster here. On one hand, there’s pure joy seeing Mike romancing El with a boisterous sing-a-long, but zero in on those lyrics: “Just a little more time is all we’re asking for/ ‘Cause just a little more time could open closing doors.” Knowing where they wind up by the end of Summer 1985 — the summer that changes everything, if you recall — those lyrics are not only melancholy but eerily foreboding. Sadly, time is never on their side.
06. The Clash – “Should I Stay or Should I Go”
Season 1, “Chapter Two: The Weirdo on Maple Street”
In just about every bar across the world, The Clash‘s Combat Rock single either elicits a boozy sing-a-long or a reluctant head bob. In Joyce Byers’ living room? It’s a jolt of terror. Put yourself in her shoes: Her boy is missing. Nobody has answers. And everyone’s telling her to stay home. So, naturally, she’s about 37 cigarettes removed from a complete anxiety attack when her house starts acting funny. Funny how? Well, the lights twitching is one thing, but the stereo turning on? That’s Poltergeist territory. The genius of this drop is how the signature chords serve as its own ominous jump scare. Because no matter how many memories we have tied to the anthem, there’s no denying its chill factor here. Granted, we soon learn it’s a message from Will, and more of a beacon of hope, but let’s be real: We’d all be running out of the house like Joyce, staring at our home and trying to tell ourselves we’re not in an episode of Sightings.
05. John Harrison – “Breakdown”
Season 3, “Chapter Six: E Pluribus Unum”
Some of the best music cues are the ones that genuinely surprise you, and the sheer niche value of this drop is worthy of a top five placement alone. Yes, the kids all go see George A. Romero’s Day of the Dead at the beginning of Season 3, but did anyone ever think John Harrison‘s score would pop up — counts list — five episodes later? Let alone a deep cut? Not only that, but two minutes into said deep cut? It’s so oddly specific that you just have to stand up and applaud the team. But, of course, none of it would matter if the scene didn’t count, and it does. It’s the first time we see Steve and his Scoop’s Ahoy partner-in-crime Robin Buckly strike a bond. No, not that scene, but their Last Crusade moment, which sees them tied up on the floor and reminiscing about, of all things, home room. It’s a tender scene ripped right out of a John Hughes rental, and Harrison’s score adds some understated magic to the moment.
04. Joy Division – “Atmosphere”
Season 1, “Chapter Four: The Body”
If you had a pie chart that broke down needle drops by tropes, “Going Through the Motions” would certainly take up the largest slice. Such is the case for this stunning pop-in by Manchester’s finest Joy Division. As Ian Curtis sings, “Walk in silence/ Don’t walk away, in silence/ See the danger/ Always danger,” director Shawn Levy wisely lingers around the Byers residence, where everyone’s grieving over the supposed death of Will. Distraught over another loss, Hopper can’t even bring himself to start his truck as he attempts to leave the house. Alone in his bedroom, Jonathan cries into his headphones, presumably listening to this very track. But, Joyce? Well, she’s still not convinced. Perhaps tearing a page from Jonathan’s Evil Dead poster, she heads to the work shed in her backyard, grabs an axe, and returns to the shadows of her living room unwilling to walk away as Bernard Sumner’s guitar flares up. Oof.
03. Peter Gabriel – “Heroes”
Season 3, “Chapter Eight: The Battle of Starcourt”
Some of the most affecting needle drops are those that stitch to their respective shows. Peter Gabriel‘s stripped-down cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes” is one such song. When it first reared its head in the debut season, it was a stroke of genius: an ’80s icon paying homage to another ’80s icon in a show paying homage to the ’80s. (Look, this writer is well aware that Gabriel and Bowie are hardly confined to that decade. Go with the point.) So, it wasn’t surprising to hear it return at the end of Season 3 — it almost made too much sense. Emotionally, it’s a savvy callback that hits even harder because we recognize it’s a part of that world. But logistically, it adds some finality to what could have very well been the series finale. Because we’re not just grieving the “loss” of Hopper or the Byers big move away, but the end of a summer that changed everything. As we see in these last fleeting moments, it certainly did.
02. Kate Bush – “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)”
Season 4, “Chapter Four: Dear Billy”
It’s a little maudlin, but the idea that music sets you free works in the world of Stranger Things. So much of this franchise is built on the idea that these pop cultural touchstones have served as essential escapes for myriad generations. So, the notion that Kate Bush could save a life in Hawkins isn’t that much of a stretch. If anything, the act is fitting for the anthem in question: “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” is one of the most enchanting pop compositions to ever grace the genre, and if you’re going to use it, you better earn it. They do by pairing the ballad with Max Mayfield, whose own traumatic past with her brother Billy Hargrove grooves to the beat of the song’s lyrical heart: “And if I only could/ I’d make a deal with God/ And I’d get him to swap our places.” The track appears early on in Season 4, but the way Levy wields it at the end of this fourth chapter truly makes a deal with the gods.
01. Moby – “When It’s Cold I’d Like to Die”
Season 1, “Chapter Eight: The Upside Down”
Believe it or not, but the best needle drop of the entire series isn’t even from the ’80s. It’s from Moby‘s 1995 third studio album Everything Is Wrong. Why does that sound familiar? Because it’s the same album that also features “God Moving over the Face of the Waters” and “First Cool Hive”, two tracks that respectively bring down the curtains on Michael Mann’s Heat and Wes Craven’s Scream. Well, it’s three times the charm for the record as another essential track pops up at the end of the first season of Stranger Things: “When It’s Cold I’d Like to Die”. The hypnotic ballad materializes when Hopper and Joyce try to resuscitate Will in the Upside Down. Making the scene even more harrowing is the way the Duffers crosscut the action with Hopper’s own memory involving the tragic death of his daughter, Sara. Moby’s spiritual sounds dance through every pounding fist and every guttural scream, be it Joyce’s emphatic pleas (“I need you to wake up”) or Hopper’s stone-cold urgency (“C’mon, kid!”). It’s impossible to watch without either straining your eyes from fighting back those tears or letting them rain down your face, a feeling that the greatest needle drops should always elicit.
We’re now officially in the back half of 2026 now that July is here, but what a year it’s been for horror so far. The sequels and reboots are still holding strong at the box office with films like Scream 7 and Scary Movie, but it’s also been a year where new voices are shattering records in unexpected ways.
Markiplier eschewed conventional production and distribution channels with his feature adaptation of Iron Lung, for example. We’re also still in the midst of Backrooms and Obsession-mania, with the former back in theaters with bonus footage and the latter extending its box office reign. Liminal horror has exploded, and low-budget indie horror is seeing just as much, and sometimes even more, success as big studio-backed fare.
All of which to say that 2026 has been a hell of a year so far for the genre, and it’s only getting warmed up. Still on the way are Evil Dead Burn, Insidious: Out of the Further, Resident Evil, Clayface, Whalefall, and Werwulf, just to name a few.
Also catch up with the Best Horror Books and Best Horror Games of the year so far.
Here are the ten best horror movies of the year (so far).
10) Chime
Horror master Kiyoshi Kurosawa is back with one of his most haunting yet, though one that’d likely be higher on this list if it were more accessible. The 45-minute feature was initially produced and distributed as an NFT before receiving a theatrical run earlier this year, with no plans to distribute digitally or on home media. It spins a somewhat cryptic tale, introducing a culinary teacher, Takuji Matsuoka (Mutsuo Yoshioka, Never After Dark), whose classroom becomes disrupted by a strange sound that leads to violence. It’s a quiet but haunting unraveling, one that leaves no aspect of Matsuoka’s life untouched, in true Kiyoshi Kurosawa style. That it defies any easy explanation also ensures Chime embeds itself under your skin.
9) Send Help
Sam Raimi’s splatstick return to form is a delightfully deranged two-hander that doubles as infectious catharsis for anyone who’s ever had a bad boss. Rachel McAdams (Doctor Strange) and Dylan O’Brien (The Maze Runner) face off when their characters are shipwrecked on an island, prompting a bid for survival in more ways than one. While O’Brien often matches her, It’s McAdams who shines as she deftly handles everything that Raimi, working from a script by Damian Shannon & Mark Swift (Freddy vs. Jason), throws at her. Send Help is full of vibrant personality, packed with all of Raimi’s signatures, making for one of the most entertaining films of the year.
8) Mārama
New Zealand filmmaker Taratoa Stappard’s gothic tale begins in familiar fashion, with Mary Stevens (Ariāna Osborne) arriving in Yorkshire upon invitation to learn more about her parents, only to find the remote manor haunted. Just when Stappard’s period horror story feels doomed to succumb to familiar gothic trappings and jump scares, though, its true horror emerges. The more Mary uncovers about her heritage and her Māori culture, the clearer it becomes that this grim home is built on violence and exploitation. Stappard’s vision comes into its own when it leaves behind its gothic influences and embraces its Māori identity; few scenes are as powerful as when Osborne’s Mary performs a haka in response to her vile oppressors, heralding in a righteous bloodbath.
7) Touch Me
Writer/Director Addison Heimann draws from retro Japanese horror, exploitation cinema, and perhaps even hentai for his campy, psychosexual sophomore feature. A toxic friendship plagued by trauma, codependency, and addiction gets tested to the extreme when Brian (Lou Taylor Pucci), a hip-hop-loving, tracksuit-sporting alien, gets between them. Olivia Taylor Dudley and Jordan Gavaris have an easy rapport and play off each other well as directionless, depressed Millennial besties prone to ignoring their problems until they become insurmountable. But it’s Pucci’s inspired, childlike take on the chicken nugget-loving extraterrestrial with tentacled secrets of his own that steals the show. Heimann has a lot on his mind with his sophomore feature and neatly condenses it all into a quirky, eccentric psychosexual camp odyssey that leans heavily into humor.
6) Backrooms
Director Kane Parsons translates the vast liminal labyrinth of his web series to the big screen in his feature debut, one that instills existential dread with its atmospheric horror and narrative. The ‘ 90s-set horror movie introduces a protagonist with a serious chip on his shoulder over life’s many disappointments, who then discovers his furniture store harbors a hidden door that leads to an endless labyrinth. It’s not just the incredible production design that instills a disorienting sense of doom and terror, but the lead characters’ palpable and profound sense of loneliness and isolation. Parsons exudes impressive confidence and control as he methodically entrusts his quiet worldbuilding and talented leads to carry the dramatic weight. While Backrooms does deflate by the film’s cryptic, cliffhanger-y end, it’s arguably the most effective and scariest yet at capturing the uncanny valley of generative AI.
5) Leviticus
Writer/Director Adrian Chiarella uses an It Follows-like supernatural entity that relentlessly stalks its prey as a launchpad to immerse audiences in the horror of constantly living in fear for simply existing. A conversion therapy ritual among a deeply conservative community plunges a pair of erstwhile lovers into a nightmarish bid for survival when it summons a force that takes the shape of those whom the afflicted desires most. Chiarella refines the horror mechanics and metaphor with much sharper precision, ensuring that the scares and emotional gravity of the young couple’s terrifying predicament reach their intended impact. It’s the central layered performances by Joe Bird (Talk to Me) and Stacy Clausen (Thrash) that clinch emotional investment in their heartbreaking plight, ensuring that the social horror cuts deep.
4) Redux Redux
The McManus Brothers, writer/director duo Matthew and Kevin McManus (The Block Island Sound), dials up the intensity of a classic revenge story by setting it within a multiverse, where Irene Kelly (Michaela McManus) seeks to snuff out every single iteration of her daughter’s murderer, Neville (Jeremy Holm). The more she stalks and slays every world’s Neville, the more she risks losing her humanity entirely. Through a narrative foil in Mia (Stella Marcus), Redux Redux smartly bypasses repetition as it explores the moral complexities and vulnerabilities of Irene’s extremely violent quest. Holm becomes utterly terrifying in the climax, ensuring that no matter whether Irene loses herself to vengeance for good or not, it’s justified if it means ridding the world of this sick maniac.
3) 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
Director Nia DaCosta takes the reins in the second entry in writer Alex Garland and original director Danny Boyle’s trilogy, picking up from the previous conclusion that saw Spike (Alfie Williams) fleeing from the infected straight into the welcoming arms of Sir Jimmy Crystal (Sinners’ Jack O’Connell). From here, DaCosta presents a stark contrast between humanity’s best and worst. The former sees the tender studies of Dr. Kelson (Ralph Fiennes) make poignant strides toward humankind’s future, while the latter unleashes more pain and bloodshed courtesy of the Jimmies. The dual paths of light and dark collide in one epic conclusion, an inspired confrontation between good and evil on a stunning set piece of heavy metal insanity. Yet it’s DaCosta’s handling of both extremes that impresses most, teeing up one epic conclusion to this trilogy.
2) Obsession
Sketch comedian turned horror filmmaker Curry Barker (Milk & Serial) wrings blood-curdling terror from a classic Monkey’s Paw wish fulfillment scenario in a way that no one could have ever anticipated. To say that it’s taken the box office by storm would be a massive understatement; Obsession is the top horror movie of the year in terms of gross. It’s not hard to see why, either. While Monkey’s Paw scenarios often yield predictable outcomes, and this outcome is practically telegraphed from the start, Barker manages to surprise with the journey itself. And it’s one insane journey paved with blood-soaked violence and no shortage of nightmare fuel. What truly sets it apart, though, is leads Michael Johnston and Inde Navarrette as the central pair undone by one vicious wish. Expect to see a lot more from breakout Navarette.
1) Hokum
A surly, traumatized writer must break free from his self-imposed shackles of guilt when confronted by a wicked witch haunting a quaint Irish inn in the latest by writer/director Damian McCarthy (Oddity). Adam Scott’s Ohm makes for an atypical but rewarding protagonist, and his complicated emotional journey gives way to a deeply moving story of a man so thoroughly broken by personal trauma that he constantly dwells in darkness. In true McCarthy style, expect the creepy as hell witch to dole out some supernatural retribution for crimes committed, but never in the way you’d expect. The filmmaker has a way of making whimsy pure nightmare fuel; Hokum distorts a kids’ show into eerie, uncanny valley-induced terror in its torment of Ohm. Channeling Stephen King, this creeper plays like a traditional campfire tale in mood and style, infusing genuine scares with a sense of magic and heart.
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