Love Ghost has created something unique yet familiar in their single “Haunted House”, featuring FLVCKKA and BrunOG. The song follows in the now well-established tradition of the pop-punk/trap fusion genre, featuring vocalist Finnegan Bell’s alt-rock-inflected vocals over an aggressive instrumental. Additional vocal contributions from FLVCKKA and BrunOG remain stylistically consistent, with a rock-grounded sung verse from the latter, and a hybrid rap/sung verse from the former mixing Spanish and English lyrics.
The distinctive horror theme of the song recalls the work of bands from an earlier generation like Ludo, while also slotting perfectly into the aforementioned contemporary genre. Balancing an upbeat overall sound with lyrics friendly to the gothically-inclined, “Haunted House” would be at home on a playlist next to artists like Machine Gun Kelly or Maggie Lindemann alike. Moreover, where more traditional trap-influenced music relies on the instrumentation to impose a sense of being unsettled while the vocalist recounts their hedonistic escapades, Love Ghost et al. are happy to be a little more maximal in their approach.
That won’t surprise fans of the group, though. Love Ghost cites “Soundcloud-era fearlessness” as a major influence on their work, and that certainly comes through in “Haunted House.” Where other artists shooting for the mainstream might play it safe, sticking to lyrics about love, sex, money, and drugs, Love Ghost have decided that they’re perfectly happy to threaten death by chainsaw right in the chorus, relying on an earworm of a melody and solid vocal chops to make up for what might otherwise be off-putting.
But “Haunted House” isn’t off-putting at all. It’s a fun song with the energy of a B-movie horror flick, and both Love Ghost and their collaborators deserve every bit of attention they can grab with it. I have every suspicion that this song is going to be on a lot of Halloween playlists this October.
Listen to "Haunted House" on Spotify here -
You can check out Love Ghost’s website here:
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