“Frankie Teardrop” by Suicide has nothing do with Halloween, October, spiders, snakes, witches, vampires, ghosts or things that go bump in the night. It isn’t creepy or spooky sounding. “Frankie Teardrop” is song that will scare the fucking shit out of anyone who listens to it. The song is a horror movie, it is depressing, horrifying, and weird. The only thing is, it just happens to be a song and not a movie. Lyrically, the song deals with a man who couldn’t provide for his wife and child and chooses to kill both of them and then himself leading to his decent into hell.
Suicide was one of the first synthesizer based acts in the U.S. They were booed regularly at shows during the NYC punk scene with bands like The Ramones, Talking Heads, and Blondie getting most of the acclaim. There is no mistaking that Suicide were ahead of its time, but they were also so weird and with songs like this, they must have scared the shit out of half the crowd.
Watch out for the volume level during the numerous guttural screams that come from the singer and also try to imagine how the hell Bruce Springsteen covered this song in concert.
