Ready for sweater weather? With fall right around the corner, it’s the perfect time to switch up the artists in your rotation. To fully immerse yourself in the fall season, you need to have a killer playlist! (No pun intended).

Every great fall playlist has three essentials: The Smiths, Mazzy Star, plus a song for everyone. This mix blends mainstream indie favorites like The Cranberries and The Lumineers while diving into lesser-known artists like The Wild Reeds and The Regrettes, offering something for every kind of fall feeling. 

Spooky Season Staples

To capture October’s spooky essence, classic tracks like Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” The Smashing Pumpkins’  “1979” and the Ramones’ “Pet Sematary” are essential listens that should be on any generic fall playlist you come across. 

While these are great tracks, the smaller artists make a playlist unique and personable.

For a  lesser-known artist,  Fox Academy’s “Vampire Banquet.”  Despite only 294k monthly listeners on Spotify, their music is top-notch. This song has a strong folk feel and describes a disturbing scene while somehow remaining upbeat. The track perfectly encapsulates autumn: comforting but slightly off.

A New Psychedelic Pop Pick

Continuing with autumn’s slightly scary upbeat theme, Tame Impala’s new single, “Dracula,” released on Sept. 24, is a vibey, psychedelic pop track that explores escapism and emotional turmoil. 

Some lyrics that really stuck with me are Impala’s repetition of “Run from the sunlight, Dracula.” While it can be taken literally, as the character Dracula famously can’t go into the sun, it can also be looked at metaphorically. “Dracula” can be a reference to the artist himself. He is running from the “sunlight,” or what he doesn’t want to face. What he doesn’t want to face could be a few things: reality, truth or certain emotions. 

The song itself has what sounds like a choir plugged into the background vocal of the track. It holds that eerie vibe with a beat that makes you wanna move. It’s perfect for any existential feelings you may have this season.

Fall Flashbacks

But fall isn’t just about scary monsters and Halloween; it’s also a time of reflection and nostalgia. The changing leaves bring both chaotic energy and an eclectic feeling. One song that perfectly embodies this is Frank Sinatra’s “Autumn Leaves.”

Sinatra’s voice carries its listener softly, so you feel like you’re strolling along in the cool breeze with colorful leaves falling around you. 

The song follows a man who is reminiscing about a past lover. During this new season, he looks back on their time together fondly. He knows that by the time the leaves change, he will miss her more than ever.

Songs that deal with loss and romantic yearning always scream fall. Girl in red’s song “we fell in love in october,” talks about these exact emotions. The song talks about memories of a girl and her lover. 

The lyric “We fell in love in October. That’s why I love fall,” is so vivid. The singer is associating a feeling and memory with a season. She’s tying a personal memory to a seasonal change, giving it new meaning and weight. That yearning and love she felt happened in October, and because of that, she will always love fall.

This playlist mixes the whimsical, the chaotic and the slightly eerie feeling that makes fall so special. So feel free to listen wherever you are: curled up in a bookshop, wandering a field of pumpkins, or sitting on a park bench, let this be the soundtrack to all your autumn adventures!