This production reminds me a great deal of Michael Jackson’s seminal hit ‘Thriller’, in its combination of 80s disco nostalgia with gothic B-movie soundtrack tropes. In the latter category, for instance, the song’s intro gives us a haunting suggestion of Phrygian Dominant mode in its B_b-C_b chord alternation, as well as mediaeval organum-like parallel voice motions from the lugubrious male-voice choir. There are genre-flags all over the instrumentation too: the tubular bells first heard at 0:12; the church-organ flavour of the synth at 0:21; the Scooby-Doo ‘woo’ glissando from the synth at 0:43; and that comedy down-shifted chuckle during the middle section at 1:56! I reckon the bass-line has a lot to answer for as well, with characteristically ‘Phantom Of The Opera’ moves like the C_b-D augmented-second leap at 0:25, the F-C_b diminished fifth leap at 0:41, and the falling E_b-D-D_b chromatic line at 0:37.

But I also love the canny use of a momentary ‘one drop’ arrangement breakdown in the chorus (first heard at 1:36). There are plenty of artists who use this kind of device for simple shock value, merely as a way of refreshing the listener’s attention at the start of a chorus (for example, in Imagine Dragons’ 'Believer') or during a later iteration of some repeated section (as in the second verse of Taylor Swift’s recent 'The Fate Of Ophelia'), but what’s especially effective about this particular specimen is that it serves double duty, not only catching the ear in its own right, but also stripping away the backing texture so that the song’s titular lyrical hook can punch through with maximum clarity. This is the kind of thing you can easily introduce with some sly editing even at the mixdown stage, and can be a good way to freshen up a song that feels a bit ‘stale’ to the client because they’ve been living with it for too long, so it’s worth keeping your ears peeled for opportunities like this if you’re trying to get your own mix work to stand out from the crowd.