Peacock’s new Satanic Panic series Hysteria! tells the story of a small town gripped by fears that Satanists are running amuck doing evil deeds all seemingly stemming from a few kids’ love of heavy metal music. Speaking at last weekend’s 2024 New York Comic Con, the co-creator and executive producer of the show explained how important the soundtrack is and revealed the one song they couldn’t use.
Hysteria! is currently streaming all eight episodes on Peacock, and anyone who has seen the first episode will know just how important metal is, not just to the characters, but to taking viewers back to the 1980s when bands like Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath captured the imagination of teens and scared the hell out of adults. Despite the show skewering the time period’s Satanic Panic and the irrational fear that gripped several communities throughout the world, co-creator, showrunner and executive producer Matthew Scott Kane said one very unexpected band was really not on board with the message and refused to license any of its music upon request for the pilot.
“You saw the scene earlier, Dylan and Judith are at their locker and they’re having a sweet exchange,” he told the crowd at NYCC after a screening of the pilot. “We thought it’d be great to play KISS’s ‘Beth’ over that scene, but apparently the Knights in Satan’s Service have a very strict policy about who they’re loaning their songs to and they found our Satanic comedy to be a little too immoral for their tastes.”
He added: “So we do not have any KISS songs in this series, but we do have a couple of good KISS jokes in this series.”
Fortunately, despite not having any KISS songs in the show, Hysteria! still finds its sound through the music as well as a cover here and there by the functional band, Dethkrunch. While KISS’s “Beth” was rejected, Kane noted that he’s pleased with the impact the music they were able to get has on the show, and promises some pretty sweet tunes for those who catch all eight episodes.