"Bad moon rising"

The song "Bad Moon Rising" by Creedence Clearwater Revival appears diegetically on the hotel truck's radio as Wendy and Danny drive down to Sidewinder, and its lyrics about trouble on the way become a direct, ironic foreshadowing of the escalating supernatural and psychological horrors that will soon engulf the Torrance family at the Overlook Hotel.

Appearance and Context

On the drive down to Sidewinder, Wendy and Danny listen to the hotel truck's radio, which has an old Buick car radio installed under the dashboard. The distinctive sound of John Fogerty's Creedence Clearwater Revival comes through the speaker, tinny and choked with static. The song is "Bad Moon Rising," and its opening lines — "I see a bad moon a-rising, I see trouble on the way" — play as Wendy navigates the mountain road. The disc jockey on KMTX follows the song with a weather forecast that warns of a major snowstorm moving into the area, telling listeners that "the chain law will be in effect" and jokingly referencing the Donner Party. Wendy reaches down and snaps the radio off, asking Danny if he minds, and he says no.

Thematic Significance

The song functions as a direct, ironic foreshadowing of the events that will soon unfold. The "bad moon rising" that the lyrics describe is not merely the literal snowstorm that the disc jockey warns about, but the supernatural and psychological darkness that is already gathering around the Overlook Hotel. At this point in the narrative, the Torrances have been at the hotel for several weeks, and the first signs of the hotel's malevolent influence have begun to appear: Danny has had terrifying visions of REDRUM and a monster chasing him through the hotel's corridors, and Jack has discovered the scrapbook detailing the hotel's violent history. The song's warning about "trouble on the way" and "earthquakes and lightning" and "bad times today" directly anticipates the escalating horrors that will soon consume the family — the hedge animals coming to life, Jack's descent into madness, the attack on Wendy with the roque mallet, and the final explosion of the hotel's boiler. The song's placement in the narrative, just before the first major snowstorm that will isolate the Overlook from the outside world, marks a turning point: the last moment of relative normalcy before the family is trapped with the hotel's malevolent force.

Connection to the Donner Party Reference

The disc jockey's joke about the Donner Party immediately after the song creates a grim parallel. The Donner Party, snowbound in the Sierra Nevada in 1846-47, resorted to cannibalism to survive. The reference reinforces the idea that the Torrances are about to be cut off from civilization in a similarly desperate situation, and that the isolation will bring out the worst in them — in Jack's case, the violence and madness that the hotel cultivates. Wendy, who has been thinking about the Donner Party since her first view of the mountains, is already primed to see the parallel, and the song's ominous lyrics only deepen her unease.

Recurrence and Contrast

The song's motif of a "bad moon rising" recurs throughout the novel in different forms. The image of a rising moon or a dark celestial body appears in Danny's visions, where the Overlook is shown under a stormy night sky with a skull and crossbones glowing on its front. The "bad moon" becomes a symbol of the hotel's growing power and the family's impending doom. The contrast between the cheerful, upbeat sound of the Creedence Clearwater Revival song and its dark, apocalyptic lyrics mirrors the contrast between the Overlook's beautiful, serene exterior and the horror that lurks within. The song plays at a moment when the family is still functioning relatively normally, but the lyrics already point toward the destruction that awaits them.