Sad Songs...

[erika]

How about songs that aren't associated with any particular memories and sometimes are not even sad-sounding but they still just make you cry? Like there's some kind of weird pressure point in your brain? I only have, like, two or three of these, but do most people have any? Or am I just nuts?

Emma I know just what you mean. "Passing Afternoon" is one of those for me.

"Happy Xmas (War is Over)" makes me cry at the end, "Don't Dream It's Over" gives me a lump in my throat and makes my head hurt when I hear it, and Radiohead's "Motion Picture Soundtrack" has brought me to tears for no real reason.

[Matt]

Linden Arden Stole the Highlights - Van Morrison

YES. Veedon Fleece on the whole is a good, weepy record. And dare I say, his best?

Most sad songs make me happy rather than sad; the best of them are so perfectly articulated and performed that they give me kind of a bittersweet uplifting feeling. The only two examples I can think of right now are Richard & Linda Thompson's "Has He Got a Friend for Me" and Chris Bell's "Speed of Sound" - the line "So you find him attractive/so what if he is?" in the latter especially kills me.

It's not really a sad song, but Dump's version of Prince's "The Beautiful Ones" kinda gets me misty-eyed.

[Sarah]

When I heard Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau perform, I cried almost from the start.  And the Queen of the Night's aria in The Magic Flute always makes me cry, too.  I think certain voices just have that power.  (This is in response to emma, by the way.)

[emma]

Now I feel un-crazy enough to share this story.

Back when I was badass*, and by badass I mean into semi-awful ska-punk bands, there was this one buncha kids who were completely forgettable (all I remember about them was that their singer had a super-average angry growly thing going on, and all their songs were about unity, drinking, fucking shit up, or fucking shit up while drunk in the name of unity) EXCEPT that, for some reason, their cover of Sound System by Operation Ivy always had me fighting back tears. Yours (Sarah and Erika) still make way more sense than that, I think.



*the hair is the result of me thinking it would be a good idea to dye it orange on top of the "forest green" it already was.

[samir]

I'm a girly man and have been brought to tears by the following songs, when seen live in concert:

'Scattered Black and Whites' by Elbow.
'Keep Your Dreams' by Primal Scream
'Exit Music' by Radiohead
'Broken Heart' by Spiritualized
'No Danger' by the Delgados

Don't judge!

[JonFromMaplewood]

-"Elizabeth Childers" performed by Richard Buckner (from the poem by Edgar Lee Masters)...it is part of the longer, single-track "The Hill" EP
-"Pale Green Things" by The Mountain Goats
-"Minnesota" by The Mountain Goats
-"Cool Water" by Marty Robbins
-"All That You Have Is Your Soul" by Tracy Chapman. Yeah. That's right. Tracy Fucking Chapman.

And here's a weird one:

-"KYEO" by Fugazi...I think it is an angry, pained cry in this case.

[masterofsparks]

Tractor Rape Chain by GBV has given me a lump in the old throat a couple of times for no discernable reason.

As for more obvious ones:

Northern Sky - Nick Drake
Albuquerque - Neil Young
Shakin' Street - MC5
Maggot Brain - Funkadelic
Seasons of Wither - Aerosmith

[theericcarr]

The Real Kids have a few tunes that always cause me to 'get something in my eye'.

'Just Like Darts'
'Common At Noon'
'Who Needs You'


One thing Boston got right.

[Shaggy 2 Grote]

How about songs that aren't associated with any particular memories and sometimes are not even sad-sounding but they still just make you cry? Like there's some kind of weird pressure point in your brain? I only have, like, two or three of these, but do most people have any? Or am I just nuts?

No, Emma, that totally happens.  Boston's "Peace of Mind" and Traffic's "The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" make me sad for no reason at all.

Sarah, ditto for Billy Bragg's "Great Leap Forwards," and Jon, ditto on Tracy Chapman. 

TL's "Bleeding Powers" makes me tear up for reals.  Also Radiohead's "Optimistic," Le Tigre's "Much Finer," Ani DiFranco's "Joyful Girl" (don't judge, I'm a lesbian trapped inside a man's body), a lot of songs on 7 Seconds' "The Crew," Bruce Springsteen's "Meeting Across The River," Johnny Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues," Dolly Parton's "Bargain Store."  And Beethoven makes me melancholy (the composer, not the fillum, which fills me with joy and laughter).

[gravy boat]

Ditto on on some Tracy Chapman stuff.

Bicycle Thief - Rainin' (3 a.m.)
Lucinda Williams  - Greenville
Bruce Springsteen - Used Cars
Turandot - Nessum Dorma
Mark Eitzel singing Western Sky on the Songs of Love Live album

Listening to Tom Traubert's Blues always makes me really sad and crawl into a bar for a week.

[erika]

Ani Difranco gets me with a few of hers:

Joyful Girl
Swan Dive
School Night

[iAmBaronVonTito]

with/out reason:

Lilac Wine- Jeff Buckley/Nina Simone
The Ballad of El Goodo- Big Star
Waterloo- The Kinks
Don't Hate Me- The Get Up Kids
You Only Live Once- The Strokes
Can't Get Over You- Daniel Johnston
Holland 1945- Neutral Milk Hotel
The Greatest- Cat Power
Heavy Metal Drummer/Please Be Patient With Me- Wilco
Bottle and Hotel Room- Harlan T. Bobo
Blackbird- The Beatles
Don't Stop Believin'- Journey
I Believe (When I Fall In Love...)- Stevie Wonder
Love At First Fell- Mark Kozelek
I Wanna Fuck You- The Ponys
Bad Man- The Reigning Sound
Woody- Hayden

[Beth]

Ani Difranco gets me with a few of hers:

Joyful Girl
Swan Dive
School Night

I'd like to add "You Had Time" to the mix. Tears everytime.
 
I agree with all of those, especially Swan Dive. I can remember being 15 alone in my bedroom and singing "I DON'T CARE IF THEY EAT ME ALIVE" at the top of my lungs. I don't listen to Ani much anymore, but she did get me through some of my darkest days of high school, and I'll always be grateful for that.


(don't judge)

[Chris L]

These have all reduced me to a Jason Segal-like mess in the past (ok, not that bad, but still...)

Elliott Smith - Between the Bars
Laura Cantrell - When the Roses Bloom Again
Sleater-Kinney - Good Things
Cat Power - Maybe Not
and, I'll say it, more than song on the fucking Langley Schools Music Project album.

[dave from knoxville]

The one-two punch of Sufjan's Romulus followed by Kate Bush's Nocturn a few minutes ago made me take a pause from grading finals to ponder the pointlessness of it all. But I recovered.

Almost anything by Neko Case (solo stuff) or Lucinda Williams can hit me in the same way. Oh, and Neil Young's Cortez the Killer (Zuma version.) I once pulled the car over when that one came on.