saddest lines in song

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Stewie
Date: 23 Jul 19 - 06:50 PM

From Mark Germino's moving song about suicide - 'Black Angel Cure':

Now I shoot the darkness down, I puncture what is swollen
And sometimes I’ll tear it down, just to keep it rolling
But picture some years gone by and someone who can’t do that
Then step back and tell me how you get somebody through that
When they know that soon the axe will fall
Judge not somebody hopeless
Or anyone who can’t quite focus
Kill what you can that is not pure
But don’t take the black angel cure

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Tony Rees
Date: 23 Jul 19 - 06:11 PM

Half surprised no-one has already called up Crazy Man Michael (that Thompson fellow again...) - last verse goes

Crazy Man Michael he wanders and calls
And talks to the night and the day-o
But his eyes they are sane and his speech it is plain
And he longs to be far away-o
Michael he whistles the simplest of tunes
And asks of the wild wolves their pardon
For his true love is flown and into every flower grown
And he must be keeper of the garden

But the whole song is pretty sad. Especially as sung on the original, by Sandy Denny :)
- Tony

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Tony Rees
Date: 23 Jul 19 - 06:05 PM

From The Maid of Coolmore
The Bothy Band version:

The first time that I met her, she passed me by
The next time that I met her, she bade me good-bye
But the last time that I met her, she grieved my heart sore
For she sailed down Lough Foyle and away from Coolmore

... not having a very good time at all!

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,GUEST
Date: 23 Jul 19 - 01:56 AM

She was a rare thing, fine as a bee’s wing
And I miss her more than ever words could say
If I could just taste all of her wildness now
If I could hold her in my arms today…
I wouldn’t want her any other way.


Yestre’en the queen had four Marys—the nicht she’ll hae but three;
There was Mary Beaton, and Mary Seton, and Mary Carmichael and me.
It’s often hae I dressed my queen, and put gold in her hair,
But noo I’ve gotten for my reward the gallows tae be my share.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Joe_F
Date: 22 Jul 19 - 05:40 PM

And the keepsakes locked in the chests
That were sold at the auction
Down at the Sailors' Rest.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 22 Jul 19 - 03:12 PM

A half empty washing line serves to remind that you're fallen and always standing in line.

Standing In Line - Lester Simpson
sadder still when sung by June Tabor.


~~~~~~~~~~

I live in the shadow of a hill
A hill of little shoes

Hill of Little Shoes - Pete Atkin / Clive James

and nearly every line in the song :
thread.cfm?threadid=73979#3906959

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jul 19 - 02:09 PM

This whole song....

Stan Rogers - First Christmas

This day a year ago, he was rolling in the snow
With a younger brother in his father's yard
Christmas break, a time for touching home,
The heart of all he'd known
And leaving was so hard

Three thousand miles away,
Now he's working Christmas Day
Making double time for the minding of the store
Well he always said, he'd make it on his own
He's spending Christmas Eve alone
First Christmas away from home

She's standing by the train station,
Pan-handling for change
Four more dollars buys a decent meal and a room
Looks like the Sally Ann place after all,
In a crowded sleeping hall
That echoes like a tomb

But it's warm and clean and free,
And there are worse places to be
At least it means no beating from her Dad
And if she cries because it's Christmas Day
She hopes that it won't show
First Christmas away from home

In the apartment stands a tree,
And it looks so small and bare
Not like it was meant to be,
Golden angel on the top
It's not that same old silver star,
You wanted for your own
First Christmas away from home

In the morning, they get prayers,
Then it's crafts and tea downstairs
Then another meal back in his little room
Hoping maybe that "the boys"
Will think to phone before the day is gone
Well, it's best they do it soon

When the "old girl" passed away,
He fell apart more every day
Each had always kept the other pretty well
But the kids all said the nursing home was best
Cause he couldn't live alone
First Christmas away from home

In the common room they've got the biggest tree
And it's huge and cold and lifeless
Not like it ought to be,
And the lit-up flashing Santa Claus on top
It's not that same old silver star,
You once made for your own
First Christmas away from home

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Thompson
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 01:56 PM

Many's the girl is singing this song nowadays:

"What's the matter with you, me lass, and where's your dashing Jimmy?"
"Them soldier boys have picked him up and taken him far from me
Last payday, he went into town and them red-coated fellows
Enticed him in and made him drunk, and he'd better gone to the gallows

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 01:27 PM

Great choice Steve, I thought of this song when this thread began. One of the saddest songs ever...right up there with John Prines'
Angel from Montgomery...

How the hell can a person
Go out in the mornin,
Come home in the evenin
and have nothin to say.

Hope I got that right !

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 10:27 AM

Well he surely does, but that song is by Ewan... Here's one of my favourite sad Richard bits:

Then they dragged her away
It was handcuffs this time
She said "my good man are you out of your mind?
Don't you know that we're married?
See, I'm wearing his ring.
From Galway to Graceland to be with the King.
I come from Galway to Graceland to be with the King."

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Daniel Kelly
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 07:05 AM

Steve,

Richard Thompson sure has a gift for the melancholy.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 06:41 AM

But now alas the tide has changed
My love she has gone from me
And winter's frost has touched my heart
And put a blight upon me
Creeping fog is on the river,
Flow sweet river, flow
Sun and moon and stars gone with her,
Sweet Thames flow softly

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 06:06 AM

"Ah, but I may as well try and catch the wind...………."

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: BobKnight
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 05:33 AM

You have to feel sorry for these young lovers in Bruce Springsteen's "The River."
"No wedding day smiles, no walk down the aisle,
No flowers, no wedding dress."

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Daniel Kelly
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 05:09 AM

I put the lyrics to this song up a few months ago, these lines are from 'William Conquest Turland' by John Warner:

I dug two graves beside the creek where old Dick's bridge now stands,
And I can still feel Hannah's grasp a-trembling in my hands,
The road ahead holds children, home and labour, land and friend,
But I held Hannah, sobbing hard, where one road found its end.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Thompson
Date: 21 Jul 19 - 03:03 AM

Tá ceo ag titim ar chraobh ann
Ná glanann le greín ná lá
Tá smúit ag titim ón spéir ann
'S a cuid uisce go léir ag trá
Níl coll, níl cuileann, níl caor ann
Ach clocha 'gus maolchlochán
Páirc na foraoise gan chraobh ann
Is d'imigh an géim chun fáin

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,paperback
Date: 20 Jul 19 - 12:32 AM

“Some of us are illegal, and some are not wanted... They chase us like outlaws, like rustlers, like thieves.”

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,LynnH
Date: 19 Jul 19 - 01:30 PM

Almost all of the last verse of '1952 Vincent Black Lightning', Richard Thompson.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,silver
Date: 18 Jul 19 - 05:10 PM

I didn't know there were worse things than dying
(The Band played Waltzing Matilda, by Eric Bogle)

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,IanA
Date: 18 Jul 19 - 01:32 PM

I ain't got nobody,
Ain't nobody got me.
I'm just like a little apple, hangin' on a tree.
Don't nobody want me I can plainly see.
I ain't got nobody,
Ain't nobody got me.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Joe_F
Date: 17 Jul 19 - 06:25 PM

Shake hands as faces blur.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,TomC
Date: 17 Jul 19 - 05:49 PM

Young Vandy in his pain put a bullet through his brain. (And) We buried them together as the snow began to fall. - Darcy Farrow by Gillette and Campbell

We filled our home with joys untold, but now the rooms are empty and cold. - My old House by me

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 07:51 PM

For she's dead in the coach ahead.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: BobKnight
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 06:46 PM

Or how about?
"I don't have good days anymore,
Every day is a bad day, but some hurt a whole lot more.
And even my best days are bad,
Oh how I wish that we could get back to the happiness we had."

Or?
It's the sweet memories that break the loving heart,
The way you smiled for me that made me love you from the start.
But there's no comfort when I think of you and me,
'Cos what hurts most are those sweet memories.

Had enough? Plenty more of those miserable weepies. haha

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: BobKnight
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 06:38 PM

Sorry, I didn't realise I wasn't logged in. That was me with "Too Late," above.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 06:35 PM

Oh my bonny lass, what if ye came tae see me one last time,
And ye took my hand in yours again, as ye did in auld lang syne.
Ye once warmed my hands 'tween your wi' love, tae keep the cauld at bay,
But there's nae warmin' in the hale world, that will warm these hands one day.

Fist verse from a song I wrote called, "Too Late."

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 03:14 PM

A very good description of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Tom Paxton's song, My Son John": the term probably hadn't even been invented then, though there was "shell shock" after WW1.
"He went up to his room and he closed the door,
My son John, my son John"

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 09:01 AM

"Yes, and thanks for the trouble you took from her eyes,
I thought it was there for good, so I never tried"

Famous Blue Raincoat - Leonard Cohen.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 15 Jul 19 - 02:21 AM

Sorry, but once it's gone, it's gone.

We've all found out the hard way!

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: lefthanded guitar
Date: 14 Jul 19 - 03:53 PM

Sorry for repeat of Strathmore verse, is there any way to edit a post after it's posted ?

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: lefthanded guitar
Date: 14 Jul 19 - 03:51 PM

Several come to mind:

A Long Road Home - Mickey Newbury:
@They tell me old Bud Rose hocked his guitar
Bought a ticket to Nashville to become a big star
Now he works on a bottle and he lives in a car;
Do you still have your dreams? "


Valley of Strathmore -
"If time were a thing man could buy
All the money I have in store
I would give for one night by her side
In the valley of Strathmore"

Bury me Not on the Lone Prairie :
"We paid no heed to his dying prayer....in a narrow grave six by three
We buried him there on the lone prairie"


Hank Wilkiams:
"I' m so lonesome I could cry"

Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll - Bob Dylan:
"Now is the time for your tears. "










The Valley of Strathmore
If time were a thing man could buy
All the money I have in store
I would give for one day at her side
In the valley of Strathmore

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Joe_F
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 05:47 PM

And overside I heard him call my name.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 05:23 PM

I ain't saying you treated me unkind
You could have done better, but I don't mind.
You just kinda wasted my precious time.
But don't think twice, it's all right.

Are you going away with no word of farewell
Will there be not a trace left behind
I could have loved you better,didn't mean to be unkind
You know that was the last thing on my mind.

She'd pass for twenty-nine but for her eyes
But winter lines are telling wicked lies

All lies
All those lines are telling wicked lies
Lies all lies
Too many lines there in that face;
Too many to erase or disguise;
They must be telling lies

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 12:58 PM

"... he answered when he got the call
Wrapped himself in Death and praised Allah
Fat man in a Mercedes drove him to the door
Just another poor boy off to fight a rich man's war...."

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,fred sprott
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 08:49 AM

I've practiced this one all day- not sure if I've got it yet but I'll have a go.......

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Ged Fox
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 07:25 AM

"I broke her heart, pet, after the ball"

"I'm alone - alone - alone"

Trite words enough, but with the music...

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: gillymor
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 05:46 AM

I liked Dick's contribution.

This is probably the saddest song I know:


"Victor Jara"

Victor Jara of Chile
Lived like a shooting star
He fought for the people of Chile
With his songs and his guitar
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Victor Jara was a peasant
Who worked from a few years old
He sat upon his father's plow
And watched the earth unfold
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Now when the neighbors had a wedding
Or one of their children died
His mother sang all night for them
With Victor by her side
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

He grew up to be a fighter
Against the people's wrongs
He listened to their grief and joy
And turned them into songs
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

He sang about the copper miners
And those who worked the land
He sang about the factory workers
And they knew he was their man
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

He campaigned for Allende
Working night and day
He sang, "take hold of your brother's hand
The future begins today"
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Then the generals seized Chile
They arrested Victor then
They caged him in a stadium
With five thousand frightened men
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Victor stood in the stadium
His voice was brave and strong
And he sang for his fellow prisoners
'Til the guards cut short his song
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

They broke the bones in both his hands
They beat him on the head
They tore him with electric shocks
And then they shot him dead
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Victor Jara of Chile
Lived like a shooting star
And he fought for the people of Chile
With his songs and his guitar
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong
His hands were gentle, his hands were strong

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 12 Jul 19 - 05:14 AM

Let's overlook Dick's post and move on.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:34 PM

Mary Chapin

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: The Sandman
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:06 PM

I couldn't heat a pot of tea or keep me trousers dry,
And me dog shat in me tucker-box five miles from Gundagai.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 06:16 AM

If the Riley boys were here
they would tell us not to cry
Dry your eyes they’d say
There’s work to do tomorrow
If the Riley boys were here
we’d hold fast another year
and be thankful for what mercy
we could borrow

The Riley Boys by Carol Denney May 15, 2004

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,Knockroe
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:55 AM

"A change in the weather is known to be extreme
But what's the sense of changing horses in midstream?
I'm going out of my mind, oh
With a pain that stops and starts
Like a corkscrew to my heart
Ever since we've been apart"

Big Girl Now, Bob

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:52 AM

Hamish, I agree with your comment, that song contains many sad and cruel? little twists....I'm fascinated by the song, the live version from "Shel's houseboat" is especially fine.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:47 AM

But it wasn’t eyes of blue, nor that hair as pale as foam
It was the gansey that his mother made that brought young Davy home

Davy Cross by Paul Davenport

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 11 Jul 19 - 05:20 AM

We lost Davy in the Korean War
And we still don’t know what for
Don’t matter any more....

In fact, the whole of that song.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: mg
Date: 10 Jul 19 - 11:34 PM

donald was the bravest man and donald he was mine

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: Stewie
Date: 10 Jul 19 - 07:28 PM

Adoptee to unknown birth mother:

On the day when I was new
You held me once, no one held you
I think of you as a mourning dove
That only flew on wings of love

From Steven Sellors' "Mourning Dove" as sung by Gordon Bok.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: GUEST,Roger
Date: 10 Jul 19 - 04:51 PM

Dave the Gnome.
I've just picked myself up off the floor!!
Best laugh I've had in yonks!!
Roger

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: motmeister
Date: 10 Jul 19 - 04:38 PM

Mickey Newbury’s “She Even Woke Me Up To Say Goodbye”:

Babys packed her soft things
and shes left me
I just know she didn't mean to make me cry
Its not her heart, Lord its her mind
She didn't mean to be unkind
Why she even woke me up to say goodbye

Subject: RE: saddest lines in song
From: meself
Date: 10 Jul 19 - 03:13 PM

There's a bridle hanging on the wall;
There's a saddle in the empty stall
....................................