Search for the saddest song ever.

Subject: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Nevada
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 03:05 AM

Hi everyone.
Tomorrow night our local club is having a "Doom and Gloom" session in order to find the gloomyest song ever. Unfortunatly, i dont know any. Please help!
Luv AAA x

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: alanabit
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 07:59 AM

We have done this one before, so a search of threads will give you plenty of ideas. My personal suggestion would be Randy Newman's, "I think it's going to rain today."

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,Rich_and_Dee
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 08:37 AM

It's not an old song, but June Tabor's "Hard Love" is positively despairing.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Snuffy
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 08:42 AM

Nobody Loves a Fairy When She's Forty

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Peter T.
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 08:45 AM

"He Stopped Loving Her Today", George Jones, is the funniest saddest song ever written, it is so sad it cracks you up. yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,alinact
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 08:48 AM

Same thing for Tell Laura I Love Her - so pathetic it is laughable.

The most seriously sad song I think I've ever heard is Steve Goodman's "My Old Man".

Allan

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: AggieD
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 09:21 AM

For a trad song 'Twa Corbies' is pretty gloomy & gory.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Feadan
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 09:33 AM

One of my favorite depressing songs is Ewan McColl's "The Terror Time".

Cheers,
David

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 10:01 AM

Previous Thread in which every sad song ever written is discussed

Murray

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Amos
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 10:13 AM

I am looking for the most opinionated opinion ever uttered as part of an experiment for science. The purpose of this experiment is to prove that opinions are empirically valid assessments and that things really ARE as good or as bad as we think they are if only we could find the right opinion to hold.

Can anyone help me?

A

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: sharyn
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 10:37 AM

Try "The Granemore Hare" recorded by Dick Gaughan -- not doom and gloom, though -- just sad

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,Fred Miller
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 10:39 AM

Amos, check out Nabokov on Freud, or translation of literature, or on Mann, or Gorky, or Doestoyevsky, or bathtubs that are too small, or whatever. Try Strong Opinions, a book of this stuff.

   For gloomy I second Twa Corbies, but for sad I've always thought The Juniper Tree was peculiarly sad because of the mask of it's bright tone.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,Brian F. Hannon
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 10:48 AM

The Fields of Athenrye is pretty Emotive . Dont you Think ??? As for An Opiniated Remark hows about Head for The Hills Folks . We are up till our Eyes with Absentee English LandLords .

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Willie-O
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 11:00 AM

Stan Rogers' "First Christmas Away From Home".

One of his very worst efforts, although I don't mean to imply there were a lot of them. It's just that he didn't do anything by half-measures.

"But its warm and clean and free, and there are worse places to be,
And at least it means no beating from her Dad,
First Christmas away from home."

Argggghhhh.

Also Danny Boy, as sung by Eva Cassidy in the posthumously released "Imagine"--of course it includes the line "And I am dead, as dead I well may be". Sung with true feeling. (FTR, I am listening to this right now. I like it.)

Willie-O
don't REALLy get me started.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Stephen L. Rich
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 06:24 PM

It may be a toss-up between the previously mentioned george Jones song and Tom Dundee's "These Cowboys" (also known as "Cowboys Born Out Of Thier Time").

Stephen Lee

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: tar_heel
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 07:10 PM

when i was a kid i use to hear a song called..."don't make me go to bed and i'll be good!"omg,it use to ake me cry then....but there another one called..."please mommy please,stay home with me!"...very depressing songs...

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Snuffy
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 07:18 PM

Tell me a story, tell me a story
Tell me a story before I go to bed
You promised me, you said you would
You'd better give in, then I'll be good
Tell me a story before I go to bed

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 07:49 PM

"Old Shep" has been known to reduce a strong man to tears.

Not this strong man, I have to say, but another strong man ...

Murray

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Hrothgar
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 11:00 PM

Now, if someone wrote a lament for the Marquis de Sade, would that qualify?

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Miken
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 11:04 PM

"Little Joe" comes to mind.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Nov 02 - 11:15 PM

Don't know the name of the song but Robin Fulks wrote a song that goes as follows;

God help us all
In troubled dreams some peace to find
The night is long
And those now gone they haunt m,y mind

The lone voice calls
The shadowed face toward me turns
Her arms unfold
And upon her breasts my name is burned

Chorus:

Call out the flame or go
Love left a child to roam
But my love has long turned cold
And night child is a stranger

Go, child, go
From mental rage your dreams have flown
Your home has fallen still
And thru it all the winds have blown

Reserve with you in
There's no sweet taste of days gone by
A long lost man
Who sees no light nor hears you cry

Chorus


You won't find a song sadder than this song. Fir real. I do this song now and then and always just weird myself out by doing it...

Bobert

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Cubs
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 12:48 AM

"Slow Movin' Outlaw" Willie Nelson(?)
"God On Our Side" Bob Dylan
"Jodi and The Kid" Kris Kristofferson
"Snowbound Friend" Hoyt Axton
"Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground" Willie Nelson
"And So It Goes" Billy Joel
"Some Folks Lives Roll Easy" Paul Simon

and almost every thing by Harry Chapin.

Have fun!

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Schantieman
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 09:55 AM

The Last of the Widows of the Duck Bill Seam by Jez Lowe.

Steve

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Socorro
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 12:02 PM

I had a quick look thru some of the older threads, too, & so far i haven't seen the one by Eric Clapton about his child who died ("no tears in heaven", i think).
That one always gets me.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 02:47 PM

How about "The Old Pubs" and "No More Beer From Kendal"?

Linn

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Big Tim
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 03:18 PM

Nobody's Child?

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Genie
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 03:35 PM

Well, I think "Georgie On the IRT" is a real tear-jerker.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Deda
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 05:21 PM

How folk-y does it have to be? There's a 19th century popular song called "The vacant chair" ("We shall meet, but we shall miss him," about a friend who has died) which strains the border between very sad and very sappy.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,Arne Langsetmo
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 05:43 PM

Well, if you count fiddle tunes, how's about
"Farewell To Whiskey"?

But I'd still put in a vote for "There Were Roses"
by Tommy Sands. . . . The saddest part is that it
based on true life events (AFAIK).

Cheers,

               -- Arne Langsetmo

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From:
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 05:56 PM

The saddest song ever is the traditional "Anachie Gordon".

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: CET
Date: 10 Nov 02 - 05:37 PM

I'd vote for Pancho and Lefty - a genuinely sad song without being mawkish.

Twa Corbies is a great song. I'm not sure sad is the word I would use to describe. Grim, certainly.

Edmund

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Deda
Date: 10 Nov 02 - 08:34 PM

I just heard a candidate on Hober -- called An Old Man's Lullaby, by James Durst.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: mmb
Date: 10 Nov 02 - 08:49 PM

In the "Shameless Self-Promotion" department, may I nominate one of my own??   Noel (Paul) Stookey recommended that I reserve it for child advocacy/activist groups because it is - in his words - a too in-your-face hard-hitting song about child abuse for the general audience.

Around 20 years ago, a young girl in New York City died of prolonged physical abuse by her adoptive father. It had been ignored by all of the adults (especially her teacher) who coulda/shoulda/woulda done something "if only they'd known" . . . I was a teacher in Upstate NY at the time, as well as the mother of a small child, and I was haunted by the story for years. I finally processed my response in a poem that became the following song. The child was Lisa Steinberg, and her death led to New York State's Mandated Reporter Law for all teachers.

PLEASE, SOMEONE SEE, SOMEONE CARE. C. 1991 Mary Bryan   

I picked up the paper this morning,
And my heart ached as I started to read.
A poor child lay dying, too weak for crying,
Her spirit about to be freed.
    But as I read on I was captive
    To the story of bruises and scars.
    Sheer disbelief turned to anger and grief
    For the child who'd been treated so hard.
And the worst part was nobody'd noticed.
Not one person heeded the signs, as
Day after day, they went on their way
And she suffered, time after time.

Refrain 1:
    And her young voice cried,
    "I'm so alone - - Is anybody out there?
      Don't just pass by while I suffer and cry - -
      Won't someone see, someone care?
      Please, someone see, someone care!"

I turned on the TV this evening.
The poor child will suffer no more.
But what about those who are still in the throes
Of abuse that we choose to ignore?
    Would you please give me just one good reason,
    Can you come up with one good excuse
    To stay uninvolved 'til this problem is solved
    And an end put to childhood abuse?

Refrain 2:
    While their young voices cry
    "We're so alone - - Is anybody out there?
      Don't just pass by while we suffer and die - -
      Won't someone see, someone care?
      Please, someone see, someone care."

For several years that was the complete song. But after Noel's critique, and feedback from some others, I've written a third verse and Refrain that I do with the aforementioned children's advocacy and/or religious groups.

Instrumental break, followed by:

We are called to be light in the darkness.
We are called to proclaim the Good News.
Eyes and ears open, we're called to be hope
In a world we can change if we choose.
    Can we take off our blinders and earphones?
    Can we risk tuning in to their pain?
    Or, will our mindless pursuits and our blindness,
    Betray them again and again?
   
Refrain 3:
    When their young voices cry "We're so alone - -
    "Is anybody out there?"
      Let's not just pass by while they suffer and die.
      Let's let them see that we care.
      Please, let them know that we care.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: Uncle Bud
Date: 10 Nov 02 - 11:28 PM

Maybe someone already picked it, but i vote for "Little Bessie", as done by Norman Blake, and Peter Ostroushke. Bud

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From:
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 12:13 AM

Did anybody mention "Gloomy Sunday"? Not my nominee, but there are stories that the suicide rate spiked when it was played. Mine: "My Darlin Nellie Gray," at least since I heard someone sing it over the weekend.

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,HesterNic
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 12:26 AM

The Cat Carol, sung by Meryn Cadell. A cat shelters a mouse in a snowdrift on Xmas eve and freezes to death. Santa has to tell the mouse his friend is dead. I cannot listen to the song, because I completely embarrass myself by crying every time I hear it.

Cheers, Hester

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: GUEST,Cat Carol
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 12:31 AM

Here are the lyrics and some nice illustrations:

http://tragiclad.tripod.ca/catcarol/index2.html

Cheers, Hester

Subject: RE: Search for the saddest song ever.
From: fogie
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 05:48 AM

Sand and Water by Beth Neilson Chapman. (I think) I cant sing it, although its extremely beautiful, it's toe-curling.