I’ve always distrusted overtly happy songs—like they must be hiding something—although that probably says more about me than the song. Still, there’s definitely something odd and heartbreaking about the theme tune from Growing Pains: “Don’t waste another minute on your crying.” “We’re nowhere near the end.” “As long as we’ve got each other, we got the world spinning right in our hands.” That dude is in some serious denial. PI
Bonus Sitcom Sad: “Angela” (Theme From Taxi); Theme from Cheers
29. Gravediggaz, “Burn Baby Burn” (2002)
For those who think hip-hop is too macho to be sad, we say: Really? Have you heard any Tupac? And here’s “Burn Baby Burn” from the Gravediggaz, featuring the late Too Poetic (aka The Grym Reaper), talking about what it’s like to be dying of colon cancer: “Four years out of seven I remember tourin’ / And this year I’m measurin’ my urine.” He died in 2001, aged 36. PI
Bonus Hip-Hop Sad: “Doo Rags,” by Nas; “Dead Homiez” by Ice Cube.
30. The Smiths, There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (1986)
“And if a double-decker bus
Crashes into us
To die by your side, is such a heavenly way to die”
If a fine line exists between Sad and Miserable, no band has walked it so delicately as did The Smiths. Though together only five years, the band assembled a catalogue that makes the definitive accessory for a certain kind of morose teenage alien; rich in desperate romanticism, confused sexuality, literary references and the sense of a better time having passed into memory, their music all but slams the bedroom door behind you after a “Nobody understands me!” tantrum.
Ultimately, the difference between sad and miserable is that the former offers some catharsis—it lyrically or musically hints at some daylight at the end of the tunnel. The Smiths often veered to the bleak side, but on the climactic track of their 1986 LP The Queen is Dead they were perfectly astride the line. A gorgeous anthem couched in Morrissey’s trademark lyrical ambiguity, “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” offers a narrator awkward in his own skin who thinks himself unwelcome at home. Driving at night with a companion—either a friend or a lover, or the subject of some confusion between the two roles—the narrator yearns for release via a fiery joint death. Few singers could elevate this stuff above the level of cheap melodrama; it’s to Morrissey’s credit that he manages it, with assists from Johnny Marr’s soaring melody and a smartly arranged string section. The beauty of the music and the prospect of escape hinted at in Morrissey’s final words elevate “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” above the miserable—and make it forever resonant with the 16-year-old inside each of us. JT
BONUS SADNESS:
31. Brahms, Horn Trio Op.40., Second Movement
With thanks for the recommendation to Miss Mussel at The Omniscient Mussel.
32. Michael Nyman and Hilary Summers, “If” (2000)
Recommended by Walrus reader Cheryl D.
Comments (16 comments)
rachelle: fernando — abba
daniel — elton john
those are my picks ... oh and some stuff by fairuz April 17, 2008 11:22 EST
clint: Into My Arms - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds April 17, 2008 11:58 EST
meg: Janis Ian - At Seventeen, especially if you're 17, which sadly seems in some respects better than 47. April 17, 2008 12:02 EST
Jeremy Keehn: Ooh, I'd go for Cheers all the way on the TV theme song front. The only place everyone knows your name is a bar? Now that's sad. And as a bonus, the show was great, though I confess to a certain fondness for Julie McCullough-era Growing Pains, too. April 17, 2008 12:34 EST
PT: 1. I Can't Forget You - Cracker
2. Funny How Time Slips Away - Al Green
3. Catch - The Cure
4. Tom Traubert's Blues - Tom Waits
5. Not Dark Yet - Bob Dylan
6. Hung My Head - Johnny Cash
7. Emozioni - Lucio Battisti (Italian)
8. Hotel Supramonte - Fabrizio de Andre (Italian)
9. Zero Chance - Soundgarden
10. The Day John Kennedy Died - Lou Reed
11. I'll Believe in Anything - Wolf Parade
12. Autumn's Here - Hawksley Workman
13. Fake Plastic Trees - Radiohead
14. Mother - John Lennon
15. Bad - U2
16. Fiddlers Green - The Tragically Hip
17. Oh! Sweet Nuthin' - The Velvet Underground
Listen to this in your iTunes, and I bet you will want to be my friend April 17, 2008 12:50 EST
Alicia: The Replacements - Here Comes a Regular. Very little question on that. April 18, 2008 13:41 EST
Paul @ The Walrus: Here Comes A Regular was in the running — it's actually the first sad song I thought of — but we cut it at the last minute in the name of the list not being 3,000 songs long. (Other cuts: Big Star's "Holocaust," "Famous Blue Raincoat," Ice Cube's "Dead Homiez."
I saw Paul Westerberg perform Here Comes A Regular at the Warsaw in Brooklyn back in 2002 — everyone invaded the stage and sat down to listen. A pretty magical experience. April 18, 2008 13:55 EST
Maurizio2: Well, I've seen some of my favourite tracks in articles parts 2 to 6 (I can't read part 1, don't know why....) but real sadness? Maybe "Tears in Heaven" could be defined sad...
Try "Sad song" or "The bed" (better: the whole "Berlin" album!) by Lou Reed, "If you see her say hello" & "Knockin' on heaven's door" by Bob Dylan, "Things the grandchildren should know" by eels, or ALMOST ALL the songs in Bonnie "Prince" Billy's records.....and what about Nick Drake or Joe Henry? April 18, 2008 22:01 EST
Hulka: Richard & Linda Thompson, "The End of the Rainbow."
"Life seems so rosy in the cradle
But I'll be your friend, I'll tell you what's in store:
There's nothing at the end of the rainbow
There's nothing to grow up for anymore." April 19, 2008 10:39 EST
m.oa.d: "Afraid Not Scared" — Ryan Adams
Look, I know he can be kind of a jerk, but it's hard to argue with the depressive power of the atmospheric upward spiral of the song and lyrics like these:
"In the yellow lights of the city wasted as bodies
In bed with somebody a touch away with nothing to do
We're surrounded" April 19, 2008 12:18 EST
K.M. Harun: The M*A*S*H theme song, "Suicide is Painless"
The instrumental seems kind of cheery on the show. However, I didn't know the title or lyrics until I watched the movie, yikes! April 20, 2008 14:02 EST
jess: If you're looking for a sad instrumental, it HAS to be Barber's "Adagio For Strings." April 22, 2008 14:38 EST
Walker: i agree with The Replacements- Here Comes a Regular.
a couple other picks from rap:
Outkast- Da Art of Storytellin, Part 1
Andre3000's stories on that track is haunting, especially combined with those mournful, muted horn samples. "I kept on singin my song and hopin at a show/That i would one day see her standin in the front row/But two weeks later she got found in the back of a school/With a needle in her arm, baby two months due"
Outkast- Toilet Tisha
A better song about a suicide than Notorious B.I.G.'s track, in my opinion, especially with the spoken word interlude of the mother finding her dead daughter.
UGK- One Day
The bluesy, country-rap instrumental backing Pimp C and Bun B's lyrics of hard-living in Texas gave me goosebumps when are first heard it, and is even more tragic now that Pimp C's died, as well. "My man RoRo just lost his baby in a house fire/And then when I got on my knees that night to pray/I asked God why he let these killas live and take my homeboy's son away/Man if you got kids show em you love em cause God just might call em home" April 22, 2008 21:37 EST
Darcy McGee: Wilco - I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Sinead O'Conner - Nothing Compares 2 U
U2 - Bad (I second this nomination from above.)
Peter Gabriel - Biko April 26, 2008 07:49 EST
G Lepine: Peter Gabriel: Book of Love
Glen Hansard (ONCE Soundtrack): Falling Slowly
May 17, 2008 19:25 EST
kilgore trout: Soaky In The Pooper - Lambchop
This has to be the saddest song ever written - anyone agree?
'As his face turns bluish
And his eyes roll back into his head
The funeral was jewish
All the mourners traveled in one car
They remembered he had said
You're never lonely when you're dead
And as the final rights were read
The angels start to sing' May 23, 2008 05:48 EST