Sad Songs

[BlueTip]

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Ryan Adams wrote a couple of songs that hit me right in the feels...

 

The songs were written about then-girlfriend Carrie Hamilton (Carol Burnett's daughter), who was diagnosed with terminal and metastatic lung cancer after they had begun dating. The songs came out nine months after Hamilton's death in 2002. "Tomorrow", a song which features a beautifully simple harmony actually sung by Carrie, was a song written about a lost love. "Oh, oh, oh-oh, my baby's gone...". "Jesus Don't Touch My Baby" is the track that gets me more, though. They lyric "Jesus, don't touch my baby...she's all I've got" will wound you, and the last 70 seconds of the song work as a fantastic device, composed to sound like the swell of love, loss, joy, sorrow, and dissonance that he felt surrounding his girlfriend's losing battle with cancer.

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Jason Isbell's "Elephant" is another good and sad one about coping with a loved one with cancer. Language warning around 0:47 seconds.

 

Edited August 26, 2014 by Colonels_Wear_Blue

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

If I'm talking about Jason Isbell, I can't leave out "Dress Blues". Isbell wrote it about a high school classmate of his who went into the Marines and died fighting in Iraq. Two things I particularly love about this song: 1) The imagery he gives with the line "flags on the side of the highway, and and scripture on grocery store signs" - I feel like I know exactly what place he's talking about. I feel like I've been there. 2) The lyric "mommas and grandmommas love you, cause that's all they know how to do". That's just the damn truth.

 

Edited August 26, 2014 by Colonels_Wear_Blue

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Steve Goodman's "My Old Man" is good for getting water in my eyes sometimes...particularly John Prine's cover of it.

 

“And now the old man's gone, and I'd give all I own to hear what he said when I wasn't listening to my...old...man.”

 

[video=youtube;NzX_kLl6-uE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzX_kLl6-uE

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Here's one that's realllly good and dark... Damien Jurado's song "Medication" is about a troubled man, Jack, who is stuck dealing with his adult brother who is severely mentally and emotionally troubled. You want sad, how about the line, "The TV is blaring with some preacher saying that God is among us, and He hears our cries. Lord, do me a favor, it's wrong, but I ask you: take my brother's life."?

 

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Steve Earle – Lonelier Than This

 

"It doesn't get any lonelier than this. I believe my heart will break. Tonight I prayed I'd die before I wake.”

 

[coldweatherfan]

I'm so Lonesome I Could Cry

 

[coldweatherfan]

Is That All There Is - Peggy Lee

 

[coldweatherfan]

How Can You Mend a Broken Heart - Al Green

 

[Hellbird]

Tears from Heaven - Eric Clapton

 

He stopped Loving Her Today - George Jones