OK, gigi, obscure Meatloaf is one thing, but Stan Rogers?! 
I was going to post “Down the Road” but you beat me to it. “Pharisee”, from that same CD is a theme song of mine. Just one thing. Please tell me a guy didn’t once propose to you after playing “45 Years From Now”. If that did happen, I’m going to be interested in checking to see if we have some people in common!
The Beatles’ “Free as a Bird” always gets me – it sounded like Lennon was pining for the old days, but his death ruled a reunion out.
When Delta blues great Charley Patton recorded the haunting spiritual “Oh Death” in January of 1934, he was basically on his death bed. It was released just before Patton died that April, but it’s still chilling to hear him sing, “Lord I know, Lord I know, my time ain’t long”.
Doug Hopkins of the Gin Blossoms died after their debut album was released, but I didn’t hear the music or know the story until after he had shot himself. He had quit the Gin Blossoms during the recording due to alcoholism and depression. The lyrics of some of the songs are pretty sad in light of what happened, particularly Lost Horizons, Pieces of the Night, and Hold Me Down. Lyrics can be read here.
You Got It by Roy Orbison. I also tear up when I hear Never Without You by Ringo Starr. Even though Ringo is still with us, the song is a tribute to the late George Harrison featuring Eric Clapton on guitar.
Sadly no, but you are one lucky girl! No one I’ve met outside my family shares my interesting taste in music.
My father hadn’t heard of Stan until they played a retrospective after his death and we were hooked. My mom had a class at Brown where she had to talk about something that reflected her identity and she played “Lies”.* I think that may be my favorite/song I most respect ever. It’s just so brilliant. And again, I played it for a friend who I really respect and she didn’t get it! :eek:
*She also plays her cassette of Bat Out of Hell whenever she starts quilting a new quilt.
Bye that same token, everything on Harrison’s Brainwashed is in that same category as Zevon’s The Rest of the Night - Harrison was dying of cancer when he wrote it, and a lot of the spirtual work is made all the more powerful by it.
And it ends on an extremely appropos note.
Both great songs, but to really fit the OP - you have to think about Jeff Buckley’s version of Satisfied Mind. Chills.
The Carpenters “A Song For You”. Especially when Karen sings the line:
And when my life is over
Remember when we were together
Just…damn.
Just about anything (I mean, just about anything she recorded- that’s not the name of a song) by Eva Cassidy is deeply haunting, I find.
Elliott Smith’s album From a Basement on the Hill was released postumously. The song “A Fond Farewell” makes me want to weep and gives me chills.
The Litebrite’s now black and white
Cause they took apart a picture that wasn’t right
Pitch burning on a shining sheet
The only maker that you’d want to meet
A dying man in a living room
Whose shadow paces the floor
He’ll take you out any open door…
From 1971, “Nature’s Way” by Spirit from “12 Dreams of Doctor Sardonicus” written and sung by Randy California.
It’s nature’s way of telling you something’s wrong.
It’s nature’s way of telling you in a song.
It’s nature’s way of recieving you.
It’s nature’s way of retrieving you.
Although this was Randy California’s environment statement, the lyrics take on a creepier meaning when you learn that his death was caused by drowning off the coast of Molokai, Hawaii in January, 1997. His body was never found.
:smack:
Sorry for the previous posting.
This was supposed to be for songs released posthumously , right?
:smack:
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG !!! :mad:
There was the posthumous release of Elvis singing “My Way”.
I third Keep Me In Your Heart. I cried real, stupid tears the first time I heard it. Luther Vandross’ Dance With My Father was touching too, but it didn’t make me cry.
Actually, Buckley’s “Satisfied Mind” off his post-mortem album “Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk” probably qualifies better than anything off Grace, since it was recorded closer to his death, and is just as pretty (and, I guess, has more to do with death than Hallelujah or So Real, though I do remember one or two songs of his having creepy drowning/dying references that seemed a little too predictive)
Oops. Didn’t read the whole thread. Sorry Who!
soul radiation, and everyone else: Please read Forum Rules: PLEASE READ and especially note post #2.
You may NOT quote an entire song on these boards. The proper approach is to quote a line or two, and then provide a link to a website that has the rights to the entire song and has published all verses.
We tend to be extremely sensitive to copyright issues here. Even if legally OK, we tend to moderate on the very conservative side: we don’t want people copying our material without permission, and therefore we don’t want our boards to be copying other folks material. Do unto others, y’know.
Soul radiation, you’re new here and more than welcome. It’s an interesting topic, but please review our rules and adhere to our respect for copyright rules.
I’ll second Otis Redding’s Dock of the Bay. Also, Chet Baker’s performance of Almost Blue from the film Let’s Get Lost (not the soundtrack version, the film performance). Heartbreaking.
A number of people have mentioned songs from Warren Zevon’s last record The Wind. I didn’t find it any more stirring than the couple prior to it. It’s nothing like as bleak as earlier works like Transverse City. Sure, it’s affecting - but it’s a Zevon album. It didn’t shake me like his Letterman performance of Genius did.
Even worse, I think the saddest song I’ve ever heard is supposedly the last song he ever recorded. If you’ve seen Harold and Maude, it is 10 times sadder. It’s a cover of Cat Steven’s “Trouble”…
“Trouble
Oh trouble please be kind
I don’t want no fight
And I haven’t got a lot of time”
“I’ve seen your eyes
and I can see death’s disguise
Hangin’ on me
Hangin’ on me”
“Trouble
Oh trouble can’t you see
You’re eating my heart away
And there’s nothing much left of me”
Verses are like that throughout the song. And since it has never been released, I’m almost positive it is in the public domain, but I’ll save the mods the trouble of finding out and won’t post it here until I see something definite.
Still, one of the few songs I actually can call haunting. His voice is on edge throughout, and it sounds so pained and troubled.
I’m going to have to ask where you heard that at. Time in a Bottle came out in 1972 and he had two albums out after that and before he died in 1973.