My mom had a 45 of this song! She used to play it a lot when I was a kid (she liked a lot of those old novelty songs.)
A Complicated Song by Weird Al. The last verse of the song is about how he’s been decapitated.
If you allow this, than you have to allow Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit in the Sky”:
When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that’s the best
When I lay me down to die
Goin’ up to the Spirit in the sky
But now the floodgates are open to songs about being prepared for heaven in general.
Just these two songs have Silverstein and Greenbaum all over them.
They ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore.
Veteran of the Psychic Wars by Blue Oyster Cult.
Well, there’s an old song called Ethan Lang.
It’s basically Green Green Grass of Home, but the guy’s getting hung, and he’s much more pissed off.
The last verse:
So I bid my last farewell, last farewell.
So I bid my last farewell, last farewell.
So I bid my last farewell,
And this story you can tell,
How I cursed you as I fell,
Dang your eyes!
Sounds like a version of the same song.
Or La Traviata. I don’t know it well enough to list specific arias, but the OP brought to mind an interview where Montserrat Caballé explained that any time she’s done Mimí counts as a perfect demonstration of the fact that operatic singers are not cast by their looks, “I’ll be there, supposed to be dying of consumption (do I look like I’m dying of consumption?), belting it out and thinking ‘yeah, I’m sure tuberculosis patients sing like this day in and day out’”.
You know what, I think I’ll start an operatic offshoot…
On the not classical end of things, “Green Hills of Tyrol”, but don’t ask me whose it is.
Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport is sung by an old Australian stockman, lying, dying, and he gets himself up on one elbow and he turns to his mates who are gathered around him, and he says… well, almost all of the rest of the song.
Until it is explained that we tanned his hide when he died, Clyde, and that’s it hanging on the shed. But still, that’s nearly the whole song.
The Show Must Go On by Queen was written and recorded with Freddie Mercury nearly too ill to sing. Both the real singer and the singer in the song are dying, although he didn’t die until a year after recording.
I came in here to say that. But I least checked to see if it was done (figuring it would have. Didn’t think it woule be this far down)
Brian
(and so is my wife)
Also Fantine’s I Dreamed a Dream. As Forbidden Broadway put it:
I dreamed a show in days gone by
Where all the scenery looked so pretty
I didn’t sing one song then die
And all my costumes weren’t so gritty
An obscure one, but a personal favourite:
Narrated from the perspective of someone who, amazingly enough, drowned.
Tonight is the Night I Fell Asleep at the Wheel by Barenaked Ladies. A first person, present tense description of the car accident that kills the singer.
Thanks, that’s a great song (I must admit I like laments, and it’s basically one).
Not saying anything about the other songs mentioned in the thread, I listened only to this one because I only recently discovered Nick Cave (yes, I’m a bit late to the party)
This one is…really unsettling.
I’m bookmarking this thread. Too many songs to listen to.