I heard that song ONCE, when I saw the movie…I’m not ever going to hear it again if I can help it. 
That goddamned song, fuggin emotional bushwhack every time! “Oh, this sounds like a nice upbeat…wait…NOOOOOO!” As it rips open the unhealing wounds an ex made with her Morgul blade a decade ago after it stopped being good. In my case, the ex and I used to love the older (through about Seventh Sojourn) Moody Blues stuff, so the irony really stings.
Older now, so hot love matters less than it did in those days. So yesterday it was The Nuns It’s a Dream. I’d heard it dozens of times but yesterday, as I was unconsciously fitting images of my recently passed father-in-law into the song, it finally clicked with me what it was about. Regrettably, I was at work at the time and I suddenly had to go for a walk.
Yeah, I hated having explained that song to my kids when they asked “Does that mean Clementine is dead?”. Hmm, lie to them or peel off another layer of their childhood innocence?
John Doe No. 24 makes me sad.
I couldn’t listen to “Winter” by Tori Amos or “Hurt” by Christina Aguilera (this is different from the NIN/Johnny Cash song, btw) without tearing up even before my dad died; nowadays all I have to hear is the beginning of either one and I go all puddly.
“Your Wildest Dreams” gets me too, but in a different way. It reminds me of a summer in the mid-80s when I was really unhappy. Other songs from that era do too, including “No One Is To Blame” by Howard Jones, and “Glory of Love” by Peter Cetera. I spent a lot of time alone with a radio during that summer, and those were on heavy rotation.
Huh. I just looked it up, and I guess we never got that far in the lyrics. Had no idea it was about a drowned girl.
Roy Orbison’s “In the Real World.” A former girlfriend and I had to call off our relationship, when we realized that our life situations weren’t going to allow us to stay together. Many years have now passed, but whenever I hear that song, it still hits me right in the feels.
Concrete Blonde - Little Conversations. I thought I’d long since forgotten being an 8-year old kid whose parents are divorcing. This song always regresses me back to the little kid hiding in his room while the parents scream at each other down the hallway.
Janis Joplin’s Me and Bobby McGee. I think about my horse of a lifetime named Bob and our 26 years together. I cry every time. I cannot even be in the room if How Great Thou Art is played. That was my dad’s funeral song.
I’m glad I’m not the only one…
This one starts out simply, but before you realize it you’re having your heart stabbed. “Goodbye” by Steve Earle, this version accompanied by Emmylou Harris:
The crescendo line in Nevermore’s “The Blue Marble and the New Soul” never fails to get me, especially since Warrel died in December, but the song is Warrel’s message to a new born about the quality of life.
"Stare into the sky with newborn perfect eyes, oh little one enjoy your time
There will be heartache there will be rain, and joy I can’t explain
My precious little one explore your time
Your mother will hold you in her arms… and smile
Your father will teach you his dignity and shun"
Holding Back The Years, Simply Red
<sobs uncontrollably>
Donovan “Catch the Wind” It sounds so wistful and then I get verklempt at how beautiful a song can be. It doesn’t have specific memories, just the tone of it does it.
It was Toy Story 2, but yeah, it’s a killer.
Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” is a painfully sad song.
I had a brother at Khe Sahn
Fighting off the Viet Cong
They’re still there, he’s all gone
(Empty bar)
He had a woman he loved, in Saigon
I’ve got a picture of him in her arms
The character’s sadness is evident; the genius of the lyrics is the beat between the third and fourth lines. It is as if the man is remembering, memories coming to him in whatever order they choose, as he recalls someone he loved but now he has no one.
The Sundays “Here’s Where The Story Ends”. Really, any song from that album. I listened to it a lot back in the day, and hearing it now takes me instantly back to a really great time in my life that I know is never coming back, and it makes me melancholy to hear it.
Courtney Barnett has a song called “Depreston” about going to look at a home for sale, which turns out is the home of a woman who died. It doesn’t speak to any particular situation I’ve been in, but I did hear it when my friend died, and it’s a sad song (Depressing + “a house in Preston”) so it hits me in the feels.
I feel like a complete schmo posting this but Holes in The Floor of Heaven by Steve Wariner gets me every time. Full on crying thinking about my daughter walking down the aisle without her mom.
My wife is quite healthy, so it makes no sense…