Born to Run is pretty sad to me.
― human life won't become a cat (man alive), Thursday, 7 April 2016 23:22 (eight years ago) link
I don't want to dieI sometimes wish I'd never been born at all
― reggie (qualmsley), Thursday, 7 April 2016 23:45 (eight years ago) link
classic rock was often super-maudlin, more convincingly despondent than "punk"
I'm going to rent myself a houseIn the shade of the freewayI'm going to pack my lunch in the morningAnd go to work each dayAnd when the evening rolls aroundI'll go on home and lay my body downAnd when the morning light comes streaming inI'll get up and do it againAmenSay it againAmen
I want to know what became of the changesWe waited for love to bringWere they only the fitful dreamsOf some greater awakeningI've been aware of the time going byThey say in the end it's the wink of an eyeAnd when the morning light comes streaming inYou'll get up and do it againAmen
Caught between the longing for loveAnd the struggle for the legal tenderWhere the sirens sing and the church bells ringAnd the junk man pounds his fenderWhere the veterans dream of the fightFast asleep at the traffic lightAnd the children solemnly waitFor the ice cream vendorOut into the cool of the eveningStrolls the PretenderHe knows that all his hopes and dreamsBegin and end there
Ah the laughter of the loversAs they run through the nightLeaving nothing for the othersBut to choose off and fightAnd tear at the world with all their mightWhile the ships bearing their dreamsSail out of sight
I'm going to find myself a girlWho can show me what laughter meansAnd we'll fill in the missing colorsIn each other's paint-by-number dreamsAnd then we'll put our dark glasses onAnd we'll make love until our strength is goneAnd when the morning light comes streaming inWe'll get up and do it againGet it up again
I'm going to be a happy idiotAnd struggle for the legal tenderWhere the ads take aim and lay their claimTo the heart and the soul of the spenderAnd believe in whatever may lieIn those things that money can buyThough true love could have been a contenderAre you there?Say a prayer for the PretenderWho started out so young and strongOnly to surrender
― reggie (qualmsley), Friday, 8 April 2016 00:44 (eight years ago) link
alan parsons' "time" (he must not have known pink floyd had a song by the same name...)
lolol
― mookieproof, Friday, 8 April 2016 00:48 (eight years ago) link
classic rock songwriters much more likely than punks to be in their 30s and wondering on some level wtf they're doing with their life. plus loss-of-innocence crap maybe. i just watched american graffiti and read ebert's review which stresses this whole "this is before kennedy got killed and everything changed" kinda thing. we could ridicule that all day but clearly if roger ebert felt feelings like that, maybe george lucas did too and also idk jackson browne.
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Friday, 8 April 2016 00:53 (eight years ago) link
they were also in danger of getting shot and killed. john lennon, say, and pete townshend came from roots way more working class than joe strummer or lou reed. their uppity-ness was more dangerous. pete wrote songs about getting molested as a child. that's pretty fucking bleak. likewise so is plastic ono band. "london calling" is a self-help anthem compared to "behind blue eyes"
― reggie (qualmsley), Friday, 8 April 2016 01:11 (eight years ago) link
Finished with my woman cuz she couldn't help me with my mindPeople think I'm insane because I am frowning all the time
― nicky lo-fi, Friday, 8 April 2016 18:02 (eight years ago) link
Can you help meThought you were my friend
― nicky lo-fi, Friday, 8 April 2016 18:03 (eight years ago) link
"All day long I think of things but nothing seems to satisfy" is sort of brilliant imo,
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:06 (eight years ago) link
Best line in that song, of course, is the bleakest one of all - "Make a joke and I will sigh and you will laugh and I will cry"
― the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:09 (eight years ago) link
Floyd may have been the most consistent purveyors of classic rock bleakness
We're just two lost souls Swimming in a fish bowlYear after year Running over the same old ground What have we found? The same old fears Wish you were here
― Brad C., Friday, 8 April 2016 18:10 (eight years ago) link
more petty:
I wanna glide down over MulhollandI wanna write her name in the skyI wanna free fall out into nothinGonna leave this world for awhile
― Keks + Nuss (contenderizer), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:16 (eight years ago) link
more resigned than bleak i suppose
― Keks + Nuss (contenderizer), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:18 (eight years ago) link
I don't feel you any moreYou darken my doorWhatever you're looking forDon't come around here no more
I think we've estabished that half of all classic rock songs have bleak lyrics.
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:19 (eight years ago) link
"Jack and Diane" is a weird one for me. When I first heard the song as a kid, I think I thought that Diane must have gotten horribly injured in a car crash or something. Afaict, though, they lost the thrill of living because they grew up and had normal adulthoods.
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:21 (eight years ago) link
Hm, that's probably unfair because I don't want to imply that someone can't have a thrilling life after injury and disability.
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:22 (eight years ago) link
Shoulda had a noms thread first.
― hardcore dilettante, Friday, 8 April 2016 18:32 (eight years ago) link
"Paradise By the Dashboard Light" is actually about sex with Meatloaf
― Keks + Nuss (contenderizer), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:36 (eight years ago) link
― Keks + Nuss (contenderizer), Friday, April 8, 2016 1:16 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
i saw something once speculating that "Freefallin'" was about heroin? like the "vampires" are addicts
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:37 (eight years ago) link
― Keks + Nuss (contenderizer), Friday, April 8, 2016 1:16 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Second verse:
I wanna stand with you on a mountainI wanna bathe with you in the seaI wanna lay like this foreverUntil the sky falls down on me
― My Whole Existence Is Flan (Old Lunch), Friday, 8 April 2016 18:38 (eight years ago) link
third verse:
I wanna run through the halls of my high schoolI wanna scream at the top of my lungsI just found out there's no such thing as the real worldJust a lie you've got to rise above
― ejemplo (crüt), Friday, 8 April 2016 19:28 (eight years ago) link
It will now forever be impossible for me to refrain from mentally admixing these lyrics and songs.
― My Whole Existence Is Flan (Old Lunch), Friday, 8 April 2016 19:32 (eight years ago) link
no such thing does give me a strangely bleak feeling
― human life won't become a cat (man alive), Friday, 8 April 2016 19:34 (eight years ago) link
like all that stuff Werner Herzog says about what he sees in the faces of bears is sort of what I imagine about the souls of John Mayer fans
― human life won't become a cat (man alive), Friday, 8 April 2016 19:35 (eight years ago) link
i gotta make a mash up where right after it's just a lie you *cut* RISE ABOVE WE'RE GONNA RISE ABOVE
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 8 April 2016 19:36 (eight years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH2w6Oxx0kQ
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 9 April 2016 00:29 (eight years ago) link
All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 9 April 2016 00:30 (eight years ago) link
i see old lunch called it earlier.
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 9 April 2016 00:31 (eight years ago) link
I know people love this song, but I try to avoid it because for various reasons it bums me out beyond belief
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTIB10eQnA0
― Crazy Eddie & Jesus the Kid (Raymond Cummings), Monday, 11 April 2016 23:36 (eight years ago) link
be someonebe someone
;_;
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 00:18 (eight years ago) link
Seriously, it's a plunge into hopefulness/hopelessness and you can sense that it's a cycle that will never stop repeating until the narrator dies (or worse, somehow doesn't die)
― Crazy Eddie & Jesus the Kid (Raymond Cummings), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 00:26 (eight years ago) link
This city desert makes you feel so coldIt's got so many people but it's got no soulAnd it's taken you so long to find out you were wrongWhen you thought it held everything
You used to think that it was so easyYou used to say that it was so easyBut you're tryin', you're tryin' nowAnother year and then you'd be happyJust one more year and then you'd be happyBut you're cryin', you're cryin' now
Way down the street there's a light in his placeHe opens the door, he's got that look on his faceAnd he asks you where you've been, you tell him who you've seenAnd you talk about anything
He's got this dream about buyin' some landHe's gonna give up the booze and the one night standsAnd then he'll settle down, it's a quiet little townAnd forget about everything
But you know he'll always keep movin'You know he's never gonna stop movin''Cause he's rollin', he's the rollin' stoneAnd when you wake up it's a new mornin'The sun is shinin', it's a new mornin'But you're going, you're going home
― reggie (qualmsley), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 00:40 (eight years ago) link
then we were drivin', drivin' in your car...
― Crazy Eddie & Jesus the Kid (Raymond Cummings), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 00:43 (eight years ago) link
Was wondering if Suzanne Vega might fit here. Don't really know what counts as classic rock just thinking about songs I heard on daytime radio
― Just noise and screaming and no musical value at all. (Colonel Poo), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:02 (eight years ago) link
who's gonna tell you whenit's too latewho's gonna tell you thingsaren't so greatyou can't go onthinking nothing's wrongwho's gonna drive you home tonight
who's gonna pick you upwhen you fall
xpostwho's gonna hang it upwhen you callwho's gonna pay attentionto your dreamswho's gonna plug their earswhen you scream
you can't go onthinking nothing's wrongwho's gonna drive you home tonight
who's gonna hold you downwhen you shakewho's gonna come aroundwhen you break
― reggie (qualmsley), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:03 (eight years ago) link
Just take those old records off the shelfI'll sit and listen to 'em by myself
― ejemplo (crüt), Thursday, April 7, 2016 6:46 AM (4 days ago)
I love this, also out of context it is my life
― no one in particular (Abbott), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:34 (eight years ago) link
Any Harry Chapin song fits this. What's more depressing than "Cat's In The Cradle"? And "Taxi", in addition to be pretty bleak, is maybe the most absurdly dramatic and pretentious thing ever recorded (hard to top a Sylvia Plath poem sung in falsetto)...tbh it always makes me laugh when I hear it and sometimes I watch this live version to cheer myself up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfqjKDRQvWI
― mosele (L P Mosey), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:37 (eight years ago) link
did you guys know if you are depressed and you hear a song at work or in the grocery store, it is a bleak song of dusty nothingness that speaks to the emptiness of mankind, even if ja rule made that song
― no one in particular (Abbott), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:38 (eight years ago) link
Harry Chapin doesn't actually get CR airplay anywhere, does he? (Nor Suzanne Vega.)
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:44 (eight years ago) link
I heard Taxi a few times on classic rock radio in St. Louis in '08 or '09, but I think that was because that station had No Repeat Weeks. Growing up in Nebraska, every station played "Cat's In The Cradle". That might be a regional thing though.
― mosele (L P Mosey), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 01:48 (eight years ago) link
Oh, cool.
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 02:04 (eight years ago) link
cats in the cradle is a brutal tearjerker. kid was neglected by his busy father, who is now a lonely, elderly man, neglected by his son. the song pretends to be about the cycle of life but it's just about a cycle of neglect.
― Treeship, Tuesday, 12 April 2016 03:27 (eight years ago) link
or maybe it's not pretending anything. the dad realizes the son grew up "just like him," too preoccupied with work to make time for his family.
the socialist in me wonders whose really to blame here: the dad for losing sight of priorities, or the insane working hours americans are expected to keep
― Treeship, Tuesday, 12 April 2016 03:30 (eight years ago) link
fast car is pretty much the saddest song i have ever heard. i didn't even know it until raymond posted it and i listened again. jesus christ.
― Gatemouth, Tuesday, 12 April 2016 03:33 (eight years ago) link
this is cracking me up.
― campreverb, Tuesday, 12 April 2016 03:51 (eight years ago) link
Burma Shave by Tom Waits has a similar theme to fast car but is way more depressing.
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 05:51 (eight years ago) link
disagree, there's a theatrical nature to waits thing that sort of keeps you at arm's length
be someonebe someone;_;
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 13:25 (eight years ago) link
Angel of darkness is upon youStuck a needle in your armSo take another toke, have a blow for your noseOne more drink fool, will drown youOoooh that smellCan't you smell that smellOoooh that smellThe smell of death surrounds you
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 12 April 2016 13:28 (eight years ago) link
which reminds me of:
I hit the city and I lost my bandI watched the needle take another manGone, gone, the damage done
― schlep and back trio (anagram), Tuesday, 12 April 2016 13:40 (eight years ago) link