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Sad vs Depressing

J

johnbasalla

It occurs to me that, in most cases, the biggest hit songs that have a sad/meloncholy mood are those that have sad moods, but avoid being patently depressing. "How Can You Mend A Broken Heart" by The Bee Gees has a certifiably sad mood, but the winning melody helps keep it from being too depressing. Contrast that with the Bee Gees followup single, "Don't Want To Live Inside Myself" which, it seems, was meant to try to strike lightening twice with a similar song. One lyric line goes... "I went walking through a graveyard, where the darkness is my friend". OOPS! They went too far. They made the transition from merely sad to downright depressing. The record didn't even make the Top 40.

Another example: (A tribute to Major Harris who recently passed away). The later-era Delfonics, of which Mr. Harris was a member, recorded the single "Tell Me This Is A Dream". This is a sad mood love song in which the production values and the crying sound of the lead singer turn it into a depressing affair. It was a fairly big R&B hit however.

On the other side of the ledger is "Is That All There Is" by Peggy Lee. Now, there's a depressing song that made it big. Maybe it was the novelty nature that did it. That, and the bravura performance by Ms. Lee. Your thoughts?
 
In Catholic Grade School, music was taught for 8 years. The differnce, taught to us, to create moods, was 1. lyric for sadness, but 2. the KEY of the tune for wretched meloncholy!

"How Can You Mend" is a sad message, but in a 'natural' or neutral key. "Yesterday", "Sounds Of Silence" (Hello Darkennes my old friend, I've come to talk with you again.) are written/played in a MINOR key. Minor keys make the tune have a unnatural dread (Think of the opening notes of "Theme from The Young And The Restless" Barry DeVorzon, while MAJOR keys have a brightness and happy mood. (Think "More Today Than Yesterday" Spiral Staircase or "Green Grass" Gary Lewis). This is why the later made great sweep songs on the quarter hours. They made you feel good...right after the station jingle.
 
Reminds me of a Gary Larson 'Far Side' comic where a piano and guitar player are sitting in an old west saloon..when the piano player turns and says to the guitarist.."UH-OHH...BAD GUY COMING IN...MINIOR KEY"....lol
 
Another consideration might be 1972's Alone Again, Naturally by Gilbert O'Sullivan. Talk about having a bad day-- he's processing his father's death, which thrust his mother into profound depression and caused the singer himself to question "God and His mercy". Eventually he discloses his intention to "visit a nearby tower..." (?) Not to enjoy the view, I'm guessing.

Particularly eerie about this number was it's casually breezy, upbeat tempo performed in a major key!
 
Yes. It's the pleasant music that keeps "Alone Again, Naturally" from being totally depressing. The lyrics are depressing to be sure, but they are offset by the tone of the melody. It also helps if you're not really listening that closely to the lyrics, which is something that happens a lot.

May I suggest that you listen to "Broken Hearted Me" by Anne Murray. Here's a very, very sad love song. It comes dangerously close to being depressing, but I still put it in the "sad" category. However, I waver on this one. She's really 'down-in-the-dumps' on this song and the production values accentuate the sadness which may push it over the edge into depression. Let me know!
 
It's possible to have "sad" but rockin' at the same time. For example, look at
much of Motown. The Supremes made a career of "break-up songs" (i.e. Where Did
Our Love Go, Baby Love, and so on). Sad but not depressing.

Depressing to me is things like "Alone Again (Naturally)" and "I've Never Been To Me".
Depressing to me is the combination of sad and slow in one bad mess!
 
johnbasalla said:
May I suggest that you listen to "Broken Hearted Me" by Anne Murray. Here's a very, very sad love song. It comes dangerously close to being depressing, but I still put it in the "sad" category. However, I waver on this one. She's really 'down-in-the-dumps' on this song and the production values accentuate the sadness which may push it over the edge into depression. Let me know!
Click to expand...
Just listened again to Broken Hearted Me, a song I've enjoyed hearing for years now, only this time with an ear towards critical discrimination. "Over the edge"? Maybe. Unlike the temptation for toe-tapping offered by Alone Again, Broken Hearted's instrumental accompaniment marches in lockstep with dreadful abyss-like grief of Murray's vocals. Very pursuasive. Sounds like she was staking familiar territory.
 
And let's tap to the beat of Last Kiss, J. Frank Wilson and The Cavaliers, a song about losing one's lover in a fatal auto accident. You can dance to that beat! From that same era came Ray Peterson's Tell Laura I Love Her, a bit more somber of a song than Last Kiss.

Finally, consider the most haunting of the grief genre, Laurie (Strange Things Happen). Take away the lyrics, and the Instrumental production could have qualified as elevator music.
 
The singer is killed in both Marty Robbins' "El Paso" (by a posse) and the Bee Gees' "I've Gotta Get a Message to You." (by the government) How much more depressing can a song get? And don't forget the ultimate singer-as-dying-man song, Bloodrock's "D.O.A."
 
CTListener said:
The singer is killed in both Marty Robbins' "El Paso" (by a posse) and the Bee Gees' "I've Gotta Get a Message to You." (by the government) How much more depressing can a song get? And don't forget the ultimate singer-as-dying-man song, Bloodrock's "D.O.A."
Click to expand...
Never have forgotten my first time hearing DOA on the student union jukebox in '69. That verse, "...teach me how to die" spooked me.
 
"D.O.A" by Bloodrock is depressing. Made for an intriguing song to be heard on "American Top 40" for the two weeks it spent near the bottom of th Top 40 in 1970.
 
johnbasalla said:
"D.O.A" by Bloodrock is depressing. Made for an intriguing song to be heard on "American Top 40" for the two weeks it spent near the bottom of th Top 40 in 1970.
Click to expand...

It was the musical equivalent of "Please, God, I'm only 17!," the letter written from the viewpoint of a dead accident victim that Dear Abby used to reprint every year (and perhaps still does) to warn teens to be careful when they get that first driver's license.
 
"Help Me Make It Through the Night" (Ray Stevens' version) starts out as maudlin and depressing as any other version, but then Ray (in one of his characters) "interrupts" himself and says "that ain't movin' me son!" and fires off a couple of shots. Ray then sings the remainder of the song in a much happier, peppier beat! 8) I probably wouldn't have even thought of this one, except that I saw it on Rayality TV on the "new" TNN last week!
 
Seasons in the Sun - Terry Jacks (1974).

"Goodbye Papa (Michelle)
It's hard to die
When all the birds are singing in the sky;
Now that the spring is in the air"

:'( :'(
 
Yikes!  Clock radio clicks on with Seasons in the Sun and Honey back to back on a morning show?  I wouldn't want to get out of bed LOL
 
CTListener said:
johnbasalla said:
"D.O.A" by Bloodrock is depressing. Made for an intriguing song to be heard on "American Top 40" for the two weeks it spent near the bottom of th Top 40 in 1970.
Click to expand...
It was the musical equivalent of "Please, God, I'm only 17!," the letter written from the viewpoint of a dead accident victim that Dear Abby used to reprint every year (and perhaps still does) to warn teens to be careful when they get that first driver's license.
Click to expand...
True, although I think DOA is about somebody dying of injuries sustained in an airplane crash. Either way though, DOA stunned me. Almost felt like I could smell the blood oozing from dying humans. Sorry for being so graphic, but that's what happened, honest. It was 1969, I was just approaching adulthood and I wasn't prepared for this shocking brand of "entertainment".
 
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