A group of us were discussing and dissecting and coming to grips with the saddest song we’ve heard. It was tough getting to the heart of the matter as what was sad then isn’t sad now.
One either stays in a relationship or moves on with memories of what was then, and what is now, or else hope to move on even when your heart and mind are in that same space in time and still with her.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s17Be3PZA8c
You marry for a reason- love- and when that love is gone, you leave. Or do you really?
That incredible bond between love and hurt and passion and memories and music and songs are so intrinsically tangled up in blue that often they come rushing into your mind so damn hard that it overpowers you and brings you to your senses though the truth always hurts. So does a kick in the nuts…
As we talked about our very different ideas of what are the saddest songs, it showed just how much of a private musical diary lives with us- now and forever- and how, what started out as a harmless game played amongst friends, cut to the very core of who and what makes us happy, and that one person, we let not just slip away, but how we pushed the limits to a point where they had to leave.
For some of us, this is a combination of arrogance and false bravado mixed with insecurity and pushing the boundaries of someone’s patience and forgiveness until there’s no more to forgive.
Personally, listening to 10cc’s “I’m Not In Love”, one can understand the machismo denial of being in love, but trying to convince yourself that you’re not in love even though there’s a nestled stain that’s lying there.
A friend mentioned McCartney’s “Maybe I’m Amazed” as one of his “saddest love songs”. I didn’t get it. “Maybe I’m Amazed” was McCartney’s unabashed glory of love to his Lovely Linda as were both his first two solo albums.
There’s a thin line between what was then and what is now and wishing to get back to then when that train has left the station. And so, one might wallow in the past of what might have been- and stay there trying to get past that eighth or ninth step of making amends.
The problem here is that it could be a lifetime of making amends to the other side who will never accept it. As Don Henley sang, “Forgiveness, forgiveness, even though, even though, you don’t love me, anymore.” It kinda said it all.
Sorry, but constantly repenting and begging for forgiveness and then being constantly kicked in the teeth is one of the saddest “mind songs” there is though one doubts that this theme or subject has yet to been written.
Thinking of the songs you carry with you as scars of where you were and who you were tells you who and where you are now. And that picture can change every day.
Now and those around you today might often not come close to what Dylan sang on “I Threw It All Away.” That was what mattered- those mountains you once held in the palms of your hand and those rivers that ran through everyday. Today, you settle for “love” as comfort food, but very seldom is that one-time passion still there.
You marry once for all the right reasons, and there is where you stay despite the divorce papers. Perhaps it’s where you belong and wish to stay. It’s that irreplaceable comfort zone.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kea0ghm7Z4E
Sometimes, love songs can be the saddest songs as lost love is hard and often impossible to find. Hearing them again takes you on a journey to the past where you wanna stay, but then you wake up to the real world and go through that masquerade.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FX92FJ-lwXI
The original version of “Without You” by Badfinger’s Peter Ham and Tom Evans, both of whom were to end up deciding to leave this world in different ways way too soon, makes me cry- for the songwriting duo, for me and for the hopelessness of the song.
Harry Nilsson’s version, however, was cathartic heartbreak as was his interpretation of Fred Neil’s “Everybody’s Talking.” What can be more sad and lonely and desperate as having “everybody’s talking at me, I don’t hear a word they’re saying, only the echoes of my mind”?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz6GzKWiIAs
Thinking of what is the saddest song or the saddest song is a very personal subject. One man’s “My Love” is another person’s “Caroline No” or “When A Man Loves A Woman” or “It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World” or “Love Hurts”.
At the end of the day and with melodies and lyrics going through your mind, you’re often left wondering, and how it’s time to cut the cords, and ask, Are we human, or are we Dancer? Singular.
Hans Ebert Chairman and CEO We-Enhance Inc and Fast Track Global Ltd www.fasttrack.hk
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