I was bored, ok? So here’s a Spotify playlist of death disks, some famous, eg Leader of the Pack, Terry, Ode to Billie Joe, some not, eg (All I Have Left is) My Johhny’s Hubcap…some are more serious than others.
This all kicked off because this week’s Spotify Discover playlist included The Girl on Death Row by Duane Eddy and that scamp Lee Hazlewood. I’d never heard it before, and it got me thinking back to a time when records featuring teenage carnage were a thing. Hard to imagine now…
Feel free to come up with more – I got bored all over again around 1970. Deram will probably say that nobody made proper death discs after that anyway.
Personal fave from the summer of ’78 – Dig Paul’s mournful oohing!
My heart rang as the phone rang
“My baby’s called at last!”
But it was a friend to say
That Joanie’s car had crashed
Sorry video doesn’t seem to be showing. Anyone help?
For some reason your original link barfed .. so I have substituted an alternative that does play ok
Cheers, does indeed. Thanks for helping! Sadly came too late for poor Joanie
Goddamit…
Steve Earle’s song about a young felon on death row is a particularly moving song. Billy Austin.
A passionate opponent of capital punishment, he also wrote this, as good, IMHO.
And this, from the other side of the page.
And one of the most depressing songs I know. Van Morrison TB SHEETS about a female friend dying of tuberculosis.
Lordy yes…
This is Van Morrison’s best song from his best album.
Blithering idiot. Any fool knows that Hymn to the Silence is his best album.
Soz, Steve! I keep forgetting – er – what was his best album again?
That song and He Ain’t Give You None are fantastic but best album????
Nyet!
Not really, Junes! I’m yankin’ yer chain! Actually this song is his best:
… from his REAL best album, the Complete Bang Sessions!
The Complete Bang Sessions reminds me of a film I once sore. I mean saw.
Hey, Moose – you can tell Junes anything! Go on, tell him something!
When I saw him do Astral Weeks in full live (see other thread), he also did this, I was pretty gobsmacked.
https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/van-morrison/2009/wamu-theater-at-madison-square-garden-new-york-ny-2bf77c36.html
Now there’s a cheery topic for a Monday morning!
There are some fine songs about bereavement such as James Taylor’s Fire and Rain or Lucinda Williams’s Sweet Old World, but I think you are looking for something more weepy and melodramatic.
Maybe Lemmy fits the bill?
How about Warren Zevon’s Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner?
To be honest I’m looking for things that make me laugh, so that fits the bill!
Surely ‘Roland’ is more of an undead disc…
‘Excitable Boy’ would be nearer the mark
*sparse applause from back of hall*
I’m here all week! Matinees on Wednesday and Saturday!
Now look here, I sing folk ballads. I could be here all day.
So here’s some country and western instead.
Body count = 12
Just a couple then if you want ones that make you laugh.
As Chesh has said there are countless folk ballads so I’ll just mention
The Poor Murdered Woman.
This was on Kenny Everett’s essential World’s Worst Records compilation.
This Jimmy Cross song “I want my baby back!” tells the story of a young man having a car accident where his gal is killed. Not to worry though, he can just dig ‘er up and, erm, hold her in his arms once more.
It didn’t chart as it failed to appeal to even the most broad-minded necro-curious record buyer.
Already on the playlist!
Oh I’m sorry – I missed that.
The Tiger lilies should have several songs that fit the bill.
I thought of Shockheaded Peter Show but there are many songs in their repertoire.
Snip snip!
Try the Sheik of Scrubby Creek himself, Mr Chad Morgan…
A suicide pact gone wrong, courtesy of the Mael brothers…
It’s all about family for some people…from The Phantom Of The Paradise
Of course Half Man Half Biscuit do this better and funnier than most.
And this with it’s stark message at the end.
Also this. The line about walking in Autumn and running in Spring is genius.
A grisly blast from the past…
Loved this
Both Country and Western are rich sources of ye olde death dirges..this is Oz legend Slim Dusty.
I immediately thought of this by Darts. Annual County Fair. I only ever heard it acapella, when they performed a session for Charlie Gillett on Radio London, before they hit the charts.
I’m not sure if it was ever released, but YouTube provided this
“Written by sax player Horace Trubridge, one of their earliest self penned songs”
His stage name with Darts was Horatio Hornblower.
Horace Trubridge is now general secretary of the UK Musicians Union, “interesting” fact fans.
Death discs. Are these real or imagined stories?
Angelic Upstarts document a real one
The Angelic Upstarts documented a second one.
I recall Peel playing this and when it had finished him saying “Mensi, I’m proud of you”.
John Denver’s ‘Leaving On A Jet Plane’ springs immediately to mind.
I was in Sydney when he died and after playing Leaving as a tribute, the Ocker DJ said “b
“And that was the late John Denver’s biggest hit! Bit like his career really. Lightweight and failed to fly. high”
Also unpleasantly prophetic.
Many to choose from but this – Hot chocolate cover and all – is the ultimate Sisters death disc:
Scariest song ever. Certainly not one to listen to alone in your house late at night.
Suicide – Frankie Teardrop
Delilah and Green Green Grass of Home by Tom Jones
Anything by Tom Jones, really.
*pushes Gar playfully in chest with both hands*
On Ken Burns’ Country Music he reports George Jones hating this song saying who would want to listen to such a miserable thing.
And we can’t leave out St Nick
It’s the age old tale of a bloke being consumed by 9 to 5 work, his wife leaving him, and the committing suicide. A cheery tale?
Len Price 3 – Mr Grey
Don’t think so, Gary.
Here’s one from 40 years ago by The Members – as with RD’s posting above it’s about a guy consumed by the 9 to 5, but a very different story, though the end is the same:
I really like that album. I’ve been playing the track Clean Men quite a lot recently.
Blue Öyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear The Reaper” has to be the winner, although as a committed BÖC fanboi it’s a song I’m fine not ever hearing again. But writer Buck Dharma’s death related songwriting skills extend some way beyond “DFTR” as this track from his solo album shows.
It’s a deeply unsettling video, for reasons that are nothing to do with the song…..
I’m sorry – this is the Afterword, and no one has mentioned Richard Thompson?
Vincent Black Lightning 1952
Another fine RT song about death is Another Brother Slips Away
I misread the thread title as “Death Disco”, anyway this is about watching his mother die. A good one for the shop assistants and students to have a groove to on TOTP.
0:38 magnificently inappropriate idiot grin from Wobble.
Anybody heard the Top of the Pops album version of this? Death Be Not Proud….
Actually, like the James Last mob doing Hawkwind, it’s not bad.
Blimey
And who can forget DOA by the mighty Bloodrock
To go further back. See also Why build a Wall round a Graveyard.
Even further ‘beyond the grave’.
Made all the more poignant….
Something in my eye….
This album appeared on the (other) stiffies thread, it reminded me of this. I loved this when I was a kid, had no idea it was Elt’.
Elton mentions in his autobiography that Gianni Versace kept harping on about how brave it was to release it a single. Elton didn’t understand what he was on about until it clicked that the Itaian had misunderstood the title as ‘Song for a Gay’.
WRT the remark about the lack of teenage carnage in songs now, it seems to me the teen symphonies back then were always melodramas : love was absolute and any romantic setback was a world-ending catastrophe. So, your boyfriend being wiped out in a motorcycle accident wasn’t that much more serious than him walking into the party holding Julie’s hand.
Nowadays, thanks, in part to female emancipation, it’s all “I want you to bang my box”. When getting it on is just a workout for which you award stars, it’s a leap to care about your bone buddy tripping into the wood chipper..
There’s a fabulous album by T Tex Edwards called ‘Pardon Me, I’ve Got Someone To Kill’ which is all death songs.
Other favourites of mine include ‘Marie Provost’ by Nick Lowe (“She was a winner that became a doggie’s dinner”)
‘Hollywood Seven’ by Jon English (“Now she’s goin’ back to Omaha but not the way she’d planned
There’ll be no crowd to cheer her on, no welcome home, no band”)
‘7-11’ by The Ramones (“On came a truck running out of control. It crushed my baby and it crushed my soul”)
Death Cab for Cutie
Took a while to find this online. The “song” is from 1979, delivered by a man sitting on an electric chair awaiting his execution on New Years Eve 1979. We hear him meet his maker at the end.
The other side of the single was Ayotollah – set to the tune of My Sharona. Memorable line – “you’re already gonna die-atollah!”
Yikes! Bet that was a floor-filler at the junior prom.
Randy Newman sez: kids, don’t fall asleep on the beach…
The Boys channel the Shangri Las
“The Executioner’s Last Songs” volumes 1, 2 & 3 by Jon Langford & The Pine Valley Cosmonauts have a large selection of death songs in two handy packages (volumes 2& 3 are a double set). The albums were made to raise funds for anti-death penalty organisations in the USA. Loads of guest singers and musicians along with Jon Langford and Sally Timms.
Here’s one, sung (pretty badly but with charm) by Pat Brennan.
Here’s another sung by Steve Earle.
Nice! Might look out for that…
This one’s a rather scary one.
.
This one’s less scary but still unsettling.
Here’s one from Chuck Prophet that he released in the last century – Dyin’ All Young:
I think this fits. Apparently the intention had been for all the songs on the album (Tiger Bay) to be about death. It’s quite something that the reveal isn’t until 3.57 minutes into the track, pretty much the last words of the song.
There are two albums of reinterpreted trad. arr. death songs by Snakefarm, alias singer/musician Anna Domino with assorted musical associates.
This is from the first one “Songs From My Funeral”
This too. Featuring “Mr. Sting” and a bit of Oliver Nelson’s “Stolen Moments”.
Pavane for a dead infanta, played by one of the best interpreters of Ravel.
Love a good Death Disc. Here’s another good playlist
Having never paid any attention to it, I had no idea Seasons in the Sun was a death disc – or that it was a Jacques Brel song, come to that.
How could I forget Miss Otis Regrets? Nothing like a nice lynching. Could go for Ella Fitzgerald, but let’s have Kirsty MacColl’s frankly bonkers version.
Here’s another from Ella.
Genius…”never the bridesmaid, always the bride…”
Poor old Thep, he so wanted that hamper and here he is 22 short….make that 21.
Never mind, just remember that death is not the end.