Saddest opening lyrics?

Ride the blue wind high and free
She'll lead you down through misery
Leave you low, come time to go
Alone and low as low can be

-TVZ

My love is dead and buried yonder
Beneath the weeping willow tree
What wrecks my life and makes me wonder
Is because he died for me

-Carter Family

also saddest closing-ish lyrics:

you won't be happy with me
but give me one more chance
you won't be happy anyway

― fervently nice (Treeship), Monday, July 29, 2013 4:49 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

knowing he is capable of writing songs like this -- and about 1/2 of his songs on the 90s albums, through 69 love songs are near this level -- it's disappointing to me that his recent material is mostly kitschy, conceptual bullshit

the saddest stephin merritt lyric is, i think, from "as you turn to go": "I know I'm not supposed to say I'm sorry / I know you've had more loves than Mata Hari / But you know you're the star of my life story / And I'm so sorry."

Also Momus's voice is lovely in melancholic mode. I wish he wrote more songs in that vein.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW6YQYlftCE

Cause I lost my job two weeks before Christmas
And I talked to Jesus at the sewer
And the Pope said it was none of his God-damned business

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oKFkc19T3Dk

xp- It's kind of hard to pinpoint the saddest Merritt lyric because it also depends on the context of the music. That line from "As You Turn To Go" is wonderfully sad but on top of my head i can think of at least 3 or 4 worthy contenders.

also OTM that Momus's best songs are the sad ones.

Many rivers to cross,
but I just can't seem to find
my way over.
Wandering, I am lost,
as I travel along
the white cliffs of Dover.

Many rivers to cross,
and it's only my will
that keeps me alive.
Well, I've been licked,
washed up for years,
and I merely survived
because of my pride.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgzWqfZo8fY

"Good times for a change"

HER
PLACENTA
FALLS
TO
THE
FLOOR

I am saddened to hear "The bugger in the short sleeves fucked my wife," the first line of Guts by John Cale.

"It was only one hour ago. It was all so different then."

With a growing sense of dread
And a hammer in my head
Fully clothed upon the bed
I wake up to the world that I've been living in

I got a call
I got a phone call from my mother
Your dad is changing
He is becoming something other

"I see myself on TV, I'm a faker, a paper clown.
It's clear to all my friends that I habitually lie; I just bring them down."

-- the Who, "However Much I Booze"

"I should have forgotten you long ago, but you're in every song I know"

Busby Berkeley Dreams by Magnetic Fields

"The last horizons I can see are filled with bars and factories / and in them all we fight to stay awake" - Last Horizons, Gin Blossoms

I can hardly bear the sight of lipstick
On the cigarettes there in the ashtray
Lyin' cold the way you left them
At least your lips caressed them while you packed
And a lip print on a half-filled cup of coffee
That you poured and didn't drink
But at least you thought you wanted it
That's so much more than I can say for me

George Jones - A Good Year For The Roses

I was raised by snakes
I lie all the time