Top Five On Friday - 9/14/07

Life is never depressing when you're doing the Top Five On Friday:

Top 5 depressing songs

They're depressing, but all five of these songs are also very good.

1) "Hurt" by Johnny Cash. This is a good song, but there's nothing positive about it at all. Johnny Cash was always musically in touch with humanity's darker side, and that comes out in full force on this song.

2) "It's Over" by Roy Orbison. Not a single "come back, baby." Not even a "screw you, I'm gonna go find me another woman." This is the sound of a man who has finally accepted the fact his relationship failed.

3) "Burning Of The Midnight Lamp" by Jimi Hendrix Experience. The music is fabulous - harpsichord, wah-wah guitar, and an angelic chorus of female voices. What's not fabulous is the tale of heartbreak and loneliness sung by Jimi.

4) "Lover, You Should Have Come Over" by Jeff Buckley. Rain. Funerals. A woman who doesn't show up. How can this song get any sadder? Yes, Jeff sings about how "it's never over," but one gets the feeling he's only saying it to comfort himself. It doesn't really sound like he truly means it.

5) "Needle In The Hay" by Elliott Smith. It's a low-key, acoustic ballad, so we're already off to a sad start. Add in the fact that this song played during a suicide-attempt scene in Royal Tenenbaums (the actor in the scene was, quite ironically, Luke Wilson) and the fact that Elliott Smith himself committed suicide, and you've got yourself a real tearjerker.