Songs/albums that remind you of someone you lost
NOTE: This does have slight self-promotion which I'm aware is against what Tildes is. While it is to drive attention to my band and although originally so, music promotion is NOT the sole reason for this post. It is here for context. It does benefit me, but I make music for this type of discussion. Grief and mourning are important things to me, and art helps me open up and process those feelings. Music is art.
Want to do more of these posts, as I have found my niche in ~music to be this. Nevertheless, I want to balance these to be fair and to make these special. Please leave feedback about what you think, and whether or not I should continue these posts. DO NOT VOTE if you think it does not fairly contribute to ~music or Tildes as a whole. All I ask is you read this entire post before reacting or commenting.
I've been going back and forth on this but I decided to do so. I want to keep things as anonymous as possible, so please respect my wishes.
I am part of a band called LUCY. Over this fortnight, I've been grinding hard trying to promote the discography in order to get as many eyes as possible. I wanted to make this post to highlight "Film" — which I strongly believe is the best released song thus far. But I didn't want to use my account just for promotion. I love Tildes, even with its quirks, and I wanna do quality, meaningful posts. Then I heard from a friend or an acquaintance that a good friend of theirs died.
Suicide, no less. I was......
There's no word or phrase or idiom. There's nothing that can describe the feeling and realisation when someone is gone. It reminded me of why I wrote "Film" in the first place — to grieve and remember a friend who killed herself. I don't think a number of grief songs or popular anti-suicide songs really talk about grief. That one Logic song was bleh but cool, but that remix that goes "WHO CAN RELATE" was insulting.
You may not even have a loved one who killed themselves. You may have one who just died, or disappeared. Or the worst:
The relationship you once had with a person you loved lots. One of your most prized people in the world. That one day, breaks and bo matter what. It will never happen. They're gone from your life
Forever.
And they're not coming back. You have to move on. Even tho you don't want to and sometimes, you yearn for the connection. To be near. Bittersweet nostalgia, to fall back into place. Y
In the end, it is what it is. Yeah..
Grief is hard. Mourning is hard. Moving on is hard. It's messy and there's no right way to do it. Life is unfair and one day, it will end. Songs and albums help. Music is that language and that lexicon that knows just how you feel. "Film" was what I wanted to do, to bring attention to that process. Nowadays, it's an occasional comfort song that's best played when it's overcast and blue. And you'll know when if you know.
So my question for y'all is... what songs or albums have you listened to that reminds you of someone you've lost? What are some lyrics that don't stick out like a sore thumb, they hit you like anaesthesia? What are your stories? What are your regrets? What are you afraid of? Hell, if youre a musician, what songs have you done that address this? And no matter what, please don't feel like it's too much. To the extent of the code of conduct and what is appropriate, there is nothing pathetic about grief. Esp if you're hanging on and can unravel at any moment.
Ask me anything about my list of songs for grief too (won't include my band's songs heh). I have another song in the works that I'd love to just talk about. I'm an open book as far as grief, fear and such. I write songs for catharsis anyway.
Hope you are all having a wonderful day or night. Forgive me if I can't reply or listen to all the songs, I really do wish I could. I will vote tho.
Coheed and Cambria - Afterman: Descension (specifically, the song Dark Side of Me)
This album was the second of a double album: Ascension and Descension. There was an option to pre-purchase and get your name printed in the art/story book upon the release of Ascension (for those that don't know, all but one of Coheed's albums have been telling a continual story. They have books and graphic novels that flesh out many details), so this was amazing to me. When the book came in early October 2012, I was so excited! But I only read about the songs in Ascension, awaiting the release of Descension the following February 2013.
Then November 2012 happened. My niece was born, and exactly a week later, my dad chose to commit suicide. Come February, I was excited to hear the next release, and Dark Side of Me played. My girlfriend came home to find me sobbing. It took me about a month before I listened to the rest of the album, but over 10 years later, I still haven't read the rest of the story. It is within arms reach right now, and I just can't bring myself to read it.
Pop, I miss and love you. We're going to see the Gin Blossoms this month for your birthday. We know you'll be with us.
I can relate to that.
When my friend was still alive, I was watching this anime called Your lie in April. I was two or three episodes through it when I spoilered myself out of curiosity. Then ofc, she died at some point and I couldn't bring myself to finish the rest. Years later, it's better and within arm's reach. Haven't finished it.
Too many parallels.
Thank you for sharing your story. Would love to check out the album at some point but do not want to start in the middle of the narrative.
Technically, the Afterman albums take place before the rest of the story. However, I do agree with you. That being said, listening by release dates, you are starting on the second part already. Four albums later you get the first part.
Five Finger Death Punch - Gone Away
My brother passed in 2019. Life has been dull and grey since, no matter the good that has happened. That song feels spot on for my feelings on the matter.
Watched the music video. The song is really powerful, the music video strengthens the emotional impact.
I don't know your brother, and I do not like to say I'm sorrys when I don't have anything to say. I don't exactly believe in God either. What I do know is... maybe your brother would understand. The time he's left you is full of meaning. I hope that this doesn't solve your pain, but rather is a sign of empathy more than a sorry can give you.
Extremely. I'm ex-forces as well and it resonates in so many different ways to my life.
Thank you buddy. It's one I flick through time and time again in my head.
I'm re-training out of my boring data job and into psychology / counselling. He knew I loved helping people, but knew I'd also followed the money in the city I live in. I think he'd be proud that I'm at least making steps in the right direction.
Take care.
Basically any Frank Sinatra song makes me think about my grandfather. He was a big fan. At the viewing and the wake when he passed, we just had a playlist of his songs going the whole time.
A very unrelated song that makes me think about him is Street of Dreams by Whitesnake. I hadn’t seen my cousins in a long time before the funeral, and we were in the same car during the procession. I forget who but somebody turned on the radio and that song was playing. We all started head-banging instinctually and then immediately looked at each other like “is it okay that we’re doing this in a funeral processions?” Our grandfather probably would have approved (he had a long run, was well into his 90s when he passed after surviving two heart attacks, and would have been happy to see his grandkids having fun together like when we were children at his house). The whole moment just felt very surreal and sticks out in my memory.
Whenever I listen to Bright Eyes, I think about my ex (especially Cassadaga, her favorite). We saw a Conor Oberst concert shortly before we started dating as friends because we were both big fans. We had tickets to see Bright Eyes when they got back together, but the show got postponed indefinitely due to Covid breaking out, and our relationship didn’t last until it was rescheduled. Our breakup was complicated, and I bear no animosity towards her over it, but I ended up just giving her the tickets when the show did happen because it was too much of a messy situation for me at the time despite us discussing just going as friends. I still listen to Bright Eyes often, but when I do I normally end up thinking about why things had to go the way they did for at least a little while.
Get Lonely by The Mountain Goats as a whole just makes me review all the failed relationships I’ve had. Darnielle just has a way of articulating how impactful all small details about an event in life are. Given that it’s basically a concept album about breakups, this is kind of an obvious answer but very few songs about break ups trigger such reflection from me.
I've always been non-conformist in some capacity, so the answer seems yes to me. When we took my dog to get euthanised, we also brought along our oldest so she could process my dog's death as it happened. The vet was so confused as to why we brought two dogs, I said that we were interested in the 2-for-1 special. The vet did not like that, but I have no regrets about that joke. After all, it was my dog and she was going to die So.
Humour is not a bad thing. Most may not like it, but anything that grounds you or helps you find the strength to live is good.
I think the hardest part about breakups is that reunion is still a "possibility" in a quantum sense, I suppose. There's perseverance in the quality of finding the problem and coming up with a solution. Seems easy enough to fix, right? It's p dead simple, and the person will love you again if things were different.
Yet, it's not always about if things were different. It's just about humans or entities. As long as something is alive and sentient, then it doesn't matter what you do. That complexity takes over, and if they decide no... it's truly over.
I can't say whether or not I would love to listen to Get Lonely, but I do wonder... if you'd like to, what specific moments on that record stand out in your grief?
Yeah I’m with you when it comes to the first point. My sense of humor normally doesn’t degrade during serious times, but I always feel pressure to self-censor it out of a worry of how it will be perceived. If it’s a period of shared grief, I don’t want to cross other folks boundaries.
Regarding the second part, yeah I agree. The short version of what happened was I was going through a very anxious period of my life, she didn’t know how to support me and broke things off with the hope that we’d get back together when I figured my stuff out. However, while I understood my anxiety was putting a big drag on the relationship and why she wouldn’t want to remain in that situation, the second part of her plan was not communicated to me, which led to a lot of drama down the line. We live in different states now and the few times I’ve seen her since we’ve been amicable. It just feels like, in hindsight and now that I know the full story, the whole thing seemed avoidable if I had more information.
For Get Lonely, I normally listen to albums in their entirety and things kind of blend together but the songs are largely pretty short. Wild Sage, New Monster Avenue, Half Dead, and Moon Over Goldsboro are some standout tracks for me I’d say. Another track off a different album I’d point to is Source Decay off All Hail West Texas, especially the set of lines (formatting on my phone is hard sorry):
Replace “West Texas Highway” with “New Jersey Turnpike” and that’s a very lived experience for me.
If you listen to any of those, let me know what you think!
Do You Realize??, by the Flaming Lips. It never fails to make me cry in memory of someone I loved. It's either the wistfulness of it or the insistence that life is found in the here and now that reminds me so much of that person.
Longest Days by John Mellencamp.
Reminds me of watching my dad in his last couple of years never giving up on living life his way: tending garden and pond, doting on mom, doing his things despite knowing he was dying and there just wasn't anything he could do about it.
The Marcus King Band - Marcus King
My introduction to them was this video right here!
Excellent blues album, and the singer caught me so off-guard. Someone shared a link to them that I saw a couple days after my dad passed away. He and I were always telling each other about new music, or whenever we heard something that reminded us of one another. This was the first artist I could never share with him and I just laid in bed drowning in the album the song I linked came from for the entire day. I was devastated, but it really helped me appreciate what an incredible bond we had shared, even if in the moment I felt like it was ripped away from me never to come back. I think he'd've loved this album. There's been hundreds more songs and artists since that've reminded me of him, but this is the one that always shows up first.
Other than that, he used to play the intro to Thunderstruck over and over again whenever we were in the car, so I can't hear a lil Angus Young anymore without remembering that goof.
I have three,
Green Day - Time of Your Life: I played this one at my cousins funeral and now the song is permanently associated with that event for me and my family. I can’t listen to it regularly anymore, but I’ve contemplated getting licensing rights and releasing my version. My uncle (cousins father) says mine is better anyways :P
Stone Sour - Through Glass: Again, another one that reminds me of my cousin. This was like, the only song he knew how to play on guitar competently. It’s extremely simple but he was really proud to play it, and now I have to change the channel anytime the song comes on. I’ve busted out this song at a few open-mics before though, I find it easier to play these songs rather than listen to them for some reason.
Gone Away - The Offspring: Obvious example, I listened to this song a lot to cope with people who’ve left us behind. Just a general good grieving song about how I’d trade places if I could.
Great topic with your post, got me in my feels over here. I’ll check out your band
"Good Riddance" is one of the songs I learned on the guitar. I've always liked the earnest nature of it, and how it treated a very bitter "fuck you" into a bittersweet ballad on the guitar. I would so love to hear your version in private (if you can share it, and if you want to).
"Through Glass" I can understand a bit (through my own perspective) on why it could be easier to play than listen. Playing a song is a journey in itself, which I think makes it necessary to finish. Or maybe it's an emotional confrontation to help with your feelings. It's really nice your cousin could fully play this on guitar, the simple things are often deceiving.
Pioneer posted a cover of "Gone Away" from Five Finger Death Punch. That cover alone is a punch to the lungs. Listening to the 1997 version is interesting, but maybe it's bc I took to the 5FDP cover that it doesn't hit. I think it is a good bittersweet ballad, it doesn't sound too sad or too happy.
Thank you for your response. Feel free to check out my band whenever you want to. I mention em bc "Film" was written to help sift through grief that has always been there. It still helps. But that song that I've refused to listen to bc of grief was "F20 / FAITH" by Fitnesss. My dog was dying and yeah, powerful song.
My great grandma was the best person ever. I had a rough time growing up, but my one soft place to land was at great grandma's house. My great grandfather died the year before I was born, so it was always just her. She never wore pants, except for when picking blackberries. Because thorns of course. We once went on a trip to New York City on a Greyhound bus and a train, it was the only way she had ever traveled since she had never driven in her life. I can remember us getting mugged and she swore me to secrecy because I'm sure that would have cause a LOT of issues, but I didn't care because great grandma secrets were the best. She once dug a trench across the dirt road she lived on because people kept flying down it in their trucks and killing her chickens. I learned at a young age that being a woman who lived by herself wasn't a bad thing, and anything can be made from scratch (she lived through the Great Depression). I was a teenager when she died and I had been too wrapped up in my own angst to have written or visited her in a year or so. It killed me. Grandma was a wreck at the funeral, but I held it together pretty well until they played Go Rest High on That Mountain by Vince Gill. I know it's a "popular" funeral song, but I think it embodied great grandma to a t. Simple, soft, and beautiful, it will always put a smile on my face.
Well, this isn't in relation to death, thankfully - but rather, a group of (once) dear friends that I drifted away from and will probably never speak to again.
We were a dedicated group that loved gaming; I was the oldest of us, but we were all middle schoolers and such who came from largely unhealthy home lives and were more often than not bullied at school. We were from all around the country, and had met with each other one by one during the greatest period of online gaming, Xbox Live, playing Call of Duty World at War.
To cut to the chase a bit, we all dabbled in Halo, but none of us had actually beaten it. We decided after hitting MP a few times that we were all going to marathon the campaign on Legendary at the beginning of summer break as a 4 man group.
Up until this point, I was always the quiet one who didn't talk much; I wouldn't find any semblance of confidence until high school. When we got to the Warthog Run at the end, we struggled quite a bit; the group decided to go three men to one Warthog, with myself driving the other one. Wildly inefficient and stupid, I know, but we were kids and they thought having a full car was cool. I didn't mind it. The first few times, we ended up dying; I would try to ram the large Flood out of the way for them and usually die as a result, but later they'd get caught on something and just end up screwed over.
By try number four, I was hitting my breaking point. I stopped ramming the large Flood out of the way, and instead I followed closely behind them. I'll link the music now, because this is the memory I've actually got it really linked to;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2NVJSJVGVQ
I'm following behind. They end up driving over a falling panel and die, and everybody assumed we were gonna have to restart yet again. I said, screw that, and I kept going. Having not made it past the point we were at I kinda assumed I'd get hit by something and die, but you bet your sweet ass I made it through probably 3/4 of the Warthog Run totally blind and on my own. I distinctly remember it as the first time I'd really felt somebody rooting for me - not just saying it, not while trying to make me do something I didn't want to do as parents often did, but literally cheering and screaming for me to make it.
Jack, my best friend from the group, ended up drifting away, and the last time we spoke wasn't on friendly terms; he'd changed quite a bit and not in a way I liked. David ended up turning on me mere months later, to the point where he actually stole his own mothers' credit card to buy a DDoS service online to attack me, he knocked out my internet at 10PM every day for two weeks. Randy and I, the only two that lived near each other, ended up having a huge falling out years ago, and I'm not intending on ever speaking to him again despite his attempts to make up with me. But for that summer, those kids made me believe in myself and began the process of fundamentally changing who I was as a person. Nowadays, my friends tell me I have a huge ego, and they're not wrong, but I always tell them jokingly that I earned it.
Listened to the song and while I wasn't paying attention to the memory associated with it, I did feel the energy and tone of the song. I think that counts for something.
Thank you for sharing your story too. I hope you are doing well.
One more thing.
Grief doesn't have to be about someone who is dead. It can be about someone you've lost connection with. That, oftentimes, is worse than someone who is dead. The dead don't have any business with the living. Something that is still alive is still possible — it is a matter of self-restraint, will and bitter understanding.
So while yours isn't about death, its just ad valid as everyone else's stories here. In a way, it is about something that has ended.
Just about any Collective Soul song (used to be one of my favorite bands) just makes me sad and miss my younger brother who was a Collective Soul super fan and passed from cancer a few years ago.
I can't listen to their music anymore unless I want to cry. I still keep a bunch of their songs on my general play list where I keep all my favorite music, but I mostly end up just skipping those tracks when they come up these days. I largely only listen to music in the car and nobody needs a huge ugly cry when they're trying to drive.
That is understandable. Beware of unhealthy mechanisms, however. I think it's okay to avoid wanting to cry if you can, but I think avoidance and reluctance are two slight, important differences. This is more of a suggestion since I do believe everyone should be more in touch with their battles, which leads to a better understanding of mental health. And I do not know you, so I could be wrong.
My parents always believe your body will tell you, I think it's that too.
This isn't a loss in terms of life, moreso a loss of social life and falling into a deep depression, but the album "Her and All My Friends" by Ritt Momney is what accompanied me through a dark period of my life.
The album really captured the feeling of being hopelessly in love with someone who has moved on from you, and the pain of losing them and the other people around you in a way that spoke to me in the deepest pits of my depressive spiral. So many of his lyrics mirrored my own thoughts in ways that I had not experienced before, and even the progression of the album mirrored my journey of recovery from that time, starting down hill, rising and falling in mood, before finally landing at somewhat muted neutral point. Not over it, but crawling from the depths, trying to move forward and leave the past behind no matter how hard it keeps trying to pull you back down. Still haunted but moving forward.
I don't listen to the album much these days, because it can be a really painful experience to relive, but it's extremely important to me. It shows me how much I've grown and recovered from that dark time, and is a good reminder that no matter how bad things may seem, if you keep pushing forwards, you can get better. For a long time, I truly thought that era of my life was gonna be the end for me, but now I'm happier than I've been in a long time, and I'm glad I stuck around and continued moving forward.
As the age old saying goes, "This too shall pass."
The epitome of what I mean by the worst kind of grief heheh.
A song that connected to me in that fashion and mirrors your experience was "i was all over her" by salvia palth. I can't remember why but it just speaks to me like how HAAMF did for you.
John Prine’s “Hello in There” reminds me of my papaw and that I didn’t spend enough time with him.
Jeff Rosenstock’s “The Internet is Everywhere” reminded of a friend I had a falling out with. Luckily, we patched things up and have a solid friendship now :)
Regret for not spending enough time seems to be a recurring motif in this post. Also, it's good you've patched up a friendship!
What Rosenstock album should I check first? Should I also check out Bomb the Music Industry?
I say "Worry"! It's the first album of his I listened to and it knocked my socks off. But truly, they're all great. I'd put "We Cool?" in second place. All of his songs come from such a genuine place and are incredibly relatable to me.
I'm aware of Bomb the Music Industry! but i'd be lying if I said I've listened much. I think the answer is yes though lol We BOTH need to check out Bomb the Music Industry!
Priceless from Copeland reminds me of my grandmother who died in 97 from cancer. Pretty sure Aaron Marsh wrote the song for his grandmother so it hits that spot of sadness just right.
As for myself I'm a musician and have been writing songs since 2000 but I've never written anything for this purpose yet. The closest was an off the cuff acoustic track I made earlier this year going through a breakup. Probably the realest song I've written as of yet as that's not my normal style but it had to come out somehow and that was the best way to release it.
Music has that power whether it's a song from others or ourselves.
hugs
Thank you for your reply.
Twenty One Pilots.
Anything of theirs up through the Blurryface album reminds me of my ex. She was a big fan of theirs before they hit it big and whenever I hear one of those songs, I can picture her happily singing along or mouthing the words while crafting.
I was having a really rough time mentally and career-wise in 2021 and she couldn't stand to be around my depression anymore. It sucks because I really miss her and the life we had together, but I totally understand as I was definitely miserable to be around.
It also sucks because I ended up really enjoying their music also. Their song Formidable also reminds of her because it felt like she always had her shit together and was out of my league.
For me, it's anything by Sublime and specifically from their album 40Oz. to Freedom. I had a friend that was really, really into Sublime back in the day; he committed suicide some 14 years ago or so. I can't hear anything by Sublime without thinking about my friend.
hugs
Self-promotion is considered acceptable here, but it does have some caveats. From the Code of Conduct:
So just don't make self-promotion the only thing you do here, and you'll be fine. :)
/offtopic