Jump to content

Saddest Song ever?


FINgers

Recommended Posts

  • Members

found the author and the lyrics... here they are


The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

Words and Music: Eric Bogle.


Copyright: Larrikin Music, Sydney, Australia
Reproduced here by kind permission of the author.


When I was a young man I carried my pack
And I lived the free life of the rover.
From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback
I waltzed my Matilda all over.
Then in nineteen fifteen the country said, "Son,
It's time to stop rambling, there's work to be done."
And they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun,
And they marched me away to the war.
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As our ship pulled away from the quay,
And amidst all the cheers, flag-waving and tears
We sailed off to Gallipoli.

And how well I remember that terrible day,
How our blood stained the sand and the water.
And of how in that hell that they call Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter.
Johnny Turk he was waiting, he primed himself well,
He showered us with bullets, and he rained us with shell,
And in five minutes flat he'd blown us all to hell,
Nearly blew us right back to Australia.
But the band played Waltzing Matilda,
As we stopped to bury our slain.
We buried ours, and the Turks buried theirs,
Then we started all over again.

Now those that were left, well, we tried to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire.
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive,
But around me, the corpses piled higher.
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head,
And when I woke up in me hospital bed
And saw what it had done, well, I wished I was dead.
Never knew there was worse things than dying.
For I'll go no more Waltzing Matilda
All around the green bush far and free,
To hump tent and pegs, a man needs both legs,
No more Waltzing Matilda for me.

So they gathered the crippled, the wounded, the maimed,
And they shipped us back home to Australia.
The armless, the legless, the blind and insane,
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla.
And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where me legs used to be,
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me,
To grieve and to mourn and to pity.
But the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway.
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared,
Then they turned all their faces away.

And so now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me.
And I see my old comrades, how proudly they march,
Reviving old dreams of past glory.
And the old men marched slowly, all bones stiff and sore,
They're tired old heroes from a forgotten war,
And the young people ask,"What are they marching for?",
And I ask meself the same question.
But the band plays Waltzing Matilda,
And the old men still answer the call.
But as year follows year, more old men disappear,
Someday no one will march there at all.

Waltzing Matilda, waltzing Matilda,
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me ?
And their ghosts may be heard as they march by the billabong,
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 108
  • Created
  • Last Reply
  • Members

I generally prefer songs that are more symbolic and less straightforward in their meaning. But I'd have to cast my vote for:

Pictures of You - The Cure
Change - Blind Melon (Not neccesarily sad, but it makes me cry.)

"When you feel life aint worth livin' you got to stand up and take a look around. Look away to the sky.
And when your deepest thoughts are broken, keep on dreamin, cause when you stop dreamin its time to die."
-- RIP Shannon Hoon

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Calling Elvis, Dire Straits.
Some poor sad lonely soul, sitting alone in a mid western farm house, juiced up on moon shine, calls anybody asking for Elvis.
"why don't you go get him - I'm his biggest fan
you gotta tell him - he's still the man"
How sad it that?

JetCityMatt: Do you know the tuning Stills used on 4 and 20?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Originally posted by MoonSlick


JetCityMatt: Do you know the tuning Stills used on 4 and 20?

 

I've never heard the song- I don't even know how it goes! :)

 

JCIsbell, do you know the tuning.

 

 

Can't believe I forgot about "Tears In Heaven" as 'the saddest song'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members
Originally posted by wooderson

"It Makes No Difference" - The Band



Yeah man!! :) What a great song!!

Rick Danko had such emotion in his voice, but when Garth Hudson comes in with the saxaphone... Uhhhhh... It kills me every time, especially the version on The Last Waltz. The Band gets overlooked so much.

I would also mention Nobidy Home from Pink Floyd. That has to be one of the saddest songs ever.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Sorry JetCityMatt, still getting used to the board
The song goes:
Four and twenty years ago, I come into this life,
the song of a woman and a man who lived in strife.
He was tired of being poor and he wasn't into selling door to door
and he worked like the devil to be more.

A different kind of poverty now upsets me so.
Night after sleepless night, I walk the floor and I want to know- why am I so alone?
Where is my woman can I bring her home? Have I driven her away? Is she gone?

Morning comes to sunrise and I'm driven to my bed.
I see that it is empty and there's devils in my head.
I embrace the many colored beast. I grow weary of the torment, can there be no peace?
And I find myself just wishing that my life would simply cease.

The tuning is something like all Es with one string different.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members
Originally posted by Picker

That has got to be the weirdest tuning I've ever seen.... How do you tune to all E's???
:eek:
:eek:



Or you can use all d's and an a.

6 = normal e
5 = down to e
4 = up to e
3 = down to e
2 = normal b
1 = normal e

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.


×
×
  • Create New...