The saddest rock song of all time, according to science
Sometimes, the need for a sad song trumps the requirement to lose yourself in happiness. Whether it is sticking on REM when faced with a new break-up or looking towards The Smiths when teenage life seems to overcome every other emotion, sad songs provide a cathartic release for all musos and should never be shunned in favour of happy-go-lucky monstrosities.
There are countless songs that we tend to think of as the world’s most melancholy music; the two aforementioned bands, alongside the work of Radiohead and Sufjan Stevens, are always preferred go-tos. Yet, when you look at the data, only one song is deemed the saddest.
In 2022, with the help of Durham University music expert Analiese Micallef Grimaud, data company HappyOrNot worked to determine which can be considered the happiest and saddest songs of all time. While it may seem like fruitless work within an art form that is based on subjective preferences, there is some value to using science to help source the songs that will allow us to revel in our feelings, happy or sad.
“It’s no secret that music can profoundly affect how we feel, or that musicians can seek to express their feelings at a certain time or about a certain topic through their work,” shared HappyOrNot chief executive Miika Makitalo.
It should be noted that the songs selected are not necessarily the tracks that are found to be the saddest by an audience but rather which tunes, according to the data points, are best at expressing the emotions of happiness and sadness. “In my research, I explore how people, irrespective of their musical knowledge (if any), think different emotions should sound like in music,” confirmed Grimaud.
The top five happiest songs are likely very well-known to you. Pharell Williams’ summer anthem ‘Happy’, Outkast’s dancefloor-filler ‘Hey Ya’, Cyndi Lauper’s ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’, the rollicking rocker ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ from Queen and Nina Simone’s ‘Feeling Good’. Considering the criteria, with lyrical content and vocal expression high up on the formula, it is easy to see how these songs would make top billing.
However, things get a little more subtle when we turn our attention to the other end of the emotional scale. Few artists write songs that are so explicitly about sorrow, so the formula is working a little harder to pick out the tracks which best express musical misery. Yet, there are some familiar names on the list.
Pearl Jam’s 1991 anthem for unrequited love, ‘Black’ takes fifth spot. A band of a similar vein, Alice in Chains, feature in the fourth position with ‘Nutshell’ and Eric Clapton’s heartbreaking tribute to his son who died from a tragic accident, ‘Tears In Heaven’ can also be found on the list. Of course, REM’s anthemic ‘Everybody Hurts’ takes the second spot, but the saddest song of all time, according to science, is Nirvana’s ‘Something In The Way’.
The track is a confessional, nearly whispered tune by Kurt Cobain. It is one of the most eerie songs on Nevermind, presenting a stark image of loneliness and hopelessness, departing from the loud-quiet-loud dynamic that characterises much of the record. Even Cobain’s delivery sounds weary, as if carrying an unseen load, as the repetitive refrain—”something in the way”—becomes a gentle mantra for immovable impediments.
Recorded on a four-string charity shop guitar, the track for Nevermind remains a gut-wrenching tune. An ode to solitude, the song sees Cobain mythologising his childhood, neatly using metaphor to explore his own feelings of isolation and allowing one of rock’s most furious records to end with stark beauty.
There is no better performance of the song than when Nirvana took on the track for MTV Unplugged, which you can watch below.
