Often we are sad. Things don't work out or we feel nostalgic for a past that was probably every bit as melancholy. So, what music to play? To feel sad? To get music to match the melancholic mood? Classical? Rock? Pop? Bossanova? Well, all of the above.

Debussy - The girl with the Flaxen Hair. Beautiful, sad, melancholic. Fading beauty, pale shadows, misty memories, dawn tears. I love this piece.

The Smiths - Please, please, please let me get what I want. The Smiths. Morrissey. Hero of many a lonely bedsit. The first and the best Smiths miserable songs. Oh how I used to put this on repeat!

Guns n Roses - November Rain - Sad. Sad. The shining flame that was GnR came up with a handful of classics but this one... Man... I remember 1991/2. I lived it. Everything was raw. Real. First time. Beautiful song.

Blur - Miss America. My secret. 1994. That was a year!

A-ha - You'll Never Get Over Me. From their flawless comeback album - Major Sky, Minor Earth. Beautiful. From the masters of melancholy a late career fightback. Check out the counterpoint melody.

Abba - The Winner Takes it All. Fuck this is sad. The best Abba song for sadness. The way Agneta says 'but you see' and then holds that high note on the last chorus just breaks your heart. One of my top ten records ever.

Van Morrison - Beside You. Well, I've mentioned this already. Just perfect. Fucking perfect. If you want to blub and think about what might have been and what used to be, then this is your song. Perfection.

The Eurythmics - Savage. I've written a full blog post on this song. It breaths. Annie is always the master of melancholy. But the guitar solo! Less is more. Stunning.... Yeah... Let's move on!

Elgar - Nimrod. Yeah, I've already mentioned this but, when I'm feeling sad - the power, the majesty and uplift of this piece always makes me feel better. Shake the house with this one and shake away the blues!

Everything but the Girl - On My Mind. Before they were famous... Private. Memories... A story told a thousand times but never with a happy ending. A different era. Different times. See the video below.

Elton John - Sad Songs. Not his best song but - hell - Bernie describes this feeling of sadness so perfectly! A more authentic song would be Sacrifice. I used to play this in a studio only group in 1994. Happy memories. Things mattered. Ultimately, we didn't.

Dry your tears. Tomorrow can always be better!

Tim

When I was in service in Rosemary Lane

Other than the homegrown Lisa Stansfield concerts I went to in the mid 80's - about which I've written before - Steeleye Span at the Manchester Apollo was one of my first ever 'gigs'. Young Tim loved the folkie sound! Simon and Garkunkel have to be top five for me. I love British / American folk music. It often gets characterised as twats with beards, beer bellies, fingers in their ears singing about sailors and shady ladies!

Which is basically what Rosemary Lane is about. Actually, I had the privilege of seeing the late, great, Bert Jansch live in concert in Brighton in 1990's. He didn't do Rosemary Lane. Bastard.

I've often thought that it would make a great book or film to depict the British folk scene in the mid-60's. The scene that created Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span, Pentangle, John Renbourne, Jackson C Frank, Simon and Garfunkel, and loads of others. They all knew each other, played in the same places, did versions of the same songs. Nicked each other's guitar style.

So let me be your guide though some the highlights of the great folk boom of the 60's / 70's - which probably reached its apogee with Sandy Denny duetting with Led Zeppelin on The Battle of Evermore - a crossover folk rock song like no other. The mighty Zep did what they did with the blues - amped up the power, took what's best in the genre, co-opted the best female folk voice ever, and created the folk hammer of the gods.

Anyway - here's Tim's top 10 acoustic / folkie / whatever list.

Top Ten Folkie / Acoustic Music

1) Bert Jansch - Rosemary Lane (1971)

2) Fairport Convention - Who Knows Where the Time Goes

3) Steeleye Span - All Around my Hat

4) Martin Carthy - Scarborough Fair

5) Simon & Garfunkel - Bleecker Street

6) Van Morrison - Beside You

7) Gordon Lightfoot - In the Early Morning Rain

8) Pentangle - Light Flight

9) Renaissance - The Northern Lights

10) Jackson C Frank - Blues Run the Game

Number 6 also appears on my top ten songs ever. I could pick half a dozen Paul Simon songs for this list but I limited myself to one.

Extra Waffle about Bert Jansch

One of the most influential guitarists ever to come out of Britain. Solo artist, part of the folk supergroup Pentangle and then back to solo again. Jansch seems a genuinely nice, self-effacing guy, as I can recall when I saw him back in the 90's. Needle of Death, from his first album, is such a sad song, tear-jerking even now, and as empathetic a song as I've ever heard. It Don't Bother Me, from his second album, is classic Bert - folkie, intricate guitar figures, detailing love's woes. But I'll plump for Rosemary Lane. Traditional song, rendered traditionally, this was the first folk song - after Steeleye Span - to really get to me. It details the seduction of an innocent servant girl by a travelling sailor. He loves and then leaves. Jansch's version - like Dylan's House of the Rising Sun - reverses the sexes, he sings from a female point of view. Love this song. Bert Jansch - a great soul who died in 2011 - the guitarist's guitar player.

From the BBC special c.'70. Enjoy.

Renbourne left and Jansch right. Scat singing. A bit of jazz, a bit of blues, some folk and a whole lot of soul.

Sad Songs Say So Much

A Little Bit of Folk