A good song for when you're down

[aadel]

I Have A Dream


I have a dream,
a song to sing,
to help me cope with anything.
If you see the wonder of a fairy tale,
you can take the future even if you fail.

I believe in angels,
something good in everything I see;
I believe in angels.
When I know the time is right for me,
I’ll cross the stream,
I have a dream.

I have a dream, a fantasy,
to help me through reality;
and my destination makes it worth the while,
pushing through the darkness, singing all the while.

I believe in angels,
something good in everything I see;
I believe in angels.
When I know the time is right for me,
I’ll cross the stream,
I have a dream.

[ILADVOCATE]

Like the music but not the last sentence. If someone feels that depressed, depressive music is not something to get into. I think what's more important to think about at times of extreme depression is people who were musicians in real life who survived depression and came back. I could think of within indie rock, which is not a genre most people are into here, the singer Kristin Hersh and the song "Your Ghost" (with Michael Stipe from R.E.M. guesting on vocals) which is a very depressing song but something she coped with in real life and recovered (with treatment) or for a more familiar singer Fiona Apple (under treatment for ocd). Can't think of a song offhand. Like the album "White Chalk" by P.J. Harvey but don't know if its from personal experience but it has the theme of surviving a tragedy to me. Perhaps there are more familiar figures people could think of that have survived depression or bipolar and made a public statement about it. As for Van Morrison like "Astral Weeks" and as for depressing but humanistic off his first album "T. B. Sheets" which is about the real life death of his girlfriend but has a feeling of mourning not nihilism. Music that is depressing if you are really going through it should end on a note of taking you out of it. Even the Cure, whom I like, did one song that was anti-suicide and not all their music was depressing, some of their later stuff the opposite.

[edmfender]

If I had to pick four songs for four moods:
Moondance by Van Morrison: good moods
Tapestry by Carol King: reflective
Body is a Wonderland by John Mayer: other stuff
Anything by Leonard Cohen: music to slit your wrists by

[dippy1]

Boomtown Rats "I Don't like Mondays" was my first ever record. Soon followed by the Queen album, "Jazz"

I find nowadays I'm finding new insight into many old favourites..a lot of meanings/depth I missed first time around. Maybe I was too superficial in earlier times :-)

[bernie40]

I tend to turn to Joan Armatrading, Dido, David Gray and Tracey Chapman when I'm feeling blue.  Beverley Craven's song words rip my heart wide open so I can't listen to her anymore.

For calming I listen to all those listed already, lol.  

For more upbeat then its a lot of the 80's plus more recent stuff like Scissor Sisters, Faithless (their song Insomnia is relevant when feeling a little dark), Born Slippy's Underworld.

On a more general note I like music that tells a story both with the words and the notes.

I loved Pink Floyd as a teen, "Another Brick in the Wall" and Boomtown Rat's "Tell Me Why I don't like Mondays" always take me back to my teenage rebellion..... don't think I've grown up yet actually!

NB.  I've missd out loads but then it would need a whole website to list everything ;-)

[monkeyc]

Oh love Nick Drake - my ipod has his entire works on it, something so beautiful about his work and yet so fragile -  I love One of these Things First and Time of No Reply but its black eyed dog that I find so calming.

I love The Wall, its an album that speaks to me. And yes I grew up angry with the world, thats why i moved into punk later on perhaps?  (Dead Kennedys still spend a lot of time on rotation and love Iggy and The Stooges.. there's a crazy man)

Right now Im just deeply depressed but working so I am stuck on smooth jazz and the like for neutral mind work - Diana Krall at the moment and some Norah Jones - that seems to work to cocoon my mind when I need to work.

[ILADVOCATE]

More along my lines. I like to listen to something depressing such as anything by Nick Drake or Syd Barrett and work those feelings out. Then having gotten over them I move on. I tend to listen to cheerier music when I am hypomanic. Its only recently after recovery from psychosis that I am aware of it but the music I listen to matches the affect I am in. As for Pink Floyd I know as a kid growing up, that half of the kids when they felt angry at the world listened to "The Wall". And myself punk rock. I know specific songs or groups might be more of a light discussion but I feel music is also good for channeling negative emotions. When I've come to terms with them I understand them better afterwards.

[monkeyc]

Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd from the wall.

Ive used it as a mantra for a long time when I get depressed and its soothing, no idea why but it works for me.

[aadel]

I think you'r right about ABBA.  The version I had in mind, though, was by Melinda Mercouri, and if it wasn't her, it must have been Nana Mouskouri.  Don't really know; it's all Greek to me!

[bernie40]

Isn't that Abba??

Very sweet :-)