Well that’s it. It’s all over. I knew we were getting there but I didn’t know we were there, parked and unpacked already. Men are officially complete wusses. (Is that how you spell wusses?)
We’ve gone from John Wayne and Gregory Peck being male role models to Michael Cera and Seth Rogen in just a few generations. Folks, that ain’t improvement.
There’s so much wrong with this story that I don’t even know where to begin. A newspaper in Britain compiled a list of songs that make men cry. OK. What kind of man responds to such an inquiry from a stranger with a notepad. Secondly, the song that topped the chart was…I can’t even write it for shame of counting myself among the same gender as these “men.” They picked…I can’t tell you. It’s too terrible. I’ll just cut and paste it in because I can’t even write it.
The UK Sun reports:
EVERYBODY Hurts by REM is the song most likely to make grown men cry.
Look I understand that the visage of increasingly skeletal Michael Stipes would frighten many people but I don’t know if there’s anything Michael Stipes could do to make me cry. I’d imagine it would have to involve rubber hammers, a monkey wrench, tasers, and rope though.
Some of the other songs included Sinead O’Connor’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” and U2’s “With or Without You.”
What? Did they forget the soothing but melancholic tones of Air Supply?
I personally had my tear ducts removed by a school nurse I paid under the table in the second grade. No anaesthesia. So I don’t even know from this crying thing you speak of…but…if there HAD TO BE such a list there are probably a few songs that could conceivably be on the list.
Danny Boy
Ave Maria
I’m Proud to be An American by Lee Greenwood
That country song about the kid buying shoes for his dying mother. I don’t know the name because I turn it off every time I hear it. (I don’t want to be emotional while driving.)
The Star Spangled Banner.
Bagpipes playing Amazing Grace.
You got any additions?
September 29, 2010 at 6:16 pm
This made me laugh! I absolutely agree with your list of songs. Well, except the one with the shoes. It's a little sappy for me. I might add "Oh, Holy Night" to your list. Gets me every time.
September 29, 2010 at 6:24 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LynZIqb0Hs
Man! I can't even watch the video:(
September 29, 2010 at 6:25 pm
The shoe song IS totally sappy, and it still makes me BAWL every time I hear it. But then I used to cry at the AT&T commercials on TV near the holidays…and when people won big on game shows…and so on.
Matthew, here's a link to test those missing tear ducts…"What Love Really Means" by JJ Heller. Don't know if we're supposed to do links here, so feel free to take it down if you don't want it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgGUKWiw7Wk
(I changed my profile name so as not to be confused with the other Lori that posts here a lot, as well…I would hate for someone to think one of my goofy posts was hers, as she's a bit more erudite than I)
September 29, 2010 at 6:25 pm
Update: I am forcing myself to watch the above video and my son "Fred" comes in and stands for a moment before going "wow Mom! That cake looks delcious!!!"
LOL!
September 29, 2010 at 6:30 pm
The Gregorian Chant In Paradisum, sung as the corpse is transported out of the Church.
September 29, 2010 at 6:31 pm
Maybe the song makes men cry because it's so awful… I might consider being forced to listen to that song as a form of torture banned under the Geneva Convention…
September 29, 2010 at 6:37 pm
Barber's own choral transcription of his "Adagio for Strings", "Agnus Dei".
Also, this one, if I may. ("A Voice in Rama")
Gerry
September 29, 2010 at 6:47 pm
When I posted this http://divine-ripples.blogspot.com/2009/10/vid-if-you-underaged-daughter-gets.html
at Catholic Dads, I got 3 remarks from dads who were moved to tears. So, I double dog dare any dad with a daughter to view this and say that he did not shed a tear – unless of course those glands were surgically ripped off without anesthesia.
September 29, 2010 at 6:50 pm
Wow, solid list. I also find that the shoe song makes me cry, until the later parts where it gets too sappy.
For some reason, Craig Morgan's "This Ain't Nothing" jerks a tear or two every time I hear it.
September 29, 2010 at 7:02 pm
"The Leader of the Band". Makes me cry every time. Can't listen to the whole song.
September 29, 2010 at 7:02 pm
I live in Chicago, on the Near North Side, not far from a neighborhood called Boystown. Back in 1992, when "Everybody Hurts" came out I had probably half-a-dozen friends with AIDS. They're all dead now. Back then, on Thursday afternoons, I would pick up the gay newspaper and scan the obituaries. There was probably a fifty/fifty chance that I knew, or did business with, or had seen around the neighborhood, someone who had recently died. Some weeks I would recognize two names. "Everybody Hurts" is the funeral dirge of the AIDS crisis.
Maybe those weren't Plague Years for you, but they were for me.
September 29, 2010 at 7:41 pm
The Battle Hymn of the Republic.
And at least two songs from Les Miserables. (Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, and the one at the end when Fantine's spirit lead's Val Jean out of this world.) What?
September 29, 2010 at 7:47 pm
After reading Dutchman's comment I feel really horrible about writing this. I hope he will forgive me. But when I read it was number one I gave a little chuckle because I sing this too my toddler all the time. Of course I change the words to "Everybody poops. Sometimes Everybody pees. Everybody poops sooommmetimes."
September 29, 2010 at 7:49 pm
"Flowers of Scotland" gets me every time. (The version by the Clancy Brothers; it's the only version I've ever heard.)
The song is simultaneously filled with a sorrowful longing for past glory and a deep hope-filled belief in a resurgent future.
September 29, 2010 at 7:52 pm
Non-Crying Melancholic Honorable Mentions:
Cat's in the Cradle
Jerusalem of Gold (Included on Schindler's List Soundtrack)
Martyrs and Thieves (Jennifer Knapp)
btw: Typo above in my handle. 5 should be 4.
September 29, 2010 at 7:56 pm
The Office Fans: Dwight plays this in his car when Michael dumps him for the temp.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzI5hPVYGOc
September 29, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Definitely the "In Paradisum," and also: Libera Me; Salve Regina (long form, if done right); Veni Redemptor Gentium; Veni, Veni Emmanuel; Natus Ante Saecula; Summi Triumphum Regis; and the Exsultet (from the Paschal Vigil). Also, the hymn "At the Beauty of Thy Virginity," third tone, from the Eastern Rite. But these all bring tears to my eyes for primarily happy and spiritual reasons.
If you're talking about songs that just make for a bit of (mostly) emotional weeping: The Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde; The Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony; Barber's Adagio for Strings (aka Agnus Dei); Tschaikovsky's 6th Symphony (the last movement); The third movement of Beethoven's String Quartet in a minor, op. 132, entitled "Heilige Dankgesang eines Genesenen an die Gottheit" ("A Convalescent's Holy Hymn of Thanks to the Godhead" – the only time at a public concert where most of the people in the audience were weeping with me); the last movement of Beethoven's 6th Symphony ("Pastoral") can bring tears of joy; finally, the sublime and perfect Adagio from Mozart's piano concerto 23 in A Major, (K488).
I guess there's one I almost hesitate to mention: the Larghetto of Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D Major… the piece can be unimpressive and boring if performed perfunctorily. But, if close attention is paid (by performers and listeners), it can really come alive with tremendous depth and pathos… a good cadence from the soloist, especially, can help tie it all together. You won't bawl, but a few tears of gratitude can flow with ease.
Also, "O Danny Boy," "O Flower of Scotland" and "Greensleeves."
I don't think it's unmanly to cry – I think beauty, sorrow, etc., should make a noble man cry. That's the question: *what* makes us cry? If lousy pop songs do us in, we are effeminate panty-waists who need to be beaten until tough. If we bawl while Brittany sings that she's no longer a girl, not yet a woman, we should be forced to chew glass until we are no longer wusses, but not yet Navy Seals. But, if a beautiful chant or great piece of music elicits our tears, that actually makes us *more manly* than men who shut themselves off to such sublimity out of fear or ignorance. The father who can't sit and listen to a masterpiece of music, and let his son see him shed a few tears over its greatness, hasn't taught his son how to be a man. Of course, he should teach him how to *not* cry when he's scared, and to be brave enough to stand up for himself, for others and for the good, too. I.e., he should teach his son to cry when that is the noble thing, to not be a wuss at any time, and to keep a stiff upper lip in spite of himself, when that is the noble thing.
September 29, 2010 at 8:01 pm
Backstory: the linked song was my Grandma's favorite. She lived with us my whole life, and when she had her stroke and was in the home, she asked me to play this at her funeral.
Shoot, I'm crying just thinking about it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzzqhaLl_8w
September 29, 2010 at 8:15 pm
Ever since 9/11, the third stanza of "America the Beautiful" brings me to tears.
O beautiful for heroes prov'd
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life.
America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness,
And ev'ry gain divine.
September 29, 2010 at 8:45 pm
It's funny but no song ever made me cry. My Dad's death did. A good friend who had a really serious asthma attack and died as a result, yeah. But a song? Different strokes, I suppose.