Free Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life by Steve Almond Page A

significant. I was twenty-one years old.
    As for “We’ve Never Met” by Neko Case, I can’t listen to that one without drowning in the anguish of my first year in Boston, getting dumped by women who were only doing what I asked them to do, which is why I listen to it
all the time
. That weepy steel guitar and Neko’s velvety alto and Ron Sexsmith’s whispered harmonies. It sounds exactly like what I always wish Patsy Cline will sound like, but never does.
You were golden and I was blind, now it’s like we’ve never met
. I have yet to find a better definition of unrequited love.
All the Lonely People
    These examples all derive from the predominant genre of Depression Songs, the Heartbreak Song, to which we might add several thousandwithout much effort, including “Tired of Being Alone” by Al Green, “The Sun Is Gonna Shine” by Aretha, and “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue.” Have I forgotten one? Oh yes, “Missing You” by John Waite.
    Not every Heartbreak Song is a Depression Song. “Song for the Dumped” by Ben Folds offers the exuberant refrain, “Give me my money back, you bitch.” It’s not designed to bum us out, but to make us laugh (a bit ruefully) at the rage we throw in the face of rejection.
    Depression Songs actually work better when they’re about something other than depression. This is why “Eleanor Rigby” is so much more compelling than “Yesterday.” Paul McCartney found a story, with actual characters who were able to personify a condition of solitude, whereas “Yesterday” is really just Paul whining.
    “Eleanor Rigby” also has a more ambitious arrangement. George Martin recognized the song’s symphonic possibilities: the constricted moan of those strings, the rueful countermelody of the cellos, the squall of the single violin that trembles across the chorus. These decisions don’t just contribute to the mood of collective isolation; they
are
the mood.
    On the other hand, one of the best Depression Songs of recent years, “Down the Line” by José González (an Argentine based, confusingly, in Sweden), includes nothing more than a voice, a couple of guitars, and a drum loop. González has a delicate voice, and he seems to be addressing a friend about an impending breakdown. But he chops at his guitar with a nervous urgency, and the melody keeps struggling against its own foreboding. “Don’t let the darkness eat you up,” González sings over and over at the end of the song, and you want to believe his pal is going to be all right but you also know, without wanting to, that he’s not, and that González knows he’s not. It’s a song about trying to save the unsavable, and it about ruins me every time I hear it.
    On the other side of the coin is “Dance Music” by the MountainGoats. The song is two minutes long, with a peppy piano riff. It’s the kind of ditty that would make Trent Reznor break out in hives. But it’s actually way sadder than anything Reznor has ever written because John Darnielle, the singer, has the guts to reveal the tragedies of his life without hiding behind enraged slogans. He recounts a scene in which his stepfather throws a glass at his mother’s head. Darnielle then dashes upstairs and leans in close to the record player on the floor. “So this is what the volume knob’s for,” he sings. “I listen to dance music.” It’s a Depression Song about why people need happy music.
    Reluctant Exegesis:
“Fade to Black”
    This section started out as a lengthy riff mocking the lyrical shortcomings of Metallica, as well as depressed teenagers who play Dungeons and Dragons. This is pretty asinine behavior, in particular when you happen to be married to an ex-D&D geek who, at sixteen, learned the entire lead guitar part (solos included) to “Fade to Black.”
    I wasn’t aware of this last fact, because my wife avoids talking about her teenage years. It’s a painful subject even now, though I didn’t realize how painful until she read