Songs That Tell a Story

Peter Seeley: Rodin’s “Belle Heauimiere” is a statue of an aged beauty.

• Edward James +2 — Thank you Peter Seeley. What a gem. How did this man create so many bangers in his short life?
• Joseph Harvey +2 — Staggeringly beautiful
• fionmul +1 — I love Stan
• Sam Ary +1
• Regina Scime +1
• Claire 0 — I love this song. But I’m gonna be really pedantic here and say that this feels more like a vignette than a story properly speaking
• judd.baker -1 — Beautiful but it’s giving me, out of all those assembled here, the least impression of narrative

• SamRobertsND +1
• Edward James +1 — I smile warmly at the idea of Joseph getting to this and then realizing with dawning horror that it's actually an 80s Bob Dylan song.
• Sam Ary +1
• judd.baker +1 — Sick
• shea nowicki +1
• Claire 0 — It’s fine. Didn’t knock my socks off. Sorry Bob
• Joseph Harvey 0 — This was hard to listen to after Stan

• ared56 +1
• SamRobertsND +1
• Edward James +1 — Not gonna lie this is a gimmicky pick and it totally got me. Used to watch this with my family in the mid 2000s and you caught me at the perfect moment to capitalize on that nostalgia.
• Claire +1 — Okay this is clever and fun
• Regina Scime +1 — Iconic
• fionmul 0 — Not into it
• Joseph Harvey 0 — Couldn’t focus

• Peter Seeley +1 — The song of my people
• Claire +1 — Classic story song. I didn’t initially want to vote for it bc it’s an obvious pick but in terms of telling a good story it does make the top 4 for me
• fionmul +1
• Sam Ary +1
• Regina Scime +1 — Classic
• Edward James 0 — I hate Eagles man
• Joseph Harvey 0 — “We haven’t had that spirit here since 1969” is like us talking about 2019.
• ared56 -1

• ared56 +1 —
• SamRobertsND +1
• fionmul +1 — Love
• shea nowicki +1
• Peter Seeley 0 — The skaters were the gamers of their day, but never developed class consciousness. As such they faced discrimination without a coherent political movement to combat it. In this essay I will examine how the works of Lavigne display this class tensions while failing to address the inherent contradictions in the system that led to such heartless discrimination.
• Edward James 0 — Absolute classic, and would never have actually thought of it as a story, but mostly since I've been hearing it endlessly since I was a child.
• Claire 0 — I wanted to go with this one because it has multiple levels of storytelling—the fictional character who’s supposedly singing the song is herself writing a song to tell a story, down to the opening line acknowledging the cliche framing
• Sam Ary -1

• ared56 +1
• SamRobertsND +1
• judd.baker +1
• Edward James 0 — I know this is Irish, but side note - Jake Xerxes Fussell is discovering/documenting forgotten American folk music in a way no one has done since the 70s, American gem
• Claire 0 — No shade to St Brendan but I find this one kinda corny

• Claire +1 — One reason this is an interesting pick is that it gets a bit “meta” with the story bit—the song is not only telling a story in the sense of talking about a sequence of events but also self consciously framing itself as a story
• Joseph Harvey +1 — Extremely creative and enjoyable listen
• shea nowicki +1
• Peter Seeley 0 — Kill it with fire
• Edward James 0 — I liked this a lot but it's not narrative!

Joseph Harvey: This will get no votes but this is a cool and subtle narrative song that was the first to come to mind for me

• Peter Seeley +2 — Thanks Joe
• Regina Scime +1
• Claire 0 — Musically super cool song but to be honest the story is just okay
• Edward James -1 — I didn't find this very narratively compelling...not really a story song. And I also thought it was just an alright song.

• Joseph Harvey +1 — As one who understands the mysterious kinship between man and machine, this speaks to me
• judd.baker +1 — I really like this one as a submission and love this story song, although this is not my favorite version. This resurrected a memory for me of hearing this song in college and I’m kicking myself that I can’t remember which version it was that I heard then.
• shea nowicki +1
• Edward James 0 — Don't like these characters.
• Claire 0 — Well this is sad
• fionmul 0 — Ugh I just love this song. “Red hair and black leather, my favorite color scheme”
• Regina Scime 0 — Freaking sad
• Peter Seeley -1 — Down voting because they took a masterpiece and made it meh You don't do that to my habibi Richard Thompson

• Peter Seeley +1 — I strongly dislike Irish nationalism, but this is a baller song.
• fionmul +1 — Chieftains and sinead is the only licit version of this for me but I appreciate an Irish song being here
• Sam Ary +1
• Edward James 0 — Didn't really strike me tbh. I think the style just doesn't really stand out to me.
• Joseph Harvey 0 — Trying to do too much, no emotional punch. The delivery doesn’t help
• Claire -1 — I guess this technically tells a story in the sense that it talks about an event that happened but it just doesn’t feel like a *story.* idk quite how to articulate it. Not really a unified narrative with beginning, middle, end

• ared56 +1
• Claire +1 — I wish I were brave enough to submit this absolute masterpiece
• judd.baker +1 — Asked why he did not approve of the use of the n-word, The Poet once said: “A Hispanic guy said it to me once, and I didn’t like that.”
• Peter Seeley 0 — Earthy lad, that Afroman
• Edward James 0 — Absolutely insane move to submit this. Bonkers, raving mad. Can't downvote simply because of that audacity, even though it deserves it. I haven't heard this all the way through since high school when it was played in a van full of high school guys and I intend to never hear it fully again. The chorus is so insanely good though and I like to listen to that part from time to time.
• SamRobertsND -1
• fionmul -1
• Joseph Harvey -1 — Too explicit for me to consider
• shea nowicki -1
• Regina Scime -1 — I wish I had never read those lyrics