The saddest song of the 1960s, according to science
When you think about the music that epitomised the 1960s, your brain might automatically jump to ‘flower power’, sunshine pop and a carefree joviality. A large amount of the music produced during the decade was bright, and reflected of the softening attitudes towards conservative and traditional values. Pop music was peppered with a sense of wonder and revelry, but beneath the surface, things weren’t all rosy.
It was, in fact, a turbulent decade, with the Cold War raging on in the background and the US involvement in Vietnam being at the forefront of many people’s concerns. On home soil, there was also the emergence of the Civil Rights movement, which saw ordinary people campaigning for the introduction of equal rights for Black Americans, but new legislation didn’t come without bloodshed and impassioned protest from the public.
Many of the songs released during the decade shone a light on the atrocities of war and racial tensions, attempting to use their platform to spread a positive message of hope for all of the negative current affairs to resolve. For all of the psychedelic bliss that acts were imposing on listeners, there was an equal amount of anguish and sadness in the music of the decade.
However, what does sadness truly sound like? It can be something that’s reflected in the lyrics of a song, expressing these feelings of remorse, pain and despair in poetic fashion, or it can be captured in the mood of the instrumental arrangements, with mournful strings being a common example of an instrumental choice that sours the vibes. There’s a lot to be said about a chord sequence being structured in a way that evokes a feeling of melancholy, and it takes an ingenious songwriter to be able to weave such a weighty emotion into their music.
A song that wonderfully captures the catharsis of allowing yourself to grieve and express negative emotions from the 1960s is Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘The Sound of Silence’; a track so haunting and lamentful that it’s impossible to listen to without getting wet around the eyes. There’s a lot to be said about the psychological aspect of sadness and how it can arise in people through a reaction to art, but what the folk duo managed to capture with this song is pure, unadulterated sorrow.
The song’s meaning is often debated, with some attesting that it is a simple portrayal of experiencing emotional disconnect and crying for help in an attempt to have your feelings acknowledged, while others believe that it having been written in the wake of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination was meant to reflect the societal mourning experienced in response to the tragedy.
Either way, the lyrics, such as the iconic opening line, “Hello darkness, my old friend / I’ve come to talk with you again”, “my words, like silent raindrops, fell”, and “I turned my collar to the cold and damp / when my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light” all capture a dour mood that is suggestive of hopelessness and desolation. This is expertly reflected in the breathy tones of Art Garfunkel, who sounds as though he’s often on the verge of tears himself during performances.
Not only is it a lyrically despairing song, but the composition from Paul Simon is just as downcast, with the minor chords never being resolved, keeping the listener hanging in a listless malaise and the sparse production reflecting the emptiness of the heart from which Garfunkel is pouring his emotions out. Simon and Garfunkel may have better songs, but none are quite as evocative as ‘The Sound of Silence’, and the way in which it triggers the same sense of misery in the listener is surely enough to secure its place as the saddest song the decade produced.
