We’re listening to songs about crying this week on A Symposium of Popular Songs, and there are so many of them that I’m only playing artists I’ve never played on the show before. Send me your song recommendations at symposiumofsongs@gmail.com!
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0:00
Jackie Wilson, “Lonely Teardrops” (Lonely Teardrops, 1959)
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4:23
Quintette du Hot Club de France, “Tears” (single, 1937)
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8:03
Reading: Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Tears, Idle Tears”
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10:05
Muddy Waters, “Screamin’ and Cryin’” (After the Rain, 1969)
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15:04
New Radicals, “Crying Like a Church on Monday” (Maybe You’ve Been Brainwashed Too, 1998)
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21:23
Bright Blue, “Weeping” (The Rising Tide, 1988)
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25:20
The Police, “Driven to Tears” (Zenyatta Mondatta, 1980)
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28:45
Reading: Edna St. Vincent Millay, “An Ancient Gesture”
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30:37
Billie Holiday, “Willow, Weep for Me” (Lady Sings the Blues, 1959)
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33:43
Billy Bragg, “Levi Stubbs’ Tears” (Talking with the Taxman About Poetry, 1986)
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37:38
Charles Bukowski, “Bluebird”
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39:00
The Hold Steady, “Carlos Is Crying” (The Price of Progress, 2023)
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42:42
Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, “The Tears of a Clown” (Make It Happen, 1967)
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45:37
Elvis Costello, “American Without Tears” (King of America, 1986)
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51:06
Clip: The Office (“The Whale”)
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51:46
Bob Marley and The Wailers, “No Woman, No Cry [London, 1975]” (Live!, 1975)
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59:09
Ruth Brown, “Teardrops from My Eyes” (single, 1949)
