Songs about unrequited love
 

I'm drinking and trying to forget someone...I figure the best thing to do is wallow all weekend and start fresh on monday, so that I get everything out of my system.

So far all I have is:

Bonnie Raitt - I Can't Make You Love Me
Beautiful South - Don't Marry Her (F*** Me)
Bjork - I've Seen it All
Dashboard Confessional - Screaming Infidelities (actually probably most of The Swiss Army Romance)
Elliott Smith - Miss Misery
Evanescence - My Immortal
Kings of Convenience - Winning a Battle, Losing the War
Lifehouse - Everything
Moxy Fruvous - Fly
Radiohead - True Love Waits

That's all I have so far. Thanks for aiding and abetting.

Time for another whisky.

I feel for you. I went through something similar just recently as well.

Here's some I can recommend:

Pete Yorn - Lose You
Coldplay - The Scientist
Garbage - Cup of Coffee
Jeff Buckley - Last Goodbye
REM - Find the River
The Smiths - How Soon is Now
The Smiths - That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore
Year of the Rabbit - Say Goodbye

Aargh, there are soooo many... where to start:

Elliott Smith - "I Didn't Understand"
Matthew Ryan - Basically the entire "May Day" album, especially "Irrelevant"
Pearl Jam - "Black"
Vertical Horizon - "I'm Still Here"
3 Doors Down - "Here Without You"
Dashboard Confessional (GOOD choice, btw) - you name it, e.g. "Rapid Hope Loss", ah, every song will do.
Matchbox20 - "Rest Stop"
Staind - "Outside", "Epiphany", "I's Been A While"
Smashing Pumpkins - "Bodies"

or, if you want to feel better abou yourself, try "Everything Ends" by Slipknot.

These are the ones that just ran through my head, I bet I missed about 1 million. More later.

Cheers,
custom

Derek and the Dominoes - Layla and other Assorted Love Songs

It's an entire album about unrequited love (recorded when Eric Clapton was deeply in love with his best friend's wife, Patti Harrison).

And I'll second 'Black' by Pearl Jam, the best song of the past 15 years.

Dashboard Confessional "Screaming Infidelities"

Smokey Robinson "Tracks of My Tears"

10cc "I'm not In Love"

Alanis Morissette "Hands Clean"

Billy Bragg "Walk Away Renee"

Jet "Look What You've Done"

Many songs from Chris Isaak, including "Forever Blue" and "Somebody's Crying"
The Band - "It Makes No Difference"
The Tony Rich Project - "Nobody Knows"
The Corrs - "What Can I Do"
John Waite - "Missing You"

When I'm in that mood I always listen to Pearl Jams Black, Release, Immortality, and Nothing man. Not that they all have to do with that stuff, but I'm pretty sure Black does.


Quite a few Smashing Pumpkins tracks as well. Check out most stuff from Gish and Siamese Dream.

The Corrs "No Good For Me" and "Heaven Knows".

"If You're Not the One" by Daniel Bedingfield

My ex played this for me and it made me cry for days.

Eminem - Stan

Ray Charles - "You don't know me"

Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - I See a Darkness

While I haven't heard EVERY song from the last 5 years, I've heard a damn good share nonetheless... and this has got to one of, if not the best song written since its release in 1999. While it's not neccessarily about a woman, it can/will be if you want it to. Johnny Cash covered it, what more can you ask for?

Better Than Ezra - "Live Again"

Michael Jackson - You Are Not Alone
Madonna - The Power Of Goodbye
KoRn - Falling Away From Me
Bush - Let The Cables Sleep
Devo - Whip It
Michael Jackson - Beat It

Great song, but it's about finding out a good friend has AIDS; nothing to do with unrequited love...

DOH! My mind must of wondered. Yes, great song, but wouldn't do jack for you after a break up. On the other hand, "Beat It" will suffice.

Billy Bragg - The Saturday Boy.

One of the best songs about unrequited love. Ever.

Pearl Jam - I Got Id (Or I Got Shit depending on the source)

A Good Year For The Roses by Elvis Costello always depresses the shit out of me!

T

My all time favorite dumped song:
"Standing in the Rain" by Husker Du

Best Sad Sap but Not Neccessarily Dumped song:
"Hazy Jane I" by Nick Drake

Then I recommend repeatedly blasting loud cock rock like:
"Here I Go Again" by Whitesnake
"Heartbreaker" by Led Zeppelin
"Foolin'" by Def Leppard

...that will set you straight.

Goo Goo Dolls - "Here Is Gone", "It's Over"
God Lives Underwater - "All Wrong", "No More Love", "23" (basically the entire "Empty" album")

"Two out of Three Ain't Bad" - Meatloaf

"In the end it took me a dictionary to find out the meaning of 'unrequited'"

Absolutely. The first song I thought of when I saw this thread.

BTW, Bragg was not the original artist to perform "Walk Away, Renee". It was a very popular hit in the late 60s by a band called the Left Banke.

I'm not sure about unrequited love, but if you're trying to forget someone, you could replay "Cup of Coffee" a million times, it gets the feeling just right.

I'm just remembering some of my old breakup/heartbreak songs. I can remember sitting on my floor rewinding, Cry Like This by Blue Room (from the Some Kind of Wonderful Soundtrack) for hours at a time.

For some R&B tears

One Last Cry - Brian McKnight
I Don't Wanna Cry - Mariah Carey

You guys realize that, if we end up listing every song written on this subject, this will become the longest thread in the history of the forum. I wouldn't be surprised if 25% of all the songs written in the last century deal with unrequited love. What's next, we list every blues song in E major?

Sure, but there are songs that truly capture the agnst of being heartbroken. I wouldn't put Cup of Coffee and How Soon Is Now and in the same league as some of the others. Bonnie Raitt's, I Can't Make You Love Me totally described how I felt when I was dumped by a particular person.

Heck, I wouldn't put those two in the same league as my other two choices, but those were songs I personally had heartbreaks with and cried with.

"Noodlebrain" - The Queers

"Passin' Me By" - The Pharcyde (a classic)
"Death Valley Queen" - Flogging Molly
"You Don't Love Me" - Matthew Sweet
"Oh, Godamnit" - Hot Hot Heat
"Hardly" - Hayden

And when you want to move on...
"Pep Talk" - Descendents