The Most Depressing Song Of All Time

WITHOUT YOU

Over the course of a year I’ve been writing about the 100 most depressing love songs of all time, so if you haven’t killed yourself by now or maybe want that suicidal three minute tune to set you running for the nearest noose then you might want to read the following.

‘Without You’, a song made famous by Harry Nilsson, strangled by Maria Carey and murdered for good measure by Celine Dion is without doubt the saddest song devoted to love in the history of music.

Over the top?  .... Read on.

The song was originally recorded by English group Badfinger, made up of Pete Ham, Ron Griffiths, Mike Gibbins and Tom Evans. The song was first released off their 1970 album ‘No Dice’ (the tune has since go onto be recorded by almost 200 artists). The group’s main songwriters Evans & Ham created the hit, both from previous relationships that had broken down. Ham’s verse was ‘warm, sweet and sentimental, whilst Evans chorus ‘intense, dramatic and heartbreaking’, (Paul McCartney would later remark it was ‘the killer song of all time’). However the group never released ‘Without You’ in Europe or America, using it as a filler on Side A of ‘No Dice’ (it belatedly was released to a tepid response in Japan)

                                American songwriter Harry Nilsson came across ‘Without You’ at a party, mistaking it for a Beatles tune – allegedly being quoted ‘They sure know how to pick a tune’

before recording it himself. The song was an immediate hit, topping the charts in America for four weeks and spending a further five ironically in the UK. Though the song won Ham & Evans an Ivor Novello award for ‘Song of the year’, that’s about as good as it got for the group and things soon took a turn for the worse.

The group at the time were managed by an American business man called Stan Polley, who immediately signed the band to various contracts and dictated all earnings from tours, royalties and personal appearances would go into ‘Badfinger Enterprises’ however the group over time would be ripped-off by Polley’s dubious financial activities.

                   The group continued to have moderate success in the UK & US, were they were constantly reminded of Nilsson no.1 million-selling version.

Ripped off by Polley, and later by Warner Bros., were the group lost almost everything in legal disputes, guitarist and songwriter Pete Ham hung himself in his garage in April 1975, leaving behind a suicide note blaming their former manager Polley for everything. That night he had drank ten whiskey’s with his best friend and fellow band member Tom Evans before going home to take his life.

He was just 27 years old.

The repercussions of the act would never leave Evans.

The group disbanded for a number of years before a reunion in 1983. Times had changed and the bands following had dwindled.

On the night of November 18^th 1983, after a heated argument with fellow band-members over a phone call, Tom Evans hung himself in the garden of his home. The royalties of the biggest hit the never had ‘Without You’ would pass to fellow Badfinger members, Gibbins and Griffiths, much to the anger of both Pete Ham’s and Tom Evans’ families.

Recorded over 42 years ago...the song is generally considered as a ‘classic’ (Paul McCartney regularly calls it ‘The killer tune of all time’) and given it’s awful true origins tops my list as

The most depressing love song of all time.