Teenage tragedy song

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A teenage tragedy song is a style of sentimental ballad in popular music that peaked in popularity in the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Lamenting teenage death scenarios in melodramatic fashion, these songs were variously sung from the viewpoint of the dead person's romantic interest, another witness to the tragedy, or the dead or dying person.^[1][2] Examples of the style are also known as "tear jerkers", "death discs" or "splatter platters", among other names coined by DJs that passed into the vernacular.^[1]

Notable examples of teenage tragedy songs include "Teen Angel" by Mark Dinning (1959), "Tell Laura I Love Her" by Ray Peterson (1960), "Ebony Eyes" by the Everly Brothers (1961), "Last Kiss" by Wayne Cochran (1961), "Dead Man's Curve" by Jan and Dean (1964), and "Leader of the Pack" by the Shangri-Las (1964).^[3] The genre's popularity faded around 1965 amid the British Invasion, but the form has inspired many similar songs and parodies since.^[4]

By the mid-1950s, postwar youth culture in the United States was embracing rock and roll, and the folk revival was also approaching its zenith—the narrative style of many teenage tragedy songs would have similarities to folk ballads.^[5] Prison ballads (such as the Kingston Trio's "Tom Dooley", based on a folk song about a real murder) and gunfighter ballads (such as Johnny Cash's "Don't Take Your Guns to Town" and Marty Robbins' "El Paso") were also popular during the teenage tragedy song's heyday; "El Paso" was followed at #1 by two consecutive teenage tragedy songs, "Running Bear" and "Teen Angel".

The teenage tragedy genre's popular era began with "Black Denim Trousers and Motorcycle Boots" by the Cheers, written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. Released just before James Dean's death in an automobile accident in the fall of 1955, it climbed the charts immediately afterward.^[6] Teenage tragedies featured specific thematic tropes such as star-crossed lovers, reckless youth, eternal devotion, suicide, and despair over lost love, along with lyrical elements that teens of the time could relate to their own lives^[5] such as dating, motorcycles and automobiles, and disapproving parents or peers.^[3][7][8] Contemporary girl groups borrowed the genre's melodramatic template and use of sound effects, orchestration, and echo for other story-songs.^[4] Ethnomusicologist Kirsten Zemke considers these songs as forming a strictly musical genre that was bound by common themes, musical style, and production elements, and as being particularly of their time. As for their popularity, she writes:

They sold well in their time, and the style has persisted throughout the decades in various forms. And … they have an interesting history. The question some writers have asked is "why?". Some of the reasons suggested for this genre’s macabre popularity are:

These were the ultimate teen rebellion songs. The only way out of parents' (and/or societal) control and expectations was death.

They were a natural extension of the "unrequited love" song, facilitated by the obvious rhyming of: good bye, cry and die.

Zemke also speculates that the popularity of teenage tragedy songs may be due in part to the many publicized deaths of young musicians and actors during their period of prominence, including those of Sam Cooke, Johnny Ace, Eddie Cochran, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper.^[9]

As popular music and the society it mirrored changed from the late 1960s onward, the themes of teenage tragedy songs carried on in different forms and styles. Songs and spoken-word productions about the dangers of drug abuse ranged from three-minute morality plays to lamentations on the generation gap. These include "Once You Understand" by Think (U.S. #23, 1971) and radio and TV host Art Linkletter's Grammy-winning single "We Love You, Call Collect" (U.S. #42, 1969). Recorded before his daughter Diane's apparent suicide in 1969, the record also included Diane speaking the reply, "Dear Mom and Dad".^[19] Into the 1970s, as the Vietnam War continued, hit ballads of youth and death included Terry Jacks' No. 1 hit "Seasons in the Sun" (1974), their protagonists of indeterminate age, or slightly older than teens. A song that was thought to have referenced the Civil War was Paper Lace's 1974 hit "Billy Don't Be a Hero", made a bigger hit in the U.S. by Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods. Hard-rock acts recorded vehicular death scenarios such as "D.O.A." (Bloodrock, 1971), "Detroit Rock City" (Kiss, 1976), and "Bat Out of Hell" (Meat Loaf, 1977).

Teenage tragedy themes would continue to chart through the 1970s. In 1979, the Boomtown Rats' "I Don't Like Mondays",^[20] inspired by the Grover Cleveland school shooting in San Diego earlier that year,^[21] reached No. 1 in the U.K., and No. 4 in Canada.^[22] The Smiths' 1987 song "Girlfriend in a Coma" also took inspiration from teenage tragedy songs. Some songs merely updated the sound of the previous era, such as "Racing Car" by Dutch group Air Bubble (1976), while others used the melodic and stylistic tropes of teen tragedy in tougher, grittier settings, as in the Ramones' "You're Gonna Kill That Girl" (1977) and "7-11" (1981), and the Misfits' "Saturday Night" (1999). "Teen Idle" by Marina and the Diamonds (2012), evoking an archetype of disenfranchised youth, is a thematic heir to the original teen tragedy oeuvre.^[23]

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Notable parodies of teenage tragedy songs over the decades have included:

• "Let's Think About Living" (1960), with Bob Luman mocking then-current musical trends, and trying to steer listeners away from the fascination with teenage death songs and gunfighter ballads.^{[citation needed]}
• "Valerie", a 1961 doo-wop styled teen tragedy spoof by the Mark III, a young folk trio.^[24]
• "All I Have Left is Johnny's Hubcap" on the 1962 parody album, Mad “Twists” Rock ’n’ Roll, produced in association with Mad magazine.
• "Surfin' Tragedy" (1963) by the Breakers, in which a surfer careens "90 miles an hour" into a Malibu pier, killing him instantly. It is included on The Rhino Brothers Present the World's Worst Records.^{[citation needed]}
• "Leader of the Laundromat" by the Detergents (1964), a parody of "Leader of the Pack" written by Paul Vance and Lee Pockriss. The Detergents were a studio group that included singer Ron Dante, later of the Archies.^[25]
• Jimmy Cross's "I Want My Baby Back" (1965), a novelty record about a fatal head-on collision with the title character of "Leader of the Pack". The single made the Billboard Hot 100 (reaching #92), and became a cult classic years later from airplay on Dr. Demento's syndicated radio show. It was included on the World's Worst Records compilation^[26] and on Rhino's 1984 compilation LP Teenage Tragedies.
• In a 1965 episode of The Lucy Show, "Lucy in the Music World", Lucille Ball tried to appeal to teenagers with a song about a boyfriend whose "surfboard came back by itself." She had been advised that youth today "aren't happy unless they're miserable."^[6]
• "Death Cab for Cutie" by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (1967), the inspiration for the band of the same name.
• Randy Newman's song "Lucinda", on his 1970 album 12 Songs, concerns a girl who falls asleep on the beach in her graduation gown, and is killed and buried by a beach cleaning machine.^[27]
• In John Entwistle's "Roller Skate Kate", from his 1973 album Rigor Mortis Sets In, the heroine is killed while skating in the high-speed lane of the motorway.^{[citation needed]}
• 10cc's 1973 song "Johnny Don't Do It" is a parody of teenage tragedy songs.^{[28][unreliable source?]}
• "Pizza Man", a parody of "Leader of the Pack, sung by Alice Playten as part of the National Lampoon Lemmings stage show and subsequent album in 1973.^[29]
• Gilda Radner, Jane Curtin, and Laraine Newman recorded a song for season 2 of Saturday Night Live entitled "Chevy, Chevy", a parodic teenage tragedy song presenting Chevy Chase as a teen idol.^{[citation needed]}
• On The Rich Little Show of March 8, 1976, Tom Bosley and "Sweathogs" Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Robert Hegyes, and Ron Palillo sang a parody of the genre called "Pizza Death", in which the simple-minded driver of a pizzeria delivery van crashed, affording the by-standers an opportunity for free pizza.
• "My Baby's the Star of a Driver's Ed Movie," a 1983 song by Blotto.
• "The Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun" by comedian and singer Julie Brown. Released nationally in 1984, the song (along with an accompanying video in heavy MTV rotation) was both a parody of the genre, and a satire of valley girl culture.^[30]
• Tom Chapin and Michael Mark wrote a parody of a teenage tragedy song called "The Battle Beast and Barbie" for Chapin's 1994 album "So Nice To Come Home." Written in the parodic style of a '60s girl group tragedy ballad, it involves two plastic toys who "met by accident and fell in love", only for Battle Beast to be shot down by "Ken" at the school prom.^{[citation needed]}
• The MST3K treatment of the 1996 film Werewolf included a sketch in which Mike and the bots dressed up as a girl group to sing "Where, O Werewolf", about "Suzy" (Mike) in a doomed relationship with her werewolf boyfriend.^{[citation needed]}
• "Road Man" by Smash Mouth, in which a roadie is hit by a train while rushing to get the band's gear to a show.^{[citation needed]}
• Rilo Kiley, with lead singer Jenny Lewis, recorded "Teenage Love Song", a genre parody in which the singer laments being abandoned by her boyfriend after having sex in a motel room.^{[citation needed]}
• In "The Living End" by the Jesus and Mary Chain, a leather-clad biker in love with himself ends up crashing into a tree.^{[31][unreliable source?]}

• Tragedy
• Murder ballad
• Obituary poetry
• Star-crossed lovers
• List of car crash songs

• Oldies.about.com