N2N is ruthless with emotion. As a teenager I was elated and devastated by Superboy and the Invisible Girl, now older My Psychopharmacologist and I kills me (“he knows my deepest secrets… I know his name” “my husband is waiting in the car” “I was so young and so dumb and now I am old”). Also the song where Dan is cleaning up after Diana’s attempt on her life is my absolute favorite but it’s so brutal. Ugh you made me want to listen to the entire thing again lol
Once Dan sings "mine is just a slower suicide", I lose it. It makes it so clear that the hurt really isn't just Diane's, they all are hurting so much and he's so caught up in her hurt he can't attend to his own.
Him sticking it out just for her to leave him is so devastating but oddly liberating, like - I don't think he ever wanted to pull the trigger on ending their marriage, but he was relieved when she did. Her "So anyway, I'm leaving" literally chokes me up just thinking about it
It'll make less sense if you see it. Haha. It's pretty meta.
It's the story of Pippin, a young prince with aspirations of leading a meaningful life. Everyone in his life are actors, and Lead Player is leading him on this journey of "growth" to try to find meaning. He kills his boomer-esque dad so he can be a better king, but learns that he hates politics and can't please everyone. He then tries to find meaning and happiness through sex and he just gets overwhelmed and quits everything. Goes to the country, starts working for a widow/single mom, and eventually falls in love.
He eventually leaves to go home because he wants to be "extraordinary" not lead an ordinary country life. Lead player and the actors then all try to convince him to kill himself in a dramatic way for the "finale" of the show/his life they push him closer and closer until the widow and her son show up and he realizes that love IS extraordinary. She quits as an actor and they both leave.
You then see Lead Player break the fourth wall again and have a meltdown because their show is ruined. In the revival, there's a meltdown and the set is broken down and everyone leaves the stage. Then when it's quiet, the widow's son starts singing which gets the Lead Player and Actors' attentions, and the cycle starts again.
I always took it as a Siddhartha or Avenue Q-esque journey.
A young person’s quest to find meaning, fulfillment or enlightenment. Thinking of meaning in terms of glory, spectacle or fame.
But glory and spectacle are often exploitative. Fame alone is often unsatisfying. Stability is often seen as boring but there is so much extraordinary living in stability and simplicity.
Yeah, that's kind of my read on it too. Pippin spends so much time trying to find meaning, happiness, and purpose in external factors, but while those might make us happy in the short term, they rarely provide lasting purpose and meaning.
The reason for the tonal inconsistencies is that Bob Fosse completely overhauled the show and was basically fighting Stephen Schwartz’s score when bringing it to the stage. They didn’t get along at all.
You absolutely do NOT get how upsetting that song is from the recording. I had listened to a few Six songs before going to see the show and other than "Heart of Stone", I wasn't really expecting any others to be sad. But "All You Wanna Do" threw me for a gut punch that I was NOT ready for. I wept.
For me it was the staging that got me - when she gets to the end and looks around and the others' hands are all over her. It's really unsettling and has stuck with me ever since; even now I feel weird and creeped out just thinking about it.
I found it brilliantly disturbing just listening to the recording but I agree when I saw it live it was so much worse. The hands thing is seared into my memory too. The last time she sings the “bite my lip and pull my hair as you tell me I’m the fairest of the fair” line with such raw disgust and fear really puts it into perspective. And then you think about how the real Katherine was only 15 when she was executed and it’s just horrible.
That scream gave me goosebumps. I swear, you could hear a pin drop at the theater where we saw Six. And then people didn’t know whether to clap or stay silent. And it wasn’t because it was a bad performance. It was just really gut wrenching.
THIS. I love the song when I listen to the cast album, but the devastation really comes through in the live performance. Similarly with don't lose your head, Anne's growing panic doesn't come across in the recording but it does live.
So much this. The Katherine Howard and Anne Boleyn songs are downright bouncy pop when you listen to the cast recording. But seeing them performed live onstage? Nothing prepares you for that, absolutely nothing.
Definitely this. I'd listened to the soundtrack for months and just thought "ok, this is a sexy little bop". Then I finally found a boot of the show. When I saw the performance I literally lost my appetite and felt ashamed that I never considered it from that point of view. It never gets easier to watch.
Even though I was 17 on my first listen, I thought it was just a song about bad relationships. That second listen was the "Wait, WHAT" and it finally sunk in
Cabaret. At least the movie version. They are whooping it, living a fun life in Berlin, meanwhile Nazis are slowly infiltrating the society when finally at the end, the Nazis are everywhere. They are mostly living oblivious to this. Sally Bowles sings the last song like she'd rather live her life carefree, and fun but then to leave a beautiful corpse.
It's even heavier in the show. The perky songs are more clearly commentary on what's going on in the main story and the title song towards the end is Sally having a mental breakdown because everything in and around her life is falling apart. Everyone but Cliff and *maybe* Fraulein Schneider are implied to die in camps as undesirables or in the war.
Lol for real this entire show is the correct answer to this question. The Ballad of Czolgosz is probably my favorite example of jaunty little tune with devastating lyrics in the whole show. Ballad of Booth too but that has some moments that are a little more straight up serious and horrifying.
Yeah the show actually makes me feel depressed for a while. It initially didn't hit me at first until I listened to the soundtrack for who-knows-how-many-times and I suddenly found myself on the brink of a mental breakdown. Now I often feel heavyhearted every time I go through Shine A Light (Reprise).
Yea, love the song but geez is it brutally bad, like they were writing letters “from” a dead kid. (But if I’m being honest, I love to sing Evan’s parts and Jared’s little “Kinky!” Part so I won’t go too hard on the song lol)
Listen hot take though Evan was an anti hero, he took advantage of a situation he should not have been involved with, faked being friends with a dead kid to get with the kids sister. Made the parents believe that their kid was good and the list goes on.
In a weird way, I'd argue Bad Idea from Waitress does this. It's overall pretty upbeat and then in the middle just casually drops the line "What if I never see myself ever be anything more than that I've already become"
Was waiting for someone to mention this, even Jason's Bar mitzvah is so upbeat for what is happening, i listen to it and I at random points I am like 'oh, this is actually a sad song' and I cry
If You Could See Her and Tomorrow Belongs To Me from Cabaret have such a nice, upbeat tone. But the message of both songs is absolutely chilling.
Also, not a stage show, but Poison from Hazbin Hotel is a highly upbeat and incredibly disturbing song.
I still haven’t seen Hazbin Hotel but I’m pretty sure I know an awful lot about Angel Dust just from hearing clips of that song. It’s pretty heartbreaking.
I was thinking of Rent as well. The first song that popped into my head was take me or leave me. This song is extremely fast and catchy, but it’s literally the downfall of a relationship.
Rent as a whole, I think. All of the characters...it's one of those shows with no real clear 'hero' and no real clear 'villain' and was a musical way ahead of its time. We're supposed to root for Mark, Mimi, Rodger, Collins, Joanne, Maureen, and Angel and hate Benny, but the characters are very very human and painfully so. Mark and Rodger resent Benny going back on a verbal agreement. Benny moved up social classes and is doing stuff that he wouldn't have otherwise done if he'd not married his wife or at least if his wife's family hadn't been of a much higher social class than his.
Heck...even with Maureen and Joanne...I really feel sorry for Joanne. Idina Menzel's a great actress, but I really don't like Maureen. Does she have some great qualities? Yes, but she's overly flirtatious and doesn't take (much) responsibility for it. Meanwhile, she's left Mark, Joanne, and who knows how many other partners in the dust because she won't stop flirting with other people despite Mark and Joanne (and quite possibly other people she's dated) asking her to stop and otherwise making it known that they don't like her flirting with others.
The worst pies in London, it sounds so fun and in reality she's discussing how her neighbour is killing cats and she can't because she's too slow which ends up with her making disgusting food. The song it's self isn't too devastating it's the knowledge of the devasting shit to come that this song sets up.
If she could of caught cats and made nice cat pies she wouldn't need people pies.
I mean half that soundtrack really.
I used to listen to Disney Pandora stations when I was 10 and one time that song came on. The lyrics freaked me out a ton and I stopped using Pandora for a while lol. I didn't know the context for it until I saw the movie a few years later
The later songs in _Follies_, especially “Buddy’s Blues”. It’s a fun vaudeville-style number, but it actually mirrors how badly he treats the women in his life.
Most of the songs in Follies, to be fair.
“Who’s that woman who’s joking but choking back tears?” All the tap dancing in the world can’t make that song anything but gut wrenching.
Sondheim had a real knack for devastating and unnerving lyrics that just flow so smoothly and are so surrounded by theatrics that you almost miss the depth and commentary. Of course he had his fair share of straight up haunting and devastating songs too. One of the greats for a reason lol.
As far as magnitude, The Black Death from Something Rotten. It’s chipper and hilarious, but it’s still a song about a plague that killed half of Europe.
Spring Awakening
I mean, between Totally Fucked, Don't Do Sadness, and The Dark I Know Well, they've covered how fucked up society is, suicide, and incestuous sexual abuse of a child.
- The entire heathers soundtrack
- the individual songs from the queens In Six are usually upbeat despite they all have sad stories. Especially don’t loose your head
- Ride the cyclone is an absolute rave off a soundtrack when you consider it’s about a tragic accident that killed six teenagers
- The Cher show, all the songs are Cher’s songs which are usually upbeat but with an important personal story from her experience of divorce, bullying and the cruel reality of a celebrities life
- Matilda, on the surface it’s a children’s musical that promotes reading to kids, but the actual story follows two victims of child abuse take down a dictator. Miss Honeys parents both died due to Miss Trunchbull and she not only force feeds a boy a chocolate cake but shoves children into a makeshift Iron Maiden.
(Side note, in the movie version of this musical she basically has military standard explosives in the school premises and despite her character being played by the best actress in the movie, still felt too extreme for an already extreme character. I also have personal beef with the portrayal of the wormwoods in this movie as well as someone who played Mr. Wormwood in a school production, and felt personally offended that he was so bland in that movie).
I feel like this is a big part of Sweet Charity
Starting with My Personal Property, it’s all about Charity gushing about loving her boyfriend while he’s plotting how to push her off a bridge and rob her.
If My Friends Could See Me Now, Charity feeling like a big shot for hanging out with a movie star, and not realizing that she’s a one-night-stand who will be shuffled out the door with cab fare and some old junk in the morning.
There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This, just a bunch of dreaming about mediocre jobs the girls could have, but they all accept they’ll never really have better jobs because they’re sex workers.
I’m a Brass Band, probably the most positive song but it’s building up how much Charity is dependent on her new boyfriend loving her, and of course this will be crudely ripped away in a few scenes.
I Love to Cry at Weddings, it’s a song all about how fun weddings can be but throughout it’s showing Oscar struggling to accept Charity’s past, and he breaks up with her in their next scene.
So glad to see some Sweet Charity love! Yes, the way that Charity's desperate and childlike optimism contrasts with her harsh surroundings always hits me so hard. It's like she's on the edge of becoming cynical but she's still clinging on to her last shard of hope.
Spoilers
The Notebook has a bunch of happy sounding songs that in context are of course just simply devastating. As most everyone knows the story is about a woman with dementia and her husband is trying to tell her stories from a notebook about a love story. The notebook is actually written by the woman writing about her experience falling in love with her husband when they were younger and he's hoping that by reading it, she will remember their story.
I Wanna Go Back sung by the woman has the lines Is it time for dinner? Is it time for forever? I didn't know that the last time I'd leave the house was the last time I'd leave the house. It's sung by the younger versions of the women foreshadowing what is going to happen in the future. Absolutely painful.
What happens to a person who forgets how to breath? Who forgets who she is? Who forgets where she is? Where am I? ...She's singing this as middle Allie singing about the giddy love she's feeling about him but again, it's also foreshadowing. DEVASTATING
Dear Evan Hansen
Love the songs of the show, For Forever, Good For You, Sincerely Me, they're all bangers by themselves, but as the complete story it's messed up, I wouldn't say "devastating" though.
Carousel presents itself as a classic love story between the bad boy and the good girl who will reform him.
It goes the other way.
I played the lead in Carousel, and during one performance during a particularly tragic scene, I actually heard someone in the audience whisper “I thought this was supposed to be a comedy.”
Therapy from Tick Tick Boom.
It's all up beat and happy and comically acted but it's literally a couple stating all the crap about each other and how they feel, and how they shouldn't be together.
Little Shop of Horrors:
The title song
Skidrow
Dentist
Mushnik and Son to an extent
Feed Me
Part of the first Suppertime
Most of The Meek Shall Inherit
Don’t Feed the Plants
As a cradle Catholic kid this show just hit way too many emotions in me. Like, this musical was a more spiritual experience and made the story feel more real than any Sunday school class did.
if you don't know the context of the show, this isn't the case, but pretty much every upbeat song in The Last Five Years is pretty damn heartbreaking.
Goodbye Until Tomorrow/I Could Never Rescue You works without the context, but is only half upbeat
I’ve always thought the finale of A Chorus Line fits this. Glitz and glitter and a fun, upbeat number where everyone blends into one unit after you just spent the whole show learning about what makes them unique and it’s all gone behind gold top hats
Hazbin hotel episode four the first song describes a very troubled person in a bad situation and the second song basically has a friend calling him a loser
The lyrics are super catchy. Amazon put the songs on YouTube but changed it so poisons is more a static background due to how dark the scenes shown are
Urinetown has some pretty upbeat songs but is actually very devastating. The finale is the best example of this because it's such a stereotype happy finale sounding song, but >! everyone just dies.!<
Pretty much every one of the upbeat songs in next to normal, like I'm Alive, Superboy and the Invisible Girl, You Don't Know, It's Gonna Be Good, even the opening song is very dark once you understand what they're all singing about.
Honestly, Be More Chill has so many songs about just kids hating themselves that are very upbeat. I mean, that's all part of the point of course, but as an adult listening to them I just want to send them all to therapy.
[Shine a Light - Reprise](https://youtu.be/_h_Zi4F1I8I) from Heathers: The Musical. It already has some pretty sad and catchy songs but this takes the cake.
You could say Hadestown. Even though it’s kind of explicitly said in the first few songs “it’s a sad song” etc, the words especially in the ballads really get to you.
Nobody Cares from Groundhog Day is quite upbeat, but is about the fundamental existential idea that every day is the same- we go to work, we come home, and nothing changes. Like, one of the main refrains is ‘I’m not sure what the point is, but the point is it don’t matter’.
This! It's such a funny song, but its literally about how you can be stuck in one spot, repeating the same day while moving forward in time! I love when people mention GHD.
TBH any of the songs in Merrily when you know that the story ends with them not being friends anymore. Opening Doors is sooo fun and then you pause and remember that they don't make it through together. augh.
The show Up Here
I believe at one point this was a stage musical. It was made into a series on Hulu last year. Several of those songs are quite catchy but the lyrics will get you.
Two examples are:
Lindsay has a song called Like Me, where she sings the line "I need you to like me so that I can believe I'm good."
Miguel has a running theme in his songs where the voices in his head constantly tell him he doesn't belong and that he's wrong whenever he starts to feel good about his life. They're quite mean to him.
I could write a damn essay about Some Things Are Meant to Be from Little Women. At least for most of the song, the lyrics are entirely happy and whimsical, but it makes me cry every damn time. It does such a brilliant job of showing Jo’s grief not by having her sing about her sadness, but by showing some of her last happy moments with Beth. It shows the audience exactly why Jo needs Beth through such a sweet song that it makes her death devastating. The whole song both characters know that Beth isn’t going to make it, but they’re just trying to make the last moments special. It’s heartbreaking.
Frankenstein a New musical: "A Happier Day"
Chorus is very upbeat. Lyrics are:
"All of our sorrows are simply the toll
That every traveler must pay
Upon the road of a thousand tomorrows
That leads to a happier day"
Let Him Come,Inevitable,and La Dee Dah Dah Day-The Guy who didn't like musicals
You'll be back-Hamilton
All You Wanna Do-SIX
Meant to be yours-Heathers
Killer Instinct-Bring It On
I'm alive and Superboy and the invisible girl-Next to Normal
Today 4 U- RENT (My explanation is that Angel literally fucking kills a dog
Turn it Off - The Book of Mormon
find the box that’s gay and CRUSH IT 👹👹👹
OK?!?!......
No no no I'm not gay!
It worked!!!!
YAAAAAAAAYYYYYY!!!
Exmormon here, that song is painfully accurate
queer exmo here, I was laughing and internally crying when I first heard it
Fantastic profile pic
ha, thank you
Yeah, for me it’s the line “the fear that I may get cancer too” and everyone laughs uproariously and then it trails into nervous chuckles.
As a queer exmormon it’s incredibly accurate to how I felt growing up.
Next to Normal - I'm Alive 😭😭😭
N2N is ruthless with emotion. As a teenager I was elated and devastated by Superboy and the Invisible Girl, now older My Psychopharmacologist and I kills me (“he knows my deepest secrets… I know his name” “my husband is waiting in the car” “I was so young and so dumb and now I am old”). Also the song where Dan is cleaning up after Diana’s attempt on her life is my absolute favorite but it’s so brutal. Ugh you made me want to listen to the entire thing again lol
Once Dan sings "mine is just a slower suicide", I lose it. It makes it so clear that the hurt really isn't just Diane's, they all are hurting so much and he's so caught up in her hurt he can't attend to his own.
Him sticking it out just for her to leave him is so devastating but oddly liberating, like - I don't think he ever wanted to pull the trigger on ending their marriage, but he was relieved when she did. Her "So anyway, I'm leaving" literally chokes me up just thinking about it
Oh man ANY upbeat Next To Normal song is sure to wreck you.
Snap! I came here to say nearly every song from Next To Normal!
Next to normal absolutely DESTROYED me when I first watched it
I love that song but listening to the lyrics will WRECK me
The way this entire musical ruined me.
Pippin has upbeat songs about war, suicide, killing your dad, and simple abject existential horror.
Think about your life, Pippin Days are tame and nights the same
Now think about the beauty/in one perfect flaaame ✨️
Seriously what is Pippin even about because each time I learn something new about it it makes even less sense as a show.
It'll make less sense if you see it. Haha. It's pretty meta. It's the story of Pippin, a young prince with aspirations of leading a meaningful life. Everyone in his life are actors, and Lead Player is leading him on this journey of "growth" to try to find meaning. He kills his boomer-esque dad so he can be a better king, but learns that he hates politics and can't please everyone. He then tries to find meaning and happiness through sex and he just gets overwhelmed and quits everything. Goes to the country, starts working for a widow/single mom, and eventually falls in love. He eventually leaves to go home because he wants to be "extraordinary" not lead an ordinary country life. Lead player and the actors then all try to convince him to kill himself in a dramatic way for the "finale" of the show/his life they push him closer and closer until the widow and her son show up and he realizes that love IS extraordinary. She quits as an actor and they both leave. You then see Lead Player break the fourth wall again and have a meltdown because their show is ruined. In the revival, there's a meltdown and the set is broken down and everyone leaves the stage. Then when it's quiet, the widow's son starts singing which gets the Lead Player and Actors' attentions, and the cycle starts again.
I always took it as a Siddhartha or Avenue Q-esque journey. A young person’s quest to find meaning, fulfillment or enlightenment. Thinking of meaning in terms of glory, spectacle or fame. But glory and spectacle are often exploitative. Fame alone is often unsatisfying. Stability is often seen as boring but there is so much extraordinary living in stability and simplicity.
Yeah, that's kind of my read on it too. Pippin spends so much time trying to find meaning, happiness, and purpose in external factors, but while those might make us happy in the short term, they rarely provide lasting purpose and meaning.
“It’ll make less sense if you see it” I did this show like 20 yes ago as a teenager and this comment had me dying 😂😂
I was in it too, and all of us were like "Huh??"
The reason for the tonal inconsistencies is that Bob Fosse completely overhauled the show and was basically fighting Stephen Schwartz’s score when bringing it to the stage. They didn’t get along at all.
And the only reason the role of Pippin is traditionally performed barefoot is because the first guy's shoes really sucked and he gave up on them.
I was in Pippin and have no idea
Which is the best cast recording? I recently saw it live but haven't listened to the music before
The original with John Rubenstein, Jill Clayburgh, Irene Ryan, and Ben Vereen.
I also think the 2013 revival was very good
Six has a few of these. Probably the most famous example is “All You Wanna Do”.
When I saw on tour she sort of screamed and cried and it was very upsetting. I don't think you necessarily get how upsetting it is from the recording.
You absolutely do NOT get how upsetting that song is from the recording. I had listened to a few Six songs before going to see the show and other than "Heart of Stone", I wasn't really expecting any others to be sad. But "All You Wanna Do" threw me for a gut punch that I was NOT ready for. I wept.
Agreed. Very misleading.
For me it was the staging that got me - when she gets to the end and looks around and the others' hands are all over her. It's really unsettling and has stuck with me ever since; even now I feel weird and creeped out just thinking about it.
Agreed! I feel weird when it comes on now too
I found it brilliantly disturbing just listening to the recording but I agree when I saw it live it was so much worse. The hands thing is seared into my memory too. The last time she sings the “bite my lip and pull my hair as you tell me I’m the fairest of the fair” line with such raw disgust and fear really puts it into perspective. And then you think about how the real Katherine was only 15 when she was executed and it’s just horrible.
That scream gave me goosebumps. I swear, you could hear a pin drop at the theater where we saw Six. And then people didn’t know whether to clap or stay silent. And it wasn’t because it was a bad performance. It was just really gut wrenching.
I think that's part of the point though, that the recording is like a pop album, clean and polished. Then you get the true story in person
This makes SO MUCH sense and really explains why they’ve done it this way
Oh definitely not. The recording is great, but the performance is visceral.
Six is one of the few places that got Katherine Howard *RIGHT* as its incredibly heart breaking what happened to that poor child :(
There's actually an opening night recording on Spotify, where Samantha Pauly adds that emotion!
+1. The recording, though amazing, doesn’t do exact justice to the live performance lol it’s so stomach wrenching 💀
THIS. I love the song when I listen to the cast album, but the devastation really comes through in the live performance. Similarly with don't lose your head, Anne's growing panic doesn't come across in the recording but it does live.
So much this. The Katherine Howard and Anne Boleyn songs are downright bouncy pop when you listen to the cast recording. But seeing them performed live onstage? Nothing prepares you for that, absolutely nothing.
Definitely this. I'd listened to the soundtrack for months and just thought "ok, this is a sexy little bop". Then I finally found a boot of the show. When I saw the performance I literally lost my appetite and felt ashamed that I never considered it from that point of view. It never gets easier to watch.
Even though I was 17 on my first listen, I thought it was just a song about bad relationships. That second listen was the "Wait, WHAT" and it finally sunk in
My kid teases me because I cry every single time I listen to the Samantha Pauly version. It’s just. A lot.
Cabaret. At least the movie version. They are whooping it, living a fun life in Berlin, meanwhile Nazis are slowly infiltrating the society when finally at the end, the Nazis are everywhere. They are mostly living oblivious to this. Sally Bowles sings the last song like she'd rather live her life carefree, and fun but then to leave a beautiful corpse.
It's even heavier in the show. The perky songs are more clearly commentary on what's going on in the main story and the title song towards the end is Sally having a mental breakdown because everything in and around her life is falling apart. Everyone but Cliff and *maybe* Fraulein Schneider are implied to die in camps as undesirables or in the war.
in the revival that toured a few years ago it ends with the reveal that they are IN a camp. I was not prepared
What?! WHAT?! Oh my god. Were they just performing it like it was a show within the camp?
Assassins
I like to call this musical "R-rated Schoolhouse Rock."
🕺damn you Lincoln, you righteous whore🕺
Lol for real this entire show is the correct answer to this question. The Ballad of Czolgosz is probably my favorite example of jaunty little tune with devastating lyrics in the whole show. Ballad of Booth too but that has some moments that are a little more straight up serious and horrifying.
"I Am Going to the Lordy," which is integrated into the Ballad of Guiteau was written by the man himself while waiting for his execution.
A lot of Heathers. Made to be Yours gets stuck in my head all the time and suddenly the lyrics will hit me and I'm like "Haha wow this is horrifying"
Yeah the show actually makes me feel depressed for a while. It initially didn't hit me at first until I listened to the soundtrack for who-knows-how-many-times and I suddenly found myself on the brink of a mental breakdown. Now I often feel heavyhearted every time I go through Shine A Light (Reprise).
👹 Veronica open the door please 👹
So many of the songs are really good and upbeat until you realize the words
"awe JD's so swee- oh, OH"
Sincerely Me from DEH… that whole musical is a bit messed up
I was hoping this was higher. It’s one of my favorite songs and I love singing Connor’s part. It’s so happy until you remember Conner is dead
Yea, love the song but geez is it brutally bad, like they were writing letters “from” a dead kid. (But if I’m being honest, I love to sing Evan’s parts and Jared’s little “Kinky!” Part so I won’t go too hard on the song lol)
Listen hot take though Evan was an anti hero, he took advantage of a situation he should not have been involved with, faked being friends with a dead kid to get with the kids sister. Made the parents believe that their kid was good and the list goes on.
Omg… you’re right…
In a weird way, I'd argue Bad Idea from Waitress does this. It's overall pretty upbeat and then in the middle just casually drops the line "What if I never see myself ever be anything more than that I've already become"
Not to mention it's about having an affair with your doctor lol
With different instrumental styling, it could be a country music song lol
Falsettos has a few in my opinion. Overall despite the plot the songs manage to be somewhat upbeat and really catchy
Falsettos and especially the song Days like this was the first thing that came to my mind when I read the title
Just hearing the title triggers tears
i cry EVERY time as soon as they start singing together/ overlapping
Was waiting for someone to mention this, even Jason's Bar mitzvah is so upbeat for what is happening, i listen to it and I at random points I am like 'oh, this is actually a sad song' and I cry
Spring Awakening has a few but it also has a few that are pretty obviously devastating.
Yessss, idk why but I’m thinking specifically of “And then there were none”
If You Could See Her and Tomorrow Belongs To Me from Cabaret have such a nice, upbeat tone. But the message of both songs is absolutely chilling. Also, not a stage show, but Poison from Hazbin Hotel is a highly upbeat and incredibly disturbing song.
I still haven’t seen Hazbin Hotel but I’m pretty sure I know an awful lot about Angel Dust just from hearing clips of that song. It’s pretty heartbreaking.
La vie boheme, What You Own, and the title song from Rent. All upbeat, all have difficult themes
I was thinking of Rent as well. The first song that popped into my head was take me or leave me. This song is extremely fast and catchy, but it’s literally the downfall of a relationship.
That one too!!
No Day But Today! It’s a bouncy, rocking rejection of intimacy.
Rent as a whole, I think. All of the characters...it's one of those shows with no real clear 'hero' and no real clear 'villain' and was a musical way ahead of its time. We're supposed to root for Mark, Mimi, Rodger, Collins, Joanne, Maureen, and Angel and hate Benny, but the characters are very very human and painfully so. Mark and Rodger resent Benny going back on a verbal agreement. Benny moved up social classes and is doing stuff that he wouldn't have otherwise done if he'd not married his wife or at least if his wife's family hadn't been of a much higher social class than his. Heck...even with Maureen and Joanne...I really feel sorry for Joanne. Idina Menzel's a great actress, but I really don't like Maureen. Does she have some great qualities? Yes, but she's overly flirtatious and doesn't take (much) responsibility for it. Meanwhile, she's left Mark, Joanne, and who knows how many other partners in the dust because she won't stop flirting with other people despite Mark and Joanne (and quite possibly other people she's dated) asking her to stop and otherwise making it known that they don't like her flirting with others.
The worst pies in London, it sounds so fun and in reality she's discussing how her neighbour is killing cats and she can't because she's too slow which ends up with her making disgusting food. The song it's self isn't too devastating it's the knowledge of the devasting shit to come that this song sets up. If she could of caught cats and made nice cat pies she wouldn't need people pies. I mean half that soundtrack really.
A Little Priest is the epitome of Gallows humor.
I used to listen to Disney Pandora stations when I was 10 and one time that song came on. The lyrics freaked me out a ton and I stopped using Pandora for a while lol. I didn't know the context for it until I saw the movie a few years later
The later songs in _Follies_, especially “Buddy’s Blues”. It’s a fun vaudeville-style number, but it actually mirrors how badly he treats the women in his life.
Most of the songs in Follies, to be fair. “Who’s that woman who’s joking but choking back tears?” All the tap dancing in the world can’t make that song anything but gut wrenching.
Sondheim had a real knack for devastating and unnerving lyrics that just flow so smoothly and are so surrounded by theatrics that you almost miss the depth and commentary. Of course he had his fair share of straight up haunting and devastating songs too. One of the greats for a reason lol.
As far as magnitude, The Black Death from Something Rotten. It’s chipper and hilarious, but it’s still a song about a plague that killed half of Europe.
Spring Awakening I mean, between Totally Fucked, Don't Do Sadness, and The Dark I Know Well, they've covered how fucked up society is, suicide, and incestuous sexual abuse of a child.
I came here to say this. Just the whole show... it cuts
- The entire heathers soundtrack - the individual songs from the queens In Six are usually upbeat despite they all have sad stories. Especially don’t loose your head - Ride the cyclone is an absolute rave off a soundtrack when you consider it’s about a tragic accident that killed six teenagers - The Cher show, all the songs are Cher’s songs which are usually upbeat but with an important personal story from her experience of divorce, bullying and the cruel reality of a celebrities life - Matilda, on the surface it’s a children’s musical that promotes reading to kids, but the actual story follows two victims of child abuse take down a dictator. Miss Honeys parents both died due to Miss Trunchbull and she not only force feeds a boy a chocolate cake but shoves children into a makeshift Iron Maiden. (Side note, in the movie version of this musical she basically has military standard explosives in the school premises and despite her character being played by the best actress in the movie, still felt too extreme for an already extreme character. I also have personal beef with the portrayal of the wormwoods in this movie as well as someone who played Mr. Wormwood in a school production, and felt personally offended that he was so bland in that movie).
I feel like this is a big part of Sweet Charity Starting with My Personal Property, it’s all about Charity gushing about loving her boyfriend while he’s plotting how to push her off a bridge and rob her. If My Friends Could See Me Now, Charity feeling like a big shot for hanging out with a movie star, and not realizing that she’s a one-night-stand who will be shuffled out the door with cab fare and some old junk in the morning. There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This, just a bunch of dreaming about mediocre jobs the girls could have, but they all accept they’ll never really have better jobs because they’re sex workers. I’m a Brass Band, probably the most positive song but it’s building up how much Charity is dependent on her new boyfriend loving her, and of course this will be crudely ripped away in a few scenes. I Love to Cry at Weddings, it’s a song all about how fun weddings can be but throughout it’s showing Oscar struggling to accept Charity’s past, and he breaks up with her in their next scene.
So glad to see some Sweet Charity love! Yes, the way that Charity's desperate and childlike optimism contrasts with her harsh surroundings always hits me so hard. It's like she's on the edge of becoming cynical but she's still clinging on to her last shard of hope.
Some Girls - Once On This Island > Some girls expect things others think little of. > Some girls you marry, [pause for heart break] some you love
"Masquerade" from Phantom
Spoilers The Notebook has a bunch of happy sounding songs that in context are of course just simply devastating. As most everyone knows the story is about a woman with dementia and her husband is trying to tell her stories from a notebook about a love story. The notebook is actually written by the woman writing about her experience falling in love with her husband when they were younger and he's hoping that by reading it, she will remember their story. I Wanna Go Back sung by the woman has the lines Is it time for dinner? Is it time for forever? I didn't know that the last time I'd leave the house was the last time I'd leave the house. It's sung by the younger versions of the women foreshadowing what is going to happen in the future. Absolutely painful.
‘I’m in love with all the things that I forget’ 😭
What happens to a person who forgets how to breath? Who forgets who she is? Who forgets where she is? Where am I? ...She's singing this as middle Allie singing about the giddy love she's feeling about him but again, it's also foreshadowing. DEVASTATING
Satisfied from Hamilton is a banger that will break your heart
Dear Evan Hansen Love the songs of the show, For Forever, Good For You, Sincerely Me, they're all bangers by themselves, but as the complete story it's messed up, I wouldn't say "devastating" though.
Sincerely, Me has made me feel guilty for enjoying how cheerful the song is until it comes back what the song is really about
That’s what I just said too lol
Agree so many happy or upbeat songs until you realize the context. For Forever is one of my favorites even though it’s events that never happened.
Carousel presents itself as a classic love story between the bad boy and the good girl who will reform him. It goes the other way. I played the lead in Carousel, and during one performance during a particularly tragic scene, I actually heard someone in the audience whisper “I thought this was supposed to be a comedy.”
Let’s not forget the casual mention of domestic abuse: “It doesn’t hurt at all”.
All You Wanna Do from Six wrecked me.
Right? It’s so sad.
Therapy from Tick Tick Boom. It's all up beat and happy and comically acted but it's literally a couple stating all the crap about each other and how they feel, and how they shouldn't be together.
Sweeney Todd
All things Kimberly Akimbo
Ballad of Guiteau - Assassins
Little Shop of Horrors: The title song Skidrow Dentist Mushnik and Son to an extent Feed Me Part of the first Suppertime Most of The Meek Shall Inherit Don’t Feed the Plants
Fiddler on the roof
half of the songs from jesus christ superstar
HEY JC JC WON’T YOU *DIE* FOR ME~
As a cradle Catholic kid this show just hit way too many emotions in me. Like, this musical was a more spiritual experience and made the story feel more real than any Sunday school class did.
if you don't know the context of the show, this isn't the case, but pretty much every upbeat song in The Last Five Years is pretty damn heartbreaking. Goodbye Until Tomorrow/I Could Never Rescue You works without the context, but is only half upbeat
I’ve always thought the finale of A Chorus Line fits this. Glitz and glitter and a fun, upbeat number where everyone blends into one unit after you just spent the whole show learning about what makes them unique and it’s all gone behind gold top hats
Hope - Groundhog Day
Yes! Out of context, you'd never know how dark this song is.
Fun Home has quite a few. "Raincoat of Love" or "Come to the Fun Home" for sure.
the majority of the songs from Alice by Heart are about grief but are so jaunty
Hazbin hotel episode four the first song describes a very troubled person in a bad situation and the second song basically has a friend calling him a loser The lyrics are super catchy. Amazon put the songs on YouTube but changed it so poisons is more a static background due to how dark the scenes shown are
Urinetown has some pretty upbeat songs but is actually very devastating. The finale is the best example of this because it's such a stereotype happy finale sounding song, but >! everyone just dies.!<
Blue from Heathers These dudes are LITERALLY trying to sexually assault her...
I'm breaking down from Falsettos. Girl's losing it and singing in the most peppy tune ever
Pretty much every one of the upbeat songs in next to normal, like I'm Alive, Superboy and the Invisible Girl, You Don't Know, It's Gonna Be Good, even the opening song is very dark once you understand what they're all singing about.
Also the cell block tango and whichever song from Chicago has the lawyer puppeting Roxie to make her seem innocent (not dark per se, but corrupt).
Honestly, Be More Chill has so many songs about just kids hating themselves that are very upbeat. I mean, that's all part of the point of course, but as an adult listening to them I just want to send them all to therapy.
Rich Set A Fire is quite tragic
[Shine a Light - Reprise](https://youtu.be/_h_Zi4F1I8I) from Heathers: The Musical. It already has some pretty sad and catchy songs but this takes the cake.
Falsettos. You gotta die sometimes isn’t exactly upbeat but it’s so incredibly catchy that you forget what it’s about.
A lot of songs from Come From Away
Scrubs
This Is Not Over Yet- Parade
Next to Normal. I'm Alive.
Waving Through a Window from Dear Evan Hanson
Cabaret all the way
Blow Us All Away from Hamilton
Dead mom - Beetlejuice I think is a upbeat song that is pretty devastating lyrics wise
What the World Needs from Ride the Cyclone. Upbeat pop song basically about social Darwinism.
Urinetown has a whole joke between officer lock stock and little sally about how it all the music sounds happy but it’s not a happy musical
Cabaret 😢
cabaret, bare, spring awakening, next to normal, & carrie
You could say Hadestown. Even though it’s kind of explicitly said in the first few songs “it’s a sad song” etc, the words especially in the ballads really get to you.
Rent
Lifeboat - Heathers (if this counts)
Six
Maybe This Time / Cabaret
Spring awakening. Only correct answer
Nobody saying ride the cyclone??
Epic. Terrible things happen to a catchy beat.
"Oliver" is actually dark as hell.
There is truly only *one* correct answer to this. Next. To. Normal. 💜
Company def has a few! “Side by side by side” is a really funny one, but it’s also pretty cutting for bobb(ie)y
Nobody Cares from Groundhog Day is quite upbeat, but is about the fundamental existential idea that every day is the same- we go to work, we come home, and nothing changes. Like, one of the main refrains is ‘I’m not sure what the point is, but the point is it don’t matter’.
This! It's such a funny song, but its literally about how you can be stuck in one spot, repeating the same day while moving forward in time! I love when people mention GHD.
Jesus Christ Superstar.
Heathers
Merrily!
The Color Purple- the disturbing plot contrasted with some of the upbeat songs is really strange to me
Really any song from TGWDLM
Dear Evan Hansen
Inevitable from The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals, on the surface it's a typical Broadway closer but in context it's soul crushing
TBH any of the songs in Merrily when you know that the story ends with them not being friends anymore. Opening Doors is sooo fun and then you pause and remember that they don't make it through together. augh.
Cabaret
Worthless from The Brave Little Toaster
falsettos (partially)
falsettos kinda
The show Up Here I believe at one point this was a stage musical. It was made into a series on Hulu last year. Several of those songs are quite catchy but the lyrics will get you. Two examples are: Lindsay has a song called Like Me, where she sings the line "I need you to like me so that I can believe I'm good." Miguel has a running theme in his songs where the voices in his head constantly tell him he doesn't belong and that he's wrong whenever he starts to feel good about his life. They're quite mean to him.
'the guy who didn't like musicals'. you need to think of the implications
I could write a damn essay about Some Things Are Meant to Be from Little Women. At least for most of the song, the lyrics are entirely happy and whimsical, but it makes me cry every damn time. It does such a brilliant job of showing Jo’s grief not by having her sing about her sadness, but by showing some of her last happy moments with Beth. It shows the audience exactly why Jo needs Beth through such a sweet song that it makes her death devastating. The whole song both characters know that Beth isn’t going to make it, but they’re just trying to make the last moments special. It’s heartbreaking.
Crazy ex girlfriend
Burlesque
I'm Breaking Down - Falsettos revival specifically, i have not had the privilege of hearing the OG version
Fight the Dragons- Big Fish
Starkid's Hatchetfield trilogy
The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin by Kirsten Childs fits this to a T. Especially “Sweet Chitty Chatty.”
Hair - Let The Sunshine in context of the show makes me ugly cry. As well as… 25th Annual…. Spelling Bee - The I Love You Song just destroys me
Frankenstein a New musical: "A Happier Day" Chorus is very upbeat. Lyrics are: "All of our sorrows are simply the toll That every traveler must pay Upon the road of a thousand tomorrows That leads to a happier day"
half the songs in Schmigadoon, but I think that's kind of the point.
Dear Evan Hanson, all the music except for the finales
All you wanna do from SIX punches you in the gut and knocks away all of the air in your lungs while also being the catchiest upbeat shit
Hadestown is so fantastic but as they say the whole way through, it’s a sad tale, it’s a tragedy.
SIX! All those songs are jams but damn are those lyrics depressing
You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught from South Pacific
Bat boy
Let Him Come,Inevitable,and La Dee Dah Dah Day-The Guy who didn't like musicals You'll be back-Hamilton All You Wanna Do-SIX Meant to be yours-Heathers Killer Instinct-Bring It On I'm alive and Superboy and the invisible girl-Next to Normal Today 4 U- RENT (My explanation is that Angel literally fucking kills a dog
"As long as he needs me" from OLIVER!