What do you think are the ten most disturbing songs ever?

Answer 1

Using popularity and high profile as a criteria for choosing songs (because there are plenty of low-quality obscure groups...):

1) "Strange Fruit", Billie Holliday
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/b/billie+holiday/strange+fruit_20017859.html
The lyrics are frightening by themselves while the melody and bass line turn this into something to repulse you. The mental images I get from this song are equal to pictures of the Nazi death camps.

2) "You've Got To Be Carefully Taught", from the play, 'South Pacific'
http://www.guntheranderson.com/v/data/youvego0.htm
> You've got to be taught before it's too late
> Before you are six or seven or eight
> To hate all the people your relatives hate
> You've got to be carefully taught
If that doesn't bother you, there's something wrong with you.

3) "Locked In The Trunk Of A Car", by The Tragically Hip
http://www.cbsc.ca/english/decisions/decisions/2005/050511.htm
People were worried more about a profanity than about a song written from the POV of a serial killer...? Talk about screwy....

4) "Still Life", by Iron Maiden
http://www.seeklyrics.com/lyrics/Iron-Maiden/Still-Life.html

5) "Little Girl", by John Michael Montgomery
http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/The-Little-Girl-lyrics-John-Michael-Montgomery/DF6B1F5F2A3B431848256BE300105CE0
This crap is pedantic and smug christianity ignoring its own flaws while demonizing others. It's putrid beyond belief.

6) "Where Were You", by Alan Jackson
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/alanjackson/wherewereyouwhentheworldstoppedturning.html
"The world stopped turning?" Since when does the world revolve around the US? It's the same world, the US was just forced to pay attention. The arrogance (not to mention the greed and opportunism of the song) are sickening.

7) "The End", by The Doors
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/d/doors/the+end_20042686.html
It was on their first album, but people should have realized even then how Morrison would end up.

8) "Kinko The Clown"
http://www.stlyrics.com/songs/d/drdemento6577/kinkotheclown248772.html
If you haven't heard it, find it. Man, this is twisted: a pedophile who dresses up as a clown to lure kids. The strangest part is that you will laugh as you listen to the song.

9) "Language Of Violence", by Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
http://www.getlyrics.com/song/disposable+heroes+of+hiphoprisy/language+of+violence
The whole album is disturbing and genius (especially "Television, Drug Of The Nation") and "Winter Of The Long Hot Summer" is even more a propos to the second Iraq invasion than the first, but "Language" with its descriptions of brutality is frightening.

10) "Lunatic Fringe", by Red Rider
http://www.songlyrics.com/song-lyrics/Red_Rider/Miscellaneous/Lunatic_Fringe/69456.html
Written at the beginning of the Reagan mis-administration and the rise of fascism, it rings even truer now than it did 25 years ago.

> "Lunatic fringe / In the twilight's last gleaming"
Gee, what national anthem are they referring to?

> "But we're on guard this time / Against your final solution"
What national anthem are they referring to this time?
And what WWII event are they insinuating the Neo-Cons will do?


Additional:

To "♪♫Frustrated_Rocker♪♫", I give you 'The Barney Song'....

> I hate you, you hate me
> Let's hang barney from a tree
> And the blood will spill all over the floor
> That dinosaur will sing no more


.

Answer 2

Nightmare on Dyke Street by Women of Sodom

Cage By Women of Sodom

Boots by Women of Sodom

Valentine for Jesus by Women of Sodom

Prison Sex by Tool

There is a song I heard about involving women wanting to have sex with a decaying male corpse and the more it decays, the different ways they would use the body parts till the body gets down to the bone (and then they would use the bones). If heard it sung, but not in the original play/movie.

Momma Can't Hear You (Momma Don't Feel No Pain) by Manda Clair, mostly from the music and singing and not the lyrics

Weeeee! (Gonads and Strife) from threebrain.com. It's just disturbing somebody would think of something like that (complete with flash animation).

Beat It by Michael "One Glove" Jackson, probably the first career suicide by song ever committed. Then you add the little kids and a chimp named "Bubbles."

Sugar Walls by Sheena Easton, a song that had sexy lyrics and a sexy singer and ends up being one of the least sexiest songs of all time. Imagine Mike Ditka singing to bad/cheap porno music and not being your imagination. That's exactly how the original song sounds.

Answer 3

I think Bloodrock's "D.O.A." definitely deserves a place on your list. To quote from Wikipedia: The song gives a grisly first person account of the aftermath of a plane crash. The vocalist describes the bloody sheets he lies in with a missing arm as doctors look over him with little hope, all this with background sounds of ambulence sirens. The song ends with the siren being shut off, as routinely ambulence drivers do when the patient dies.

In March, 1971, many US radio stations and high schools banned "D.O.A.". Despite a lack of air-play, the single still reached #36 on the Billboard chart.

Bloodrock was clearly ahead of their time. Their cynical lyrics were a mismatch for the late 60s and early 70s, but would have fit right in with much of today's alternative music.

Answer 4

Creep Radiohead

Answer 5

Pretty much every song by G.G. Allin... I would get banned if I listed some of the song titles and lyrics... but look it up on the net if you are interested... also check out a band called the mentors...

Answer 6

The song on the Rembrandt commercial with the couple sucking face.

ST

Answer 7

I definitely think "Jeremy" by Pearl Jam and "Strange Fruit" are near the top of that list.

Answer 8

DEFINATELY "Kim" by Eminem.
Alternately some Biggie songs were pretty hardcore...

Answer 9

songs by marilyn manson gets my vote
haha

Answer 10

when it comes to videos, it pretty much goes to marilyn manson and aphex twin