If I Cant Have You / Music

• Interestingly enough, the well-known song by The Bee Gees/Yvonne Elliman that shares this trope's title has this trope subverted. If she couldn't have him, she wouldn't stop him from pursuing others instead- but she'd keep herself from pursuing relationships with others instead.
  For dreams that never will come true
  Am I strong enough to see it through
  Go crazy is what I will do
  If I can't have you
  I don't want nobody baby
  If I can't have you, uh-huh!
  • Tony DiBart's 'The Real Thing' uses this trope as song lyrics in much the same way.
• Dream Theater's concept album Metropolis Part II: Scenes from a Memory has this as an important part of the main plot. It's how Victoria died.
• The Megadeth song "Loved to Deth": "If I can't have you, then no one will/And since I won't, I'll have to kill..."
• "Love Me Back" by Sunrise Skater Kids about a man who becomes increasingly obsessed with a girl already in a relationship, and eventually resorts to constantly stalking her, despite having a restraining order put on him:
  You're the one for me
  I'll kill anyone who gets in my way
  We all know I'm your biggest fan
  If I can't have you then no one can
• The titular song from the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough. "If we can't have it all, then nobody will..."
• The Beatles song Run For Your Life written by John Lennon: "I'd rather see you dead little girl, than to be with another man". It's actually a pretty upbeat country-rock song.
  • Those lyrics actually come from Elvis's "Baby, Let's Play House," which is also an upbeat country-rock song.
• The song "Turn It On" by Franz Ferdinand invokes this trope by name.
  • There's a dub version of this song who is named "If I Can't Have You Then Nobody Can."
• Sonata Arctica's song Don't Say A Word is about a man who kills his wife/girlfriend after she leaves him.
• Always by Saliva is about a man who shoots and murders his girlfriend over leaving him (or cheating on him, not sure which).
• A common theme in Eminem's works:
  • "Kim" is probably the most notorious, with Eminem screaming about murdering his ex.
  • Also implied in "Stan"; after Slim Shady doesn't return his calls or letters, Stan snaps and kills himself, his girlfriend, and his unborn child.
  • "Space Bound" combines it with Murder-Suicide: when the narrator's lover announces she's leaving him for another man, he crosses the Despair Event Horizon and kills her with a Neck Snap before blowing his own brains out.
• Tom Jones' "Delilah", in which a man catches his girlfriend cheating. When he confronts her, she laughs at him. So in a fit of rage, he fatally stabs her, and pleads for her to forgive him. It's quite catchy.
• Evillious Chronicles: "The Tailor of Enbizaka" sung by the Vocaloid Megurine Luka has her pulling one of these when her lover is seen with at least three other women. The twist is that her "lover" doesn't even know her, and the other women were his family.
• Another Luka song, "Love Disease" by madaco, heavily implies that she murders her love interest at the very end, after having murdered the hypotenuse only to have said interest try to get away from her.
• "The Phantom Opera Ghost" by Iced Earth.
• "Siberian Kiss" by Glassjaw
  I've watched you whore yourself for one more thing
  Why don't you sell yourself for one more?
  There's always one more thing
  Why don't you sell yourself
  If I can't have you, NO ONE WILL!!!
• "Goodnight Socialite" by The Brobecks includes this trope in the chorus.
• "Pick up the Phone" by Falling in Reverse, which is about an abusive relationship from the perspective of the jealous boyfriend, features the line "I'll be damned if I see you with some other man; If I cannot have you then nobody can".
• "Die With Me" by Obsidian Shell has two refrains, one starting with "die with me or fight for me," the other "mine. only mine." — stock lyrics in this case sounds appropriate.
• In the "Please, Don't Leave Me" music video when her boyfriend tries to leave her P!nk exhibits Sanity Slippage and chases after her boyfriend with an axe.
• "Tigerlily" by La Roux:
  Lurking in the dark, there's someone who breathes you night and day
  There's a friend who wants so much more
  And if they can't have you, they'll never let you walk away...
• The Barenaked Ladies song "Straw Hat and Old Dirty Hank" is an intensely upbeat song about the devotion a farmer has to a lady who is special to him. He's actually a stalker, the lady is a singer, and he shows up at her house bearing "flowers and a twenty-two with shells."
• "The Last Mistake" by Assemblage 23. "If I can't have you, then nobody can".
• "Henry Lee" by Nick Cave and PJ Harvey: "Lie there, lie there, little Henry Lee, 'til the flesh drops from your bones. For the girl you have in that merry green land can wait forever for you to come home."
• "I'll Sink Manhattan" by They Might Be Giants, in which the narrator kills not only his ex-lover, but everyone in Manhattan as well.
• "Jealous Girl" by Lana Del Rey
  Think you should be my man
  No one's better than I am
  C'mon give it to me, bam
  If I can't have you baby, no one else in this world can
• "Over You", an early hit by Aaron Neville, just comes out and says, "If you ever break up with me I'll murder you." Lyrical Dissonance may obscure this a little.
• Jonathan Coulton's Skullcrusher Mountain has overtones of this trope, in a Mad Scientist kind of way.
• Delain's "I Want You" starts out seeming like a typical unrequited-love song; it gradually becomes clear the narrator is a Stalker with a Crush and ends here, even including the trope name verbatim.
• “Toy Soldiers” by Marianas Trench, which is about creepy fans who obsess over celebrities to the point where they genuinely believe this trope.
  One day you will learn to love me
  One day you will thank me, you'll see
  If I can't have you, no one can
• The Willow Maid is about a young man who lusts after a dryad. When she rejects him, he chops down her tree and forces her to leave the forest, which predictably ends in her death.
• "Macaulay McCulkin" by The Fall of Troy is a pretty disturbing example.
  I'll be waiting on the side of your house
  With an empty body bag
  And a loaded .45
• Word for word in Natalia Kills's "I'm Watching You".
  No, no, no, this was not the plan,
  If I can't have you, then no one can.
• "Psycho" by Maisie Peters has a Hypocrite version, where the singer's ex has already started dating again (and may have been doing do before the break up) but is still trying to control her and stop her moving on.
  You don't want me at all,
  But you don't want me to fall,
  For anyone, but you'll go with anyone.
• Knife Party's "Internet Friends" features the protagonist ranting that her crush is refusing her advances ("Look at everything I've done for you!") and accusing them of seeing other women ("I bet you're busy talking to some fucking slut! / Fucking skank! / Is she hotter than me?") It culminates in the subject of her affection blocking her on Facebook, which she does not take well at all.
  You blocked me on Facebook, and now you're going to die.
• Quoted verbatim in "Kill Bill" by SZA, a song that narrates her fantasy of killing her ex and his new girlfriend (and eventually doing it). In the first bridge, she sings "if I can't have you, no one should", with "should" being replaced with "will" in the second bridge, indicating that she is coming closer to going through with her murderous plan.

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