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Tear Jerker / Sonata Arctica

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This Finnish progressive power metal band has some very depressing songs.


  • "Letter to Dana" is basically the story of a bigoted man who lost what could have been the love of his life because he couldn't accept her for who she was.
  • "White Pearl, Black Oceans". I was born and raised by the sea, shy yet proud...
  • Also "Shamandalie", "My Selene", and (if you pay attention to the lyrics), "Paid in Full". All awesome, all will bring you to your knees if you let them.
  • "Tallulah". Listen to it after a breakup! Yeah, a breakup song after a breakup is extra tearjerking as it is, but Tallulah tops them all. Now listen to it after a breakup when neither of you wanted to break up - but you did, because you wanted your ex-significant-other to be happy and you knew that she couldn't be happy with you anymore. You know that you could practically undo it with a phone call, but you still don't do it because you want her to be happy.
  • "Caleb". Child abuse, Start of Darkness, and Tear Jerker fuel galore.
  • And the final song in the Caleb series is pretty damn depressing, too.
  • "Under Your Tree". Ever had a pet dog that died? It's basically the musical equivalent of Death by Newbery Medal.
  • "Mary Lou".
  • "FullMoon". A man becomes a werewolf and is not only targeted by the rest of the town, but even his own wife is unable to accept the full circumstances of his transformation, implied to have gotten herself killed for it.
  • "Draw Me", "The Last Amazing Grays", and "Replica"
  • "Alone in Heaven" is a man's lament at having ascended to Heaven without his loved ones to join him there.
  • "The Day". A man loses his family in a flood but handles it with a dignity that will have listeners scrambling for hankies.
    • Not just any flood, but the tsunamis that struck Japan in spring 2011.
  • "Replica" is about a man who comes home from a war and feels like a shell of his former self.
  • "What Did You Do in the War, Dad?" is about a father who did terrible things he thought would make the world better for his children, but now is haunted by his dark past and unable to enjoy being a parent.
  • "The Cage" is about a wolf kept trapped in a cage, with a strong Humans Are Cthulhu implication, and has lines like "The walls around me, eyes surround me, feed my fear again// I must be freed or I will die before the harvest moon, my friend // I do not have another year in me, you've got to set me free."

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