They’d be begging to die inside of 24 hours of this.
Songs as Torture
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
The last 2 minutes of Tommy James’ Crimson and Clover…
“Crimson and clover. Over and over”…. literally.
Anything sung by Yoko Ono or Bob Dylan….
Yoko, absolutely. Dylan, your mileage may vary. I can listen to Mr. Tambourine Man or Like A Rolling Stone frequently, but other songs of his make screeching cats sound like glorious medieval polyphony.
This is very funny.
Almost anything in a hymnal published in the 1970s
At her passing, my mother had made clear she wanted my niece and I to each sing a song at her funeral. My niece sang “Ave Maria” and I had to sing “On Eagles Wings”. Not with everyone, but solo. I love you Mom. I miss you. But…
Josh reminded me … Mr. Tambourine Man, the Shatner edition! 😀
This is off-topic but I can’t a way to communicate with Mr. McClarey on this site. I was posting on another blog about the fact that the Catholic Church saved Western Civilization. Last month there was a post on the American Catholic that had a chart illustrating how the Crusades halted the invading Islamic armies and saved Europe from becoming Islamic.
That post is no longer visible on the home page and there doesn’t seem to be a way to go back to old posts. Is there a way to view old posts? I did find something similar by googling it but it was not as succinct as what I read here.
Thank you.
The “glad tambourines” phrase makes me cringe almost to the point of physical injury.
More like “GLAAD tambourines,” am I right?
Is this what you were thinking of George?
https://the-american-catholic.com/2025/05/06/thought-for-the-day-1233/
I think to some degree any song that becomes an earworm can be torturous. I spent the last couple of days constantly humming the Statler Brothers “Flowers on the Wall”, even to the point my students yesterday were all “what IS that song?”
Imagine.
For extra cruelty, sung by Cardinal Tagle.
[…] Cast Lots For Jesus’ Tunic: Is it Now In France? (Photos) – Cerith Gardiner at AleteiaSongs as Torture: Sing a New Song Unto the Lord – D.R. McClarey, J.D., at The American CatholicRupnik Victims Published Book, if Francis […]
Yes, thank you Don. I have now saved that link. But am I correct that there wasn’t a way for me to find it after it cycled off the home page?
Sing A New Song is, funnily enough, really singsong. It’s pure repetition. It’d be awful. Still, for me it’d be any hymn I learned in my youth (even the beautiful ones) with updated lyrics. Maybe where the rhyme had to be changed because a verse ended with the word “men”.
There is a general search feature on the main page, but that does not work properly. I have access to search features that sadly are restricted to blog owners and contributors.
O…M…G… The Teletubies sing the Psalms …
“Almost anything in a hymnal published in the 1970s.”
AMEN. Especially “Gather Us In.”
Eeuw.
Anything from Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, Human League, Nirvana and Cobain’s widow, George O’Dowd, Marty Haugen, Dan Schutte, the St. Louis Jesuits, Blondie’s Rapture and The Tide is High, the awful Genesis song with the video that skewers Reagan and Thatcher…and that is a start.
I sometimes tell family that if they don’t believe in the resurrection of the dead, play “On Eagles Wings” at my funeral. Then, watch me get up and strangle the organist. (Just kidding).
BTW, thank you for all the informed columns and the wonderful comments that accompany them.
“Mr. Tambourine Man, the Shatner edition”
How about “The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins” sung by Leonard Nimoy
I hate Novus Ordo elevator music. That’s torture.
I have been listening to some Latin music on You Tube which for me is wonderful.
Roma – Lingua Latina, Amor Aeternus
https://youtu.be/_E_7sIgUMnQ?si=JiYrS066jnjSDqk6
Gaudeamus magna cum laetitia! 😀
1975
Walt Disney experience.
I T ‘s A Small World A F T E R A L L.
Let’s face it.
It is Clockwork Orange bad.
I think we need to understand that Sing a New Song…was probably intended for young children.
Or, if you prefer, it’s intended to express …childlike exuberance.
It’s not intended as a deeply thought piece. It’s more like a four-year old scrambling to his mother to hand her a dandelion, exclaiming, “Look what I found!”.
Mom will naturally share the little boy’s delight for a few moments. That’s the point.
…I suppose I have rather a bias favoring that or On Eagle’s Wings. They both are, quite frankly, dreadful as solo pieces. ..Yet I was introduced to them in a children’s choir. Either of them sound soooo much better when the melody is augmented by harmony and descants. Yes, I have heard harmony and descants for both.
I must agree about Imagine being horrid though.
I understand Lennon’s point, yet imagining that neither Heaven nor Hell exist…. has always struck me as being depressing.
…and I have not heard much by Bob Dylan which made me want to sing along. ..I’d be more inclined to turn off the record. ..and that’s assuming I don’t break it too…..
Much of the music from the 70s and 80s… does show the thinking of the era. Sooner or later, one does need to mature and sing something more in-depth.
Ordinarily I try to avoid listening to any song over and over, with one exception. A few years back I did a charity 50 mile walk 20-20-10 and listened to this song hundreds of times in the process. It pulled me through.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzFpiW5vHrc
David WS
What?
No REO Speedwagon’s Flying Turkey Trot!
You could of done a 20-20-20. 👀
My vote is for this one, “We Are One In The Spirit.” I shudder every time I hear it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGD_BFSf90c
Good heavens no! It’s the soundtrack from the football movie “Invincible” for me.
“One In The Spirit” sounds so much like music in a movie about primitive tribes. Vikings, cavemen, American Indians, it doesn’t matter.