Murder Ballads

Busy day in work and I've been painting my bedroom, second coat tonight and it will need another, it's harder to go from green to cream than I thought.  I've also been writing a murder ballad -

daDUM da DUM daDUM daDUM
              daDUM  daDUM daDUM
daDUM daDUM daDUM daDUM
              daDUM daDUM daDUM

- but it is unfinished and I will work on it again tomorrow.  It's also harder to write than I thought but it is a good way of telling a story in a shorter form than a novel.  That's not a cop out by me, just a thought!  Some examples of murder ballads in song form that I like are Where the Wild Roses Grow by Nick Cave and The Pines/Where Did You Sleep Last Night by Leadbelly, and covered by Nirvana. 

Jake Adam York, an American poet, writes In the murder ballad, the singer undertakes to narrate a horrific crime, at times in the first person, but does so in a melody so sweet, that though at first it seems perversely insensitive to the horror comes to act as a kind of consolation for the terror of the narrative and thus functions as a measure of remorse or loss. So, the poems of Murder Ballads seek to find a music in language that can act as a melodic consolation for all the poems must relate. 

Some of his work here

 http://www.blackbird.vcu.edu/v3n2/poetry/york_ja/index.htm

Hmm it's a lot to think about.  The funniest part of my day was hearing a four and a half year old break out into the chorus from The Wanted's song Glad you came -

The sun goes down
The stars come out
And all that counts
Is here and now
My universe will never be the same
I’m glad you came