Ok, right now I'm looking for a song called "Gloomy Sunday" by Reszo Seress. I thought this should go in this category cuz it's basically a song shrouded in an urban legend. It's supposed to have such a hypnotizing and depressing melody that people commit suicide after listening too much. I'm curious and I wanted to know if any of you know a site where I can find it. Here's the article about it:

In December, 1932, a down and out Hungarian named Reszo Seress was trying to make a living as a songwriter in Paris, but kept failing miserably. All of his compositions failed to impress the music publishers of France, but Seress carried on chasing his dream nevertheless. He was determined to become an internationally famous songwriter. His girlfriend had constant rows with him over the insecurity of his ambitious life. She urged him to get a full-time 9 to 5 job, but Seress was uncompromising. He told her he was to be a songwriter or a hobo, and that was that.

One afternoon, things finally came to a head. Seress and his fiancée had a fierce row over his utter failure as a composer, and the couple parted with angry words.

On the day after the row - which happened to be a Sunday - Seress sat at the piano in his apartment, gazing morosely through the window at the Parisian skyline. Outside, storm-clouds gathered in the grey sky, and soon the heavy rain began to pelt down.

"What a gloomy Sunday" Seress said to himself as he played about on the piano's ivories, and quite suddenly, his hands began to play a strange melancholy melody that seemed to encapsulate the downhearted way he was feeling over his quarrel with his girl and the state of the dispiriting weather.

"Yes, Gloomy Sunday! That will be the title of my new song" muttered Seress, excitedly, and he grabbed a pencil and wrote the notes down on an old postcard. Thirty minutes later he had completed the song.

Seress sent his composition off to a music publisher and waited for acceptance with a lot more hope than he usually had in his heart. A few days later, the song-sheet was returned with a rejection note stapled to it that stated: "Gloomy Sunday has a weird but highly depressing melody and rhythm, and we are sorry to say that we cannot use it."

The song was sent off again to another publisher, and this time it was accepted. The music publisher told Seress that his song would soon be distributed to all the major cities of the world. The young Hungarian was ecstatic.

But a few months after Gloomy Sunday was printed, there were a spate of strange occurrences that were allegedly sparked off by the new song. In Berlin, a young man requested a band to play Gloomy Sunday, and after the number was performed, the man went home and blasted himself in the head with a revolver after complaining to relatives that he felt severely depressed by the melody of a new song which he couldn't get out of his head. That song was Gloomy Sunday.

A week later in the same city, a young female shop assistant was found hanging from a rope in her flat. Police who investigated the suicide found a copy of the sheet-music to Gloomy Sunday in the dead girl's bedroom.

Two days after that tragedy, a young secretary in New York gassed herself, and in a suicide note she requested Gloomy Sunday to be played at her funeral. Weeks later, another New Yorker, aged 82, jumped to his death from the window of his seventh-story apartment after playing the 'deadly' song on his piano. Around the same time, a teenager in Rome who had heard the unlucky tune jumped off a bridge to his death.

The newspapers of the world were quick to report other deaths associated with Seress' song. One newspaper covered the case of a woman in North London who had been playing a 78 recording of Gloomy Sunday at full volume, infuriating and frightening her neighbors, who had read of the fatalities supposedly caused by the tune. The stylus finally became trapped in a groove, and the same piece of the song played over and over. The neighbors hammered on the woman's door but there was no answer, so they forced the door open - only to find the woman dead in her chair from an overdose of barbiturates. As the months went by, a steady stream of bizarre and disturbing deaths that were alleged to be connected to Gloomy Sunday persuaded the chiefs at the BBC to ban the seemingly accursed song from the airwaves. Back in France, Rizzo Seress, the man who had composed the controversial song, was also to experience the adverse effects of his creation. He wrote to his ex-fiancée, pleading for a reconciliation. But several days later came the most awful, shocking news. Seress learned from the police that his sweetheart had poisoned herself. And by her side, a copy of the sheet music to Gloomy Sunday was found.

At the end of the 1930s, when the world was plunged into the war against Hitler, Seress' inauspicious song was quickly forgotten in the global turmoil, but the sheet-music to the dreaded song is still available (on the Net too) to those who are curious to know if the morbid melody can still exert its deadly influence...

I got it. You wanna kill yourself?

Well, I was thinking about it. Nah, that ain't funny...well, it kinda is...

Anyway, I just wanted to find it and listen to it. You know, be one of those people who wants to kill themselves but never has the courage so instead they just throw fecalmatter at people.

But really, I just wanna listen to it.

Bipolarities? I am one, good job offending me. Now I'm gonna break your neck. Just kidding, PM your msn and all send the song to you.

Unfortunately, I ain't gots no MSN. Yay for goods grammar!!

Email?

Sure, that'll work. PMing in 3...2...1...

Numerous contemporary artists have done covers, I doubt you shall have any trouble tracking down a version on p2p.

The song doesn't depress me the slightest bit.
I have heard Enya songs more depressing.

Just listen to new kids on the block that will give anyone the incentive to kill themselves of rip off their ears.

I agree.

Although I have to admit the Sarah McLachlan version of the song is very sad. But it doesn't make you want to kill yourself. Just kinda lie on the couch and look out at the grey clouds and do nothing.

Now you all have me wanting to hear it. I am off to download!

I couldn't agree with you more!

Find Sarah Mclaughlin's version! Oh yeah!

It's beautiful, isn't it?

I bet that by the time I have posted this, you are all dead

I think Sarah Brightman's version is the best. It's a depressing song, but I really don't think it could cause a mentally healthy person to kill themselves.

I'm not dead yet. *Goes off humming Gloomy Sunday*

I remember thta we had a thread dedicated to this one time a while back. It made me go find it on the web. I downloaded it and listened to a couple of times then, I went out and jumped off a bridge. Lucky for me, it was a picture of a bridge. I was in such a state that I couldn't tell the difference.

Actually, it's a pretty cool song. People were different back then I guess.

I dunno, i think this song has a weaker effect on people that are already depressed, They have a higher tolerance. I guess in the past people were super happy, says a lot about todays society.

he agrees too

I heard that in total about 200 people killed themselves after listening to the song. The composer, in such a state of distress at having written the song responsible for so many deaths, shot himself in the head after playing the song one last time on the piano.

I think the Sara Brightman version of the song is the best. It is a haunting melody, but I wouldn't kill myself over it.

Ah, you'd have to be pretty over the edge to off yourself over a song.

I can't seem to find the original version by Reszo Seress. Can someone possibly send it to me ? Thanks

If you are refering to an original recording, I don't know that there actually is one. People at the time bought the sheet music and played it themselves much the way that we buy a CD and pop it in the player. If you do happen to come across it, it will be in I think Hungarian. It's not likely to have the "suicidal effect" if you can't understand it!

Still, if someone has the MP3 of it, I hope they offer a link.

For those who have Windows Media Player:

Sarah MacLaughlin~Gloomy Sunday

For those who have Real Player:

Sarah MacLaughlin~ Gloomy Sunday

I liked it. I think I'm normal...hey I'm half Italian - half Irish...so I guess I could be hereditarily bi-polar... No I'm not running out to kill myself after hearing that but I MIGHT WRITE A POEM NOW. lmao.

Maybe try "I Don't Like Monday's" by the Boomtown Rats....

Oh crap are you trying to get me to kill myself? lmao...only kidding hun.

You add too much beauty to the world for me to wish that!

Well the most available copy right now (that I can find) is a version by the great Billie Holiday (in jazz), but her version is more of a gazed dream style.

GLOOMY SUNDAY-THE SUICIDE SONG




Reszo Seress, the Hungarian who wrote Gloomy Sunday


In December, 1932, a down and out Hungarian named Reszo Seress was trying to make a living as a songwriter in Paris, but kept failing miserably. All of his compositions failed to impress the music publishers of France, but Seress carried on chasing his dream nevertheless. He was determined to become an internationally famous songwriter. His girlfriend had constant rows with him over the insecurity of his ambitious life. She urged him to get a full-time 9 to 5 job, but Seress was uncompromising. He told her he was to be a songwriter or a hobo, and that was that.

One afternoon, things finally came to a head. Seress and his fiancée had a fierce row over his utter failure as a composer, and the couple parted with angry words.

On the day after the row - which happened to be a Sunday - Seress sat at the piano in his apartment, gazing morosely through the window at the Parisian skyline. Outside, storm-clouds gathered in the grey sky, and soon the heavy rain began to pelt down.

"What a gloomy Sunday" Seress said to himself as he played about on the piano's ivories, and quite suddenly, his hands began to play a strange melancholy melody that seemed to encapsulate the downhearted way he was feeling over his quarrel with his girl and the state of the dispiriting weather.

"Yes, Gloomy Sunday! That will be the title of my new song" muttered Seress, excitedly, and he grabbed a pencil and wrote the notes down on an old postcard. Thirty minutes later he had completed the song.

Seress sent his composition off to a music publisher and waited for acceptance with a lot more hope than he usually had in his heart. A few days later, the song-sheet was returned with a rejection note stapled to it that stated: "Gloomy Sunday has a weird but highly depressing melody and rhythm, and we are sorry to say that we cannot use it."

The song was sent off again to another publisher, and this time it was accepted. The music publisher told Seress that his song would soon be distributed to all the major cities of the world. The young Hungarian was ecstatic.

But a few months after Gloomy Sunday was printed, there were a spate of strange occurrences that were allegedly sparked off by the new song. In Berlin, a young man requested a band to play Gloomy Sunday, and after the number was performed, the man went home and blasted himself in the head with a revolver after complaining to relatives that he felt severely depressed by the melody of a new song which he couldn't get out of his head. That song was Gloomy Sunday.

A week later in the same city, a young female shop assistant was found hanging from a rope in her flat. Police who investigated the suicide found a copy of the sheet-music to Gloomy Sunday in the dead girl's bedroom.

Two days after that tragedy, a young secretary in New York gassed herself, and in a suicide note she requested Gloomy Sunday to be played at her funeral. Weeks later, another New Yorker, aged 82, jumped to his death from the window of his seventh-story apartment after playing the 'deadly' song on his piano. Around the same time, a teenager in Rome who had heard the unlucky tune jumped off a bridge to his death.

The newspapers of the world were quick to report other deaths associated with Seress' song. One newspaper covered the case of a woman in London who had been playing a 78 recording of Gloomy Sunday at full volume, infuriating and frightening her neighbours, who had read of the fatalities supposedly caused by the tune. The stylus finally became trapped in a groove, and the same piece of the song played over and over. The neighbours hammered on the woman's door but there was no answer, so they forced the door open - only to find the woman dead in her chair from an overdose of barbiturates. As the months went by, a steady stream of bizarre and disturbing deaths that were alleged to be connected to Gloomy Sunday persuaded the chiefs at the BBC to ban the seemingly accursed song from the airwaves. Back in France, Rizzo Seress, the man who had composed the controversial song, was also to experience the adverse effects of his creation. He wrote to his ex-fiancée, pleading for a reconciliation. But several days later came the most awful, shocking news. Seress learned from the police that his sweetheart had poisoned herself. And by her side, a copy of the sheet music to Gloomy Sunday was found.

At the end of the 1930s, when the world was plunged into the war against Hitler, Seress' inauspicious song was quickly forgotten in the global turmoil, but the sheet-music to the dreaded song is still available (on the Net too) to those who are curious to know if the morbid melody can still exert its deadly influence...


© Tom Slemen (British paranormal investigator)

www.slemen.com
http://www.qsl.net/w5www/gloomy.html

wow intresting story nice find

I never want to hear this song. just in case. omg.

lol its not that depressing imo.

One of Many Gloomy Sunday Threads

thanx! just reading this made me even more depressed.

I listen to this song quiet a lot. I'm not dead. It doesn't cause you to commit suicide. Yes, it is very depressing, but the most it will make you want to do is lie down on the couch and not move for the rest of the day. It really is a beautiful song, so I do recommend listening to it.

I was sceptical about this story until i actually downloaded and listened to the song. It is both disturbingly beautiful and depressing.

could you get in trouble or be charged with murder if you intentionally make someone commit suicide?

im now playing it out loud....IN PUBLIC!..hehehehehe (watches around for any twitches or teary eyes)

Dude...I don't know, but if not...I should do that to my psycho ex.... She just won't leave me alone!