Angel Olsen
White Fire
2014
From album Burn Your Fire For No Witness
Before Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, Haley Heyndrickx, etc Angel Olsen set the template. You want a sad song, how about opening it with “Everything is tragic?” It could devolve into parody easily but it doesn’t. The deep smoldering depression in this song is real. Another line “I turned on a picture show” somehow fits the song perfect despite the anachronism, it gives it a timeless quality. Even if it starts tragic it ends with
If you’ve still got some light in you then go before it’s gone
Burn your fire for no witness, it’s the only way it’s done
and
Hit the ground and run.
It’s lyrically brilliant and that’s before you get to the fact that Angel Olsen has one of the absolute best voices on the planet to give emphasis to every line she writes. It’s just her and her guitar and it’s exceptional.
Entreaty 