This is a tough thread for me, am old dude who loves music but I don’t recognize 3/4 of what others have posted. I’ll have to check out some of it but it has been hard for me to find new bands I like. Songs Ohia is an example, but lots of them are too twangy, too folksy, or overuse auto tune.

Anyways, to the question:

• Cranberries - Zombie

• Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Poor song

• Simon and Garfunkel - The sound of silence

• NIN - Hurt

• Jose Gonzalez - Heartbeats

• Dolly Parton - Jolene

• Annie Lennox - Don’t let it bring you down

Radiohead - How to Disappear Completely

Radiohead - Exit Music (For a Film)

Led Zeppelin - Rain Song

Pink Floyd - Great Gig in the Sky

The Rolling Stones - Gimme Shelter

Pearl Jam - Black (especially the MTV Unplugged version)

Nirvana - Where Did You Sleep Last Night (MTV Unplugged)

This isn’t every song I could put forth, but it’s a good short list off the top of my head. They’re breathtaking, emotional art when actively listened to with good headphones or speaker setup with volume up and no distractions. Even if you know these songs already, I encourage you to have a focused, active listening session. I think other than Rain Song which is probably like 7 or 8 minutes, all of these songs are only like 4 or 5 minutes long. We should all be able to take 5 minutes out of our day to enjoy some good art. If that 5 minutes is really precious, then I specifically recommend How to Disappear Completely because I interpret it to be about dissociating from anxieties and expectations and responsibilities for just a moment of peace, almost wishing for failure because what success you’ve found is contributing to the lack of time and peace that you so crave, and feeling guilty for that when you know that people would give anything to have what you have. That song didn’t mean anything to me until I put it on in the shower (I love my waterproof Bluetooth speaker) after a rough stretch of work, and it slammed into me harder than any song ever has. It was the exact right time and place for me to be listening, and it allowed me to let go of much more than I even knew I was holding onto. It was like an emotional enema, flushing things out that I didn’t even know were there. It wasn’t fun, but it was what I needed, and it might be what somebody else reading through these is looking for… Have a good cry!

A bunch of Sia’s music really sparks something in my soul and gets me emotional.

I can’t remember the last time I’ve had a good cry to some music but goosebumps come easier. Crying is hard haha. But here’s some sad stuff that runs an equal risk of giving me goosebumps or ruining my mood for the day:

Lingua Ignota - All removed Die (album)

Uboa - The Origin of My Depression (album)

Joy Division - Closer (album)

The Antlers - Hospice (album)

Giles Corey - Giles Corey (album)

Black Country, New Road - Ants From Up There (album)

Modest Mouse - Edit the Sad Parts (song)

The Tallest Man on Earth - Shallow Grave (album)

Songs: Ohia - Magnolia Electric co. (album)

Two Gallants - What the Toll Tells (album)

The Mountain Goats - Tallahassee (album)

Might come back an add more later!

Joe Hisaishi. It just hits different.

Green Bird by SEATBELTS/Gabriela Robin is a fantastic example of music that’s a bit inherently moody but nearly everyone familiar with it has a strong emotional tie…

Julia…

I think your question is a difficult one - the common answers are likely to be tied to shared media moments as a multimedia experience creates a much stronger memory than sound alone.

Did the radio happen to be playing “Little Green Bag” as you pulled into the parking lot of the church for your father’s funeral? Well then “Little Green Bag” might make you break out in tears. When my partner’s mother was passing away she was listening to Dancing Queen on loop by request… my partner has difficulty listening to Abba now.

So we’ve got three ways (maybe) songs can get emotional - they can be inherently emotional, they can have a curated multimedia experience or they could have a personal multimedia experience. The last factor is absolutely where you’ll find the strongest emotional ties - the middle factor inherently produces softer associations but ones that are more likely to be shared experiences (and dip into personal experiences… i.e. I was watching Cowboy Bebop when my girlfriend was growing more distant and I associate it really strongly with loneliness)… as for inherently moody music, I’d argue that’s just a more vague form of a curated experience. We have cultural associations with instruments and chords and those “written to invoke X emotion” songs are playing into those associations.

Anyways, I did want to clarify that it’s still super interesting to see other people’s emotional associations. That dive wasn’t meant to lessen the question or be dismissive in anyway - I just find the why extremely interesting.

He’s hardly modern, having died nearly 30 years ago, but Kevin Gilbert’s Song for a Dead Friend still brings tears to my eyes every time.

Heilung hits me really hard. It’s become my annual “cleansing” seeing them live. It’s transformative to me.

Live musicians give me goosebumps more easily than my HiFi headphones

Certain anime opening and ending themes

I don’t cry just when listening to music but when it appears in certain movie scenes it can happen. Like a few times in CODA (don’t click if you haven’t seen the movie) or when „What was I made for“ began in the Barbie movie.

Goosebumps:

• This Mortal Coil - Song to the Sirens
• Anne Clark & Murat Parlak - Be Drunk
• Samuel Barber - Adagio for strings
• Jean Sibelius - Violin Concerto in D minor - I. Allegro moderato
• Antonio Vivaldi - Four Seasons - Summer III. Presto
• and a few other classic songs

Also just in general

• Hania Rani
• Eva Cassidy
• Scala & Kolacny Brothers
• Dead Can Dance
• Rokia Traoré

John Prine and Bonnie Raitt: Angel From Montgomery.

Streetlight Manifesto gives me goosebumps, especially With Any Sort of Certainty and The Littlest Things.

If You Wanna Start Again by The Trews makes me cry, especially watching the video, because it brings back bad feelings from a horrible breakup I had back in December.

The song that ends Call Me By Your Name, as Elio sits staring into the fire always tugs at my heart strings. It’s “Visions of Gideon” by Sufjan Stevens. But “Leaves From The Vine” from Avatar: The Last Airbender always rips out my heart, hearing the anguish of a man who lost his only son to a war he regrets ever fighting in.

As cheesy as it may seem, travelin soldier, by the chicks (when they were still the Dixie chicks) gets me every time.