Classic rock is a genre that can capture all emotions, but none more so than heartbreak. That is especially true in the three cases below where Warren Zevon, Fleetwood Mac, and Nirvana wrote devastating tracks.
Videos by American Songwriter
“Keep Me In Your Heart” by Warren Zevon
“Keep Me In Your Heart” was the last song Warren Zevon ever recorded. He did so while dealing with inoperable cancer, a situation that is well felt in the devastating track that asks listeners to remember him when he’s gone.
Shadows are fallin’ and I’m runnin’ out of breath
Keep me in your heart for a while
If I leave you it doesn’t mean I love you any less
Keep me in your heart for a while
The album on which it appeared, The Wind, won the GRAMMY for Best Contemporary Folk album, while the song itself was twice nominated.
“Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac
“Landslide” came to be one of Fleetwood Mac’s best-known songs. Stevie Nicks wrote the track after her and ex Lindsey Buckingham’s first album failed and resulted in them being dropped from their label. At the time, Nicks was debating whether to continue in music or go back to school.
In a 2014 interview with The New York Times, Nicks shared what life was like when she penned the iconic classic rock tune.
“I wrote ‘Landslide’ in 1973, when I was 27, and I did already feel old in a lot of ways,” she said. “I’d been working as a waitress and a cleaning lady for years. I was tired.”
I took my love, I took it down
Climbed a mountain and I turned around
And I saw my reflection in the snow covered hills
‘Til the landslide brought me down
Meanwhile, in 2007, Buckingham told The Austin Chronicle that he considers the song one of Fleetwood Mac’s first-ever tracks.
“That was a Stevie thing. It’s a beautiful song,” he said. “It did deal with some problems that she and I were having at the time.
The song, which was certified Gold, peaked at No. 51 on the Billboard Hot 100.
“Something in the Way” by Nirvana
Nirvana may not be defined as “classic rock” in everyone’s books, but they are classic, and they are rock. And in terms of timelines, the grunge pioneers released their debut album over 35 years ago.
“Something in the Way” appeared on Nirvana‘s seminal 1991 album, Nevermind. Written by Kurt Cobain, the classic rock song details the period the late singer was homeless and struggling mentally.
Underneath the bridge, tarp has sprung a leak
And the animals I’ve trapped have all become my pets
And I’m living off of grass, and the drippings from my ceiling
It’s okay to eat fish ’cause they don’t have any feelings
Ultimate Classic Rock reported that Cobain once said the track was him imagining horrible scenarios, like, “if I was living under the bridge and I was dying of AIDS, if I was sick and I couldn’t move and I was a total street person. That was kind of the fantasy of it.”
In a 2021 interview with The Los Angeles Times, Cobain’s widow, Courtney Love, provided more insight into the song.
“He is clawing his way out on ‘Something In The Way’,” she said. “He’s telling himself anything just to get through.”
(Photo by Hayley Madden/Redferns)
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