History Main / MurderBallad

* Music/{{Beck}}'s "Girl", from ''Music/{{Guero}}'', is written from the point of view of a murderer in the planning stages.

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'': In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS5E154ComeWanderWithMe Come Wander With Me]]", the titular song tells the story of Floyd Burney accidentally killing Billy Rayford and being killed himself by Billy's three brothers out of revenge. Floyd believes that it is a scam devised by Mary Rachel and the Rayfords. [[spoiler:He's wrong.]]

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1985'': In "Love is Blind", the BlindMusician begins to sing a song about a man killing his wife's lover as soon as Jack Haines enters the Mustang bar. It doesn't take Jack long to realize that the song is describing exactly what he intends to do.

* "The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia" by Vicki Lawrence is a sordid tale of infidelity and murder in a small Georgia town which ultimately leads to an innocent man being hanged. The murderer turns out to be [[spoiler:the narrator, who was punishing her brother's wife for her adultery. Unfortunately, the judge hangs her brother before she can confess the crime]]. Famously covered by Music/RebaMcEntire, though her version's music video was a mini-movie version which had Reba as the sister, revealing to an historian that the judge [[spoiler:had been the man sleeping with her brother's wife and had refused to let her confession be heard so that the matter would be closed quickly and without further investigation]]

* [[http://www.bluegrasslyrics.com/all_song.cfm-recordID=c184.htm "Never Let The Devil Get The Upper Hand Of You"]] is a chilling song about a man who is raised well, finds a good job, meets a girl who he loves, plans to get married, and then beats her to death for no reason.

* Hardy's "Wait in the Truck" has a drifter coming across a woman abused by her husband. He kills him, smokes one of the husband's cigarettes', and waits for the police to arrive. Currently, he's five years in a life sentence, and while prison isn't easy, it was worth it to see a brighter side of the woman he picked up that night, and the place is better than where the abusive husband is.

* "Hey Joe" - Written by either Dino Valente or Billy Roberts, originally recorded by GarageRock band the Leaves, [[CoveredUp made famous to the rock generation by]] Music/JimiHendrix on his album ''Music/AreYouExperienced'', and also covered by Music/TheByrds and Music/{{Love}}, among many others.

** Late member Bushwick Bill had a song on his debut album ''Little Big Man'' called Chuckwick. About a short psychopath who goes on a killing spree, ranging from random killings, to breaking into a woman's house... and I'm sure you can guess the rest, all ForTheEvulz. The song was heavily inspired by the horror movie character Chucky from the Film/ChildsPlay franchise.

* Several songs on Music/MartyRobbins' ''Music/GunfighterBalladsAndTrailSongs'' fit this trope, among them "El Paso".

* "Run, Joey Run" by David Geddes. A family man snaps upon learning that the title character had impregnated his daughter, Julie, and unable to be reasoned with (the girl begs, "It wasn't his fault/He means so much to me/Daddy please don't/We're gonna get married/Just you wait and see"), grabs a gun and hunts down Joey. Julie warns Joey that he can expect a visit from her angry father, prompting Joey to drive to Julie's house. There, the father sneaks up from behind to try to shoot Joey ... only for Julie to stand in the way at the last second and take the bullet. Julie dies in Joey's arms; the father's fate is unknown, whether he is arrested for manslaughter, turns the gun on himself or does something else.

* "I Did What I Did For Maria" is a bouncy ballad by British singer Tony Christie about a widower who, on the eve of his execution, recalls how he remorselessly avenged his dead wife by finding and gunning down her killer, hence the title.

* "Murder by Numbers," from ''Music/{{Synchronicity}}'' by Music/ThePolice.

* Mike Oldfield’s “Moonlight Shadow,” is about a women watching her boyfriend being shot dead after getting in between the cross fire of a gang war, all sung to [[LyricalDissonance upbeat jangly tune.]]

* Music/TheNotoriousBIG, a.k.a. Biggie Smalls, was, well, ''[[IncrediblyLamePun notorious]]'' for some of these.

* The Louvin Brothers had a hit with a cover of "Knoxville Girl", in which the singer beats his girlfriend to death for seemingly no reason and then throws her body in the Tennessee River to hide it, but gets caught anyway.
--> She fell down on her bended knees, for mercy she did cry
--> "Oh Willy dear, don't kill me here, I'm unprepared to die"
--> She never spoke another word, I only beat her more
--> Until the ground around me within her blood did flow

** "Janošek" (name of the titular character) might be about this, or about a RoughishPoacher, depending on whether you believe "young doe" to be an euphemism.

* "Walker's Woods", the debut hit for Ed Bruce from 1967. The narrator has a backwoods tryst with the girlfriend of a CrazyJealousGuy, who's pursuing them. The narrator then lets her sink to her death in quicksand when she threatens to tell her boyfriend what happened. The narrator almost succeeds in escaping the woods but is fatally bitten by a snake. Still, he takes [[DeadAllAlong posthumous satisfaction]] in knowing that he died before the boyfriend could kill him.

* Music/{{AURORA}} has "[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Murder Song]] (5, 4, 3, 2, 1)", and its possible SequelSong, "It Happened Quiet".

* "The Tale of Jenny and Screech" by Ren, actually a trilogy of stories involving characters named Jenny, Screech, and Violet. in which a boy named James - better known as Screech - kills Jenny in a mugging gone wrong. Screech tries to flee but is shot by a police officer. The story then takes a turn as it goes back in time to 2005, to discuss a teenager named Violet [[spoiler: who gives birth to twins as she is dying - who grow up to be Jenny and Screech.]]

* ''In the pines, in the pines, where the sun never shines'' is a short browser game based on the US murder ballad tradition.

* "Blood Red and Goin' Down" by Music/TanyaTucker, a 1973 ballad about a young girl made by her father to help track down his unfaithful wife. Eventually, the two find them at a roadside hotel, and after the man sends his daughter back outside, he brutally slays both of them. Unknown to her father, the daughter witnessed the murder by watching through a window, remarking that as he came back outside, her father "''left them both soakin' up the sawdust on the floor''."

* "Run, Joey Run" by David Geddes. [[OverprotectiveDad A family man]] snaps upon learning that the title character had impregnated his daughter, Julie, and unable to be reasoned with (the girl begs, "It wasn't his fault/He means so much to me/Daddy please don't/We're gonna get married/Just you wait and see"), grabs a gun and hunts down Joey. Julie warns Joey that he can expect a visit from her angry father, prompting Joey to drive to Julie's house. There, the father sneaks up from behind to try to shoot Joey ... only for Julie to stand in the way at the last second and take the bullet. Julie dies in Joey's arms; the father's fate is unknown, whether he is arrested for manslaughter, turns the gun on himself or does something else.

-->"''Dead in the middle of Little Italy, little did we know that we riddled two middle men who didn't do diddly.''"