I was 12, I think. A neighbour and I, along with his younger
sister and her friend, were trying to recreate the magic of Abba in his
parents’ bedroom with a cassette recorder and whatever current songs we could
sing along to.
Somehow we stumbled on to a recording of Peggy Lee’s 1969
hit “Is That All There Is?”
I’m going to let Wikipedia explain why, not yet in high
school and having not really even started living yet, I found the song
spectacularly depressing:
“The lyrics of this song are written from the point of view of a person who is disillusioned with events in life that are supposedly unique experiences. The singer tells of witnessing her family’s house on fire when she was a little girl, seeing the circus, and falling in love for the first time. After each recital she expresses her disappointment in the experience. She suggests that we ‘break out the booze and have a ball — if that’s all there is ...’ ”