Lover, You Should've Come Over

Jeff Buckley was twenty-seven when he made Grace and twenty-nine when he died, and “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over” is the song that most clearly demonstrates the loss — six and a half minutes of a voice with no audible ceiling being used entirely in service of the ache rather than the display.

The song walks the specific line between grief and self-pity and never crosses it. Buckley keeps the narrator honest: he is young, he missed his chance, the woman he loves is getting married to someone else this afternoon, and none of that is anyone’s fault but his. He sings it like someone making peace with the fact that the person you are grieving is a person you drove away yourself.