There’s actually a lot about this song to appreciate: its clever lyrical turn (is Smith talking about his love of/need for melancholy or a woman so perpetually unhappy she’s known to him as Miss Misery?), one of his patented key changes at the bridge, an ungodly amount of sweat equity invested in it since recording an early demo at Larry Crane’s Jackpot! Studios (which can be heard in a different key and with different lyrics on 2007 compilation New Moon). But I’m not hating on “Miss Misery” just because of its relative fame.
This Good Will Hunting centerpiece was the one Elliott Smith song your mom could be counted upon to know, thanks in part to his somewhat shaky appearance during the Oscars, performing the tune in an out-of-character white Prada suit and standing between Celine Dion and Trisha Yearwood to take bows afterward (an experience Smith characterized as “very strange, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day”). :: The Five Most Overrated Elliott Smith Songs Throughout his career, Smith recorded way more material than ever made it to the public’s ear, some of which comprises the “underrated” portion of this week’s The Over/Under. 25, 2003 the event and everything leading up to it was first published by MAGNET as a free-form essay called “The Moon Is A Lightbulb Breaking”). 17, 1994, at a long-forgotten Portland, Ore., all-ages venue called Umbra Penumbra, where Smith played a combination of acoustic Heatmiser material and some new songs that would later appear on solo debut Roman Candle) and Smith’s posthumous Portland memorial (Oct. Corey duBrowa can clearly remember two pivot points in the career of Elliott Smith: the first solo show he attended (Sept.