Latest / Crime and Horror / His song will KILL you... - MrBallen

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His song will KILL you... - MrBallen · Crime and Horror

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Both of today's stories are about people who actually achieved
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: their big career ambitions, but at an extremely high cost.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: But before we get into today's stories, if you're a
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  Speaker 1: we do, and we upload two.
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  Speaker 2: Three, even four times every week.
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  Speaker 1: don't miss any of our weekly uploads. Okay, let's get
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  Speaker 1: into today's stories. On the afternoon of June 10th, 1871,
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  Speaker 1: A defense attorney named Clement Valendingham sat in a courtroom
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  Speaker 1: in Lebanon, Ohio, listening intently as a prosecutor questioned a witness.
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  Speaker 1: And with each word that this witness said on the stand,
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  Speaker 1: it made the knot in Clement's stomach get tighter and tighter.
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  Speaker 1: Because this testimony was very bad for Clement's.
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  Speaker 2: Client, an accused murderer named Thomas McGeehan.
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  Speaker 1: So the murder that McGeehan was on trial for had
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  Speaker 1: happened about six months earlier on Christmas Eve in the
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  Speaker 1: nearby city of Hamilton. That night, McGeehan had stormed into
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  Speaker 1: a saloon with a group of men and attacked another
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  Speaker 1: man named Tom Myers. And at some point during this attack,
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  Speaker 1: a gun went off and Tom Myers was shot and killed. Now,
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  Speaker 1: there were at least 30 witnesses in the saloon at
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  Speaker 1: the time. But the whole attack had happened so fast
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  Speaker 1: and was so chaotic that no one had seen who
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  Speaker 1: did the actual shooting. Despite that, everyone in town immediately
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  Speaker 1: decided that McGeehan had done it.
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  Speaker 2: However.
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  Speaker 1: Even Clement had to admit that that was a reasonable assumption.
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  Speaker 1: McGeehan and the victim, Tom Myers, had a longstanding feud,
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  Speaker 1: and everyone knew they hated each other. Also, McGeehan was
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  Speaker 1: a well-known violent criminal who was said to have killed
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  Speaker 1: at least four other people. So when Tom Myers got killed,
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  Speaker 1: the citizens of Hamilton didn't even wait for a trial.
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  Speaker 1: They wanted to hang McGeehan right now. Now, the police
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  Speaker 1: had obviously intervened and arrested McGeehan instead, But word had
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  Speaker 1: spread all over Ohio about how messy and dramatic this
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  Speaker 1: case was. And as a result, the trial itself had
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  Speaker 1: become very high profile. Every day, journalists and important people
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  Speaker 1: from all over the state came to sit in court
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  Speaker 1: and listen to the testimony. And now all of these
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  Speaker 1: important people were watching Clement's defense case get just obliterated
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  Speaker 1: by this witness. The witness was one of the men
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  Speaker 1: who had been in the saloon at the time of
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  Speaker 1: the murder.
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  Speaker 2: And he was making a very big claim.
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  Speaker 1: He was saying that even though no one in the
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  Speaker 1: saloon saw McGeehan fire the gunshot that killed Tom Myers,
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  Speaker 1: he must have. Because after the gun went off, this
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  Speaker 1: witness saw smoke coming from McGeehan's jacket pocket, like he
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  Speaker 1: had been concealing his gun inside his jacket when he
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  Speaker 1: had fired it. Clement looked around the courtroom while the
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  Speaker 1: witness explained this and saw that everybody was nodding, like
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  Speaker 1: what the witness said made perfect sense. Clement could tell
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  Speaker 1: basically at this point, everybody thought his client was guilty.
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  Speaker 2: But Clement, he did not agree.
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  Speaker 1: He knew McGeehan's case looked bad, but Clement was absolutely
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  Speaker 1: certain that his client really was innocent. Clement's theory was
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  Speaker 1: that the victim, Tom Myers, had shot himself by accident
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  Speaker 1: when he pulled out his own gun during.
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  Speaker 2: The fight to defend himself.
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  Speaker 1: Unfortunately for Clement, though, this was 1871, so there was
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  Speaker 1: no forensic evidence about gunshots except for some scorch marks
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  Speaker 1: on Tom Myers' shirt. So the whole entire case was
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  Speaker 1: really just based on witness testimony. And of course, this
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  Speaker 1: witness was very convincing for the other side. The prosecutor
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  Speaker 1: finished up his questioning and then walked back to his
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  Speaker 1: seat with a smirk on his face, like he knew
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  Speaker 1: what he had just done. They pretty much had just
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  Speaker 1: won the case. It was now Clement's turn with the witness,
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  Speaker 1: and he really didn't know how it was going to go.
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  Speaker 1: But as Clement stood up and crossed the courtroom floor,
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  Speaker 1: he felt a calm come over him because he was
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  Speaker 1: thinking to himself, don't have much to lose. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: pretty much everybody thinks my client is guilty. And so
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  Speaker 1: if he's found guilty, no one's going to be shocked. But,
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  Speaker 1: you know, maybe I can find a way to prove
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  Speaker 1: he's innocent and that would be just great.
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  Speaker 2: But if I don't, it is what it is.
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  Speaker 1: So to be clear, Clement was a very controversial figure
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  Speaker 1: in Ohio at this time, which was right after the
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  Speaker 1: Civil War. He had been very vocally against the then
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  Speaker 1: President Abraham Lincoln and And his viewpoints had gotten him
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  Speaker 1: banished from Ohio and the other northern states. And then
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  Speaker 1: after the war ended, he had returned to his home
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  Speaker 1: state of Ohio and had gone back to being an attorney.
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  Speaker 1: But he had never really been able to fully rehabilitate
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  Speaker 1: his public image. Even now, six years later, a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people still really hated him for behavior.
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  Speaker 2: During the war.
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  Speaker 1: And so, in essence, Clement knew that pretty much his
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  Speaker 1: public profile was not about to change if he lost
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  Speaker 1: this case. I mean, basically nothing would change. You know,
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  Speaker 1: he's the guy that everybody hates and his client's the murderer.
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  Speaker 2: It is what it is.
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  Speaker 1: But if he won, he could recreate himself in the
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  Speaker 1: court of public opinion as a sensational criminal defense lawyer
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  Speaker 1: who overturned impossible cases. And again, he really believed his
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  Speaker 1: client was innocent. So this would be like a two-pronged
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  Speaker 1: major victory for Clement. And so Clement stepped up to
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  Speaker 1: the witness box and began firing off questions to this witness.
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  Speaker 1: By the end of the day, Clement had gotten that
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  Speaker 1: witness to admit he hadn't actually seen a physical gun.
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  Speaker 2: And eventually, Clement was.
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  Speaker 1: Able to completely destroy the jacket shooting theory when he
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  Speaker 1: showed the court that the jacket that McGeehan had been
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  Speaker 1: wearing that night, there was no hole anywhere on it.
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  Speaker 1: As the week went on and more witnesses took the stand,
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  Speaker 1: Clement was pleased to find that none of them had
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  Speaker 1: any actual proof that McGeehan shot Tom Myers. He also
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  Speaker 1: couldn't find any evidence that proved his client was innocent either.
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  Speaker 1: So later that week on Friday, June 16th, as the
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  Speaker 1: trial came to a close, Clement was kind of worried.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, he knew that he had not done enough
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  Speaker 1: to get his client acquitted. And even though he knew
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  Speaker 1: that the likelihood of success here was always going to
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  Speaker 1: be slim, he felt like he had begun to make some.
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  Speaker 2: Serious headway and they could win. Victory felt possible. And
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  Speaker 2: it was just slipping out of his hand.
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  Speaker 1: That afternoon, Clement sat behind the defense table, sweating profusely
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  Speaker 1: as he listened to the prosecutor's team deliver their just
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  Speaker 1: brutal closing arguments. This was giving Clement a lot of anxiety.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, he was moments away from giving his own
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  Speaker 1: closing arguments, and it was really his very last chance
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  Speaker 1: to convince the jury that his client was innocent.
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  Speaker 2: But he just did not.
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  Speaker 1: Feel like the speech he had prepared would do that,
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  Speaker 1: especially after, you know, the prosecutor's really just very powerful
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  Speaker 1: speech that he was giving right now. And so as
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  Speaker 1: the prosecutor very eloquently and beautifully wrapped up his speech,
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  Speaker 1: Clement was busy furiously crossing out lines on his speech
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  Speaker 1: and rewriting things and trying to make it better, but
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  Speaker 1: he just couldn't.
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  Speaker 2: So he just sat there racking his brain on what
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  Speaker 2: to say.
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  Speaker 1: But as he was sitting there in silence and like
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  Speaker 1: the prosecutor has sat down and everybody's waiting for Clement
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  Speaker 1: to stand up and deliver his speech here, an idea
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  Speaker 1: suddenly hit Clement. It hit him so hard that he
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  Speaker 1: actually just dropped his pen. He didn't know why this
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  Speaker 1: idea hadn't occurred to him earlier. But he suddenly realized
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  Speaker 1: there was a way he could prove McGeehan was innocent.
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  Speaker 2: It was so obvious.
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  Speaker 1: And if he was right, he would go down in
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  Speaker 1: history as probably the greatest defense attorney Ohio had ever seen.
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  Speaker 1: And so Clemente lunged for his pen again, then he
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  Speaker 1: frantically scribbled down what he was thinking. And then a
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  Speaker 1: minute later, he heard the judge call his name and
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  Speaker 1: tell him, come on, it's your turn to speak. And
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  Speaker 1: so Clemente He shot to his feet and he cleared
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  Speaker 1: his throat. And instead of launching into the speech he
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  Speaker 1: had prepared for this moment, he asked the judge to
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  Speaker 1: let him do it instead on Monday. The judge was
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  Speaker 1: a little apprehensive, but eventually they agreed. And when they did,
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  Speaker 1: Clement felt a surge of excitement rush through his body.
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  Speaker 1: And after the court proceedings officially ended for the day,
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  Speaker 1: Clement could not get out of there fast enough. Clement
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  Speaker 1: waited until nightfall to act. He needed to run a
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  Speaker 1: test to make sure his theory he was going to
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  Speaker 1: employ on Monday was correct. But he didn't want anybody
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  Speaker 1: from the prosecution team to see him doing it. So
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  Speaker 1: after dinner, Clement slipped out of his hotel and into
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  Speaker 1: the quiet streets of Lebanon.
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  Speaker 2: He'd spent the last few hours having dinner with some friends.
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  Speaker 1: And while he was pretty vague about what he actually
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  Speaker 1: planned to do tonight, he did tell them that they
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  Speaker 1: really needed to stay in town long enough to hear
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  Speaker 1: his big final argument on Monday. He was so confident
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  Speaker 1: in what he'd uncover tonight doing this test that he
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  Speaker 1: was sure his speech on Monday would be like the
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  Speaker 1: greatest legal.
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  Speaker 2: Moment in the history of Ohio. And so now, as.
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  Speaker 1: Clement made his way to the edge of town, he
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  Speaker 1: was filled with adrenaline and kept increasing his speed until
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  Speaker 1: he was basically running.
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  Speaker 2: And then he finally arrived at a quiet, isolated part
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  Speaker 2: of Lebanon. And as soon as he got there, he
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  Speaker 2: set up for this test he had planned and then
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  Speaker 2: ran through it. And after he finished... Clement smiled.
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  Speaker 1: Because he knew he had just found a way to
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  Speaker 1: prove that his client was innocent. Just a few minutes later,
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  Speaker 1: around 9 p.m., and Clement was back inside of his
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  Speaker 1: hotel room. He was so excited about the results of
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  Speaker 1: his test that he couldn't even sit down.
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  Speaker 2: And so he just kept pacing around and around and
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  Speaker 2: trying to get his thoughts together, but he was just
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  Speaker 2: so excited.
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  Speaker 1: His hotel room door was cracked open, and as he
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  Speaker 1: paced around, he saw his co-counsel, who was another lawyer
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  Speaker 1: on the defense team, walk by.
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  Speaker 2: So this hotel was.
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  Speaker 1: Sort of like the home base of everyone who was
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  Speaker 1: in town for the trial, and so most of the
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  Speaker 1: prosecution and the defense teams were staying there. When Clement
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  Speaker 1: saw his co-counsel, he immediately waved him inside and tried
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  Speaker 1: to tell him what he'd figured out. But the words
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  Speaker 1: just kind of tumbled out and all he really got
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  Speaker 1: across was that the prosecution had it all wrong. But he, Clement,
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  Speaker 1: had figured it out. But his co-counsel was just looking
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  Speaker 1: at him like he really didn't understand what he was saying.
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  Speaker 1: And so at some point, Clement realized he really needed
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  Speaker 1: to do a physical demonstration here. He really needed to
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  Speaker 1: repeat the test he had just done to show, actually
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  Speaker 1: show the co-counsel exactly what he was talking about. So
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  Speaker 1: without a whole lot of explanation to his co-counsel, Clement
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  Speaker 1: got up, he set up the test, and then he
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  Speaker 1: turned and he told his co-counsel to watch carefully.
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  Speaker 2: And then Clement began to perform the test. But this time,
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  Speaker 2: during the test, there was a sudden explosion and Clement
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  Speaker 2: collapsed to the ground.
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  Speaker 1: It would turn out that Clement's test did prove without
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  Speaker 1: a shadow of a doubt that.
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  Speaker 2: His client really was innocent.
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  Speaker 1: His theory was that Tom Myers shot himself by fumbling
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  Speaker 1: with his own gun. But in order to make sure
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  Speaker 1: his theory held weight with the jury, he wanted to
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  Speaker 1: show everyone that it was definitely physically possible to do that.
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  Speaker 1: So when Clement had gone to the edge of town
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  Speaker 1: to do this test by himself for the first time,
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  Speaker 1: he took a gun with him and he basically experimented
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  Speaker 1: with ways it could have actually happened by shooting the
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  Speaker 1: gun through fabric from different angles and looking at the
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  Speaker 1: resulting scorch marks. And when he did this, he realized
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  Speaker 1: that the scorch marks that had been left on the
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  Speaker 1: victim's clothes, the only forensic evidence they had, they could
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  Speaker 1: have only been made if the victim was shot at
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: point-blank range, which meant that McGeehan was standing too far
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  Speaker 1: away to be the shooter. But it was not until later,
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  Speaker 1: when Clement acted out the shooting again for his co-counsel,
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  Speaker 1: that his discovery went from great to perfect. Because completely
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: by accident, he did exactly what Tom.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: Myers had done. He fumbled with the gun and shot himself.
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  Speaker 1: Clement died from his self-inflicted wound 12 hours later. But
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: his death made his arguments so convincing that his client.
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  Speaker 2: Was eventually acquitted. So Clement had been right. This was
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: the greatest case of his life. It was also his last.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: Our second and final story is about a song, but
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: we're not going to be playing this song during the episode.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: And when you get to the end of this story,
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: you'll see why.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: On an overcast, chilly Sunday in the fall of 1932,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: 32-year-old composer Rezo Shoresh sat in his apartment in Paris
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  Speaker 1: trying to write a new melody.
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  Speaker 2: He'd been at it for hours, and it was not
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: going well at all.
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  Speaker 1: Each time he jotted down a new combination of notes,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: he'd just tear it up and toss it into his
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: trash bin where there was already a pile of other
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: discarded drafts. So Rezzo was used to this kind of
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: messy creative process. He had made a name for himself
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: as a musician in his home country of Hungary over
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: the last decade. He'd written more than 40 musical compositions
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: for various singers and artists, and a few had been
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: really successful. So Rezzo knew he had the talent to
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: be a huge star and to change people's lives with
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: his music. But recently, you know, despite trying many different
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: iterations and just allowing the the messy creative process to
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: take hold and just kind of letting it run its course,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: Rezzo still just could not come up with any new
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: good work, mainly because he was incredibly stressed out. So
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: at this point in 1932, Rezzo and many other people
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: were very nervous about the state of the world and
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: their future because there were really violent political views spreading
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: across Europe, especially in Germany. This was still seven years
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: before the start of World War II, But Hitler and
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: his Nazi party were already starting to gain power. And Rezo,
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: who was Jewish, was worried about all the anti-Jewish rhetoric
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: that the Nazis were spreading. And while that was terrifying
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: and kept Rezo up at night, the more urgent worry
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: he had on a daily basis that was really impeding
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: his creativity was how to literally afford food. Because the
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: world was also in the middle of the Great Depression,
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: which was a period of time in the 1920s and
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: 30s when multiple countries were dealing with terrible economies and
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: mass unemployment. Back in Rezo's home country of Hungary, things
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: were especially bad and getting worse. Banks and businesses were
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: closing almost every day, and more than a quarter of
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: the population was unemployed, living in extreme poverty. Rezo had
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: moved to Paris so he could find more opportunities. Paris,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: after all, was the art mecca of Europe. And even
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: though the state of the world felt depressing, Rezo thought
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: that the The creative energy there would inspire him to
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: create something beautiful amid all the darkness. But now, Rezzo
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: sighed and leaned back to look around the tiny, drafty
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: Parisian apartment of his. He'd been here for months, and
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: his fortunes certainly had not changed. He still didn't have
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: any work, and he still could not seem to write
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: anything good. But, you know, Rezzo, he kept leaning back
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: over and trying to write, but it was like immediately
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: he would tear it up, and he was just getting
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: more and more frustrated. Until finally, he just did give
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: up and put his head in his hands and basically said,
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: I can't do this. It seemed like the harder he
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: worked and the harder he tried to ignore all the
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: despair and sadness and awful things going on in the world,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: the worse he felt and obviously the worse his work was.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Like right now, he actually almost felt physically ill from
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: kind of bottling up all these competing terrible feelings and thoughts.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: But as he thought about the fact that he was
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: doing that, he suddenly decided, He just can't do that anymore.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: He can't continue to keep that stuff in.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: It was at that moment that Rezzo exhaled and let
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: in all the anguish he'd been trying to push away.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: Sadness and fear and quiet desperation just washed over him
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: and into him, and he didn't fight it anymore. He
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: just suddenly started writing. His pen flew across the page
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: as wave after wave of terrible emotion hit him.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: And when he was done.
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  Speaker 1: he ran over to his piano to play the notes
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  Speaker 1: that he had just written. And as his fingers moved
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: across the keys, a very slow, sad melody began to
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: fill the air. And it was so beautiful and so
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: sad that he.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: Actually felt like crying as he heard it.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: When he was done playing, he just sat back in
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: his chair and now tears filled his eyes and his
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: heart was pounding so fast that he knew he needed to.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: Get some air fast or he might actually just pass out.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: And so Rezzo went outside to take a walk and
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: hoped the fresh air would help him snap out of
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: the wild emotional fog that had just come over him.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: But the Paris.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: Streets were gray and cold, and this new melody continued
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: to ring in his ears. He was thrilled that he'd
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: actually written something, something real and powerful for the first
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: time in what felt like a long time. But it
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: was such an intense expression of his own sadness that
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: it almost hurt. Shortly into his walk, he heard somebody
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: call his name. When he looked up, he saw it
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: was his good friend. a poet named Laszlo Javor, who
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: rushed right up to him. And right away when Rezo
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: saw his friend, he felt himself.
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: Lightening up a little bit. He liked Laszlo. They were
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: both Hungarians in Paris trying to make good art and
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: a name for themselves, but neither of them had really
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: done it yet. But as soon as Laszlo reached Rezo,
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: Rezo could tell that his friend seemed really upset about
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: something too. And his friend told him that his fiance
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: had just ended things with him and he was completely heartbroken.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: After Rezo said that he was terribly sorry, The men
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: just walked together in silence. They were both lost in
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: their own sad, heavy feelings, and neither of them could
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: think of anything to say. And without even meaning to,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: Rezzo just began whistling the song that he had just written.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: And when he did this, it was like the tune
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: had an immediate effect on Laszlo. His eyes welled up,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: and he sort of began to cry, and also he
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: began to sing along, using words from a very sad
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: poem that.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: He had recently written. Rezzo couldn't believe it. Because without
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: even trying, Laszlo's words were perfectly fit for his melody.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: And so as this sort of impromptu collaboration has begun,
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: the men went from this really dark, gloomy mood to
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: a purely excited one. They were so inspired that they
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: rushed into a nearby restaurant to sit and work out
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: the rest of the song. And before they knew it,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: Rezzo had written an entire composition with Laszlo's lyrics. And
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: the song was about someone whose lover.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: Had just died. and their desire to be reunited with them.
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: When the men finished, they wanted to.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Hear their song out loud, so they asked the restaurant's
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: resident musicians to play it. And pretty soon, their song,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: something that hadn't even existed a few hours ago, was
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: blaring around the crowded restaurant. And as far as Rezzo
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: and Laszlo could tell, everybody inside was loving this song.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Some of the restaurant patrons actually cried, and others closed
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: their eyes and.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: Just kind of swayed to the sound.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: It was what Rezzo had always hoped his music would do,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: which was truly affect those who heard it. Rezzo and
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Laszlo looked at each other, and for the first time
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: in days, they smiled. Rezzo and Laszlo decided to call
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: their song Gloomy Sunday, since it had been created on
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: that hazy fall Sunday. They both had a feeling that
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: this tune was very special, and that it would finally
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: be the thing that changed both of their lives. So,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: over the next few months, they took the song around
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: to producers, and tried to get somebody to buy it.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: And finally, someone did.
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: A company agreed to publish the sheet music and record it.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: After that, Rezzo went back to his shabby Parisian apartment
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: and waited for the song to take hold and the
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: money to start pouring in.
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: But that's not what happened.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: As the months passed by, Rezzo didn't hear Gloomy Sunday
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: on the radio or see it on any charts, or
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: hear it in restaurants, or performed in theaters.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: It was like it really had never existed at all.
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: And this crushed Rezzo. He was even more upset and
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: defeated than he had been before he had written it.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: Because he'd gotten a taste of hope. And it felt
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: even worse to fail after that. The rest of Rezzo's life,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: and the state of the world, got worse too. The
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: Great Depression was still going strong.
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: And as Hitler got more and more popular... people started.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: To wonder if there was going to be a war.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: So Rezo and pretty much everyone else around him just
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: sank further into their fears and worries and kept praying
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: for something to change. Three years later, on a spring
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: evening in 1935, Rezo was back in Hungary, walking down
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: a street in the country's capital city, Budapest. He was
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: on his way to a friend's house, but as he
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: strode down the sidewalk, he heard a song coming from
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: an open window. He stopped cold and his heart began
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: to pound because he knew that song.
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: It was his. It was Gloomy Sunday.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: Rezzo had no idea how or why he was hearing
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: a song, which as far as he knew, no one
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: had really been that interested in.
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: But it was completely shocking.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: I That meant it was being put out on the
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: airwaves and being consumed by the public.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: This was incredible.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: And so Rezzo just stood there letting his own notes
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: wash over him for the first time, you know, hearing
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: this out in public. And then when it was done,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: he just stood there and just absolutely beamed. And after that,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: for months, Gloomy Sunday was everywhere. Rezzo heard it played
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: at social gatherings, streaming from people's windows, street performers sang
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: it to passerby, and It was even performed at concert
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: venues all over the city. And so by the end
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: of the year, it seemed like there was hardly anyone
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: in Hungary who hadn't heard and loved his song. Rezzo
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: even read in the papers that his song was being
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: played in England, in France.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: And as far away as the United States. So Rezzo
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: knew that he had actually done it.
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: He had realized his dream of being a successful, internationally
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: recognized composer with a hit song that truly resonated with
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: the public. A few months later, on a morning in
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: late February of 1936, Rezzo left his apartment and was
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: heading out for the day. And on his way down
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: the street, he passed by a newsstand. And he noticed
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: that one of the headlines mentioned his song, Gloomy Sunday. Initially,
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: he was really excited to see that he was getting
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: some press. So he immediately grabbed a copy.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: And opened it up to read. But as his eyes
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: scammed the page, his stomach flipped because... This was not
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: good press.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: Actually, what this article had to say was so terrible
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: that Rezzo's first reaction was that he'd read it wrong.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: And so he read it again and again and again.
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: But each time he read it, it just said the
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: same horrible thing. And so Rezzo found himself starting to panic.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Rezzo quickly shut the paper and just began looking around him.
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: And he saw there were a few other people who were.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Also by the newsstand and they were reading the same paper.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: And they were all talking to one another in hushed voices.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: And pointing at that headline about his song. And Rezzo
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: just stood there, listening to this unsettling murmur, and feeling
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: a wave of absolute horror wash over him. Over the
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: next month, more and more headlines about Rezzo's song continued
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: to appear in the papers, and it was like each day,
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: they only got worse.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: And then the story went international. I mean, the Catholic
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: Church weighed in on it, and then the police got involved.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Finally, one afternoon at the end of March in 1936,
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Rezzo was sitting at his piano, staring down at the keys.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: He knew he should be writing music, but.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: Instead he was just filled with dread, just like he
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: had been every day since he first read that dreadful headline.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: And then suddenly there was a knock at the door.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: And when Rezzo got up and answered it, a cold
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: sweat broke out all over his body because it was
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: the Budapest police and they wanted him to come down.
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: To the station.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: Rezzo's pulse raced with nerves, but at this point he
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: wasn't surprised. Because by now he knew that writing Gloomy
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: Sunday had been a horrific mistake. Because it would turn out,
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: Gloomy Sunday had been a very shockingly impactful song. Just
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: as Rezzo thought he wanted it to be.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: But over the course of the last year, the police
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: had begun finding its sheet music or its written lyrics
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: or the actual song playing on record players at scenes
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: of suicides. Dozens of people across Hungary, Europe, and the
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: United States, from police officers to teenagers to waitstaff to students,
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: had taken their own lives, basically while listening to Gloomy Sunday.
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: These deaths were so widespread that a Hungarian archbishop actually
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: wrote a letter to the general public begging them to
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: stop hurting themselves, and multiple bands of the song itself
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: were enacted across Europe and England. And the United States.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: On the day that the Budapest police knocked on Rezzo's door,
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: they demanded that he stop sales of the song.
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: And Rezzo agreed.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: And eventually, so did the song's publisher and his musical partner, Laszlo.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: And Rezzo's partner, Laszlo, was especially grief-stricken by this whole thing.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: Because his fiancée, the one who had broken his heart
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: on the day he had written this song with Rezzo,
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: she ended up being one of the many suicide victims.
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: Before she took her own life, she sent Laszlo a
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: telegram which simply said, Gloomy Sunday. No one knows why
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Gloomy Sunday potentially caused the sudden wave of death.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: One theory is that people were already.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: Really suffering from depression and feeling hopeless because of The
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: Great Depression and the worsening political climate and the song's
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: popularity was either a coincidence or sort of an unfortunate trigger.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: As for Rezzo, he was devastated by the legacy of
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: his song, even though it did technically live up to
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: his original vision. It did deeply resonate with people and
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: was unquestionably a hit. And over the years, despite all
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: the negative associations with the song, it's been translated into
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: 28 different languages and was even performed by legendary singers
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: like Frank Sinatra and Billie Holiday. Initially, there was an
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: estimated 20 suicides attributed to Gloomy Sunday across Europe and
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: the United States.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: In the years that have followed, however.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: Lore around the song has only grown, and some estimates
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: put the death toll in the hundreds, although the numbers
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: are difficult to verify. Rezzo never wrote another hit, and
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: in fact, ultimately, he followed in the footsteps of some
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: of his listeners. he jumped out the window of his eighth.
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: Floor apartment on another overcast gloomy Sunday and died two
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: days later.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: Before I wrap this episode up, I want to say
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: that if you are experiencing suicidal thoughts or suicidal ideations
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: or you're just struggling right now, number one, you're not alone,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: but number two, you really need to talk to someone.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: Don't hold that stuff in.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for watching today's episode. Let me
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: know what you thought of it in the comments below.
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: And remember, we have a whole playlist of Places You
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: Can't Go episodes ready for you to binge right now.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: So go ahead and click here and give them a watch.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: All right, until next time, see ya.