Back to 11 Sad Songs About Car Accidents
The Shangri-Las "Leader of the Pack"
Ron Case, Hulton Archive
In the girl group's most enduring and third most morbid hit, they sing about Jimmy, the leader of a local motorcycle game who comes to an unfortunate end when his girlfriend is forced to break up with him and he speeds away in tears. "As he drove away on that rainy night, I begged him to go slow," the girl recalls. 'Whether he heard, I'll never know."
The Shangri-Las also sang about a fatal crying-related crash in "Give Us Your Blessings." In that song, another Jimmy and his girlfriend Mary try to elope against their parents' wishes and die when they fail to see a detour sign on the road, further cementing the group's strong anti-emotional driving (and anti-Jimmy) stance.
