Top 12 songs about breakups

Heartbreak and heartache suck, sure, but think of all the truly great music they inspire. We've chosen 12 of the best for your consideration.

“Cry Me a River” by Justin Timberlake
In the days before it was commonplace to exploit your celebrity breakup on your own reality TV show, the lack of ambiguity in Justin Timberlake's "Cry Me a River" was somewhat shocking. We all knew he'd broken up with his girlfriend and fellow Mouseketeer Britney Spears, but despite having never spoken publicly about it, this single from his debut solo album said more than we ever previously imagined about their relationship. "You don't have to say what you did / I already know, I found out from him" sang JT, with most fans concluding this referred to allegations that Britney had been unfaithful with dancer Wade Robson. Justin denied it was about her (despite featuring a Spears lookalike in the video) but Britney was in no doubt and told Rolling Stone: "He got what he wanted. I think it looks like such a desperate attempt, personally."

“She’s Out of My Life” by Michael Jackson
If you can listen to Michael Jackson sing "She's Out of My Life" and not cry like a child watching "Bambi" then you have no heart. It makes the 1980 single even more traumatic when you know it was written by Tom Bahler after he was dumped by none other than Karen Carpenter, following her discovery he had a child with another woman. Intending the song for Frank Sinatra, producer Quincy Jones let Michael record it with some trepidation, knowing the 21-year-old had never experienced the emotions the subject raises. Nevertheless, Jackson broke down in tears with every take, most noticeably on the released version as he sings the final line.

“Go Your Own Way” by Fleetwood Mac
If anyone could write the songbook on fractured relationships it's Fleetwood Mac. Taken from "Rumours," the tenth best selling album in U.S. recording history, "Go Your Own Way" is guitarist Lindsay Buckingham's careworn instruction to his bandmate Stevie Nicks, with whom he'd just ended a tempestuous relationship. The tension in the recording studio was added to by the fact that fellow band members John and Christine McVie were also splitting up (it must've been fun there at lunchtime). Buckingham's accusation that "Packing up, shacking up, is all you wanna do" has been denied by Nicks, who told Q magazine: "It was certainly a message within a song. And not a very nice one at that."

“Say Hello Wave Goodbye” by Soft Cell
It's quite astonishing to realise that 80s synth-pop duo Marc Almond and Dave Ball graduated from smearing themselves in cat food and wailing pretentiously about a consumer society to writing a near perfect torch song of failed romance in just two years of forming Soft Cell. Their classic 1981 single finds Marc telling his unnamed, mismatched, prostitute lover of the reasons why their relationship must end (but not the obvious one, curiously enough!) "You were a sleep around / A lost and found / And not for me, I fear", croons Almond in the most earnest of all white soul vocals. Whoever she was, she got dumped in style. Incidentally, never listen to the foolishly re-recorded version from 1991 - it's a travesty.