Life. It's not for everyone. As someone who has only ever had one nickname ("Born To Die"), this has always played on my mind somewhat. This situation is not helped by the fact your friends and family continually insist on expiring at inopportune moments, leaving you with the task of getting rid of the buggers when they shuffle off the coil. This is a job which makes it impossible not to consider the ramifications of the whole unpleasant death thing for yourself: earwigs making homes in your eye sockets and a family of big juicy blow flies up your Khyber.

It's not for me. Throw me in a bog like Tollund Man so the anaerobic and acidic conditions will preserve my fine beard for future archaeologists to ponder over and bury me with my extensive collection of Sunno))) T-shirts so they can make up the exhibition in a nearby visitor's centre. Anything but the standard RC burial/secular incineration at the local crem. It's never as funny as it's made out to be in films written by Richard Curtis or a sitcom from 1973. Unless it's at a really posh person's funeral where it's not only de riguer to laugh loudly all the way through it but also to wake up the next day amongst the pieces of a topiary chess set naked from the waist down with the deceased's sister. Well, it's what he would have wanted.

Given that I've just given up drinking and smoking just before the 38th birthday cut off and I'm only 18 stone there isn't a good reason why I shouldn't live to the age of 117. When I eventually go serene, tumescent, listening to the 187th new Fall album and laughing heartily at something witty Armando Ianucci has said in The Observer I hope my funeral is short and to the point. I'm not going to have a stupid song played like 'I'm Still Standing' by Elton John or 'Don't Worry Be Happy' - I don't want to upset my mum and dad.

Here in The Quietus office we were relieved to see that the art of the well chosen funeral song is not dead and buried yet. A new compilation Final Song on Get Physical Records has asked punters to suggest their own funeral songs here. But all this maudlin yet celebratory thought led us to compile our favourite songs that were actually about funerals here.

Listen to our Spotify funerals song mix here. Submit your additions in the comments field below.

But remember, death is not the end, and sometimes miracles occur from the far side of the grave. Devo proved in the video for their track 'R U Experienced', managing to tempt Jimi Hendrix out of wormy retirement to play a solo in front of an audience of bemused teenagers:

Hendrix' family were so insulted by seeing their cadaverous kin dug up that they had the video banned. Mind you, they can't have been as upset as the relatives of the young lady who was the subject of Jimmy Cross' affections in his song 'I Want My Baby Back' which proves that, indeed, love can endure after death. Imagine the dirt under her fingernails...

Of course, if you want your post-coil coitus a little more animated, you're going to have to rely on zombies to leap forth from their graves in orgiastic abandon to get your kicks. This was something that Michael Jackson well knew - as did his Indian cousin:

But let's not forget that funerals are a time for solemnity, for remembering life past, the humble achievements of the dearly departed. This is the spirit that Guns 'n' Roses captured in the video for November Rain, perhaps one of the most subtle and delicate ever shot:

Then again, GNFNR had nothing on our final video this week. Check out Bones Thugs & Harmonies preposterous 'Crossroads', where dead rappers are pulled from their coffins, and ascend to heaven with a flap of their angelic wings...