DOWN. WITH. BEARDS.

Call up the Kleenex factory! 2007's virtual album factory churned out some proper old tear-jerkers – records to make our lips wobble, our snouts sniff, our eyes moisten at the corners, and the floods of the salty stuff tsunami from your baby blues. If you're feeling in the mood for something sad and lonely, here's some records we can tender...

PJ Harvey / White Chalk / (Universal/Island)

Is this the saddest record ever? Polly reinvents herself – yet again – this time as a desperately sad Dorset girl. Singing in an eerie soprano about the devil, the darkness and silence, and playing her piano like an inquisitive child, it's a record so beautifully bare that it chills you to the bone.

Editors / An End Has A Start / (Sony BMG)

OK, so they sound like Coldplay gone evil, or a mawkish sympathy card plugged into a stack of amps, but turn it up and it's BRILLIANT. When old cheery-chops Tom Smith sings "every little piece of your life, will add up to one", you can't doubt their marvellous way with mournfulness (or their questionable maths).

Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton / Knives Don't Have Your Back / (Drowned In Sound)

An album for which the words "criminally ignored" are a compulsory prefix, the lady otherwise known as Metric's frontwoman delivered a subtle, string-doused record of easy heartbreak and killer lines.  How we swooned.

Epic45 / May Be Your Heart The Map / (Make Mine Music)

The instrumental album of the year – full of gorgeous rushes of electronics and deliciously sweet samples that recall the magical sounds of summer and early childhood. As tear-jerkingly nostalgic as a Sunday afternoon at home watching Bagpuss.

Susanna / Sonata Dwarf Mix Cosmos / (Rune Grammofon)

Imagine the sadder moments of Joni Mitchell's Blue but even sadder, and fed through even more layers of wispy loveliness. I know! It helps that the Norwegian frontwoman of Susanna and her Magical Orchestra has the sort of rich, Nico-like croon that can jostle you into weeping as soon as she draws breath.

Electrelane / No Shouts No Calls / (Too Pure)

OK, I'm cheating here – although the best girl band ever's fourth album is emotive and lovely and full of their trademark dreamy lady-Krautrock, the saddest thing about it is that it might be their last (they went on "indefinite hiatus" in November). Start rattling the Bring Electrelane Back collection tin now!