Good. I love sad songs. The girls with sullen gray faces Billy Strayhorn embraces in "Lush Life," the lonely speed-comedown Lou Reed chases on "How Do You Think it Feels"—"when all you can say is if only"—I thrive on this awesome, thorny torpor.

"Depressing songs have the greatest mom-ents of happiness—so celebrating it made sense," says Rich Wexler. His Sherman Arts Community booked the show, asking members of Red Heart the Ticker, Northern Arms and The Boats to cover despondent acedia. "Besides, some people listen to Neil Young and hear sadness. I hear joy."

"If you're depressed—and I can be a depressive fucker—and you listen to sad music, it's as if you're honoring your depression, naming it. It makes it pass easier than fighting it. I also thrift when depressed. It's much better to be crying into some really cool threads."

I second that forlorn yet fashion-forward emotion. As does the dysrhythmic lineup Wexler put together:

"No tribute to depressives would be complete without Leonard Cohen—though early Neil Diamond runs close," says Olmstead. The refrain to "So Long, Marianne" requires a great female harmony, so he'll probably pull somebody up on stage with him. "It'd make a good excuse to sing with a lady at a coffee shop on a Friday night, and drink way too much comped caffeine right before my bedtime." Olmstead claims Leonard's despair is but a dramatic device employed to express a dark sense of humor. Makes sense for the cyclical breakup/makeup that "Marianne" entails.

The line: "So long, Marianne/ it's time that we began to laugh and cry/ and cry and laugh about it all again."

"Repeated attempts are made to force an emotional and intellectual distance and safe nostalgia on something still very much raw. It's like Alan Alda's line in Crimes and Misdemeanors about distance equaling humor," says Olmstead. But it's obvious this couple is not quite there yet. "That's why it's so darned sad."

Q: Are you normally a depressed person? What's your remedy?

A: No. If you go to

Josholmstead.com

, you'll find my original music is big, loud, uplifting, rock anthems with what I'm told and hope are somewhat clever, self-aware lyrics. The best remedy? "Remedy" by the Black Crowes.

Aron Dunlap, Kandy Whales

"I had already recorded Lou Reed songs," said Dunlap, who'll cover Velvet Underground's "I'll Be Your Mirror" and "Pale Blue Eyes." "Like Huddie Ledbetter said: You don't sing the blues to get sad, when you sing 'em they bring you up."

The line: "Thought of you as my mountaintop/ thought of you as my peak/ thought of you as everything/ I've had but couldn't keep." ("I'll be Your Mirror")

"Depressing? Maybe. But it could be simply the earth turning on its axis. The mind has the power to stay still—or at least it thinks it does—resting on a memory, two lingering pale blue eyes. There is a certain sweet pain. The power of the mind to hold onto the dearly dead, but that truth only comes in the form of pain, of a sword cleaving the heart. Reed simply caresses that sword."

Q: What do you do to stave off depression?

A: I sing depressing songs. Don't ask me why that works.

Tim Howard, Soltero

"Depressive is one adjective I'd rarely use for Neil Young," says Howard of the legendary miserabilist he'll be tackling on Friday night. "I'm really just taking this occasion as an excuse to murder some of my favorite songs live."

The line: "I am a lonely visitor/ I came too late to cause a stir/ though I campaign all my life towards that goal." ("Campaigner")

"There have been times that this line has hit close to home. People who are scared of intimacy might find it depressing," says Howard. "They will wander the earth lonely for the rest of their days. But it's not Neil's fault."

Q: Are you normally a depressed person? What's your remedy?

A: No. Only rarely. But today I was, and all I could think to do was to eat half a green pepper and clean the heads on my 8-track.

Fri., April 14, 7-10 p.m., free, The Green Line Cafe, 43rd St. and Baltimore Ave., www.greenlinecafe.com, www.shermanarts.org.