Not long ago I was listening to Arcade Fire's Neon Bible, and it suddenly occurred to me that I didn't know what the singer was saying. I don't mean the lyrics were difficult, I mean I couldn't make out the actual words. And the second thing which occurred to me was that that didn't matter, and it didn't affect my opinion on the album.

Am I the only one who really doesn't care about how some anguished singer-songwriter tore each word of every song from their tortured soul over a period of months before agonisingly committing them to record?

I'm not saying lyrics don't matter, just that they can't transform a bad song into a good one (or vice versa). However, you can't say the same for the music itself: it is absolutely key and speaks to our inner self in a way which words cannot.

So by all means have decent lyrics, but don't over-state their importance. Some of my all-time favourite acts fail to have meaningful lyrics (Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance) or aren't in English (Juana Molina, Sigur Ros), or have pretty banal lyrics (New Order, Nine Inch Nails, Laibach).

Am I in a tiny minority here?

I can't readily see a previous blog on this, so here goes ...

I was thinking about song endings the other day, and wondered what my top 5 would be. Then I realised that, other than many of the Beatles songs, the only one which springs to my mind is Jigsaw Feeling by Siouxsie & the Banshees.

Am I missing something? Where are the GREAT endings to songs. Practically every song falls into one of the following categories:

1. just fade out (bit of a cop out, but often perfectly fine)
2. "sudden chord crash"
3. "gradual slow-down and halt",
4. the traditional heavy metal "everyone play their instrument really fast and loud and atonal until a final BANG
5. the terribly affected 80s indie "let's pretend we're just getting bored and stop one at a time".

Somebody please tell me I'm hopelessly ignorant - any nominations?

Finally, a couple of thoughts on the topic:

(a) do most songs not have proper endings because they don't really expect people to listen to the end (unless you were listening to Mr Peel)?

(b) surely bands have had to be a bit more imaginative when they play live, as they have to come up with SOME sort of ending?

A quick comment on the March 2008 edition:

Page 38 - Paul du Noyer's "Spare Room" article seems to assert that religion can't be all bad because look at all the wonderful music it has inspired.

Page 48 - Mark Kermode states he is a "militant non-atheist".

Page 64 - Kim Cheshire writes to complain that atheists are just fundamentalists too, who haven't had the good grace to "wait until all of the facts are in".

Is it just me or is this a slightly worrying trend of religious apology creeping in to what should be an otherwise excellent music-oriented magazine? I'm not saying none of these people have the right to say what they're saying, but why in Word? I'm not saying they're talking complete rubbish, but their arguments do have some fundamental flaws.

And if they're going to say these things, then can we please balance this a little by appreciating that:

- you need to have about as much respect for religion to appreciate Johnny Cash, Elvis, soul music, as you need to be an alcoholic or junkie to appreciate huge swathes of other pop or rock music;

- militant anything is a bad idea, and sounds dangerously close to fundamentalism;

- if atheism is derived from reason and evidence then it is not fundamentalism, it is simply going wherever reason and the evidence take you (because that's probably going to be getting you closer to the truth);

- if 2,000 + years isn't enough time to get "all the facts in" then God must be a pretty slow worker.

I don't want to start a religion vs atheism debate - I really don't - but could we please keep this wonderful magazine on the (musical) tracks?

Thank you