Lyrics - Enough is enough
Posted by Jon on 8 April 2008 - 2:16pm.
At an acoustic gig last night I was stuck by how many clichéd phrases will not go away. Here are a few I would be delighted never to hear again:
'I would swim the deepest ocean/climb the highest mountain'
'I love you more than words can say'
Anyone being 'all alone', usually in the proximity of a telephone
'Stop and wonder why'
Anyone having 'a dream come true'
Anyone whose paramour/ex makes them 'blue'
Stars pointlessly described as being 'in the sky', usually to fill three syllables
Any more? And in particular, any great and good songwriters guilty of such a crime who really should know better?
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Stars
I heard a guy sing an "original" song with the mighty hook "I gave you the moon, and you....(pregant pause) showed me the stoooooors ("stars" in phony mid-Atlantic cod American accent).
Oh how we laughed.
Larf! That's as desperate as
Dan Fogleburg's (??)
"Gonna write a classic
Gonna write it in an attic
Coz babe I'm an addict
For your lurve"
Fogelburg?
Nah....it's Adrian Gurvitz isn't it?
You're right.
However, maybe it was Dan Fogelberg who passed himself off as Adrain Gurvitz on realising how awful those lyrics are.
like...
...a thief in the night.
Cuts ...
like a knife
and furthermore
can I suggest that anyone who rhymes "brain" with "insane" should be swiftly dispatched.
So where do you stand on
"insane in the membrane
insane in the brain"
(Cyprus Hill)
Not a thumbs up I guess?????????
Any songwriter ...
... moved to tell the his subject 'I love you' will immediately give the further re-assurance that 'I care'.
Burns like fire
... getting higher (with desire)
Fire.....
.....rhyming with Pyre.
Any songwriter....
...who writes songs sbout writing songs has almost certainly run out of ideas. "I sit before this page, holding my pen" laa dee dah.
At least Neil Young...
...admitted as much in Borrowed Tune:
I'm singing this borrowed tune,
I took from The Rolling Stones,
Alone in this empty room,
Too wasted to write my own.
The tune being Lady Jane.
And so it goes...
...Mercury Rev then borrowed "Borrowed Tune" to make the song "The Dark Is Rising". To my knowledge, no lawyers have been involved at any stage on this particular tune's journey - so far.
Borrowed, lent or original.
Sorry, this is a tune, as the words are different. Your mention of NY reminds me of reading a Melody Maker report of Messrs Young and Dylan playin a show together and doing a "medley" of Helpless and Knockin' on Heavens Door. Perhaps so as not to unduly tax the Horse, somehow assuming it was them on back-up duties?
Does anyone in real life
ever call their partners in romance "baby"? You do hear "babes" or "babe" from time to time, but it tends to be in a spirit of irony. I prefer the terms of endearment you get in Derbyshire/Staffordshire: "me ducks" and "chucky egg".
Not in romance, no, bu
Not in romance, no, but perhaps in more, erm, physical encounters. (think I may have said too much...), blushes....
I am tired of...
...being asked to put my hands in the air and then wave them around like I just don't care; especially by armed police.
For the record my typical ‘just don't care' stance is an extreme slouching position, usually in front of the TV. Often I will fill my cheeks with air, which I will subsequently expel through pursed lips, affecting the worn-down enthusiasm of a Blue Whale who has become bored with criss-crossing the pacific ocean.
There is no jubilant hand waving. Only miles and miles of ennui as I follow repeats of Friends and CSI from channel to channel, like the aforementioned Blue Whale follows shoals of plankton.
It's cynical to be cliched at Christmas
It's worse at Christmas:
bells are ringing --> children singing
toys --> girls and boys
jolly --> holly
merry --> (holly) berry
snow --> ho ho
wine --> Christmas time
etc, etc.
"And that's all I gotta say"
followed by at least seven more verses of it.
Let Your Yeah Be Yeah
I wish some artists would think more carefully about whether to sing "ooh yeah" or "no, no" in between sentences.
Example: "Would I Lie To You?" Charles and Eddie spend an entire song trying to persuade "baby" that they wouldn't lie to her, and yet they undercut their case by singing "Would I lie to you? Oh yeah".
It's the little details that make the difference.
Sir Cliff is a thoughtless pig
In "I Just don't have the heart" Sir Cliff warbles airily and
jauntily about not being in love anymore with someone who thinks their love has legs.
Then he lists with chilling, single-minded certainty why he has gone off her and how it can never, ever be rekindled. That would be a bit of a blow to the lady involved - which he acknowledges. So why is he so upbeat?
Then - to add insult to injury - he sings to her "I just don't have the heart to tell you". I have successfully absorbed A Brief History of Time but I cannot work out in what context this line can possibly be said.
Thoughtless on so many levels. No wonder he never married if this is how he treats women!
Yoda word order
Even the best of them victim to this they can fall. Even Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Bob Dylan in "Hurricane", by which time he should surely have known better, found himself writing "Three bodies lying there does Patty see". Still, at least he managed to hold himself back from making it "a-lying".
Ooh yeah
I hate that. Actually, it riles most in the homemade rhymes some people add to greetings cards.
"I hope you a nice birthday have.."
T'Pau
... are a good example:
'Don't push too far your dreams of china in your hand'
As Bill Bailey put it, 'Who wrote these lyrics? Yoda?'
Oh, I don't know
Put a comma in between 'far' and 'your' and change the word 'of' to 'are' and it makes a lot more sense. That's still no excuse for nipping down to your local and sticking it repeatedly on the jukebox, Carol.
And I have to add
this one from the Cranberries, by way of William MacGonnagal. A bit of Yoda styling, and painful in its search for a (half) rhyme:
It was the fearful night of December 8th.
He was returning home from the studio late.
He had perceptively known that it wouldn't be nice.
Because in 1980, he paid the price.
John Lennon died.
With a Smith & Wesson 38,
John Lennon's life was no longer a debate
Unbeatable example
of Yoda word order (thanks for the name):
Heart's 'In Dreams' which runs
'The saddest sound is silence, that I've ever heard.
Funny how your feet, in dreams, never touch the earth.'
Green grow the rushes-o
Mr Stipes finest,in my favourite R.E.M. song
Complete disregard for grammar in search of a rhyme
Surpassing his former colleague's 'world in which we live in' is George Harrison's "Not Guilty" which contains the line "I'm sorry that you're underfed, But like you heard me SAID, 'I'm not guilty'". And this is the hook line! He recorded it in 1968 - over 100 takes apparently - recorded it again in 1978 and still couldn't be arsed to tidy up the lyric.
I think it's accepted now..
...that he sings "world in which we're living" (which is unusually sound grammar)
I'd like to think so
I really would, I've taken that view in his defence myself before now, but I'm not convinced.
My favourite is Norways finest.....
...which may explain differences in translation. Take on me, which as the chorus eventually gets to, means take me on, as a plea, I presume, rather than an arch "get me" type epithet
I woke up this morning
and I'd been dreaming of a cliche free song. It was called, " I hate you so much I can't shit".
I drunkenly attempted
to write a similar song with a mate once. We called it "Living With A Knobhead", and the only verse I can remember is:
"His hair is crap and his socks are red
His favourite is are Right Said Fred
You can't make him a sandwich cos he doesn't like bread
I'm living with a knobhead"
Not a "baby, baby" or a "yeah yeah" in sight.
La lalalalalala
I hate songs where they have obviously run out of lyrical ideas and just sing "la la la la la la" instead. Utterly crap. Simple Minds did this a lot.
That goes for nah nah nah nah too
e.g. "hey Jude" - total toss.
Or Van Morrison's recent
"Blah!, blah blah!"
Apart from....
Elvis Costello on "The Element Within Her" from Punch The Clock.
I like the use of la la la's after the lines... Are You Cold? She says "No, but you are La".
La of course being the scouse slang term for mate.
I Like it anyway! ;)
And also Billy Bragg
And la la la la la la la la la
Means 'I Love You'
But surely
Minnie Ripperton deserves allowances here?
This is a good lyric - poetry!
I've seen the bright lights of Memphis
And the Commodore Hotel
And underneath a street lamp, i met a southern belle
Oh she took me to the river, where she cast her spell
And in that southern moonlight, she sang this song so well
If you'll be my Dixie chicken I'll be your Tennessee lamb
And we can walk together down in Dixieland
Down in Dixieland
We made all the hotspots, my money flowed like wine
Then the low-down southern whiskey, yea, began to fog my mind
And i don't remember church bells, or the money i put down
On the white picket fence and boardwalk
On the house at the end of town
Oh but boy do i remember the strain of her refrain
And the nights we spent together
And the way she called my name
If you'll be my Dixie chicken I'll be your Tennessee lamb
And we can walk together down in Dixieland
Down in Dixieland
It's many years since she ran away
Yes that guitar player sure could play
She always liked to sing along
She always handy with a song
But then one night at the lobby of the Commodore Hotel
I chanced to meet a bartender who said he knew her well
And as he handed me a drink he began to hum a song
And all the boys there, at the bar, began to sing along
If you'll be my Dixie chicken I'll be your Tennessee lamb
And we can walk together down in Dixieland
Down in Dixieland, Down in Dixieland
Oh Yes Indeed
The Rock 'n' Roll Doctor at his very best.
Good call
It doesn't get much better than that
This just had to be done
My hero
Lowell that is rather than Vulpes, who is also undoubtably a sound fellow!
Sears and Roebuck
No one ever put a socket set to finer use.
11/16th
11/16th socket wrench. Want one!
Sorry everyone,
Twang and I have turned this into a Lowell Fan Club site. Hoy Hoy!
Blues Singer's Woman Permitted To Tell Her Side
We don't have a go at the old blues singers for their cliched, ultra-repetitive stuff, do we? Here's my all-time favourite news story from The Onion:
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28803
Well Spotted Sir,
.........Very good indeed, I love the Onion.
"This heart of mine"
I think mine is easy to rhyme.
Sandy Denny was very talented but she dropped passive Yoda-speak all over the shop. I don't mind at first but then it gets really repetitive.
It's not solid, there are holes in it, Sandy.
Our fiddler, he just loves to play
And that's why he plays so good.
And now he plays a violin
Made out of solid wood.
All About Eve
"Remember" and "November". Never should the twain be anywhere in the same room.
Quite....
September would have been so much better.
How different would the world be...
..if Mother didn't rhyme so readily with Brother
And a 1, 2, 3, 4,
Brooooce uses this one just a little too much. How about something else for a change
Classic lyrics
'School's Out' by Alice Cooper features the line 'We couldn't think of a word to rhyme'.
OMG!
Now you've made me think of the unspeakable cack of Bernie Taupins most lucrative moment, Your song.............
And he can, occasionally, otherwise pen a decent enough lyric. Certainly better than other lyrics only bandmembers, Keith Reid and the godawful Pete Sinfield* coming to mind.
I actually bought his solo LP: he can't sing either. Unlistenable claptrap.
Sinfield!!
I'm sure that we all have some half-remembered album buried deep in our past that we thought was lost forever. Retro you have sparked a Proustian moment for me with Pete Sinfield! I was sure I had Sinfield's first album during the 70's but all I could remember was that it was Prog and that the cover was a rather girly pink.
Had a 10 second delve on google and the memories flood back. Also the lyrics....
"The sea goat casts Aquarian runes through beads of
mirrored tears,
Suave pirates words of apricot crawl out of your veneer
Anoint your eyes with Midas' oil and make it still appear"
etc
etc
My normal course of action when this happens is to seize on the memory and ensure that I recover the album by hook or by crook.
Strangely though on this occasion I've rather lost enthusiasm.....
Thats the one!
(Thankfully) I had forgotten the lyrics until your bruising reminder. It also came in a blue cover, and was made of a sort of fuzzy felt material. I thought the blue cover would be worth a few bob more, but they still only gave me a quid for it in the Diskery!
I'm afaid
that they saw you coming.
Hmmmm
As in ridiculously overpaid me, I feel, rather than the opposite
Now, now...
I used to own Mr. Sinfield's Still on vinyl and I was sure mine had a blue surround but years of alcohol abuse kinda erased that particular memory. I bought the remaster (with compulsory studio floor fodder) and it was in pink, so my memory readjusted to accommodate this. Apart from Song of the Seagoat and the title tracks (dreadful lyrics both) it wasn't very good, no matter how stellar the cast. The cover wasn't on some felt like material, just a particularly fine piece of card with a 'handmade' finish. I do believe Mr. S is also responsible for some piece of awfulness on ELP's Works that rhymes 'spoon' and 'June'.
Clever
Aren't they being very clever in that verse?
Well we got no class
And we got no principle
And we got no innocence
We can't even think of a word that rhymes
Sort of punky/school metaphor?
Take The Skinheads Bowling
There's not a line here that rhymes with anything (anything! anything!)
Maybe .....
Any permutations of : maybe baby lady
I'm sure there's a line that goes : "Maybe baby, you could be my baby"! Say it ain't some stone cold classic that'll leave me with egg on me face!
Been musing about this...
...as I drove in today, no doubt aided and abetted by such oddities as the Sergio Mendes & Brasil 88 version of "For What It's Worth". Do the lyrics really matter anyway? I cite the Ramones and, with trepidation, Oasis, who neither could ever be accused of later risks of being filched for GCSE set texts. Both undoubted, at least in earlier output, and very effective doggerel. Or the Cocteau Twins and Magma (now that's an odd combo!), neither of whom float my boat, but both used, did they not, made up language. Any the less to their appeal? Or Syd Barrett, with his streams of knights move nonsense. It works. (Sometimes; across Madcap Laughs, Barrett and Terrapin there is a very good EP)
Or how about other tongues? I have been listening and enjoying a lot of Yasmin Levy and Bebel Gilberto of late. Don't understand a word. And Thomas Mapfumo. All fabulous, but not a clue as to content.
And where lyric are just a (seeming) conversational stream, I do believe dear old Marshall Mathers could string a shopping list into a snappy segue of sentence. Or (but only, as all subsequent is bleepnik copy of the same template, in my humble)a song such as Losing My edge/LCD soundsystem, which one might struggle to call the words lyrics, says so much and so well, tho' possibly 'cos the author is citing the imaginary me that many, probably on this site, share.
So, am I saying that lyrics don't matter, or shouldn't be confused with poetry. Probably. Possibly. But I am sure there is little to be gained by printing them out to read away from the rest of the whole.
"Maybe lady,
You wanna be my baby?" Sounds like Cockney Rebel´s Grazy Raver?
oh, the pain!
I particularly hate anything like: "the pain going round and round my head" (next line usually ends with bed) - nearly every acoustic singer songwriter support act has this in at least one of their songs. David Gray has made a living out of singing "maa heyyyyyd" in nearly every song.
Also, lyrics that mainly consist of I, Me, You, We : step forward, Bernard Sumner!
again and again
Then of course you've got the old fallback of singing "again and again and again and again and again" over and over. Or indeed "Over and over and over and over...". You get the point. I suppose this is what Morrissey was saterising when he so brilliantly sang "et cetera et cetera ..."
New Model Army
I don't suppose anyone here gives a hoot about New Model Army. I was a big fan, but I have to admit that pretty much every one of their songs mentions 'eyes' at some point. I'm not exagerating. I could name 20 songs off the top of my head (but I wouldn't waste your time with it).
Well spotted....
Simon, good spot,
57 songs in New Model Army's back catalogue mentions "eyes" in the lyrics.
57 out of the 179 listed on their websites lyrics page
http://www.newmodelarmy.org/Lyrics/Index1.htm
That's got to be deliberate surely? The songs are..........
125mph, 225, 51st State, All consuming fire, Ambition, Ballad, Ballad2, Bd3, Believe It, Betcha, Better than them, Bittersweet, Bluebeat, Brave new world, Chinese whispers, Christian militia, Coming up, Courage, Curse, 11 years, Far better thing, Flying through the smoke, Freedom 91, Frightened, Green, The Hunt, If you can't save me, Inheritance, I wish, Long goodbye, Lullaby, Lust for power, Nothing touches, The price, Red earth, Rip, Rumour & rapture 1650, See you in hell, Sex (the black angel), Shot 18, Sky in your eyes, Smalltown england, Sooner or later, Space, Stupid questions, Sun on the water, The attack, Too close to the sun, Turn away, Vagabonds, Vanity, Vengeance, Waiting, White of the eyes, Wipe out, Wired and Wonderful way to go.
And yes, it's really quiet in work this afternoon. ;)
Waste my time
Saw New Model Army back in the mid eighties - can't say I can remember 20 of their songs tho'. Go on then, name 20.
I would do..
but now Steve has saved me the trouble. This whole 'eyes' thing was a running joke with me and my brother. I recently compiled a best-of CD for him, with a home made NMA-style cover entitled "Small Town Eyes Of Steel" (which I think covers it the lot)
I ain't so blind
that I can't see.
God I used to hate that line, but you don't seem to hear so much these days do you?
Proper pop lyrics
Rubber biscuit by the Chips
Cow cow hoo-oo
cow cow wanna dib-a-doo
chick'n hon-a-chick-a-chick hole-a-hubba
hell fried chuck-a-lucka wanna jubba
hi-low 'n-ay wanna dubba hubba
day down sum wanna jigga-wah
dell rown ay wanna lubba hubba
mull an a mound chicka lubba hubba
fay down ah wanna dip-a-zip-a-dip-a
mm-mh, do that again !
doo doo doo boooh
cow cow lubba 'n a-blubba lubba
ow rown hibb'n 'n a-hibba-lu
how low lubbin 'n a-blubba-lubba
hell ride ricky ticky hubba lubba
dull ow de moun' chicky hubba lubba
wen down trucka lucka wanna do-uh
how low a zippin 'n a-hubba-lu
hell ride ricky ticky blubba-lu
how low duh woody pecker pecker
mm-mh, did you ever hear
of a wish sandwich
well that's the kind of a sandwich
that is supposed to take
two pieces of bread
and wish you had some meat
doo doo boooh
cow cow lubba 'n a-blubba lubba
hell ride hibbin' and zippin 'n
how luva mail take a-lubba hubba
hey ride wanna tak' a-recca recca
ho' low take a-lubba hubba
hey ride wanna 'n suppa suppa
ho' low a mail take a-lubba hubba
hey ride a hippin' and a-hubbin' no
hi-low 'n sum a-chicka whaa
the other day
I ate a ricochet biscuit
well that's the kind of biscuit that's supposed to
bounce off the wall
back in your mouth
if it don't bounce back
- shh-mmhh-mmhh
you go hungry
doo doo bouuh
cow cow lubba 'n a-blubba lubba
hell low a sum did a-lubba goin'
hey ride wan' take a-lubba do
how long lon' suppa dubba
how low a mail take a-lubba hubba
hey ride wanna take a-lubba hubba
how low a mail take a-lubba hubba
hey down nothin' take a-luva do
hey ride a sippin' and a hubba dubba
mmmmmh, the other day
I ate a cool water sandwich
and a sunday-go-to-meeting bun
doo doo bouuh
cow cow lubba 'n a-blubba lubba
hell ride ricky ticky hubba lubba
how low a wann' suppa do
hey ride sippin' and hubba lubba
hell ride a-hubbin'
That is
vile and disgusting.
Fraser! The deletion key! Now!
Mama Oom Mow Mow Mama Oom Mow Mow
"Rubber Biscuit" is on the wonderful compilation "Great Googa Mooga", a collection of (proper) nonsense songs. To my ears, R.E.M. specialize in a similar approach.
Proper pop lyrics 2
You broke my heart
'Cause I couldn't dance
You didn't even want me around
And now I'm back, to let you know
I can really shake 'em down
Do you love me (I can really move)
Do you love me (I'm in the groove)
Ah do you love me (do you love me)
Now that I can dance (dance)
Watch me now....!
Mike Smith (RIP)
re: not so much lyrics...
.. but i do hate it at gigs or live TV outside broadcasts where the band/or singer (usually some crap TV talent show loser) as the crowd to 'hey (*add venue) make some noise...' - it really winds me up and makes me feel that the entertainer has realised the crowd don't actually like them or the music!
Make some noise, what like 'bugger off you no-talent tosspot and geet the main act on' kind of noise?
Oh and any lyric that mentions 'driving a car' seems to annoy me too for some inexplicable reason - the Cars song especially, jeez who is gonna drive their car tonight eh?
'Heat of the night'
any song with these words in that order will be switched off immediately in my house..
What the...
Ray Charles theme song to the film with Sidney Poitier, arranged by Quincy Jones with additional organ by Billy Preston?
Or you mean Jim Steinman fright-wig type sort of thing? With you on the second one, especially when the next line is something about "into the light". Seems the 80s was littered with those things.
Trouble is....
...when it is Graham Parker, who really writes a pretty awful verse, or did when he started off with the Rumour, it still produces a mighty fine end product. But his lyrics really are all nonsense around the Heat in Harlem, White Honey, Soul Shoes etc etc, full blown cliche overdrive, as only a surrey born petrol pump attendant could imagine.
so why do the French only have one egg for breakfast?
see title of the blog for answer
Oh dear...
...give the man a slap....
Naughty corner!
Now.
Worst lyrics of all time
Truly the worst of the worst.
Heart - All I wanna do is make love to you
I am the flower you are the seed
We walked in the garden
We planted a tree
Cringe!
Bad, but no.
The worst lyrics of all time are "Soccer Superstar" by Jess Conrad.
Point one...
Another side of this (touched on by one or two) is the shoe-horning of lyrics to make them scan. The first example into my mind is Elton John's execrable "Sacrifice".
It has three syllables, Sir Elton, not four. Enough with the "sac-er-i-fice already!"
Point two...
I can't believe this one's been left out
Des'ree comes up with a classic case of WTF?? In "Life"
I don't want to see a ghost
That's the sight I fear most
I'd rather have a piece of toast
And watch the evening news.
(shakes head sadly)
Vorsprung durch Deutsche
If you want something a little less run of the mill, try listening to groups whose first language isn't English. They often come up with new ideas because their cliches aren't our cliches.
For instance, try The End by Germans De/Vision:
"I'm unimpressed
By everything you do
You make me sick
I never wanna be like you..."
and my own favourite:
"You make me puke
I can't stand your stupid face"
eh?
"Is she trying to get out of that clitoris"?