Truly great songs with AWFUL lyrics

[ih8music]

^ That belongs in the musical blasphemy thread!

heh. actually, the more I think about it, I think it's a pretty good example of the OP's point/question. I wouldn't go as far as calling the lyrics AWFUL, but there's nothing really special there (aside from "liberty is a lie" I suppose)... but yet the song is one of the greatest, most gut-wrenching performances ever.

[a-me-with-a-you]

If you look at the "Thirteen" lyrics without imagining the melody accompanying it, I'd understand the nomination, sort of speak. However, together they work great. The frailty of a first love, the delicacy of the arrangement and the shyness of the lyrics are a winning combination.

 

I think some of the "Sky Blue Sky" lyrics aren't awful but pretty disappointing still. Ease up on the wheather metaphores.

 

It's not that there's no point to "Impossible Germany", "Either Way" or "Sky Blue Sky", most of the lyrics are pretty observational or describe simple situations and feelings, not the more complex and intruiging ones we've come to love in his AGIB and YHF lyrics.

 

And as far as more simple lyrics go, "Being There"s are just better, as long as you're aspiring nothing but poetical beauty. Most of the other lyrics on SBS, after reviewing, aren't quite as awful as "Either Way", "Impossible Germany" and "Sky Blue Sky" but those are the three greatest songs on the album; I think it fits right in with the thread title.

 

Maybe the sun will shine today

The clouds will blow away

Maybe I won't feel so afraid

I will try to understand either way

 

Maybe you still love me maybe you don't

Either you will or you won't

Maybe you just need some time alone

I will try to understand

Everything has its plan

Either way I'm going to stay right for you

 

Maybe the sun will shine today

The clouds will roll away

Maybe I won't be so afraid

I will understand

Everything has its plan either way

 

------------------------------------------

Oh, the band marched on in formation

The brass was phasing tunes I couldn't place

Windows open and raining in

Maroon, yellow, blue, gold, and gray

 

The drunks were ricocheting

The old buildings downtown empty so long ago

Windows broken and dreaming

So happy to leave what was a home

 

With the sky blue sky, this rotten time

Wouldn't seem so bad to me now

Oh, if I didn't die I should be satisfied I survived

It's good enough for now

 

With the sky blue sky, this rotten time

Wouldn't seem so bad to me now

Oh, if I didn't die I should be satisfied I survived

It's good enough for now

---------------------------------------------

Impossible Germany

Unlikely Japan

Wherever you go

Wherever you land

 

I'll say what this means to me

I'll do what I can

Impossible Germany

Unlikely Japan

 

Fundamental problem

All need to face

This is important

But I know you're not listening

No I know you're not listening

 

This was still new to me

I wouldn't understand

Impossible Germany

Unlikely Japan

This is what love is for

To be out of place

Gorgeous and alone

Face to face

 

With no larger problems

That need to be erased

Nothing more important

Than to know someone's listening

Now I know you'll be listening

[Jayson]

Every Kiss song ever.

 

"Girl I can make you feel...ok"

[bobbob1313]

In the day we sweat it out in the streets of a runaway American dream

At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines

Sprung from cages out on highway 9,

Chrome wheeled, fuel injected

and steppin' out over the line

Baby this town rips the bones from your back

It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap

We gotta get out while we're young

'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

 

Wendy let me in I wanna be your friend

I want to guard your dreams and visions

Just wrap your legs 'round these velvet rims

and strap your hands across my engines

Together we could break this trap

We'll run till we drop, baby we'll never go back

Will you walk with me out on the wire

'Cause baby I'm just a scared and lonely rider

But I gotta find out how it feels

I want to know if love is wild

girl I want to know if love is real

 

Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard

The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors

And the boys try to look so hard

The amusement park rises bold and stark

Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist

I wanna die with you Wendy on the streets tonight

In an everlasting kiss

 

The highway's jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive

Everybody's out on the run tonight

but there's no place left to hide

Together Wendy we'll live with the sadness

I'll love you with all the madness in my soul

Someday girl I don't know when

we're gonna get to that place

Where we really want to go

and we'll walk in the sun

But till then tramps like us

baby we were born to run

 

 

Dreadful.

[mpolak21]

Love Thirteen's lyrics. McCartney's Jet takes this one by a country mile for me.

 

--Mike

[moxiebean]

Love Thirteen's lyrics. McCartney's Jet takes this one by a country mile for me.

 

--Mike

I got no problems w/ Jet, although it took me 34 years to figure out he's singing "lady suffragette"

[bobbob1313]

Just listening to "Birthday" by the Beatles. Not sure it exactly fits in this thread, but I do wish they had saved what may be their best riff and one of their best overall rock performances for a slightly less silly song. It's part of the charm of the White Album, but man that song is pretty damned heavy for what it is.

[Lammycat]

I got no problems w/ Jet, although it took me 34 years to figure out he's singing "lady suffragette"

 

I learned something today!

[Plumplechook]

Spanish Stroll - Mink De Ville. Great song but :

 

Little Johnny - he caught a plane

And he got on it

 

 

Jailbreak - Thin Lizzy.

 

Tonight there's going to be a Jailbreak

somewhere in this town.

 

Really? Let me hazard a guess where. At the jail perchance?

[mountain bed]

Driving home from work tonight I thought of this thread. ELP's "Karn Evil 9" came on. Just a straight-down-the-pike-classic prog tune from the seventies, amazing chops, great melodies. But damn...those lyrics are a fine example of why people have such an aversion to prog.

 

Seven virgins and a mule

Keep it cool, keep it cool

 

 

One line - the rest aren't a hell of a lot better imo.

[Sweet Papa Crimbo]

In the day we sweat it out in the streets of a runaway American dream

At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines

Sprung from cages out on highway 9,

Chrome wheeled, fuel injected

and steppin' out over the line

Baby this town rips the bones from your back

It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap

We gotta get out while we're young

'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

 

Wendy let me in I wanna be your friend

I want to guard your dreams and visions

Just wrap your legs 'round these velvet rims

and strap your hands across my engines

Together we could break this trap

We'll run till we drop, baby we'll never go back

Will you walk with me out on the wire

'Cause baby I'm just a scared and lonely rider

But I gotta find out how it feels

I want to know if love is wild

girl I want to know if love is real

 

Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard

The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors

And the boys try to look so hard

The amusement park rises bold and stark

Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist

I wanna die with you Wendy on the streets tonight

In an everlasting kiss

 

The highway's jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive

Everybody's out on the run tonight

but there's no place left to hide

Together Wendy we'll live with the sadness

I'll love you with all the madness in my soul

Someday girl I don't know when

we're gonna get to that place

Where we really want to go

and we'll walk in the sun

But till then tramps like us

baby we were born to run

 

 

Dreadful.