We all love music – that is why we spend so much time on The Spill and RR, but sometimes it can really make you want to scream ! ! !
I want to find out what really makes you scream. The J-Pop Idol group C-ute are maybe for me the most annoying group ever, on so many different levels but part of it is because their tracks are so catchy that however much I try once I hear one on the radio, then the stupid thing is stuck in my head all day.
This Happened to me today and made me think of this challenge.
Is this the most annoying lyric ever ? ? ?
In the track Dance To The Bakon they sing the line:
Mainichi ga shoubu PANTSU
Which in Englsih means (more or less)
Every day I wear lucky panties.
If there is a lyric in a song which is more annoying that that then I really want to know it ! ! !
So the challenge is what is the line from a song that really really REALLY makes you want to scream when you hear it ? ? ?
Have fun ! ! !
C-Ute - Dance to Bakon
Not sure its the most annoying ‘ever’ – i’ll have to give that a bit of thought, but my daughter’s current fave is Jessie J and whilst i can live with the song Who’s Laughing Now?, i can’t abide the lyrics, which are effectively the musical equivalent of Alan Partridge’s famous quote, ” … and needless to say, I had the last laugh – now **** off!”. I know, I know, its pop music, silly lyrics, not meant for me etc, etc, but it doesn’t half wind me up.
Right, now that’s off my chest i can think of a properly annoying lyric.
I find egoism and selfishness really unattractive and any song that portrays that as some how OK irritates me also.
I think i’ve included the lyrics of the entire song in my entry – not a specific, particular ‘lyric’, but if you listen to the lyrics (or search them out online), these combined with her schoolgirl- aping voices/imitations make what is an OK song lyrically, really cringeworthy.
I hope she has lots of lucky panties, not just one pair.
I imagine that would be irritating to have stuck in your head.
I have a horror of obvious rhymes in songs, like high-sky, heart -start, tears- fears, or common expressions, although the only one I can think of now is “hair of gold and lips like cherries” which I quite like.
However, I have got quite annoyed by Midge Ure’s song “If I was” because I think it should be entitled “if I were”. I expect someone will tell me I’m wrong, but it seemed to be in the charts for ages when I was younger and it irritated me at the time.
Hi Beth ! ! !
I assume she must mean a luck brand ! ! !
What a relief! I am glad to hear that there is a brand of lucky pants, otherwise, it doesn’t bear thinking about
You have actually hit on an issue in the current US political race. The republican frontrunner is a Mormon, and “magic underwear” even got it’s own CiF article.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/mar/01/mormon-underwear
Then again maybe they meant Lucky Brand Jeans -
http://www.luckybrand.com/
I just looked at Lucky Brand Jeans site – they have some cool things ! ! !
It’s actually one of my favorite clothes brands. Usually out of budget range, but i do get things on sale sometimes.
I raised the Live and Let Die atrocity on the Grauniad’s recent “terrible grammar in song lyrics” thread, and aroused the ire of numerous McCartney fans who claim that the line is “…in which we’re living” – possible, in which case it’s correct, but his enunciation is simply rubbish.
Bother, sorry, that was supposed to be a response to Severin’s comment below.
Yes, “If I Were”, as in “…A Rich Man” or “…A Carpenter”. You have to dig that subjunctive mood baby.
thank you, I feel vindicated!
If I Was annoys me as well. I’m sure there’s lots of grammatical disasters in punk records but there’s nothing to distract me from with the Midge song.
If we’re talking crap use of the English language then none of the above hit the heights of:
“So if this ever-changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry
Say live and let die”
A lot of people mis-hear the “if” in the first line as another “in” which would really hammer in the last nail.
See above.
I know exactly what you mean beth. I hate songs where you pretty much know what the next line is going to be…either the rhyme, as you say, or the ”uh oh, it’s another flying metaphor” type thing
But hang on – doesn’t “cherries” rhyme with “Mary” in beth’s example? Not the most obvious of rhymes…or even a rhyme at all.
Double negatives drive me nuts! Any song even if I like the song…
Ain’t Nuthing But A G Thang
Didn’t post lyrics. Not going to. Garbage. Forget this one.
oh dear, forgot all about that one. And i actually read the book too.
I thought the lyrics to Wrapped Around Your Finger were painful.
sorry, that was me. best to claim my anon-by-accident posts these days.
and of course this reply ended in the wrong place anyway, was supposed to be after Don’t Stand So Close to Me.
The Police’s song Walking on the Moon contains the irritating double negative “I hope my leg don’t break” which peeves me too. I agree with you on this point.
Did Sting write that? Mr “most pretentious lyrics ever” school teacher Sting, I mean?
De do do do, de da da da
Is all I want to say to you
de dond dond dond
la la la la la la la
etc
..bobby mcghee, yeah
“He sees her he starts to shake and cough
Just like that old guy in that book by Nabakov”
Nothing to add to that!
Oh, I like ‘em – for instance You Ain’t Nothin’ But A Hound Dog…And “that don’t make no nevermind” is one of my favourite expressions.
Fear not the obvious… It’s been said too often, but, to me, nothing can beat
Imagine there’s no heaven
I wonder if you can…
It always makes me think of that Mission of Burma song title, even though I know it’s in bad taste, given the circumstances.
Don’t know Mission Of Burma, lambre, but I’m certainly with you on Imagine, Yes, John, I can imagine that perfectly well.
Ah – thanks, lambre. That’s the quote often attributed to Hermann Goering, though apparently (as with so many such quotes!) he didn’t actually say it: “When I hear the word ‘culture’ I reach for my revolver.”
A pedant writes………..
It’s “Imagine there’s no heaven, it’s easy if you try”
But then he says
“Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can”
hmmmmm…………
oops…sorry John!
Thanks for the correction, severin. I bloody hate the song, and for years I’ve been doing all I can to avoid it, but it’s no excuse to misquote it.
(Both lines sound just as awful to me, if not more, though…)
Yes, I think the real version is even worse.
When Joan Baez did her version of it she at least had the decency to change the line to “I wonder if I can”.
This one has got to be a contender.
“I had a taste of the real world (Didn’t waste a drop of it)
When I went down on you, girl”
That is seriously annoying ! ! !
Dond! But you’ve got to admire their…errm…cunning linguistics…in getting that lyric into a song that’s been a Muzak staple ever since.
That song is actually a guilty pleasure, i still like it. But seriously cringeworthy lyrics. The feel me dancing inside you bit is pretty bad too.
is it just me that nearly puked when I found out Paul McCartney’s album was called – Kisses On The Bottom – makes me queasy just typing it.
It made me think of Pogue Mahone, which is what the Pogues were originally called… but, agreed, poor choice of album title. Bleurgh.
As I’m sure Mr McC would be quick to point out, it’s a quote from I’m Going To Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter.
TFD – it’s context though isn’t it?
.. he can be as quick as he likes pointing out the theft, but he’s put that image in my mind.
….rather than a fine Fats Waller (and others) tune .. and certainly not what Joe Young wanted to pop into my mind when I hear that line I’m sure .. and now, I WILL always think of Paul McCartney kissing bottoms – wrong on so many levels.
indeed – Pogue Mahone.
Well, I’ve just censored what I was about to say, in case it’s a step too far for some of you….but how about babies? It’s a good place to kiss them, I always think.
Nah Shane, I wrote expressing a pretty similar sentiment on a Guardian blog about the album – perhaps the live streaming one, I can’t remember. Got roundly dismissed as a “hater”. I wasn’t alone of course.
TFD – I have nothing against parents kissing their own children on bottoms, if Stella Mc is okay with that- then fine.
– here’s another that got to me.
My fav band is Pixies – I can perfectly cope with the lyrics:
‘lost my life to a whore with disease..
lost my penis to a whore with disease’
yes, it’s wrong on a lot of counts – but is from a song ‘Nimrod’s Son’ it makes sense in that context – it’s a stunning burst of noise.. a track I bloody love… but it isn’t called ‘my penis’
Frank Black Francis the singer and writer bought out an album last year called ‘Nonstoperotik’ – and I said then, and I say now: NO Frank, IT IS NOT – the song ‘When I Go Down On You’ is another song that just goes way beyond an image I want in my head… if it was part of a song ‘Nonstoperotik’ or ‘When I Go Down On You’ work and ‘Kisses On The Bottom’ in the song, in it’s correct context, is perfect – but not like this.
I can’t be the only one who sees a huge difference between Pogue Mahone (which i kind of like) and Kisses on the Bottom. ewww.
Pogue Mahone – it suited them.
if Paul had called the album xxxxxxxx put that at the base of the cover art and referenced the line Kisses On The Bottom from I’m Going To Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter in interviews or in the album notes. I wouldn’t need to feel so bloody Bleurgh.
I AM NOW NOT THINKING ABOUT THIS EVER AGAIN ever ever ever fingers in ears La la la la.
I confess i checked out your Frank Black song. To my deep regret. That’s worse than Starship.
The troble is that it reeks of that “trying to be edgy” quality that Macca gives off these days, but at the same time it doesn’t work – it sounds to quaint to be edgy while simultaneousy making people feel queasy.
I think that’s ‘Of The Barrel’
dond for that, Mr. Oat sir.
In sort of the same vein, even Jagger cringes at these lyrics now. But it still rocks anyway -
Just like when a streaker runs on the field and TV cameras don’t show it so as not to encourage others, I am not going to share the name of the songwriter – a term I use loosely here – of this gem:
I’m going to pull the tire iron out of my trunk
bang up all of my fenders so they can match my heart
Yes, it’s a country song. I’ve always felt that when you are working in a genre that gets stereotyped, you should strive not to re-inforce them.
Yes I do know what you mean . . . There are some examples from Metal and Punk that have the same problem. Metal songs about Nordic Gods and flaming swords tend to irritate me a little also.
Speaking of country, the Nashville hybrid anyway, this is a song that has a nice point and even a wordplay gimmick that works. Too bad about clunker lines like these -
A couple years of up all night and a few thousand diapers later
That mistake he thought he made covers up the refrigerator
She had that Honda loaded down
With Abercrombie clothes and fifteen pairs of shoes and his American express
David Gates writes nice tunes and, partly because of this, gets away with lines like:
“If a man could be two places at one time
I’d be with you
Tomorrow and today”
David, that’s one place at two times! I can do that! We can all do that!
Unless he means he wants to be in two time locations at the same time ? That’s more difficult and a little unsettling, it sort of gives him too much power in the relationship.
A step further than Every Breath You Take. It makes me think he’s dabbling in some kind of weird quantum physics shenanigans in a similar manner to those CIA black ops goat-starers in order to monitor his beloved more closely. She’ll ever escape!
Clearly channelling Henri Bergson here, so not a problem in my eyes.
That is good one Severin – it looks like it makes sense when you first read it but actually it is complete nonsense ! ! !
Too Much Too Young by The Specials. Nasty criticism of a young single parent for having a baby; completely stupid reference to her “cooking currant buns for tea”; and most bizarrely of all, suggesting that she could’ve been having fun with the singer instead. Terry Hall is a talented man, but his pop star persona is set to permanently glum and I was never convinced that ‘Fun’ would be on the agenda.
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again
Oh no! Oh noooooo!
The sweet cream icing on a cake of lyrical glurge.
Have you seen this ? ? ? I just found it when looking for your video – it was blocked for me here – I thought it was quite funny . . .
(Great Spill challenge by the way!)
With so few mass-appeal songs for Al to cover, it was only natural that he would start dipping into the oldies vault.
And while his songs often have limited appeal to anyone over age ten, his videos are always top notch.
Sorry, I take my hat off to the sheer nerve to put this chorus in what was a big hit. I can’t help liking it – I expect Richard Harris and the songwriter (Jimmy Webb?) were sniggering to themselves.
Guilty pleasures : MacArthur Park and Richard Harris. TNP’s version replaces the word cake with crack. littleriver
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ME-jCLjw-G8]
Sorry about that. Hopefully this will work. lr
I am so happy you came by and posted Littleriver ! ! !
I really liked the TNP version. I had never heard them before and will check out more of their things.
I lived in LA for a year and studied at UCLA on a scholarship as part of my university studies. I used to go to the Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist temple to pray when I was there and it is in the down town area near the park. Also Little Tokyo and Korea Town are very close, to MacArthur Park and I did walk there once or twice, but I never really liked it so much – it has a strange atmosphere for me.
I wish I had known this track then – I would have opened my eyes more when I was there ! ! !
I actually like that track, but I never really listened to the lyrics and they are very negative actually ! ! !
Sorry I was replying to Daddy Pig and The Specials ! ! !
Thank you – and I know what you mean, it sounds good if you don’t listen to the words too much.
wasn’t it written by Frederick (Toots & the Maytals) Hibbert or am I mistaken?
the ‘call me immature
call me a poser’….. sets up a different take though.
‘I’d love to spread manure on your bed of roses’.. points to the fact that the young mother isn’t really struggling .. she just isn’t availiable to sleep with the songwriter anymore… and why would she want to with that attitude?
It’s a bitter male song – were the young jamaican mum (I’m guessing from the ‘pickni’ =’ little un’ use)…. is probably very happy cooking currant buns for tea and will be young and fit enough when her son is older to go out and party with him and hopefully her husband (who is very happy to share the same surname as her) .. in the coming years.
I think recording it at the time in the early days of Thatcher – the relevance of ‘just another burden on the welfare state’ would be ringing in the ears of Midlands teenagers …..
Terry Hall was in dry black humour when we saw him last year – the permanently glum is a good “image” for social comment songwriters.
Cofession – I really liked this as a teenager! I think it appealed to me in two ways, one being continual rejection by girls, some of which were beginning in heir mid-teens were beginning to settle down. The other being that I didn’t ever want to have children!
From the more mature perspective of a happily married dad contemplating the media hounding of single mums and the ongoing attack on the welfare state it doesn’t seem as good.
This reminds me, and as Mitch isn’t here this week – Paul Anka’s Having my Baby. He’s a dad but hates the song as much as i do.
Shane, on The Specials website it’s credited to Jerry Dammers / Lloyd Charmers, which surprised me a little as Jerry always seemed to be responsible for the more upbeat and more right-on material. I suppose there’s some truth in the lyric as well as a little bitter-and-twisted nastiness.
The music is based on Lloyd Charmers’ “Birth Control” then? – they did cover some Toots (‘monkey man’ ?) – I should really try and check my facts better, but checking facts in the days of the internet is a many tentacled beast..
still…
current bun = fun
bun in the oven = pregnant
.. . no – still bugging you?
Ian Brown – Dolphins Were Monkeys
Obviously this undermines Ian Brown’s former creationist stance: ‘I am the Resurrection’, ‘Breaking into Heaven’, ‘Where Angels Play’ and the Second Coming and instead jumps on an adatped Darwinian theory of evolution.
So monkeys who didn’t like the land, went back to the sea and are now dolphins… Possibly Mr. Monkey Man is citing the Aquatic Ape theory … like some types of sea creatures having nostrils on the underside of the nose, blubber, etc. so speculating that humans evolved from such creatures….
but if I think about it too much it’s simple lines like:
“Now I’m caught in the middle, You’re next to me”
that really does my noggin in…
you see, ‘clowns to the left of me jokers to the right’.. that makes sense I can be ‘stuck in the middle with you’…
so I’m guessing it must be a shoal of fish.. then we can be in the middle….
“I swim with the fishes, You come from sea”
but then how does a dolphin.. ‘walk the beach, holding your hand’ – no feet…. only fins !
… and should there be an IF in the title or is it just a statement of fact?
this and many more question – will be answered on next weeks episode of (Ian Browns been smoking) ‘Soap’
A good analysis Shane. I read that Ian Brown is absoloutely serious about this and subscribes to some “dolphins evolved from apes” theory.
I actually liked this track ! ! ! I really enjoyed the music but the lyrics are a little strange . . . .
Actually I thought dolphins evolved from cats, so I checked Wiki and it seems that they evolved from Indohyus which looks like a rat or something.
But they evolved in a good way and much cuter now than the animal they evolved from ! ! !
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indohyus
I like the track too – he’s just ‘barking mad’ some times.
that “India’s pig” Indohyus is an oddity too.
Wot – no Duran Duran?! A rich seam of contenders in their lyrics, the one that really sends me into wriggling agony is “You’re about as easy as a nuclear war”.
Dond! I don’t think there’s any Doors noms either.
SHA
I had a friend who used to improvise faux Jim Morrison poems. The only snippet i can remember is something like The Penis Emerges from the Ocean…
In order to improvise, i guess it means that she must have actually read Morrison’s poetry.
dond. i never did know exactly what a Reflex was anyway. But i did have my suspicions.
One of the all time clunkers! It would be an oversight if it hadn’t been included. Being 13 at the time I seem to remember even some of their teen audience mocking it back in the day.
Absolutely – with fingers on buttons able to unleash all-out destruction in a matter of seconds, nuclear war seems, at least ergonomically, to be rather “easy”. “You’re about as easy as a ground war against a determined militia” would be a good substitute, or “You’re about as easy as listening to the Duran Duran covers album, especially their version of 911 Is A Joke.”
yeah, what were they thinking with that cover.
They also massacred White Lines (Dont Do It!) and Led Zep’s Thank You – you’ve got to salute their indefatiguability as George Galloway would say.
good lord, i’ve never heard Thank You. And will avoid doing so like the plague.
me. sorry.
Persuasion, by Richard Thompson, is one of my very favourite songs…suzi nommed it for the Valentine’s RR last week. The words are by Tim Finn, though, so I can’t blame RT for the line
And it’s written in my heart so that everybody can see it
Which doesn’t scan! And it annoys me every time! And it could SO easily have been
And it’s written in my heart so that everyONE could see it
Which would’ve made me much happier. Here’s RT with his son Teddy in the band:
Eddy is very handsome ! ! !
But gosh ! ! ! That line really stands up when you listen to the song ! ! ! If you wrote to him do you think he would change it ? ? ? It does not spoil the whole song but it is a pity about that line . . . .
Doubt it, as he didn’t write the words himself…But I’ve noticed another thing – in the second verse, Teddy sings
But we need to rebuild
What was never there
Which I’ve always heard as ‘repair’ not ‘rebuild’ but when I checked the lyrics, ‘rebuild’ is right. Crazy! If you have ‘repair’, then it rhymes! Damn you, Tim Finn!
Like A Hurricane by Neil Young. I always felt the recorded version never quite lived up to the blistering performances live. A feeling compounded by the following lyrics:
That perfect feeling
When time just slips
Away between us
On our foggy trip
I just feel the song hits a trough here and never quite recovers.
Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to comment ! ! !
Yes the song seems to change at that point. But I like the track (even if it is 8 minutes long – American Stars and Bars album version!!!)
Just quickly with this one (busy right now), but back later with more…………
Squeeze…..”Up the Junction”
This morning at four-fifty,
I took her rather nifty.
Down to an incubator,
where 30 minutes later,
she gave birth to a daughter………..”.
No you didn’t.
I’d see this as a lyrical collage representing a moment that sticks in the mind but not necessarily within a reliable chronological framework.
I always wince when I hear the line ‘He stands where it is steep’ in Leonard Cohen’s ‘Let’s Sing Another Song Boys’.
It’s the sheer clunkiness of it compared to the usual beauty and skill of his lyrics. I just end up shaking my head crying “Oh Lenny, why? Why? What were you thinking?”
Hi Exodus ! ! !
Thanks for stopping by ! ! !
I find most Leonard Cohen songs to be completely beyond me. It is like understand the words but somehow I can not just understand what he means, some Dylan is like that for me also.
So the line about ‘He stands where it is steep’ was lost to me in whole flow of strange metaphors that this song uses.
But actually the lines in this song that really irritated me were:
She finds him lying in a heap;
She wants to be his woman.
He says, “Yes, I might go to sleep
Ummmm……….
I read an interview with Cohen related to this. he said his songs – no songs, really – are meant to be analysed line by line. He said something to the effect that if you write a song like that, it’ll be so banal as to be worthless. Some lines, he said, half just come to you and you’re not sure why it’s there or what it means but you do know for sure it’s supposed to be there.
* I’m willing to accept that from Cohen. Not from others – yes Jon Anderson, we see you ducking your head in the back of the class – as an excuse to string together nonsense phrases and call it a song.
listen to Tom mcRae explain the problems of knocking out a song:
I am sure it is very difficult and I did feel sorry for him, but at he does have a sense of humor!!!
So much to choose from! I was watching the Depeche Mode film 101 the other night, and apart from the fact it was one of those completely pointless “look at us playing big venues in the US, we’re really popular” type films, I was being driven mad by all the songs that “rhyme / all the time / it’s a crime”. Sorry DM fans!
There’s lots of dumb lyrics in punk, not just the intentional ones, if it annoyed me that much I wouldn’t listen to it. In fact it can be part of the “charm”. But let’s acknowledge the master of mock-profound-but-actually-completely-dumb punk rabble rousing, Jimmy Pursey. So much to choose from but my favourite would be one of Sham 69′s most famous songs, If The Kids Are United
“Look at me now
I’ve got something to say
I want to say it now
And now is today”
The opening line sets the tone for Pursey’s brand of attention seeking. He then tells us he’s got “something to say” before chucking away the next two lines saying absoloutely nothing, filling time until he gets to the chorus where he makes his big statement.
“If the kids are united they will never be divided”
Really? Surely the history of political and social movements suggests that they are always prone to division and infighting. I see know reason why “the kids” led by Pursey would be any different (and the history of Sham 69 and their audience of course backs me up).
I respect Pursey for having stuck his neck on the line on many occasions, particularly when speaking out against racism to audiences full of violent racists, but he could also be a bit of a clown.
My second Sham choice would be Questions And Answers which features this profound chorus
“Qusetions and answers
Honesty lies
Yes, no you can’t
But you can if you know why”
Eh……?
I must admit Sham 69 are a band I did not really know about before. But I am sure this song had the music written before the words, it really sounds like they are trying to force something with the words, but the music is really great ! ! !
Agreed. I guess he came up with the chorus (naive as it is) which is in fact borrowed from a Chilean political song (as Mitch would confirm), then the music was written (the riff is great) and the words to the verses were forced in afterwards. Who knows. They were a hugely successful punk band in the late 70s and have influenced loads of bands that I like … but the lyrics …(sighs wearily)
oh indeed, wyngate, Depeche Mode are fine contenders for the doggerel school of rhyme prize. I have laughed myself silly to some of them (bearing in mind that I do love the mode). There are too many examples, I don’t know where to start.
I do, beth! “People are people so why should it be/ you and I should get along so awfully?” – well, your dreadful, skipping-rope rhyming and crass adverb use would be my explanations of “what makes a man hate another man.”
that one is pretty terible, may1366, as good a place to start as any.
All I ever wanted, all I ever needed
Is here in my arms
Words are very unnecessary
They can only do harm
Enjoy the silence
Works for me.
Feeling’s unknown and you’re all alone
Flesh and bone by the telephone
Lift up the receiver
I’ll make you a believer
doesn’t.
Also, of course, responsible for “Hersham Boys, Hersham Boys, lace up boots and corduroys” and “They call us the Cockney Cowboys” ( “they” did not).
One of my favourite old stylee punk lyricists was Shane MacGowan in his Nipple days ( before he became Irish). He produced such gems as “Maida Ada, Maida Ada, Woo-ooo-ooo she’s got big knockers, Wooo-ooo-oo she’s an all round rocker” and ” I don’t like f***ing and I don’t like dope just give me a blow job and a line of coke”.
Happy days.
Sorry, that (Shane) cracked me up. So shoot me.
“I don’t like f***ing and I don’t like dope just give me a blow job and a line of coke”.”
Nothing wrong with those lyrics -very punk.
Ubu,
“In the week you work your life away at the weekends you get pissed.”
…..is another great McGowan lyric imho.
Aaaah The Nips and you are quoting the wonderful ‘Hit Parade’.
And what about ‘Venus in Bovver Boots’ with the great chorus of :
‘She’s a Venus in bovver boots!’ (x3),
Great big Doc Martens!!!!!
A hay, hay, hay!’
I have to go to bed now but I really enjoyed reading and listening and I can not wait for tomorrow to check out some more comments ! ! !
You say it best when you say nothing at all.
I’ve ranted about this before, and I seem to recall someone actually trying to defend it. The song is EVIL, the same old patriarchal chauvinism dressed up as ‘new man’ style touchy-feely sensitivity: just keep your mouth shut, love, it’ll spoil the decorative effect. Give me Whitesnake any day.
“I seem to recall someone actually trying to defend it.”
That would be me.
But wait, isn’t that Alison Krauss singing it to a guy?
That’s not the version Abahachi knows, and he won’t accept that there’s a different way of interpreting it.
Well, it’s the only one i know! So i’ll have your back on this one.
I will concede that a woman singing that line is a rather different matter; somewhat condescending, and perhaps legitimising and condoning male inarticulacy and emotional illiteracy rather than confronting it, but not in the same class of appallingness as Ronan F******* Keating.
Well, that’s something…but I’m not shifting. I don’t believe it matters which gender is which, and if I had a partner who said that to me I would take it that he was celebrating the trust in the relationship and the fact that I can communicate in ways too deep for words. (Which, as a matter of fact, I can.) And I’m a Feminist with a capital F.
Not trying to gang up on you here, Aba, but i’m still with tfd on this one. (Granted i don’t know the RFK version, or even who he is.)
On the other hand – to this day this quote has stuck in my mind:
“She’s my whore and my inspiration.” – David Coverdale on Tawny Kitaen
I’m a Stones / Led Zep fan, sure, but i’ll pass on Dave
That comment from Coverdale is a beauty Amy – he’s gone neither up nor down in my estimation. Kinda nice that she took him to the cleaners though!
She didn’t seem to make good use of all of that dosh though. She’s not had an easy time of it since splitting from Dave.
One of the possibilities we always forget with should it be a guy or a girl singing is same-sex love songs. (I’ve never actually thought about this til now, but your debate here got me thinking about it.) A line sung by a guy to a girl can be patronizing but not seem so when sung by a girl to a guy. But how does it sound by a guy to a guy or a girl to a girl? ‘Cause if s/he addresses it to someone in second person – you, your – rather than third – his, her – we have no idea if its same sex or opposite sex.
I wonder if same sex love songs would be a good RR topic? It’d be a short one methinks.
I expect it depends on whether the listener is straight or gay – if you’re straight, you would assume it’s a straight relationship being sung about, unless there’s a definite reference, and vice versa. I do sometimes think when I’m listening to a performer who I know is gay – Mary Gauthier for instance – Oh yes, she’s thinking about a woman.
One song that intrigues me is Cry To Me – it’s by Solomon Burke, and TP&TH used to do it in concert quite a bit. In the song a man addresses a male friend (one assumes) who’s been dumped by a woman (or someone who wears perfume anyway) and offers comfort – calling him ‘baby’.
When you’re all alone in your lonely room
And there’s nothing but the smell of her perfume
Don’t you feel like crying
Don’t you feel like crying, like crying, like crying?
Come on baby, cry to me.
See, conventionally you might expect it to be a woman saying that.
See, i think a good love song is kind of genderless. George Michael or Rufus Wainwright are surely not singing to me. But if i hadn’t an inkling as to their orientation, how would i know? It works however you perceive it. Same with KD Lang, Melissa Ethridge, and who ever. Never mind bisexual artists like Ani DiFranco or whoever else.
On Cry To Me, could it be (to restore the man-singing-to-a-woman orthodoxy) that she is all alone in the lonely room where she knows her man has been entertaining the Other Woman and all that’s left “is the smell of [the Other Woman's] perfume”? I’ve just been reading the Anne Enright short story, Until The Girl Died, narrated by the habitually passive wife of a serial philanderer, telling of the watershed of emotion when the husband’s latest bit on the side dies in a car crash. In that, a curious intimacy emerges between the cheated-on wife and the dead mistress, and perhaps I’m sensing that in the idea of a woman moving around a house with only her rival’s perfume for company, when she could be getting her some payback courtesy of Reverend Burke.
That’s a point, May…of course all she’d need to do in that case is open the windows for a bit. Or peel some onions.
Mind you, I’d prefer my payback to come thisaway:
Ahhh… You said it best when you say nothing at all! that’s a true gem of (unintended?) misogyny. Sadly, Pablo Neruda said it even better, he said (in his most (mis)quoted verse, shame…)
Me gustas cuando callas, porque estás como ausente
(I like you when you’re silent, ’cause it’s like you’re not even there)
Not exactly the sentiment the whole poem is aiming for, but it paints a bleak picture of what the woman in your life is supposed to be there for… Even genuises come up with clunkers now and then.
Since nobody’s perfect, I must take a moment here to deplore Mr Petty’s use of the nonexistent word ‘alright’.
Treefrogdemon TP negative review shocker! LMAO
Sorry to post twice (although it was that funny) I thought my computer had timed out), Sakura you can delete if you want to.
Well, not really. I love the song.
And TP did go to high school, but not very often.
TFD Tom Petty negative review shocker! LMAO
I think she’s cleverly found one she can live with so no one will go looking for something worse
Frogs can be quite clever, you know.
I am very clever, of course – but here’s one…Not that I find it annoying, merely incomprehensible. TP says that when the band went into the studio to record this he had the verses written and the middle eight, but no chorus; so he just winged it, and when he opened his mouth what came out was
Baby, even the losers get lucky sometimes
Even the losers keep a little bit of pride
They get lucky sometimes…
and he was very happy, because he reckoned it drew the whole song together and made it mean something. But I don’t agree, although it is a wonderful chorus (and the song itself is in my top 50, if not my top 10); I don’t think it makes any sense at all.
Even The Losers by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Very annoying video, anyway!
OK, I’ve though of a really clunky one. It is annoying:
Well I’m down on my knees
And I’m begging again
You tell me why that you have to pretend
I don’t like the way you’re looking at him
Surrender
Third line contains a completely unnecessary word just to make it scan
Fourth line forces emphasis on ‘the’ because of the metre. Very bad writing. I would suggest
Well, I’m down on my knees
And I’m begging again
You tell me why you should have to pretend
Don’t like the way you’ve been looking at him
Surrender
Surrender by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. This one isn’t in the top 50 but it’s probably no. 51.
I’m not sure where this one falls in the ant-pantheon of annoying lyrics, but the utter repetiveness of 2Unlimited’s dance floor hit really winds me up.
“No no, no no no, no no no, no no there’s no limit”
Repeat. Ad infinitum. Oh, I know there actually are some other lyrics, but they are rather inane. I also know that it’s an easy target, so, havng got that off my chest, I shall go and try and think of a better example. There are, I think, many.
Can I chuck another one in? This is one of the best Spill Challenges ever.
Conflict – Custom Rock
Conflict were take very seriously in some quarters as a poltically active band which makes it more annoying that some of the lyrics were a lot of old guff masquerading as some kind of serious comment.
I really like the music to this track, and I don’t have a problem with the main thrust of the song which is attacking New Model Army’s decision to sign to EMI which at the time had business involvement in apartheid South Africa and nuclear arms.
The line that really irritates me almost at random is
“Custom rock it sounds like a sex aid, just as cheap and twice as nasty ”
What does that mean exactly? It superficially sounds like it’s making a point – but what? First of all as far as I can make out “custom rock” is a phrase that Conflict have invented themselves. I’m not aware of anyone else ever having used it in this contesxt. Therefore if it “sounds like a sex aid” then who is responsible for it doing so? Conflict themselves.
I say “if” – have you ever heard of a sex aid called “custom rock” or anything remotely similar? I’m not an expert but it dosn’t sound anything like a sex aid to me.
And “custom rock” is “just as cheap and twice as nasty”. Again I’m not sure what they are on about, I sort of imagine Conflict as men of the world but they seem to have an unlikely hang up here about sex aids (although this may have been a reflection of the anarcho scene’s hostility to sexual exploitation). But it’s an odd comment – supporting apartheid and the manufacture of nuclear weapons, however indirectly, is “twice as nasty” as a sex aid??
Sorry, it’s been bugging me for years! Give me the straightforwardness of the Varukers anyday.
I actually could not understand a lot of the words in this track his voice is really hard for me to understand.
If a sex aid called “custom rock” existed you would be able to buy it in Kabukicho, as people say you can find absolutely everything however strange there (Kabukicho is one of the entertainment districts in Tokyo) I must ask some men friends of mine if they have seen one ! ! ! (Personally I do not go to Kabukicho – there are a too many sex establishment places there and I do not like that atmosphere)
I will let you know ! ! !
“I actually could not understand a lot of the words in this track his voice is really hard for me to understand.”
Hard for you …and everyone else! This is how he can get away with some of his lyrics!
This is one of the best Spill Challenges ever.
Yup
This one is a really bad case of lyrics poaching. John Denver’s Annie’s Song (1974) (very guilty pleasure) starts out with the lyrics
You fill up my senses
Like a night in a forest
Like the mountains in springtime
Like a walk in the rain
Like a storm in the desert
Like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my senses
Come fill me again
Which is really kind of lovely.
Dolly Parton’s Here You Come Again (1977) poaches the first phrase and plugs it into the chorus -
All you gotta do is smile that smile
And there go all my defenses
Just leave it up to you and in a little while
You’re messin’ up my mind an’ fillin’ up my senses
Huh?
I love “Here You Come Again”…
Yes, I’m going to allow Dolly that one, bish.
I love Dolly. But that song i guess reminds me of a relationship i’d prefer to not be reminded of. When the song first came out though, that phrase stuck out like a sore thumb to me.
Hi Amylee
I have a whole band that I can not listen to know because it reminds me of a relationship I want to forget ! ! !
But I suppose so we all have songs or bands like that . . . . .
I am going to cheat unashamedly by going again and posting a song in foreign. I am not only going to post annoyingly cloying lyrics, I am going to post a really bad translation. I hope Maki or Sra Maki will offer their two euros worth.
Sabor A Mi – Luis Miguel
Tanto tiempo disfrutamos de este amor
nuestras almas se acercaron tanto a así
que yo guardo tu sabor
pero tú llevas también
sabor a mí.
So much time we enjoyed from this love
Our souls have gotten so close that
I save your taste but you also carry the
Taste of me
oh dear, what have i unleashed. But for one that kind of works, i’d go with the Butthole Surfers’ Pepper.
Boleros are fantastic… as long as you don’t take them at face value. Their lyrics are purposefully over the top, they’re trying to convey a sentiment with words, while working under the premise that words will always falll too short… An understated bolero is an oxymoron.
We’ve been enjoying our love for so long
and our souls have got this close
That I’m keeping your taste
and you’ll be carrying mine with you
So, the translation is fairly spot on, I think. I take issue with Luis Miguel, though!!! (shudders…)
…only the word “this” in the second line of the verse was supposed to be in italics
Meh.
Thanks for the decent translation, Lambretinha.
I do enjoy a good bolero. Some of them are quite beautiful and romantic, but some are OTT and some of the translations are quite awful.
I am even cool with some of Luis Miguel’s boleros. I have a couple of his CDs! (Bracing now for the abuse sure to follow that admission.) On balance, though, I prefer his Mariachi songs.
I enjoy many of the flavours of Mexico – just as long as nobody plays any Tejano music anywhere near me
.
Sorry, here’s another REALLY annoying one.
Carrie doesn’t live here anymore
(carrie doesn’t live here)
Carrie used to room on the second floor
(on the second)
Sorry that she left no forwarding address
That was known to me
(carrie)
How many times do you need to repeat that?
C’mon – what did you expect?
I expected that there would be a loud slammed door after the first chorus. The sound of retreating footsteps then a motorbike starting up and a remix version with Cliff singing a duet with Meatloaf of Bat Out Of Hell.
Ha – you didn’t think we were going to click on that, did you?
No way. I’m not evil.
I can imagine William Shatner making a cover of this . . . .
Sorry can’t leave it there, there’s too much to choose from.
The Straps – Brixton
A fine single from a band who will probably feature in a future Back To No Future feature. The Straps lived in Brixton, scene of major riots in 1981. The single cover has a photo from the riots in fact. So what insights did The Straps have into life in this harsh inner city environment
“Kentucky Fried Chicken
And a few chip shops
Theres quite a few punks
And there’s too many cops”
The chorus offers this thought
“Too much trouble on the streets
But I’m not gonna leave
If I go anywhere else
I’ve got nothing to achieve”
So there you have it, don’t bother trying to achieve anything becuse if you do you might end up with nothing to achieve.
To be fair when I saw them years later at Rebellion they seemed to have a sense of humour, as singer Jock Strap introducing the song nnouncing in sneery, Lydon-esque tones “Now I live in Cornwall”. Hopefully he still has things to achieve.
It’s a bit lame, isn’t it? The third line could have been much better.
The whole thing could have been much better! And one of the ridiculous things is a KFC and a few chip shops could describe pretty much any town in the country. Maybe the point of the song was “contrary to it’s image Brixton is an ok place to live” – maybe…
Too rich a topic, and i promised myself at the beginning that i was only going to go with bands / songwriters that i liked. And that may have had an off moment or 2. The Stones have a bazillion, but you still can’t call them bad songwriters.
On the other hand, i love these guys. Not for their lyrics though, which may be just too zen for my convoluted mind to comprehend.
Well, the look on the cake
It ain’t always the taste
My ex-girl she had
Such a beautiful face
They pretty well mangled that one didn’t they? Shame, it’s a pretty good song!
i was only going to go with bands / songwriters that i liked.
Yeah, we’d be here forever if we started on songs in the charts. I have preteens and am quite familiar with a lot of the ‘top’ songs. Some of the rhymes and lines in those are absolute eyerollers.
I should say in their defence I suppose that those songs are aimed at an immature palette and won’t connect with the kids otherwise. I don’t think any of us who think we are discerning were born that way.
Anyone going to attempt Yes? Above my own pay grade i think.
Isn’t it official that Des’ree’s “Life” suffers from probably most annoying lyric ever?
I’m afraid of the dark
Especially when I’m in a park
And there’s no one else around,
Oh I get the shivers.
I don’t want to see a ghost,
It’s the sight that I fear most
I’d rather have a piece of toast
And watch the evening news.
But isn’t it true, in a very real sense, that we would all “rather have a piece of toast”?
In almost every conceivable scenario, yes.
Once I saw three ghostieses
Sitting on three postieses
Eating buttered toastieses
The grease ran down their fistieses
Eurgh, the dirty beastieses.
Well, somebody had to.
“Mrs White
Had a fright
I the middle of the night
She saw a ghost
Eating toast
Halfway up a lampost”
Playground rhyme from my schooldays, circa 1975.
Maybe I was at school with Des’ree without kowing.
Annoying lyric and yet I rather like the song.
However, not being entirely sure what a ghost would really look like, should such a thing exist – and if were assured that the experience would remain purely visual – then I think I would forgo the piece of toast. For the sake of curiosity.
I absolutely refuse to post a link to the song but it is this;
Two hundred degrees
That’s why they call me Mister Fahrenheit
I’m trav’ling at the speed of light
I wanna make a supersonic man of you
No, if they were calling you Mister Fahrenheit it would be 212 degrees.
Oh Christ, yes. Almost any song you can think of by this band actually. That “fried chicken” at the end of “One Vision” makes me murderous with rage. And as for “Bohemian Crapsody”…
Too harsh, bish.
Teehee.
There is a really totally amazing cover . . . .
Yes! I’m with you on this one Carole and Bish
With you all as well. Flash is their best song – musically and lyrically! It’s all downhill from their.
“All we hear is radio ga ga, radio goo goo” etc etc
Wot! sneering at Radio Ga Ga? (It’s A Kind Of Magic, magic,magic….)
I understand that not everyone appreciates this kind of disrespect.
http://www.league-online.com/lebanon.html
But i liked that song.
A bold defence by League Online! I bought the record when it came out and quite liked it, but I was 14. Well meaning but ill advised.
I see the troll has made a reappearance on RR – he must be disappointed that there’s nobody there to irritate.
Oh no, it’s in good hands with Sceptic, who’s having some fun. I can’t babysit today, despite appearances i’m actually doing work. I wish i had his way with words.
I’m not intending to engage at all,amylee, I am just so curious about why someone would expend their energy in such a negative pastime. I’m enjoying reading up on it this afternoon.
I don’t think it’s a lady though, Amy. A couple of new monikers have appeared this evening, one of which has also commented on sports threads. I’m not saying that women don’t comment on sports, but it de rigeur for abusive comments to come from the male “contributors”.
I’m not banking on that it’s a female. But i’m not discounting it like some of the others are either. At this point though i’m wishing that everyone over there would just leave it to the crickets.
One of our most articulate and savvy (and nastiest, when provoked, but also one of the very good guys) posters on CiFA has a female profile and that’s what everyone assumed. Finally came to light that it was a guy, a few of us were shocked. He said, hey, its on my profile, all you had to do was read it. I said i wasn’t nearly as smart as he was (true), but even i didn’t believe everything i read on profiles.
Llama -
There was briefly a troll awhile ago (male profile), maybe before your time, who came out of left field to spit bile at Webcore. The profile is gone, but now you have me wondering if Webby may have given it a kicking on one of the sports threads or something.
Quite enjoying the ringside view myself. You’ve got to wonder why he would go to all the effort to set up all the different log ins but who am I to judge how others get their kicks.
I once thought briefly it might be amusing (to me) to set up an extra log in specifically to pick arguments with myself I my “wyngatecarpenter” guise but then realised I had more important things to do, like washing up.
Well, exactly. Now if it was a paid troll like on the political threads, at least there is some sort of tangible reward for the effort.
I still think it’s a female though.
I thought it was Lucretia at first, but L wrote quite well,this one doesn’t write as well. L also pops in, delivers a stinger or two and departs, this one doesn’t. Going to read up on troll psychology today I think.. but am pretty sure that total non-engagement is the best way to get rid.
One thing more about the troll – might it be a good idea to refrain from or limit comments about or links to The Spill on the blog for a while? It would be tiresome if he/she followed posters over here.
I do not know what to think about not posting the links to here.
The link is on the main page of RR and also about half of the views we have for our He Said -She Said series come from either the link I post or Google searches . . . .
But also in the mail you get from here when someone comments, we have lots of computer details and stuff. May be we can find out who it is from that anyway and stop them ?
Yes possibly there is an anti-narcissism cloaking shield that can be activated.
There’d also be that danger that you lose, too wyngate. Can you imagine having to live down being unable to defend yourself from yourself? Worse is you’d be the only one who knew, so all the jeers and teasing you’d get would be from yourself too.
Pretty soon there’s have half a dozen threads going you’d have to keep track of. ”Sorry wyngate, that was meant to be from Heckler B to Wyngate C.”
I think its L, Spotted Rich. Sceptic got it right – some style, very little substance. That shows up no matter what threads it posts on. When we first got these trolls, it was kind of tempting to think it was an ex-RR’rr who was maybe before your time. The sharp tongue was the same. But the tunage was very different, that one liked classical. And i would think she was way above this sort of thing.
SpottedRich -
You’re right about the non-engagement bit, as Sceptic was, but not sure if the psychology is going to be all that useful. Regulars on the yank threads get pretty good at troll spotting and recognizing resurrected profiles and tag team profiles, recomend clicks out of proportion, etc, it’s just pattern recognition. You can try to disguise yourself but there’s always a thumbprint that gives you away.
The L one drops a post on the CiFA threads every now and again. Lots of bile in big words, but zero grasp on the real issues at hand. One time the yanks gave it a good hard kicking, self with stones avatar included. Lo and behold, it shows up as 2 profiles, the L and DuLac ones on RR.
Now apparently it got a good kicking by Chris and maybe some others, profile deleted, and it shows up with a few other profiles on RR to start shit again.
Can play for awhile, but too high maintainance to bother with over the long haul. Above all of our paygrades i think.
@tincanman – yes I would have been opening a whole can of worms. Best leave this sort of thing to people with geuine personality disorders.
wyngatecarpenter –
me and arTEEsane are wondering quite what you are inferring.
Nothing at all!! Unless I’m inferring something about certain recent “multiple personality” visitors to the mothershipof course. Narcissistic personality disorder I suspect.
Don’t get me started on Q***n. Almost anything they have done makes me squirm………..
And Manfred Mann were always good value until they came up with this load of nonesense.
“Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce
Another runner in the night” (x3)
“Madman drummers, bummers
Indians in the summer
With a teenage diplomat.
In the dumps with the mumps
As the adolescent pumps his way into his hat.
With a boulder on my shoulder, feelin’ kinda older
I tripped the merry-go round,
With this very unpleasin’ sneezin’ and wheezin’
The calliope crashed to the ground”.
The music is great but the lyrics are shite…………..
Oy! Dem woids is by Mr Springsteen, you know. (Except for the second line you quote there.)
Did not know they were Brucies words. I think that makes it worse as I’ve always thought of him as a good writer. Still don’t know what the Donald Duck he’s on about though.
I like them. But he was only young at the time, you know – the song’s from his first album.
As high school kids, this song always brought a snicker – we always heard “deuce” as “douche”.
Bruce’s line is “cut loose like a deuce” which is less likely to be mistaken, I think. Served Manfred right for changing it.
Dear old Auntie Lou Reed has been responsible for some shockers ( Egg cream ?) .
I have a particular loathing for the Sally Can’t Dance album ( personal reasons) and this little number, Animal Language bumps along the bottom of that particular shallow pool of lyrical dexterity.
“Miss Murphy had a cat
on her lap it sat
And once in a great big while
it looked like that Cheshire cat did smile
But often it used to chase
anything that crossed its face
But one day it got so hot
that Cheshire cat had a blood clot”
Saint’s Alive ! That there is a right royal stinker and no mistake, guv’nor.
ooh, you’ve just put the cringeworthy Walk on the Wild Side in my head.
I can forgive “Auntie” Lou Reed almost anything because he wrote Perfect Day which I love so much it hurts sometimes ! ! !
The trouble for some such artists is that they become insulated from criticism. Can you imagine a member of Lou Reed’s band daring to say to him “We need a word about those lyrics”.
I suspect Mark E Smith went up his own arsehole a long time ago for similar reasons.
Think Shakira may have used google translate to convert Wherever, Whenever into English. Includes the immortal lines:
“Lucky that my breasts are small and humble
So you don’t confuse them with mountains”
Google translate . . . . . Oh dear . . . . .
I have an Australian friend that writes to me and he used to put the English in to Google translate to get Japanese to send to me.
I had to put his “Japanese” back in Google translate and get the English to understand what on earth he was writing about ! ! !
I had to tell him to write to me in English as I needed to practice so he would stop doing it ! ! !
It’s not too far off the mark, it says roughly the same in the Spanish version…
And yeah, we scratched our heads at that one too. Quite embarrassing, even for her lyrical standards
I always thought that was quite a good, or at any rate entertainingly bizarre, couplet.
Sorry Prof, forgot about your Shakira crush. It’s really very poetic [snigger]. Do like the song though.
You can be forgiven for a whole lot when you look and move like Shakira.
“Starting to feel just a little abused, like a coffee machine in an office” from Shewolf is a similar head-scratcher.
I must be too old, that was just awful.
Can i interest you in some Katy Perry ?
Boom boom boom
Even brighter than the moon, moon, moon
Stoned Americans moving through the desert on a horse with no name: “There were plants and birds and rocks and THINGS.” Way to go boys.
This made me laugh Shoey ! ! !
Wonder how long they scratched their heads for that fourth thing before saying ”fuck it, lets just go with ‘things’?”
Or did someone say ”we’ve been at thsat long enough, just put down ‘things’ and we’ll come back to it later?
You got it all wrong, guys… in that desert there are things… strange, unexplained things, sort of mysterious things, the mind just can’t, like, grasp, you know? It’s weeeeeeeeeeeeeird over there, man…
(damn hippies…)
yeah, things like peyote
I’ve always found the song very annoying too. The horse hasn’t got a name? Who doesn’t name their horse for heavens’ sake?
Moving through the desert on a horse called Mr. Ploddy, doesn’t have quite the same effect, so will give them credit for that.
I’ve been through the desert on a horse called Jane
It was good to get out of the rain
I’ve been through the desert on a horse with a name
It was good to get out of the rain
I’ve been through the desert on a horse that was tame
It was good to get out of the rain
I’ve been through the desert on a horse that was lame
It was good to get out of the rain
Moving through the desert on a horse with no mane.
Trying to find some Rogaine.
??
The horse has no name in the context of the desert where “you can’t remember your name” – they’re just very forgetful chaps. We should be lucky they remembered the rocks, plants and birds before getting stumped by the other stuff.
It’s not, may, it’s where you CAN remember your name. But not your horse’s. Evidently.
You are so right @May. Why must we always look for the negative. It’s a glass 3/4 full – 1/4 empty thing.
Or perhaps a scooped out piece of cactus 3/4 full – 1/4 empty thing.
I think Hans would be a good name for a horse. Especially a tall horse.
..mind, it would take quite a few to change a lightbulb, if the many Hans make light work saying is true.
In the desert, I can’t remember the lyrics. OK, you CAN remember your name but only by surrendering yourself to the prevailing anonymity, where there ain’t no-one for to give you no pain (and that’s a triple negative, which is awesome). If the horse was chuntering on about how, “I’m Dobbin, turned out nice in the end, didn’t it? Mind you, one thing they say about me, they say, ‘Dobbin? He doesn’t mind a spot of rain,’” the song would go “I didn’t go through the desert because Dobbin was doing my fucking head in.”
Triple negatives = even better than double ones!
Just to say that this discussion has made me laugh out loud several times. I’ve never really got the bit about an ocean being a desert with its life underground either. Still like the song, but not sure I’ll be able to listen to it now without calling the horse Duane or Elaine or something.
Oh, and while I’m here, how can we not have mentioned Toto:
As sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti
Must be Beth Orton and ‘Blood Red River’ – “Never did find my way home in time for my dinner” (these may not be the correct lyrics but that’s what they sound like)
Her mum must have been really angry if she was always late for dinner ! ! !
I’ve sounded off on this before: Elton John’s Candle In The Wind
It seems to me you lived your life
like a candle in the wind indeed
Never knowing who to turn to to whom to turn, perhaps, but let’s not go there
when the rain set in fair enough – my mum collects religious candles – I must try to find one of those candles that turn in various directions for her
And I would have like to have known you
but I was just a kid poignant, ‘cos he probably would have known her as a grown up if she was still alive, him being Elton John and all
Candle burned out long before hang on! How did it burn out when it was in the wind and it was raining? That suggests impressive durability.
the legend ever did. except that this is a large part of what constitutes the legend, isn’t it? You know, “oh Marilyn, she lived her life like a candle in the wind” – that’s not exactly forensic biographical detail, is it? It’s formulating a legend. So the candle, the constituent of the legend, can’t have been outlasted by the legend. Indeed, seeing as the candle in the wind analogy was able to furnish the death of another famous blonde in ’97, I’d say the candle didn’t burn out, get blown out or get doused by the rain at all, Elton
This is a really good one. The melody is a bit confusing too.
I remember my five year old nephew Corey bursting out with…
Like a candle in the wind
And the hoo-ome of the brave
(To much general hilarity)
The worst rhyming couplet ever…..
“Just suppose I juxtaposed with you….”
Credit to those Welsh wonders Super Furry Animals.
But it’s not the worst.
The Undead – Sanctuary (more obscure punk circa 82) – like the song but :
“I need sanctuary
Thank you very
Much”
You see what they did there?
Oh, no no no! Come on people, enough with the prescriptive grammar fascism already!!
Grammar is like free jazz, you know. Sure, there are some basic structures, but it’s free to evolve and be manipulated and generally fucked around with by us who use it, and that’s the way it should be! If people say “was” instead of “were”, then it’s OK to say either, simple as that. Its how we use it, not how some book written a couple of hundred years ago says it ‘should’ be! OK, rant over…….(maybe)….
Anyway….annoying tunes……for some unfathomable reason this band seem to be really popular with critics and the in-crowd (apologies if any Spillers are fans!), but for me Tuneyards (I refuse to do the whole upper/lower case thing, which is already annoying in itself) was by far the most annoying sound of 2011. Even writing about it now is annoying me a bit….ahhhh…….I think I need a lie down…….
…..but I need to nominate a lyric? Hmm…..Placebo are the first band that springs to mind when it comes to awkward, pseudo-profound lyrics….
“eyeholes in a paper bag,
greatest lay I ever had”
…..is so bad that it’s great and always makes me laugh…not that I listen to it too often of course!
OK…..time for a hot drink…
Teehee
I love those lyrics. Nothing like letting the world in general know that you’ve set the bar really, really low! The only way is up, surely?
another dond for the lyrics!
Do we have a volunteer for next week?
Hi SR ! ! !
Maybe you you have an idea for a topic ? ? ?
No, but if nobody wants a turn and it’s my turn again, I suppose I’ll rack my brain and try and think of something..
I think that means it is your turn next week ! ! !
I am looking forward to it already ! ! !
Has anyone mentioned that top pop combo Oasis?
Champagne Supernova anyone?
‘slowly walking down the hall,
faster than a cannonball,
where were you while we were getting high?’
which is accentuated by that whiny professional Manc accent
Pure pish!
Good call. That one is a wtf, and i still have no idea what a wonderwall is either.
They probably don’t either – they nicked “wonderwall” from a George Harrison LP. No surprise there then.
Actually, the unfortunate thing that always pops into my head is the (Prince penned) Sheena Easton – Sugar Walls. So kudos to Prince for placing that image in my head, and i’m feeling the need for a lobotomy to remove it.
lalalalalalalala
While we’re getting into such territory, Here’s Jaz Coleman getting typically melodramatic about the fact that he can ejaculate!
Killing Joke – Tabazan
” Architects erect erections,monoliths are raised
I love the swollen mound,i love the swollen mound….
… I push it between the legs,i stretch the lips,mother releive me (!!!?)
Bodies entwined,inhuman,tangled at the point of climax
Shoots forth the new gold and at last reason makes perfect sense
And I’m shooting forth, i’m shooting forth a new gold now hah!”
So does he sing that live with a straight face?
You got me curious, so i did 2.5 seconds of research on wonderwall.
“The music is based on Wonderwall Music, an instrumental album George Harrison wrote for the movie Wonderwall in 1968. “
“The general consensus is that this song is about Noel Gallagher’s then girlfriend Meg Mathews, who is compared with a schoolboy’s wall to which posters of footballers and Pop stars are attached. Noel later married then divorced Meg Mathews. However, according to Q magazines 1001 Best Songs Ever, this was not about Mathews. Noel is quoted as saying, “The meaning of that song was taken away from me by the media who jumped on it. And how do you tell your Mrs. it’s not about her once she’s read it is? It’s about an imaginary friend who’s going to come and save you from yourself.”"
Imaginary friends, hmm, is Noel our troll?
“So does he sing that live with a straight face?”
You mean Jaz? You understimate the man – here’s some of his onstage patter, he goes way beyond keeping “a straight face”
Somewhere a particularly scary cult is missing a leader!
“Imaginary friends, hmm, is Noel our troll?”
Nice theory! But no, I can rule Noel out
- He would have targetted the openly declared Beatlephobes such as myself – he hasn’t done so yet.
- In fact he would have been uable to resist the urge to nominate at least a couple of Beatles songs
-I’ve seen Noel interviewed several times, and whatever else, he is actually quite witty.
I’ve been in the odd position of having to defend Liam to some British folks who seemed sort of ashamed of him on CiF. I think the guy is hilarious.
I crewed for Oasis one time – and this lad who was mad keen, wanted a photo (on his phone) of them just walking past – they nearly ripped the thing out of his hands… these two blokes were going to have 15,000 phones in their faces in 5 hours time – to act so ‘up there our arses’ to a fan was beyond me.
Maybe the Columbian Marching powder had failed to arrive – or indeed had just turned up – couldn’t tell the difference.
“I’m feeling supersonic, gimme gin and tonic…”
Utterly moronic.
And that is their best tune!
Surrendipitously, another way of looking at this topic came to me last night. I was interviewing Joe Pug for my blog after his show in Manchester, and aske dhim why he’d left two of his best-know anti-war songs off the set list.
The answer – and I’ll post a link when I get the video up – is that the songs now make him cringe. He said he still stands by the sentiment and is still writing political songs, but he wrote those songs in his early 20s and finds them too ham-fisted to sing now.
He was almost in tears talking about “Bury Me Far (From My Uniform)”, which is one of the songs that vaulted him to national attention. (It’s here if you want, but I’m trying to cut down on too much embedding http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsNp7x_pJJA ). As he explains in the interview, a few years after writing this song he was in Arlington National Cemetery at the full military honours funeral for a buddy killed in Iraq and was floored that he had been so callous. His stance hasn’t changed, he said, but there are better ways to say it.
Reminds me tangientally of the Varukers, a band who’ve written many anti war songs, but it’s fair to say aren’t in competition with Bob Dylan in lyrical terms. One of their early songs is called Soldier Boy, and is fairly bog standard but still one of their most popular songs live. I was at one of their gigs once and saw the set list with, scrawled in as the last song, “Soldier Shit”!!
It’s obviously unfair to criticize the lyrics of most pop songs, as they’re not intended to be poetry, so I’ll throw in some Perry Barlow lyrics to a Bob Weir song, Looks Like Rain. It’s a real shame as the song was one of the most beautiful in the Dead’s repertoire, both in its first country incarnation with Garcia on pedal steel and as a later dramatic ballad. The first verse is perfect but this is the second:
Did you ever waken to the sound of street cats making love
And guess from their cries you were listening to a fight?
Well you know, hate’s just the last thing they’re thinking of
They’re only trying to make it through the night
street cats ‘making love’??!! ffs
hate’s just the last thing they’re thinking of. cats? thinking?
I don’t want to google it to find out, but I seem to remember reading once that cats’ penises have hooks on them.
I, too, will refrain from research but I thought the hooks were part of the hole, not the stopper (as Gunther Grass once named those bits).
Ah, you may be thinking of vagina dentata there, which is (as far as I know) a metaphor…
It turns out you are right about the cat’s stopper, tfd (yeah, I know I shouldn’t be surprised).
Vagina dentata is something I try hard to never, ever think about…..
DEFINITELY a metaphor, Chris.
ok, agree with you that the lyrics are pretty bad. But in defense of cats, i’ve had many and you underestimate them mightily. They are devious little buggers, and a lot smarter than i am. I really can’t credit it all to simply instinct.
Having had a cat for 20 years, I have no quibble about cats being capable of great deviousness and cunning but I strongly doubt their ability to feel existential angst about ‘making it through the night’….
fair enough. I can’t see Bob having the inside line on that one either.
Least inspiring opening lines:
We are the youth, we’ll take your fascism away
I suppose they can be forgiven since they were about 15 at the time, and ‘Tomorrow’ is still kinda fun.
Silverchair – Anthem For The Year 2000
For more empty, vapid sloganeering than this, you’re just going to have to read CIF.
Jewel – Hands
If I could tell the world just one thing, It would be that we’re all OK
I really want to like Jewel. I mean, she’s got a great voice, is gorgeous, and has never – or at least rarely tarted up to sell music. It’s just hard when you pen such Chicken Shit for the Soul.
You have just reminded me of another clunker that has irritated me from the first time i heard it.
“I’m all out of faith
This is how I feel”
And yet i don’t dislike the song.
Speaking of CIF, is the Graun down? Connection times out on both Firefox and IE and when it does load, none of the articles have any comments.
I’m having the same problem, and have been on and off for the past week or more and so have others. I’m just about to give it a try on Safari, sometimes it’s better than FF.
It’s no good on Chrome, either
btw, SHA -
We have our own sort of CiFA Spill blog, as an escape from both the declining quality of articles there, and the proliferation of trolls and bots. You’d be more than welcome, it’s not a closed shop. Gunny runs it, you can find the link in his profile.
In the process of trying to get the Graun up and going, i stumbled across an ad for a Graun conference on Paid Content. Hmm. As they’re losing money hand over fist, have to wonder if this is the way it’s going to have to go. I’d pay, it’s probably about the only site i’d pay for.
Whenever the Graun goes wonky like this, it seems to be just before they roll out a new bag of tricks. Which have been pretty good ones in terms of the upgrades to the comment system.
Grauniad is back for me now, RR, comments, and all
And this one -
“Shake it like a polaroid picture”
Congrats to Sakura-san for an outstanding topic. Spent the last hour wrestling with my morning coffee cup between fits of giggles. Somewhere in Nashville there’s a cloistered room where they keep the song writers tethered to their beds being fed twin IV’s of Jack Daniels & tobacco juice. How else to explain the lack of shame for titles like – If I told You You Had A Beautiful Body Would You Hold It Against Me – or – I Still Miss You Baby, But My Aim’s Gettin’ Better – or – Her Teeth Were Stained, But Her Heart Was Pure – or – My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend and I Sure Do Miss Him – or …. well I’m sure you get the point. I love me some country music but that kinda – wait , wait here comes the line again so the whole damn bar can sing it together and collapse in ridiculous self parody – schtick drives me up the wall. But it’s the really simple one’s drive me round the bend here’s Shania Twain.
What, no Saddle Tramps?
(Yeah, i know they don’t count for this one.)
The Saddle Tramps are in a class ( none, I believe) by themselves.
They don’t count because they’re trying to write cringe.
Think you’ve hit on it.
I’ve loved Neil Young’s music for 45 years (more actually) and it’s relatively easy to find a couplet or two make you go WTF. But the only one seriously irritates me is The Last Trip To Tulsa. Really the whole song sets me on edge but these lines may serve to illustrate.
If you guarantee the postage,
I’ll mail you back the key.
Well I woke up in the morning
With an arrow through my nose
There was an Indian in the corner
Tryin’ on my clothes.
In an aside I’ve got a bootleg record from a 1971 Los Angeles acoustic concert in which Neil (very humorously) stops singing in the middle of Sugar Mountain to explain the following lines were the lamest ones he ever wrote & he includes them just to show what can happen & if the whole crowd sings really loud on the chorus he’ll be able to forget he sang them.
Now you’re underneath the stairs
And you’re givin’ back some glares
To the people who you met
And it’s your first cigarette.
The Clash:
If I go there will be trouble
And if I stay it will be double
Well go then. No debate. End of song.
Similarly, Amen Corner:
If paradise is half as nice
As heaven that you take me to
Who needs paradise?
I’d rather have you
Well, yes. If you offered me a house that was half as nice as my house, I’d rather stay where I’m living now.
The worst lyric of all time though is definitely this:
Don’t love me for fun, girl
Let me be the one, girl
Love me for a reason
Let the reason me love
Sucks you into a vortex of circular logic, with vocals from Boyzone. Not nice.
big dond for the Clash.
Oh Gosh ! ! !
“Do not love me for fun, girl
Let me be the one, girl”
That is so bad – maybe the worse one so far for me . . .it succeeds to be both needy and patronising at the same time ! ! !
“If I go there will be trouble
And if I stay it will be double
Well go then. No debate. End of song.”
Yep! That struck me the first time I ever heard the song, aged 12.
The worst lyric of recent years, at least grammatically/in terms of making actual sense, has to be this from Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’ “Empire State of Mind”:
Concrete jungle where dreams are made of
Eh?!?
Sade – Smooth Operator
“Coast to coast, L.A. to Chicago”
…irritating song, and geographically very wrong as well…