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Anybody have some personal favourites? I have a few I like, witty, poignant, funny etc.
A couple of my favourites.
How I wish, how I wish you were here We're just two lost souls Swimming in a fish bowl Year after year Running over the same old ground What have we found? The same old fears Wish you were here
and And I guess it's all true what your girlfriends say That you don't ever want to see me again And your brother's gonna kill me and he's six feet ten followed by I see you've sent my letters back And my L.P. records and they're all scratched
Editted fir speeling
[Post edited 6 Mar 2023 20:39]
No idea when I began here, was a very long time ago. Previously known as Spirit_of_81. Love cheese, hate the colour of it, this is why it requires some blue in it.
"I saw two shooting stars last night I wished on them, but they were only satellites. It's wrong to wish on space hardware I wish, I wish, I wish you'd care."
Billy is one of the great lyricists of love and yearning.
See also St Swithin's Day, which has an amazing extended metaphor of the old saying about sun and rain on St Swithin's Day setting the dial for the English Summer:
Thinking back now, I suppose you were just stating your views What was it all for For the weather or the Battle of Agincourt And the times that we all hoped would last Like a train they have gone by so fast And though we stood together At the edge of the platform We were not moved by them.
With my own hands When I make love to your memory It's not the same I miss the thunder I miss the rain And the fact that you don't understand Casts a shadow over this land But the sun still shines from behind it.
Thanks all the same But I just can't bring myself to answer your letters It's not your fault But your honesty touches me like a fire The Polaroids that hold us together Will surely fade away Like the love that we spoke of forever On St. Swithin's Day.
I don't know where the sunbeams end And that the starlights begin It's all a mystery And I don't know how a man decides What's right for his own life It's all a mystery
Billy is one of the great lyricists of love and yearning.
See also St Swithin's Day, which has an amazing extended metaphor of the old saying about sun and rain on St Swithin's Day setting the dial for the English Summer:
Thinking back now, I suppose you were just stating your views What was it all for For the weather or the Battle of Agincourt And the times that we all hoped would last Like a train they have gone by so fast And though we stood together At the edge of the platform We were not moved by them.
With my own hands When I make love to your memory It's not the same I miss the thunder I miss the rain And the fact that you don't understand Casts a shadow over this land But the sun still shines from behind it.
Thanks all the same But I just can't bring myself to answer your letters It's not your fault But your honesty touches me like a fire The Polaroids that hold us together Will surely fade away Like the love that we spoke of forever On St. Swithin's Day.
And don't forget the very poignant lyrics to Levi Stubbs' Tears, a song about a domestic abuse survivor.
With the money from her accident She bought herself a mobile home So at least she could get some enjoyment out of being alone No one could say that she was left up on the shelf "It's you and me against the world, kid", she mumbled to herself
When the world falls apart some things stay in place Levi Stubbs' tears run down his face
She ran away from home with her mother's best coat She was married before she was even entitled to vote And her husband was one of those blokes The sort that only laughs at his own jokes The sort that war takes away And when there wasn't a war he left her anyway
When the world falls apart some things stay in place Levi Stubbs' tears run down his face
Norman Whitfield and Barratt Strong Are here to make right everything that's wrong Holland and Holland and Lamont Dozier too Are here to make it all okay with you
And one dark night he came home from the sea And put a hole in her body where no hole should be It hurt her more to see him walking out the door And though they stitched her back together They left her heart in pieces on the floor
When the world falls apart some things stay in place She takes off the Four Tops tape and puts it back in its case And when the world falls apart some things stay in place Levi Stubbs' tears
"People laugh, they will call it folly But we connected like a Yeboah volley"
"Daddy came out of retirement He took a hobby as a PCSO Let me level this as an indictment Only a part-time grass, but a full-time asshole"
"So, maybe the lining of a winter's coat Mightn't be the best place to hide a summer secret You said every photo that you took that festival Got lost in your camera in an insurance scam And though underexposed, I could see from the quality His K Records t-shirt and you holding his hand And I know he took you to the beach I can tell from how you bite on your cheek Every time the sand falls from your insoles And when our eyes meet All that I can read, is "you're the B-side"
Another thumbs up for Los Campesinos!
This is probably my fav track of theirs both musically and lyrically..
"You could never kiss a Tory Boy without wanting to cut off your tongue again"
You're rarer than a can of dandelion and burdock And those other girls are just postmix lemonade
Class.
Alex Turner is a fantastic lyricist, and though the album is divisive, some of his best are on Suck It and See.
And do you look into the mirror to remind yourself you're there? Or have somebody's goodnight kisses got that covered? When I'm not being honest, I pretend that you were just some lover
I'm blue Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di I'm blue Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di Da ba dee da ba di
"A+++++", "Great Comms, would recommend", "Thank you, the 12 inch black mamba is just perfect" - Ebay.
"I did my best, it wasn't much I couldn't feel, so I learned to touch" Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen
"You see a mousetrap, I see free cheese and a f'ng challenge" Introdiction - Scroobius Pip
"I used to hate the sun Because it shone on everything I'd done. Made me feel That all that I had done Was overfill the ashtray of my life." Sunrise - Pulp
"When you punish a person for dreaming his dream, don't expect him to thank or forgive you" The Best Ever Death Metal Band out of Denton - The Mountain Goats
"Some things you do just to see How bad they'll make you feel Sometimes you try to freeze time 'Til the slots are a blur of spinning wheels
But I am just a broken machine And I do things that I don't really mean"
Cry For Judas- The Mountain Goats
"The first time I made coffee for just myself, I made too much of it But I drank it all just 'cause you hate it, when I let things go to waste And I wandered through the house like a little boy, lost at the mall And an astronaut could've seen the hunger in my eyes from space"
Woke Up New - The Mountain Goats
"I'm in the living room watching the watergate hearings while my step father yells at my mother. launches a glass across the room, straight at her head and I dash upstairs to take cover. lean in close to my little record player on the floor. so this is what the volume knob's for." Dance Music - The Mountain Goats
I know that Noel Gallagher gets slammed for being an awful lyricist- but most of the songs on Definitely Maybe really spoke to a generation.
Gallagher's really hit and miss. Definitely Maybe has some great lyrics on it. Live Forever, Cigarettes & Alcohol and Slide Away are brilliant.
Some of the stuff from the same period is awful though. If I read the lyrics to a song like Whatever without listening to the recording, I'd assume it was something by Little Mix or Jess Glynne.
And I said - "I've a little money and a take away curry, I'm on my way home to my wife. She'll be lining up the cutlery, You know she's expecting me Polishing the glasses and pulling out the cork"
You can add Ian Dury to that list
“Hello, I'm your MP. Actually I'm not. I'm your candidate. Gosh.”
Boris Johnson canvassing in Henley, 2005.
Very true, and from the same era my favourite singer-songwriter, Elvis Costello, who has an amazing way with words. These from his song Man Out Of Time.
So this is where he came to hide When he ran from you In a private detective's overcoat And dirty dead man's shoes The pretty things of Knightsbridge Lying for a minister of state Is a far cry from the nod and wink Here at traitor's gate
[Pre-Chorus 1] Because the high heel he used to be has been ground down And he listens for the footsteps that would follow him around
[Chorus] To murder my love is a crime But will you still love a man out of time?
[Verse 2] There's a tuppeny hapenny millionaire Looking for a fourpenny one With a tight grip on the short hairs Of the public imagination But for his private wife and kids somehow Real life becomes a rumour Days of Dutch courage Just three French letters and a German sense of humor
[Pre-Chorus 2] He's got a mind like a sewer and a heart like a fridge He stands to be insulted and he pays for the privilege
[Chorus] To murder my love is a crime But will you still love a man out of time?
[Verse 3] The biggest wheels of industry Retire sharp and short And the after dinner overtures Are nothing but an after thought Somebody's creeping in the kitchen There's a reputation to be made Whose nerves are always on a knife's edge Who's up late polishing the blade
[Pre-Chorus 3] Love is always scarpering or cowering or fawning You drink yourself insensitive and hate yourself in the morning
[Chorus] To murder my love is a crime But will you still love a man out of time?
[Outro] Will you still love a man out of time? Will you still love a man out of time?
There are some artists - Costello, Billy Bragg, Springsteen, HMHB, Pulp - who consistently write really good lyrics. Just a question of narrowing those down for a thread like this.
Another one though:
Well, I woke up Sunday morning With no way to hold my head that didn't hurt And the beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad So I had one more for dessert
Then I fumbled through my closet for my clothes And found my cleanest dirty shirt And I washed my face and combed my hair And stumbled down the stairs to meet the day
Cash’s version made more poignant by his own struggles with addiction.
I'm working on a morning flight to anywhere but here I'm watching this evening fire burn away my tears All my life I've left my troubles by the door Leavin' is all I've ever known before
It's not the way you hold me when the sun goes down It's not the way you call my name that left me stranded on the ground It's not the way you say you hear my heart when the music ends I am just learning how to fly away again It's not the way you say you hear my heart when the music ends I am just learning how to fly away again
And maybe you were thinkin' that you thought you knew me well But, no one ever knows the heart of anyone else I feel like Garbo in this late night grande hotel Cause living alone is all I've ever done well
Thought the thread need some Nanci Griffith (RIP, too soon, too soon)
I swear on the wet head Of my first case of gonorrhea It's his ugly voice That I forever hear
You've got this slippery quality It makes me think of phlegm And a dual personality I hate both of them .... What kind of creature bore you Was it some kind of bat? They can't find a good word for you But I can Tw4t!
I swear on the wet head Of my first case of gonorrhea It's his ugly voice That I forever hear
You've got this slippery quality It makes me think of phlegm And a dual personality I hate both of them .... What kind of creature bore you Was it some kind of bat? They can't find a good word for you But I can Tw4t!
If you don't put me on trial Then why don't you turn me loose You can throw the key away Let me chase the wild goose Your progress is my desire You shouldn't do me wrong Although it's true I'm worried now I won't be worried long
Telling stories to the peacocks Selling systematically Just a counterfeit engraving Of the way you used to be Just another one-way number Another two-way song Although it's true I'm worried now I won't be worried long
If you don't put me on trial Then why don't you turn me loose You can throw the key away Let me chase the wild goose Your progress is my desire You shouldn't do me wrong Although it's true I'm worried now I won't be worried long
Telling stories to the peacocks Selling systematically Just a counterfeit engraving Of the way you used to be Just another one-way number Another two-way song Although it's true I'm worried now I won't be worried long
Oh I can see them all So formal and so stiff Like a sergeant at arms At a policeman's ball And everybody's pushing To be the first in line Their hearts upon their sleeves Like a ten cent valentine The old women are there Too old to give a damn They've brought along the kids Who don't know who I am
Oh I can see them all So formal and so stiff Like a sergeant at arms At a policeman's ball And everybody's pushing To be the first in line Their hearts upon their sleeves Like a ten cent valentine The old women are there Too old to give a damn They've brought along the kids Who don't know who I am
And if one day I should become A singer with a Spanish bum Who sings for women of great virtue
I'd sing to them with a guitar I borrowed from a coffee bar Well, what you don't know doesn't hurt you
My name would be Antonio And all my bridges I would burn And if I gave them some they'd know I expect something in return
Wer zu Lebzeit gut auf Erden Who in their lifetime is good on Earth wird nach dem Tod ein Engel werden and will become an angel after death den Blick gen Himmel fragst du dann you look to the sky and ask warum man sie nicht sehen kann why can’t you see them
Erst wenn die Wolken schlafengehn First if the clouds have gone to sleep kann man uns am Himmel sehn you can see us in the sky wir haben Angst und sind allein we are afraid and alone
Gott weiß ich will kein Engel sein God knows I don’t want to be an angel
Sie leben hinterm Sonnenschein They live behind the sunshine getrennt von uns unendlich weit separated from us, infinite expanse sie müssen sich an Sterne krallen (ganz fest) they must cling to the stars (very tightly) damit sie nicht vom Himmel fallen so they won’t fall from the sky
Erst wenn die Wolken schlafengehn First if the clouds have gone to sleep kann man uns am Himmel sehn you can see us in the sky wir haben Angst und sind allein we are afraid and alone
Gott weiß ich will kein Engel sein God knows I don’t want to be an angel
Erst wenn die Wolken schlafengehn First if the clouds have gone to sleep kann man uns am Himmel sehn you can see us in the sky wir haben Angst und sind allein we are afraid and alone
Gott weiß ich will kein Engel sein God knows I don’t want to be an angel
On the National Express there's a jolly hostess Selling crisps and tea She'll provide you with drinks and theatrical winks For a sky-high fee Mini-skirts were in style when she danced down the aisle Back in '63 (yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah) But it's hard to get by when your arse is the size Of a small country
As I went walking I saw a sign there, And on the sign it said "No Trespassing." But on the other side it didn't say nothing. That side was made for you and me.
In the shadow of the steeple I saw my people, By the relief office I seen my people; As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking Is this land made for you and me?
Some of the Squeeze lyrics are amazing, all the more so because they tend to be wrapped up in almost throwaway humour. That's one of my personal favourites too.
Absolutely this , when I saw the original post on the forum page I opened wondering how far I would have to scroll to find a squeeze song... also think Ray Davies and the Kinks are in the same mould.... Come Dancing I can relate to enormously........ and I bet someone will also go for Divine Comedy, Norma & Norman I think it beautifully put together.
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