Lyrical crimes committed by Beatles members

One of my favourites:

I had another look and I had a cup of tea and butter pie
Butter pie?
The butter wouldn't melt so I put it in the pie, alright?

McCartney - Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey

Like, yeah whatever fits.

Ah! böwakawa poussé, poussé

Jai guru deva om

Gibberish.

sanskrit is gibberish?

i think the entire set of lyrics to "Lady Madonna" are absolute crap

smdh

seriously! lady madonna lyrics are great:

Early in the morning, risin' to the street
Light me up that cigarette and I'll strap shoes on my feet
Got to find a reason, a reason things went wrong
Got to find a reason why my money's all gone
I got a Dalmatian, and I can still get high
I can play the guitar like a mother fuckin' riot

Life is too short, so love the one you got
'Cause you might get run over or you might get shot
Never start no static, I just get it off my chest
Never had to battle with no bulletproof vest
Take a small example, take a t-t-t-t-tip from me
Take all of your money, give it all to charity

Love is what I got, it's within my reach
Yeah, and the Sublime style's still straight from Long Beach
It all comes back to you, you'll finally get what you deserve
Try and test that, you're bound to get served
Love's what I got, don't start a riot
You'll feel it when the dance gets hot

Lovin' is what I got, I said remember that
Lovin' is what I got, I remember that
Lovin' is what I got, I said remember that
Lovin' is what I got

I don't cry when my dog runs away
I don't get angry at the bills I have to pay
I don't get angry when my mom smokes pot
Hits the bottle and goes right to the rock
Fuckin' and fightin', it's all the same
Livin' with Louie Dog's the only way to stay sane
Let the lovin', let the lovin' come back to me

'Cause lovin' is what I got, I said remember that
Lovin' is what I got, I remember that
Lovin' is what I got, I said remember that
Lovin' is what I got, I got, I got, I got

nothing beats Harrison's "The Lord Loves the One":

We're all making out
Like we own this whole world
While the leaders of nations
They're acting like big girls

she could be a bellydancer i don't need a true romancer she could be a diplomat but i don't need a girl like that she could be a neurosurgeon if she's doing nothing urgent what i need's a temporary temporary secretary

lol marcos

You say you've seen Seven Wonders and your bird is green

I know that she's no peasant.

Her name was Magill, and she called herself Lil, but everyone knew her as Nancy.

being for the benefit of mr. kite is top to bottom awful

Benefit of Mr. Kite is not lyrics by Beatles however. Also using florid 19th C. entertainment poster is a cool idea for a song.

Many George Harrison rhymes are crimes. "I look at the floor and I see it needs sweeping." Hey Ringo get on that.

ah i see u

Trying to remember if there were any tone deaf solo Beatle outings on par with "Let's Work" that displayed a similarly self-righteous lack of awareness of their status and privilege.

I know I was a crazy fool for treating you the way I did
but something took a hold of me and I acted like a dustbin lid

Trying to remember if there were any tone deaf solo Beatle outings on par with "Let's Work" that displayed a similarly self-righteous lack of awareness of their status and privilege.

― Pastor Of Muppets (Old Lunch), Thursday, January 29, 2015 6:10 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can!

wrong

that is a very self-aware line

"Get Back" is kind of revolting.

I don't want anything from you
Turn on your motor of love

Motor of love, motor of love
Heavenly father look down from above
I can't get over your powerful
Motor of love

And while the Pope owns 51% of General Motors
And the stock exchange is the only thing he's qualified to quote us

Love this song but gah.

but the biker
didn't like 'er

aw I love that line

have no idea if the pope ever actually owned stock in GM

xp

backstory on Get Back lyrics....it could have been so much worse. Like, apologizing for the rest of his life worse.

We wasted time and again on things, things we already knew
Born to do, I give my love to you
Whenever you get some time
Whenever you get some time
I'd like to roll it all up in a ball and spend it with you

the dung beatles doing "roll it all up in a ball"

Yeah, 'Get Back' could have been so much worse. As it stands though, I think 'You Can't Do That' and 'Run For Your Life' make me wince more.

Yeah, I heard some of the original lyrics, and some of that shit could have singlehandedly ruined the Beatles' legacy.

No Pakistanis (Get Back)
------------------------

Spoken b4 song - "Who what that black man? Don't dig no Pakistanis, taking all the peoples jobs."

Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.
Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.

Ronan Relimun, was a Puatarican, working in another world.
Want it thrown around, Se patiha mohican, livin' in the USA.

Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.
Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.

(Instrumental)

Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.
Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.

Pretty Ado Lamb, was a pakistani, living in another world,
Want it thrown around, don't dig no pakistanis, taking all the people jobs.

So get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.
Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.

(Instrumental)

Get back, get back, get back, get back.
Get back, get back, get back, get back.

Get back!
Yeah,
get back!
Yeah!
Yeah!
Get back!

I got a little woman I can really love / My woman fit me like a little glove

"Say you don't love him, my salamander"

I LIKE this song, but:
-----------------------
Big Barn Bed

Who's that coming round that corner
Who's that coming round that bend
Who's that coming round that corner, Will it
Will it be my friend

Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed

Who you gonna weep on?
Who you gonna sleep on?
Who you gonna creep on next?

Weeping on a willow
Sleeping on a pillow
Leaping armadillo, yes.

Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed
Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed

Re Let's Work-style self righteousness may I humbly
present
"so this is Christmas AND WHAT HAVE *YOU* DONE?"

"Leaping armadillo, yes." That's the sound of a man who's gone beyond having nothing to say and just rhyming nonsensically.

"Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" has always been a conundrum: it vaguely sounds like an accusatory protest song in the vein of Some Time In NYC...but other than the "war is over if you want it" chant, really isn't. Who doesn't want the next year to be "a good one without any fear?"

John and George had some kind of mind meld on the accusatory lyrics. "Look at you all" "are you one of them?" from 2 of George's sermons.

"All You Need is Love" is the weirdest one because it's nothing but downs with this phony uplift chorus.

"All You Need is Love" isn't all downs. it's realistic

"No way you can sell as many records as we do" should have been included

it's all tautological faux-profundities:

"nothing you can do that can't be done"... REALLY???

it's like yellow submarine or we can work it out, perfect kids song

someone in my hs used Ah! böwakawa poussé, poussé as his yearbook quote. a football player, too.

"if you fall on the concrete, that's your asphalt" - George Harrison

I think more than a few lyrics from Lennon's Some Time In New York City could go in this thread!

no wait John is singing all those lines in "All You Need is Love" directly to Paul. Paul gets nervous, starts singing "She Loves You".

kinda surprised that people are overlooking how narcissistic songwriters can be - "you" in a song can be the songwriter/internal monologue etc. Neil Young's pointed this out explicitly, I'm pretty sure John did too

I don't hear George criticizing himself a bit on those Beatle songs. John's self-criticism is kind of explicitly first person.

(was kidding about the addressed-to-Paul thing, that would come later)

I said on some other thread that in general John writes about himself, Paul writes about made-up people, George writes about everybody

tmi, Paul:

Like gravy, down to the last drop,
I keep mopping her up
Oh yeah, she's my baby.

ugh what is that from?

'She's My Baby' from Wings At The Speed Of Sound

Yes, Sir, That's My Gravy, No Sir, Don't Mean Maybe

I wanted to hear about Paul's sex life about as much as I wanted to know about Prince Charles's

I think more than a few lyrics from Lennon's Some Time In New York City could go in this thread!

If we could make chains with the morning dew
The world would be like Galway Bay
Let's walk over rainbows like leprechauns
The world would be one big Blarney stone

I know I was a crazy fool for treating you the way I did
but something took a hold of me and I acted like a dustbin lid

― You’re being too simplistic and you’re insulting my poor heart (Turrican),
>
that's rhyming slang isn't it?
He's saying he was acting like a kid.
I think there's normally a more shortened form of that in the slang though, as language tends to take something that rhymes then shorten it so you don't normally immediately get the source until you find the longer original version. I can't think what dustbin lid normally gets shortened to though.

Maybe even then it's not great.

You're probably right but I thought the rhyming slang was saucepan lid rather than dustbin lid? Do they have rhyming slang in Liverpool?

there's a lot of slang rather than rhyming slang iirc.

'dustbin lid' features here too if you can bear it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7_viW_lc98

I know I was a crazy fool for treating you the way I did
but something took a hold of me and I acted like a dustbin lid

― You’re being too simplistic and you’re insulting my poor heart (Turrican),
>
that's rhyming slang isn't it?
He's saying he was acting like a kid.
I think there's normally a more shortened form of that in the slang though, as language tends to take something that rhymes then shorten it so you don't normally immediately get the source until you find the longer original version. I can't think what dustbin lid normally gets shortened to though.

Maybe even then it's not great.

― Stevolende, Friday, January 30, 2015 11:38 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Oh yeah, it's definitely slang, but for me it just ruins the entire song in the first two lines, especially given the subject matter of the song. With a tweak here and there it could have been so much more than it is.

Well I'm talking to a former engine driver (DRI-VER!)
Trying to find out what he used to do

Uh... drive an engine?

Ummmm, what's wrong with that?

Faster than a bullet from a gun
He is faster than everyone
Quicker than the blinking of an eye
Like a flash you could miss him going by
No one knows quite how he does it but it's true they say
He's the master of going faster.

I remember winning third place in an elementary school poetry contest with some similar lines.

haaaa, yes, "Faster" owns this thread IMO, especially for "People became his friend."

The entirety of "Spies Like Us" (the ultimate "Fuck it! I'm Paul McCartney!" song), but especially,

We get there by hook or by crook
We don't do a thing by the book
Never needed special clothes
How we did it no one knows
I guess we must have had what it took

Great Britain you are tremendous / and nobody knows like me
but really, what are you doing / in that land across the sea