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Artists whose shoddy lyrics -- however banal/trite/meaningless/oblique/poorly composed -- still make for completely satisfying listening.

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- Secret Machines
- Ride (oof, are they ever poor lyricists)
- Underworld (lyrics are almost completely meangingless here, but it all works)


Otherz?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Primal Screamz

― sexyDancer, Monday, 14 June 2004 20:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Greg Sage owns this thread.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Al Green doesn't exactly write deep deep lyrics but when they're being sung by that voice over that production they work beautifully.

― Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:07 (twenty-two years ago)

i knew this was an alex in nyc thread, somehow

― m. (mitchlnw), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:11 (twenty-two years ago)

..due to the needlessly wordy and awkwardly phrased question, perhaps?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Oblique isn't actually a bad thing.

― David Allen (David Allen), Monday, 14 June 2004 20:30 (twenty-two years ago)

oasis/verve

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Monday, 14 June 2004 21:20 (twenty-two years ago)

teh violent femmes

― andrew l. r. (allocryptic), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:33 (twenty-two years ago)

MBV

― the surface noise and the analogue warmth (electricsound), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Rob Zombie/White Zombie
I love his music to death, but, sheeee-it! Does *he* even know what he's talking about?

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:35 (twenty-two years ago)

black sabbath.

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

latebloomer OTFM!

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

sometimes, Neil Young. esp. the Harvest Moon album which I like a lot for reasons I don't fully understand.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Oasis big time own this thread though

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 14 June 2004 22:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Neil Sedaka.

― Joseph McCombs (Mary), Monday, 14 June 2004 23:14 (twenty-two years ago)

well i just listened to a beulah CD all the way through. I don't know if it was "satisfying", but i had fun ridiculing it on the Beulah Singer thread.

also, I know they've written good stuff too, but iggy/bowie/lou have launched some lyrical stinkbombs in their day, but I like the songs said stinkbombs are in regardless.

Also, Stones! Does jagger REALLY say, "I'm a cold italian pizza/I need a lemon squeeza!" on monkey man or did i just make that up?

― AaronHz (AaronHz), Monday, 14 June 2004 23:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Phoenix and Black Box (although I actually like the meanings in Phoenix's stream of non-sequitur truisms and Black Box's Loleatta Holloway reassemblages).

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Monday, 14 June 2004 23:24 (twenty-two years ago)

new f'n order.

― bill stevens (bscrubbins), Monday, 14 June 2004 23:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Mister, would you please help my pony?
He's over there behind the tree
He's down in the dirt, would ya help him?
I think it's his lung

Mister would you please help my pony?
He's chewin' bark and not the leaves
He's cryin' like a baby, would you help him?
I think it's his lung

Mister, would you please help my pony?
He's down and he ain't gettin' up
He coughed up snot in the driveway
And I think his lung's fucked up

Pony, Pony, Pony

Mister, would you please help my pony?
I think it's his lung

Mister, would you please help my pony?
He's over there lookin' at me
He can't talk because he's a pony
I think it's his lung

― OH EM GEE DUBYA TEE EF WEEN EL OL EL EXCLAMATION POINT (nickalicious), Monday, 14 June 2004 23:30 (twenty-two years ago)

The Ween lyrics are genius, though.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 00:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Guided by Voices to thread.

― evan chronister (evan chronister), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 00:34 (twenty-two years ago)

I’m a fleabit peanut monkey
All my friends are junkies
That’s not really true

I’m a cold italian pizza
I could use a lemon squeezer
What you do?

But I’ve been bit and I’ve been tossed around
By every she-rat in this town
Have you, babe?

Well, I am just a monkey man
I’m glad you are a monkey woman too

I was bitten by a boar
I was gouged and I was gored
But I pulled on through

Yes, I’m a sack of broken eggs
I always have an unmade bed
Don’t you?

Well, I hope we’re not too messianic
Or a trifle too satanic
We love to play the blues

Well I am just a monkey man
I’m glad you are a monkey, monkey woman too, babe

I’m a monkey
I’m a monkey
I’m a monkey man
I’m a monkey man
I’m a monkey...

― de, Tuesday, 15 June 2004 01:43 (twenty-two years ago)

NEW ORDER TO THREAD

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 01:45 (twenty-two years ago)

the Police too, for sure. Ride OTM. some Magnetic Fields, but not all.

To be honest, I've never ever paid attention to the lyrics of the Sea And Cake, though I thoroughly enjoy them. They're quite possible terrible, and I'm rather scared to find out.

oh, and DEPECHE MODE, often in a very bad way. Probably Air, too.

― derrick (derrick), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 01:59 (twenty-two years ago)

thanks de, I thought I was hallucinating the first time I heard that stones lyric but never looked up the song myself...lemon squeezer indeed.

― AaronHz (AaronHz), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 02:18 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.sonymusic.pl/grafika/specjaly/wywiady/d/msp.jpg


what's that sound? I believe it is a thread locking!

― Morley Timmons (Donna Brown), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 04:17 (twenty-two years ago)

i gotta say neil young's lyrics are beginning to grate, this is after listening to him about ten years...

― duke dragnet, Tuesday, 15 June 2004 05:03 (twenty-two years ago)

there's a new song out by a group called nations by the river (an amalgamation of gelbison and sleep jackson members) which basically repeats the lines "i was just a boy when you called out my name, just to see what i would do". i love it.

― gem (trisk), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 05:05 (twenty-two years ago)

IMO no one's going to beat Oasis + New Order

― Sonny A. (Keiko), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 05:10 (twenty-two years ago)

1.Black Sabbath seconded. Their lyrics (mostly by Geezer Butler, not Ozzy) often dealt with interesting ideas, despite being clunkily phrased and often terribly rhymed.

2.Led Zeppelin: I know why people ridicule Robert Plant's Led Zep lyrics: Christ, how many times did he use the phrase "Need Your Love"? or use the words "Babe", "Baby" or "love" (="sex")? Too damn many! But every once in awhile he'd come up with a real gem of a song, full of brilliantly tossed-off, nonsensical (or not) throwaway lyrics, like in "Hots On For Nowhere."

3.Yes: I gained a newfound respect for Jon Anderson and his incomprehensible nonsense after he admitted that he often used words merely for the way they SOUNDED, and not to read any deep meaning into them. (But shit, man - I always speculated that he'd scribbled 3-4 lps worth of his lyrics during an epic acid trip!)

World's Greatest Song with World's Worst Lyrics: Stevie Wonder, "I Wish"

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Tuesday, 15 June 2004 05:12 (twenty-two years ago)

two years pass...
the movement you need is on your shoulder

― it wasn't me it was the one-legged woman (bergholt), Friday, 29 September 2006 05:23 (nineteen years ago)

WILCO, especially the last two albums

Guided by Voices, too. Robert Pollard and Jeff Tweedy both seem to have a little Jon Anderson in them...

I love love love Black Sabbath's lyrics, though.

― Rat Nasty (ratnasty), Friday, 29 September 2006 05:43 (nineteen years ago)

Most shoegaze bands would fit this, except I generally don't like the music.

― Bumblepuppy (Horbgorbling Slubberdegullion), Friday, 29 September 2006 12:22 (nineteen years ago)

There's a big difference between evocation and banality / triteness etc. Especially wrt Wilco and Underworld.

― Cheek0 (Cheek0), Friday, 29 September 2006 13:07 (nineteen years ago)

bob dylan

― Enr1que (Enrique), Friday, 29 September 2006 13:09 (nineteen years ago)

...and Bob Dylan (xpost-ish)

― Cheek0 (Cheek0), Friday, 29 September 2006 13:10 (nineteen years ago)

Oh man... Ride and TSM are responsible for some of my favourite lyrics ever. :-(

― Virginia Plainsong (kate), Friday, 29 September 2006 13:28 (nineteen years ago)

The night we met I knew I needed you so
and if I had the chance I'd never let you go.
So won't you say you love me,
I'll make you so proud of me.
We'll make 'em turn their heads every place we go.

So won't you, please, BE MY BE MY BABY
be my little. baby MY ONE AND ONLY BABY
Say you'll be my darlin', BE MY BE MY BABY
be my baby now. MY ONE AND ONLY BABY
Wha-oh-oh-oh.

I'll make you happy, baby, just wait and see.
For every kiss you give me I'll give you three.
Oh, since the day I saw you
I have been waiting for you.
You know I will adore you 'til eternity.

― Johnny B Was Quizzical (Johnney B), Friday, 29 September 2006 13:29 (nineteen years ago)

The Killers, although I haven't heard the new one yet.

― Eppy (Eppy), Friday, 29 September 2006 14:04 (nineteen years ago)

rolling stones, rolling stones, rolling stones...

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 29 September 2006 19:57 (nineteen years ago)

from "sweet virginia"

"Wading through the waste stormy winter
And theres not a friend to help you through
Trying to stop the waves behind your eyeballs
Drop your reds drop your greens and blues
...
Yes, Ive got the desert in my toenail"

fortunately, he sings these lines with such a big fake american drawl they sound almost wise and profound.

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:03 (nineteen years ago)

sir elton john

― methanie tanner (methanie tanner), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:09 (nineteen years ago)

SONIC YOUTH

― mucho (mucho), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:13 (nineteen years ago)

Suede. Utter nonsense.

― winter testing (winter testing), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:18 (nineteen years ago)

Jon Spencer and his special typewriter that has a "TALKIN BOUT THE BLOOZ", an exclamation point, and a space bar.

― a naked Kraken annoying Times Square tourists with an acoustic guitar (nickalici, Friday, 29 September 2006 20:25 (nineteen years ago)

"TALKIN BOUT THE BLOOZ" key, that is

― a naked Kraken annoying Times Square tourists with an acoustic guitar (nickalici, Friday, 29 September 2006 20:25 (nineteen years ago)

Husker Du

― Si.C@rter (SiC@rter), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:26 (nineteen years ago)

There was one Ride lyric I liked, once, but then I realized it was copped from Salinger.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 29 September 2006 20:41 (nineteen years ago)

huey lewis

― tremendoid (tremendoid), Friday, 29 September 2006 21:43 (nineteen years ago)


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