(one side of a chat with Carl Neville aka the Impostume, done in the mid-2000s)
FAVES
Ian Dury
Jim Morrison (but
perhaps only his delivery could get away with some of that stuff)
Robert Wyatt (king
of bathos)
Kevin Ayers
(recently got into into him in a big way... "Decadence" and
"Song from the Bottom of A Well", amazing words)
Bryan Ferry (a
genius of delivery also)
Marc Bolan (best
spangly pop nonsense)
Edwyn Collins
Morrissey (not
after a certain cut-off point which is almost as early as The Queen Is Dead
except there are moments in the later Smiths stuff and one really great later
solo song "I Am Hated For Loving"... actually I just read a really good book on Morrissey by an academic that made a good case for his lyrical genius
throughout, broke down his various strategems etc... I was convinced but
then the music gets to be mostly so pedestrian post Viva Hate)
Roy Harper
Billy Mackenzie
Green (the early
stuff .... Songs to Remember just is too cute and smugly in love with
himself .... some moments on Cupid... the last LP, White Bread Black Beer, very much)
Jarvis Cocker
Martin Bramah
Kristin Hersh
Poly Styrene
John(y) Rotten/Lydon
Pete Shelley
Syd Barrett
(actually there is also one song that was a B-side early on, by Rick Wright --
amazing lyrics, strange fragile emotion i can't think of any prototype for in
rock. 'Paintbox" -- well worth checking out if you have any time for Floyd
at all)
Captain Beefheart
(not always but often)
Lawrence from Felt makes it just for "Primitive
Painters" and some of the Denim lyrics.
David Byrne (not always but quite often --
"Mind", "Animals", side 2 of Remain)
Iggy Pop when he was in the Stooges
further thoughts
Stevie Nicks, in a
funny sort of way
Rapping is almost
like another thing, it doesn't look good written down often, but Jay-Z, LL Cool
J, DMX
SPECIAL CATEGORY: can't say I adore exactly but you can definitely see why they're so rated: Lou Reed, Ray Davies, David Bowie
OVER-RATED
it's not that they're bad, they might even be
"good", but just substantially over-rated
Thom Yorke (just
very few really memorable lines)
Manic Street
Preachers (I warm to them as people but the lyrics are just fucking wretched
aren't they! as is the music and the singing come to think of it. Do not see
why Owen and Anwen et al are so into them, guess it might have been a
certain-age type thing)
Ian Curtis (it's
very young, isn't it? Exception: "Love Will Tear Us Apart" is perfect)
Elvis Costello (used to really like but it's rubbish, okay it's not rubbish but really masturbatory -- wordplaying with yourself in public heh heh- actually I kind of enjoy it on that level, as grotesque exhibitionism, and also as sensuously sounded nonsense) (see this earlier post, the section on "pubadelia")
Nick Cave (used to
like him a lot but now it seems so posey -- the over-written Birthday Party
stuff is still pretty great I think, but what's worse is when he tries to do
"simple" later on in a sort of King James Bible/Faulkner kind of way, tries to achieve the language of parables and common simple-hearted folk... cod-"timeless").
Mark E. Smith (agenius obviously but his seems to be an
approach where you could get away with murder so I wonder if he does that quite
a bit)
Brian Eno (the
story ones are good, the ones about people marooned on beaches or twilight
states of vegetative indolence... but the other Warm Jets type
stuff is just twee )
Kurt Cobain (some
great one or two liners and the odd verse but…)
J&MC, Primal Scream, Spacemen 3, Spiritualized -- it's like the cooler, slightly
higher brow version of how metal bands write lyrics, like they've gone to the
School of Rock
X, Violent Femmes,
etc -- American wannabe poets
Vic Godard (good
lines here and there, don't completely understand the fuss I must say - like "Ambition" - why is this considered an all-time lost classic?)
Patti Smith (has
her moments, but…)
Joe Strummer and Paul Weller
The Clash lyrics pale next to the Pistols (the exceptions here - "Complete Control", "White Man in Hammersmith Palais", "Lost in the Supermarket" and - while overly abstract - "Straight To Hell")
Weller has some moments but ("When You're Young", "That's Entertainment". "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight" is great - a 3 minute Play For Today was his goal, he said - but then narrative doesn't make sense - why is travelling by Tube to bring home a curry; midnight is a bit late to be having a curry; how would the muggers work out his address so to be able to use his keys to break in and attack the wife?). "Town Called Malice" makes me wince. Then there's the Style Council...
Donald Fagen (except for The Nightfly, when he's great)
That was circa 2006, who would I add now?
Faves
The chap(s?) in Vampire Weekend but only for the first album
It pains me to say it but Ariel P**k
Florence Shaw, obviously
I should have added The Specials (Dammers, Hall, Golding, Radiation)
Also Gang of Four but only the first album (gets clumsy after that - except for "Paralysed")
Also Joni Mitchell (often)
Also John Lennon (often)
Also Paddy Macaloon except when he's very cloying (which admittedly is quite often)
Also Neal Peart but only for two songs, "The Spirit of Radio" and "Limelight".
Also David Crosby for "Everybody's Been Burned", "Mind Gardens" and "Triad"
Also Peter Perrett
Overrated
Really not sure - I don't seem to listen out for lyrics in the way I once would have, and for a while now quite a large proportion of my listening is music sans words.
But in terms of someone for whom the argument is made very much on the basis of the lyrics, I would say Lana Del Rey.
56 comments:
It's "The Spirit of Radio", not "The Spirit of the Radio". Why do people keep on getting it wrong? I've won $30 over the years in bets with Rush-worshipping Canadians who've insisted "Radio" has a definite article. I don't even remotely like Rush and I know the correct title. What on earth is going on?
That's just a typo - trust me I know the title!
Great lists. A few others for me:
Faves
Alex Turner (On the first Arctic Monkeys album certainly, and intermittently on the second one. I lost touch with them after that, so I don't know if he's been able to keep it up.)
Bill Ward (Wrote most of Sabbath's lyrics. A bit clunky at times, but often hugely effective as sold by Ozzy. NIB is probably my favourite rock lyric of all time.)
Overrated
Black Francis (Hey and Monkey Gone to Heaven are great. The rest is mostly cliche.)
It'd be nice to see Jackson C. Frank championed in such a list.
Am I the only one who finds Forever Changes a little weak lyrically? For instance, the comedy of "Oh, the snot has caked against my pants" doesn't make the tummy undulate with laughter.
Great: Mike Skinner on Original Pirate Material. Overrated: Mike Skinner on A Grand Don't Come for Free (one of the worst cases of second-album syndrome I've ever heard, Pam Ayres tries garage).
And you forgot the greatest of the greats, Bob Dyl... no, obviously Shaun Ryder.
Yes! Mike Skinner is a great shout. And I agree the first album is his high point, although I have to admit to having a soft spot for a lot of his later work, even the dreaded Dry Your Eyes.
I can't remember which tune it is from, but "Considering how much prang you'd done, you looked amazing on CD:UK" is a great lyric. Especially as it is apparently drawn from real events.
Ed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PiIO-pVZr0
Faves:
- Madness. They are not poetry but they are integral to the songs. They were probably the most sung lyrics in the playground when I was growing up.
- I am also going to defend Paul McCartney as a kind of word painter (but not as good as Lennon).
- Kristin Hersh is seconded. Her lyrics stay in my head.
Unfaves:
- Chris Martin after Parachutes. His lyrics take some Coldplay songs from being non-descript to actively bad.
- Bono - not always terrible but again often detracts from the music.
In terms of musical blindspots (Canadians referring to "Spirit of the Radio") and Black Sabbath, it's only last weekend, whilst reading the Mojo Collections edition on Black Sabbath, that I realised Tommy Iommi's first name is actually Tony. Someonme please tell me that they made the same mistake.
A Grand Don't Come for Free reminds one of the old adage: give a starving artist a vast palate and they'll make the worst choices. An incoherent concept album about a charmless loser who comes to owe a thousand pounds then may or may not find it in his television? That would be the greatest weakness of the album, were it not for Mike Skinner's lyrical talent having vamoosed. Read aloud these lines:
I might ask my mates where they'll be drinking
From the sofa giving them a ding
You'll automatically clock that it's an incorrect use of metre. But don't worry! Mike tries to cover this metrical jack-knifing by EMP-PHA-SIS-SING EV-ER-RY SYL-LA-BLE. How can you defend that without encouraging ridicule?
And that whole urban underclass poetry was done much better by one Shaun Ryder;)
As for Macca being a word painter, Greg Lake (of Emerson, Lake and Palmer) once published a collection of his lyrics and poetry under the title Word Sculptures. Here's ELP's Still... You Turn Me On, perhaps the best condensement of Greg Lake's semantic artistry:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4Z-IO5YxZU
Matt M - Thanks!
I see I misremembered it. The line is actually "Considering the amount of prang you'd done, you looked amazing on CD:UK." A good one either way, I think.
Also, thirded on Kristin Hersh. Not many lyrics get me a bit teary just reading them on a page, but Cry Baby Cry has that effect. She has so many great lines, on the first two Muses albums in particular but really throughout her career.
"Pam Ayres tries garage" - classic!
But he was so good on Original Pirate Material.
I'm thinking I should have said Van Morrison - at least on the basis of Astral Weeks.
I like Arthur Lee's lyrics - I'm not sure "snot has caked" is meant to be a laugh line, it's meant to be disconcerting, a little eerie.
He was really good at titles - "Andmoreagain", "Maybe the People at etc etc", "You Set the Scene"
I was really taken with Alex Turner's way with words at first but it's faded. The one about the doors being secure in the cab and the drunken ride back from a club is a good bit of observational wotnot.
Did think of Madness - "Embarrassment" and "My Girl" are very touching, "House of Fun" is great, "Our House" is excellently Kinksy - I feel like it somehow indirectly inspired the Ray Davies-sung sequence in Absolute Beginners - the one with the cut-away / diorama / dolls-house effect, where you can see Ray's character amid the whole bustle of the household. Along with Bowie's "That's Motivation" set-piece, the only good scene in the entire godawful movie.
Oh and "Grey Day" is a great lyric - "I wish I could sink without a trace". Suggs's phrasing and affect is part of why the Madness lyrics works so well.
'Cry Baby Cry' obviously a Lennon lyric. But yeah, Kristin Hersh's words have always been inscrutable yet familiar, much like her music. I'm thinking of something like 'Fish' off of the 4AD 'Lonely Is an Eyesore' compilation.
My faves would definitely include Iggy on the first two Stooges albums ("1969" is simply genius), Joey Ramone (who can beat 'Beat on the Brat'?).
Always loved Tom Verlaine's lyrics, the way he minimizes words used to convey maximum vibe.
Paul Westerberg is on my list of faves. Utterly disarming and emotionally searing double and tripe entendres tossed off with casual indifference (as opposed to Costello's studied schoolboy serious). Thinking of the completely unknown track 'Nobody' from their terrible final album which switches the identity of the 'nobody' repeatedly and you hardly notice.
Always loved Stevie Wonder's words during his '70s run, marrying melody with syllable so perfectly.
Becker/Fagen always brilliant ("Showbizness kids making movies of themselves / You know they don't give a fuck about anybody else"), although I hate Steely Dan fandom.
More recently, Frank Ocean hits the spot for me.
WORST LYRICISTS: Have to admit, nearly spit out my drink when I read Neil Peart included as a fave. Almost as bad as Elvis Costello but in an entirely different way. But I have always loathed lyric-y lyricists such as Leonard Cohen, Nick Cave, Ian Curtis (although I love Joy Division), solo Lou Reed ("New York" ugh), etc.
Hard to overstate how awful '90s alterna-rock lyrics were. Billy Corgan, etc. even though I enjoy singing them loudly when they come on the radio. And in fact, I would say that there is an undeniable joy in singing bad lyrics loudly that often exceeds the joy of singing good ones.
Above comment (begins w/ Cry baby Cry blah blah) from me, Asif. For some reason, the system anonymized me!
Thanks for reminding me: the trophy for the worst lyricist of all indisputably goes to Billy Corgan, alongside his worst voice, worst frontperson and worst band trophies. But I find no joy in singing his tripe, because along with all its other flaws, it's boring. Easy to mock, pxcruciating and dull to endure. It's also worth noting that Billy Corgan genuinely considers himself the greatest living songwriter, and indeed he considers himself better than all the dead songwriter, because he's still alive and they're not.
Re., "the snot has caked": the comic and the disconcerting are oft synonymous. And I said Forever Changes was lyrically a little weak, not massively. It doesn't spoil my enjoyment of the album, but I notice the smile/while/style and the die/why/goodbye rhymes in You Set the Scene, and I can't forget them. Consider them moles on a bosom.
Into the "Faves" ring I'd have to throw Robert Forster and Grant McLennan, lyricists who usually receive proper credit when people get around to paying them some attention, but who rarely figure into lists like these. They wrote some incredible lyrics. Are they often overlooked over because they were, from the beginning, annoyingly self-conscious in their presentation as literary romantics?
Paul Heaton wrote some wonderful, scathing songs. Billy Bragg in his first couple of years.
More recently I've liked Annie Clark (St. Vincent).
Your assessment of Morrissey lines up with a suspicion I've long nursed, which is that all his best lyrics came from notebooks he'd filled as a nobody typing away in his bedroom. He had enough for a brilliant initial rush of LPs and little else. It's a been a long, slow brain-drain from the moment Johnny knocked on his door. But when your plunge starts from the top of Everest, even the lower-elevation fluff floats higher than most.
Other interesting categories might be:
Lyricists whose words are fantastic fits for their particular style of music but absolutely atrocious out of context: Martin Gore, say.
Lyricists who diminished their reputation by putting too much out there, like Lou Reed, whose handful of undeniable gems go missing in a catalog of songs that somehow felt bloated and gassy even before "Transformer".
Lyricists who were much, much better when they had no idea what they were doing, wrote by committee, and tossed word salads over a beat-- and made it work. Later proven by the fact that when they became "proper songwriters" their lyrics were abysmal. I can only be talking about New Order, of course.
Hi Asif - the Cry Baby Cry I was referring to is a Hersh original, the last track on the Chains Changed EP. It's a cracker.
They played it as the last track in their Glastonbury set in 1989, available here:
https://archive.org/details/throwing-muses-1989-06-16-glastonbury-uk-flac/11+-+Cry+Baby+Cry.flac
Or on video here: https://youtu.be/DX8BeqhCLic
Confusingly, Throwing Muses also later covered the Beatles' Cry Baby Cry, I think, but I've never heard it.
I really like the Go Betweens but find the lyrics are a little opaque and closed-off, they don't quite connect. "Cattle and Cane" is a good one though and I love the title "Twin Layers of Lightning". It's a sort of bookish, over-subtle sensibility.
Yes Paul Westerberg is a great writer, smart but direct. Not afraid to tug on the old heart strings.
Neal Peart is literally for just two songs, great examples of meta-music - rock about rock.
Arthur Lee does this clever thing on one of the songs on side 2 of Forever Changes - "Maybe the People Would Be the Times or Between Clark and Hilldale", that's the one. A twist on enjambment maybe, the last line of the verse sets you up for an end word - but instead there's a gap - and the absented word appears as the first word of the first line of the next verse.
And "The Red Planet", c'mon - that's a great lyric. Including the interpolation from Marat/Sade.
Thinking there might be a special category for Gauche But Great. Stuff that only works, can only be got away with, in pop music.
So, in a certain way, Gary Numan is a big contender in the GBG category. "Are 'Friends' Electric", the pictures painted in "Down in the Park" (the chilling image of the rape-machine), "Cars". The title / hook of "You Are In My Vision". But if the melodies weren't so grand and the voice wasn't this perfect self-pitying lonely-boy whine, maybe it would all be embarrassing.
Whereas, despite the great tunes, the atrociousness of the lyrics to Duran Duran shines through so rank.
Martin Fry's lyrics in ABC are a little over-written and pun-happy, but there is one song that is lyrically very clever indeed but also quite heartbreaking - "Date Stamp". Like Gang of Four "Damaged Goods" turned into ultrapolished discofunk.
Chic Organisation have some fantastic lyrics - "Lost In Music" above all.
Hi Ed,
Absolutely right about 'Cry Baby Cry.' Thx for the correction. I was just listening to the Muses' cover of the Beatles track the other day, which is actually quite good! Here in the U.S., it was almost impossible to get the first Muses album and the 'Chains Changed' EP in the late '80s, neither of which was domestically released. Ironically, it was actually much easier to see them live.
Nick mentioned Paul Heaton -- I am not a Housemartins fan but it always used to kill me to hear the couplet 'Too many Florence Nightingales / Not enough Robin Hoods' - especially as we barrel through late-stage capitalism into God Knows What.
On a different note -- what are musical acts that have atrocious lyrics but redeem themselves quite well otherwise? My pick is Bauhaus. Unintentionally hilarious lyrics but I always thought they had pretty great and inventive arrangements.
Asif
Asif: 100% on Flag Day. Gets me every time. Another great couplet: "So you thought you'd like to change the world. Decided to stage a jumble sale." Just utterly bleak.
Agreed, too, on Stevie Wonder in the 70s. He gets stick for being sentimental, but I find songs like As are just irresistible evocations of the euphoria of being in love. Master Blaster (Jamming) is another terrific lyric, although it seems more poignant in retrospect.
Gauche But Great-- the first song I think of is "Total Eclipse of the Heart". As a kid it always snagged my attention when it came on the radio or MTV, but I never gave it a second thought after it passed into oblivion with the rest of the dross. Decades later it hooked me again after a malicious algorithm ambush. I found out it was written by Jim Steinman, borrowed from a musical he'd created about Nosferatu; the lyrics become mildly funny if you imagine them sung from a vampire's point of view. The song is pure Eighties power-ballad slickness but to really get it you've got to watch the nutty video, a Gothic phantasmagoria featuring Tyler as Mary Shelley with a perm, which blasts the song into its full majestic absurdity. Great? I don't know. I'd definitely cite it as an example of an oddity you can only get away with in pop.
Some interesting and provocative choices! (I imagine busloads of SERIOUS YOUNG MEN spluttering in horror at the Ian Curtis nomination!) Agree particularly re:the Manics - as I've said from the get-go, I've always liked everything about them except the music.
Despite a later turn to mawkishness ("Hymn to Her" ughh), Chrissie Hynde had her moments: "I saw a picture of you/those were the happiest days of my life"("Back on the Chain Gang) may well be the most perfectly, unpretentiously poignant couplet in all of rock.
Whither Neil Tennant?
It may be overlooked among greater cultural crimes, but Bono is a reliably terrible lyricist.
Bruce Springsteen has his moments, particularly on his quieter songs; that said "Born to Run" is simply a glorious piece of music.
Stephen Malkmus is interesting...although self satisfied and VERY derivative of MES in his early days.
He never matched it, but Tricky's "Maxinquaye" is just about perfect lyrically...low key menace and stoned despondency mixed into a impressionistic Joycean haze
Nobody's mentioned Bobby Gillespie yet, easily the most consistent weaver of lyrical bollocks striving far too hard to be edgy and streetwise for three decades now. A personal favourite is the line from Nitty Gritty, "Feel like Christ on the cross with a loaded gun". Aside from the risible image of an ass-kicking Jesus, how can Jesus hold a gun with those nails through his palms? Still, I do have quite a bit of affection for Gillespie-brand nonsense, and I reckon other people here do as well. So, an entry in the Gauche-But-Great category?
The Go-Betweens - yes!
I'm going to suggest antipodeans Paul Kelly - who at his best can tell stories with economy and grace - and Martin Phillipps of The Chills - who on Doledrums and Heavenly Pop Hit has a wry wit.
AlsoL Neil Tennant - there's a man who knows the kind of lyrics that work with his delivery.
Also: Liz Fraser
Aside from Gauche But Great, there's also lyrics that work when sung but not on the printed page. I think a lot of Bee Gees songs somehow carry a lot of emotional weight, but when the lyrics are spelled out, it is difficult to work out how.
I would second Chrissie Hynde as a lyricist and also nominate Abba.
Predictably enough, I will put in a word for The Stranglers - some brutally effective couplets and one-liners. Also for employing the unreliable narrator ("Strolling along minding my own business").
The aforementioned Go-Betweens actually have a whole song about the Gauche But Great phenomenon: Robert Forster's When She Sang About Angels, about Patti Smith. Sample lines: "When she sang about angels / She looked at the sky / Anybody else, anybody else, but I let it go by."
The song itself is a bit drab, but it is fun to see Forster as a fan, struggling to reconcile his emotions and his intellect. His dry, distanced style underlines the song's meaning, heightening the contrast between his reserve and Smith's passionate commitment.
Smith is a perfect example of GBG for me. The lyrics on Horses are fantastic, of course, including what is often cited as the greatest opening line in the history of rock. After that the quality drops off pretty sharply, but for me her energy and conviction make it work, even through to the comeback albums in the 90s.
Phil Knight's mention of the unreliable narrator reminds me of the absolute master of that technique: Smokey Robinson. He has written so many great lyrics, but my absolute favourite is The Tracks of My Tears. As I hear it, he is not actually at all upset to be single again, but wants to charm his ex (to seduce her?) by making a big show of being broken-hearted.
And Stylo - That is spot-on about Bobby Gillespie. It surely cannot be any coincidence that the best tracks on Screamadelica are all either instrumentals, or use words from someone else: Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper, Jesse Jackson, Tommy Hall. That said, I do have a bit of a fondness for the pro-acid propaganda of the original Higher Than The Sun.
Primal Scream did get mentioned in the School of Rock: 'Dark Stuff Canon' mention alongside J&MC, Spacemen 3 etc. It's definitely gauche and posturing, but I dunno, "Higher Than the Sun" is a great lyric I think.
I've never quite felt it with Neil Tennant - like, what is "West End Girls" about? "Being Boring"? For such a huge, Number 1 hitting type pop group, the lyrics are quite oblique. (Well apart from the clumsy "Opportunities").
Maybe I'm just dim. I'm a big fan of "come out and say it, if you've got something to say". Like Jarvis Cocker - it's writing that anyone can understand, but it's often surprising and rarely corny (and if so, corny on purpose). Morrissey too is at his best when most instantly legible - "How Soon Is Now", "Heaven Knows", "Accept Yourself" etc. Coynness is not-nice and elliptical is irritating.
I like the things Neil Tennant says in interviews though.
Jim Steinman is the master at writing Jim Steinman-type lyrics. Nobody does it better.
But seriously he is an interesting lyricist with his cod mythology of r'n'r as salvation. There's a very strange monologue spoken word thing on his solo album, which is a bit like Maldoror meets Spector.
Eee says of the Manics "As I've said from the get-go, I've always liked everything about them except the music".
Haha, so true. I was going to say, "if only they could have just existed to do interviews in the weekly music papers, they would have fulfilled their destiny." But then I remembered 4 Real being carved into Richey's arm to prove a point (traumatizing poor Tim Jonze I think it was; wasting NHS resources, and - with a slip of the blade - quite possibly cutting a tendon or major nerve in his arm, or even bleeding to death). I thought it idiotic at the time, and as a safety-first oldfuck, I think it ridiculous and reprehensible, an absolutely shame-worthy stunt.
And then "Michael Stipe I hope he gets AIDS and dies" - I think that was one of Nicky Wire's golden nuggets, right?
Maxinquaye is so brilliant lyrically - and made richer and more deliriously confusing by having so many of them come through the mouth of Martina Topley-Bird.
"My brain thinks bomb-like..."
Smokey's "Tears" songs - "Tracks" and "Clown" - are fantastic. Dylan famously described Robinson as the best poet, or maybe it was lyricist, in America.
Another great unreliable narrator song is Dury's "If I Was With A Woman" - a portrait of a misogynist, but
I'm not sure if George Jones ever wrote a lyric himself, but I associate him with great funny-sad lyrics like "The Race Is On," "We Must have Been Out of Minds", "Love Bug", "He Stopped Loving Her Today", "She Still Thinks I Care" . I can't be arsed to look up who wrote them.
Lyrics written by professional songsmiths and the words-half of words-and-music teams - that's a whole other category. But in that category you'd have to mention Jimmy Webb just for "Wichita Lineman".
Likewise not sure if Willy Nelson penned the words to "Hello Walls". I tried to argue with a girlfriend that this was as harrowing as "Love Will Tear Us Apart" but she wasn't having it.
A great lyric, I associate with Al Green (also Georgie Fame did a version), not going to look it up but - "Ain't It Funny How Time Slips On Away".
Scott Walker! Just on those first four albums, things like "Plastic Palace People". Oh and Climate of Hunter has some good stuff. Gets very dense in the Tilt-onwards era.
Oops, my mistake, sorry about that.
Think with the later period Gillespie/J&MC lyricking there is an overcompensation for the fact that they are basically dweebs; that they can't attain the Harley-riding hirsuteness that fits their Americanophile sound, so the lyrics become a concatenation of cliches. This is also very apparent with The Cult from "Electric" onwards - Lil' Devil being a classic example (although great fun):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZUABAirbE4
It's interesting to contrast this with AC/DC, who often sang about quite ordinary things. And on which point, "Down Payment Blues" has absolutely fantastic lyrics.
AC/DC have some great lyrics - "Problem Child", "TNT"
In the metal stakes, Budgie have some funny lyrics and titles - "Hot as a Docker's Armpit"
Another one that occurred to me just now is Devo - mostly the first album. "Uncontrollable Urge" and "Praying Hands" are hilarious, "Gut Feeling" is a great Devo-ization of the garage punk put-down / "evil woman" mode, "Shrivel Up" and "Jocko Homo".
Feels like they ran out of juice ideas-wise after that first great burst of pent-up creativity, musical and conceptual. (The later released early material on Hardcore Devo is also full of hilarious, gross, offensive creativity).
But "Triumph of the Will" stands out on Duty for the Future, because it is such a creepy song - seems to be a Nietzschean apologia for rape, as far as I can work it out.
After the first album, the inspirations seems to stretch to the titles - "Whip It", "Through Being Cool" - and not much further. "Freedom of choice is what you've got / Freedom from choice is what you want" - I think that's how it goes? - is clever, though.
Remember that period (2000-2003) when the consensus became that, despite the objections he invited, Eminem was the greatest lyricist of his generation? And then straight after he simply forgot how to make good songs?
Surprised nobody mentions Warren Zevon (Excitable Boy, Lawyers, Guns & Money,"And if California slides into the ocean/Like the mystics and statistics say it will/ I predict this motel will be standing until I pay my bill", etc.) - full of noir clichés but often funny.
Talking about California, I quite like "Mr Wilson" by John Cale - who often sounds like some mixture of Zevon & Ayers (and not at all like Lou Reed).
Rickie Lee Jones on the first or the first two albums.
Kacey Musgraves, sometimes.
John Darnielle, maybe too obviously.
Ronnie Lane (Debris, Oh La La apparently co-authored by RWood, etc.)
And Neil Tennant can be quite direct : Your funny uncle, Dreaming of the queen, etc...those AIDS songs
Oh, and two more I forgot. You don’t generally think about listening to Husker Du for the words, but both Grant Hart and Bob Mould were fantastic lyric-writers, IMO.
Rickie Lee Jones is great, although abstract-leaning - picture-lyrics, mind-cinema ("Traces of the Western Slopes", etc)
I love Husker Du but I never really thought about them as great lyricists I must admit - like, I'm not sure I could quote a lyric.
You could be laughed out of the building (or the Oporto) at Melody Maker for saying as such, but Lloyd Cole has some good lyrics. He knows how to paint an emotional picture: "2CV", "Patience", "Are You Ready to Be Heartbroken", "Why I Love Country Music". It's gauchely bookish early-20s often but that's authentic to him - the kind of person who'd look forward to touring because of all the reading you can get done on the bus.
I think Lloyd Cole would have been fine, and a lot cooler, if he had refrained from name-dropping. That "read Norman Mailer/get a new tailor" line still makes me cringe even today.
Which brings me to another thing - the clanger, that one line that makes you press your mouth open like in an Edvard Munch painting. Guy Chadwick and Brett Anderson were particularly prone to this phenomenon, I seem to recall.
Surprised that no one mentioned Richard Butler - at least in the two first Furs albums.
Lloyd Cole was proud of his namedropping, although he disputed that characterisation and had a fancy self-invented term for it. When I interviewed him, he said this:
"When I started, I'd just come out of studying literature, so in a
way it was quite natural for me to write like that. I think
I developed the idea of the proper noun as metaphor and
simile. That's one of the few innovations in songwriting
that I'm responsible for. To hear it referred to as name-
dropping, doesn't seem very nice. It certainly wasn't name-
dropping, I'd never met anyone like Norman Mailer, and I
never even read Simone de Beauvoir. But I knew what she
represents as a figure, so I thought she could easily be used
as a metaphor."
Yeah there are lots of examples of lyricists who are generally good but then there'll be a real clunker, where you gasp or want to avert your gaze.
I've come round to thinking (again - liked them a lot early on, then went the other way) of the Psychedelic Furs as cool and Butler having this mesmerising presence, vocal tone, phrasing, which carries right on through into the pop phase with "Love My Way". I'm not sure if I'd say the same of the lyrics, but they do often work up a nice mystery - especially "Sister Europe".
On the first album, he has this fixation on the word "stupid" - spat out in this stinging, dismissive, world-weary, disgusted-with-it-all tone. But it does get a bit repetitious.
That Norman Mailer line is a joke, surely?! Or at least tongue-in-cheek. That whole song is very funny: “Listening to Arthur Lee records, and making all your friends feel so guilty about their cynicism… Not even the government, is going to stop you now.”
Another great lyricist not yet mentioned, who is also often very funny: Pete Shelley. From Orgasm Addict onwards.
Oh Pete Shelley is in my big list up there at the top - absolute favorite. Funny and poignant, light and profound at the same time. I love his turn towards the spiritual-existential and questioning (I believe Buzzcocks were doing a load of LSD around the third album) with songs like "I Believe" and "Nostalgia". "Hollow Inside" and "Why Can't I Touch It" too in a way.
"You Say You Don't Love Me" is such a brilliant lyric.
comedy corner - a recent one is Richard Dawson, just on the basis of "Jogging".
https://youtu.be/UGiQ_-Ktpvc
Tragedy corner. Absolutely devastating lyrics:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsnakPFRhXs
Also very mysterious as to what it's about. Some washed up journalist in the Philippines just after the Vietnam War?
We've discussed Pete Shelley, but not Howard Devoto? I champion My Tulpa especially.
Is there a bad song about wanking? Even the comic ones still remember to stay comic.
He's he got some good ones, Mr Devoto. "Boredom", "Shot By Both Sides", and some of the tunes on The Correct Use of Soap.
Well, come to think of it, Lloyd Cole with his "I invented proper noun as metaphor and simile" claim is bollocks - on one song on Correct Soap, Devoto says "I could have been Rashkolnikov / But Mother Nature ripped me off". There's some other literary references elsewhere I think.
But perhaps literary character references are different (Cole might say) to the names of actual living people of renown.
But Bryan Ferry did that in a bunch of songs long before Lloyd - "Do The Strand" is full of namedrops of artists and entertainers. "2HB" - a whole song about Humphrey Bogart. I think there's some famous namedrops in "Virginia Plain" - the whole song is a Pop Art canvas.
What is the Canon of Wank Songs in Rock 'n' Pop?
"Orgasm Addict"
"Pictures of Lily"
"I Touch Myself"
Dury's "Razzle in My Pocket" is not about wanking per se but the procuring of materials for the facilitation of masturbation.
"She Bop"
"Dancing with Myself"
"Turning Japanese"
"Blisters in the Sun"
"Muscle of Love"
"Praying Hands" (and several others by Devo)
"Teenage Kicks" originally went "I wanna hold it, wanna hold it tight".
Does "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" count?
May is International Masturbation Month, apparently.
She Bop, Dancing w., Turning Japanese - of course (I only recently came across that explanation of the Vapors song! I wouldn't say it's at all obviously legible - which explains how it managed to be a hit)
Blisters - i've never paid any attention to the lyric so never picked up on that.
Praying Hands - well they told me it was their joke attempt to write a Born Again Christian dance anthem, but you might be right - they did have an interest in porn ("Penetration in the Centrefold" i think is an early Devo track - inspired by Hustler)
"Teenage Kicks" - I think one has to go with the subsequent and official lyric which is horny and hormone-pumped but directed at a real-world girl rather than a fantasy
Re. Dream Home - That's an interesting eroto-philosophical question, whether an inflatable woman is masturbation, I think you'd have to say since no sentient other is involved, it is a sub-category of wanking.
Heaton had a pretty funny one in "Tonight I Fancy Myself": "The neighbours ask them out but they flatly refuse/'We're saving up for a world-wide cruise'/With a choice between loneliness and love-sick QE2's/Well tonight I choose - self-abuse."
Of course "Darling Nikki" must have a place in this august canon. Why, it just about launched the PMRC single-handedly. Heh.
Momus, anyone?
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