Not-So-Good Lines in Songs

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Cluin
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 07:20 PM

James Gordon's song "Lonesome Cowboy's Lament" has the line:

He's headed west out to Lethbridge
He suspects some kind of death-wish...

I told him: "You are my songwriting hero! You had the balls to force a rhyme out of "Lethbridge" and "death-wish" and still make the song work"

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 08:03 PM

Bad lines in bad songs don't bother me a bit, but every so often one pops up in a song that I think is really good, and it infuriates me. In Keith Marsden's magnificent "Normandy Orchards", there's this bit of nostalgia: "tanks on the village green, just a fond memory.."

fond? FOND? Aw, c'mon. It scans just as well, and makes sense with "dim memory"

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: TheSnail
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 08:13 PM

It's probably blasphemous to criticise the Blessed Ewan MacColl but I don't know if I can forgive him for

Kissed her once again at Wapping, flow, sweet river, flow
After that there was no stopping, sweet Thames, flow softly

Sweet Thames Flow Softly

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Cstargazy
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 09:43 PM

remember a couple of wicked extracts from my days in Scotland, but the songs weren't what you'd call 'otherwise great or good': .....'Oh ho ho Idaho, but I'd rather be back in Kirkcaldy'.........and 'Heaven can't be far away, From the Town Hall in Stornoway'

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Joe_F
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 11:27 PM

"It was his career or mine" -- "Mary Magdelen"

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Genie
Date: 07 Sep 07 - 11:43 PM

Gordon Lightfoot: Cotton Jenny

"In the hot sunny South, where they say, "Well, shut my mouth! ... "

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: MystMoonstruck
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 12:19 AM

from Sammy Hagar's "Your Love Is Driving Me Crazy":
Lead me to forbidden doors You know I'm yours Yeah you've got it, yeah I want it Don't you know it babay

Right on time, a tight fit right on the money So sublime, hot sweet cherries on the vine.

Every time I hear it on the radio, I shout, "Cherries don't grow on vines!" I'm not sure why that irritates me so much. I need to learn to switch to another station or turn down the volume. Actually, the rest isn't all that good either, but that line BUGS me!

As for this Paul Anka hit, I can't imagine the girl being too flattered by the "so old":
Diana
by Paul Anka

I'm so young and you're so old
This, my darling, I've been told
I don't care just what they say
Cause forever I will pray
You and I will be as free
As the birds up in the trees
Oh, please, stay by me, Diana

Can we excuse him because he was very young? I don't think so. Yet, we Baby Boomers made it a hit!

I've always heard "I'll Be Home for Christmas" sung as "presents under the tree". Perhaps somewhere along the line, the lyrics were tweaked to change the "on".

I love playing "Madereine Rue", which has a lively tune, but slang lends a different interpretation to the fox's theft, so I hesitate to sing it. Maybe it could be "nicest rooster in Erin"? (Teasing! I think... Perhaps I'll just stick with the melody. After all, there's that "fine fat..." bit, isn't there?) The only person I've heard sing this subversive little song is Peg Clancy on one of her brothers' albums. Now, if I could sing it as adorably as she does, perhaps I'd do it.

Unfortunately, "Leezie Lindsay" tends to draw laughter from crowds as the fellow reveals his identity as Ronald McDonald (or MacDonald in some versions). Every performer I've seen develops a rather sheepish grin before saying the surname, fully aware that at least part of the audience will break into giggles.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Genie
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 12:32 AM

Yeah, Cluin, but given Anka's age when he wrote "Diana," she was probably just 2 or 3 years older than he.   (I think, in fact, the songs was written for a slightly older girl he had a crush on.) When you're a lad of 17, a 21-year-old female is "an older woman."


======
GUEST(21 Apr 06),

I originally 'heard' McCartney's lyric the way you did, and I cringed too. But the actual lyric is:
"but in this ever changing world in which we're livin' ..."

Perfectly grammatical, just a case of underenunciation -- common in everyday speech.

=====

Foolestroupe, Joni M is, indeed, wunnerful!   
And, at the risk of being nit-picky, it's
" ... they charged all the people a dollar and half just to see 'em!" (as in "see them"), not "see-um" (as in "Tonto see-um heap big horse).   Again, most of us probably say "see 'em" a lot more often than we say "see them."

==

LadyJean, in the hymn "Spirit Of the Living God," the original lyric is "melt me, mold me, fill me, USE me." I guess to some our minds that's still suggestive, but in the context of the Bible, it's pretty straightforward with no double-entendre.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Genie
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 12:48 AM

Much as I love Leonard Cohen's song "Hallelujah," he does have a few groaner lines in that song, e.g.,

[Now maybe there's a God above
but all I ever learned from love
Is how to shoot somebody who outdrew ya
..." - with that last bit being a rhyme for "Hallelujah."

And, of course, this next one not only stretches the rhyme but is rife with double-entendre - which I really don't think was intentional:

"There was a time you let me know
What's really going on below,
but now you never show it to me, do ya?
... "

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 03:56 AM

The chorus of "Dumbarton's Drums" is

"Dumbarton's drums, They sound sae bonny
And they remind me o' my Johnny
Such fond delights they steal upon me
When Johnny comes and kisses me."

Presumably followed by a cigarette?

Somebody somewhere decided to change the last line to-

"When Johnny kneels and kisses me."

My question is, where did he kiss her? It might give us a hint if she then had a cigarette!

Eddie

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: David C. Carter
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 04:59 AM

I do believe Dylan wrote "Sign Language"mentioned above.


His song "Highlands"contains a ligne about "Boiled eggs"
I believe he made it up while recording it.I can't get past that ligne.
But I don't lose any sleep over it!

Good thread Cluin.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in otherwise good Songs
From: Genie
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 05:20 AM

A couple of people have decried Amanda Bloom's botanically incorrect lyric to "The Rose," but, in truth, while I realize roses seldom, if ever grow from seeds and usually survive snow, that bit of poetic license has never bothered me any more than do lyrics about "feeling" things "from the heart" -- which we all know is not the part of the body wherein emotions lie, either.

And, Teresa, if anyone wants to nit-pick about "The Rose," the last verse ends:

Just remember, in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snowS, (rhymes with "rose,")
LIES the seed that, with the sun's love,
In the spring becomes the rose.
========

[[ McGrath of Harlow -

"songs she brang to me .." "Bring" for "brought" is common enough in quite a lot of dialects. And pronouncing "bring" as "brang" is not such an unusual way of doing it in some places. We don't always notice that kind of thing when it isn't written down.]]

Hey, that line irked me like chalk on a blackboard the first time I heard it. And I don't think I've actually ever seen it written.   
Harry Belafonte sings the lines:
"Songs she sang to me,
Songs she brought to me,
Words that rang for me,
Rhymes that sprang from me ... "

And it sounds just fine. Far better than the way Neil wrote and sings it.

==================================

[[GUEST - 03 Feb 05 -
I once saw on Country music tv a guy who was quite good and i was enjoying the song till he took it too far and sang;
"I've a burning, yearning, churning, deep inside o'me" ...]]

That really does sound like he was singing Cole Porter's "Night and Day" or some spin-off from it.
"Night and day, under the hide of me,
There's an oh, such a hungry yearning, burning inside of me ... "

==
[[GUEST,Joe_F - 4 Feb 05-

Sometimes, a word that is not poetic diction can be not only tolerable but an improvement in the poetry. An example, IMO, is in "Angel Band":

I hear the noise of wings. ... ]]

For what it's worth, the version of that "Angel Band" lyric I like best is "I hear the rush of wings."

======

[[YorkshireYankee - 5 Feb 05

Come to your life like a warrior/Nothing will bore ya is from Cris Williamson's "Song of the Soul". And I have to agree, it is a jarring couplet in an otherwise glorious song. But it can (with the right delivery) add a bit of humor to a song about (IMHO) getting the most out of life by not always playing it safe...

Come to think of it, Cris Williams was certainly not "playing it safe" by using those lines, so in a strange way, I guess it's appropriate (whether or not that was her conscious intention).]]

Poor Chris!   If you listen to her recording of the song, it's really not all that forced a rhyme. She doesn't enunciate "warrioR." Rather, she pretty much sings "Come to your life like a warriah, Nothing will bore ya ... ."
Still not the most eloquent rhyme in the world, but it does approximate how an American might normally pronounce both "warrior" and "you," and the rhyme does work that way.

What made the lyric seem really awful was my seeing lyric sheets printed up that had the lines as "Come to your life like a warrior; nothing will bore yer ... "   Aarrgghh!

===

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Genie
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 05:25 AM

The first time I heard Paul Stookey's "The Wedding Song," this couplet stood out like a sore thumb for me and kind of ruined the whole song:

"As it was in the beginning, is now unto the end,
Woman draws her life from man and gives it back again."

The line made me think of the one version (of two) in Genesis of the creation of humans, in which Eve is taken from Adam's rib.

Later on, I realized it can be interpreted differently.   He could just as easily have said it the other way around, but it wouldn't have scanned as well. It's an ongoing circle of reciprocity (codependence?).

Still, I think that line is the weakest part of the song.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: TheSnail
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 06:18 AM

Buckets of rain
Buckets of tears
Got all them buckets comin' out of my ears.

Maybe the greatest love poet of the twentieth century was having an off day.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Stringsinger
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 03:46 PM

"Feeeeeelings! Nothing more than feeeelings!" (whatever they are)

A nice mixup although not intended in the song. The Riddle Song performed by a novice folkie. "I gave my love a baby that had no end". Someone called out, "That's the only way to have 'em."

Times change: "I feel so gay in a melancholy way".....................

Ol' John Jacob Niles might have mixed his styles up in his Olde English ballad,
"Lass From The Low Countree" by proclaiming at the end of the song, "He ain't got no soul, nor no sympathy."

Now here's a conundrum. "I hate to wake you up to say goodbye. So kiss me and smile for me." This after "I'm standing here outside your door". (walking through walls?)

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in otherwise good Songs
From: Genie
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 07:14 PM

One of the dumbest, most nonsensical lines I've ever heard is in Rod Stewart's song that goes "You're In My Heart, You're In My Soul ... "   
In one verse he sings:
"You're (something), you're glamour,
Please pardon the grammer
But you're every schoolboy's dream."

Absolutely nothing wrong with his grammar in the song - so the line is an inane, feeble rhyme.

Similary -- Neil Diamond (again). From "I Am, I Swear" (again):

"I'm not a man who likes to swear,
But I never cared for the sound of being alone."

What's the point of saying "I don't like to swear" except to force an internal rhyme?

But other songs also avail themselves of cheap, pointless rhymes too.

In "Walking After Midnight" Patsy Cline sings,
"I stop to see a weeping willow
Crying on his pillow."

Pillow???

(And Neil Diamond - again - also uses the trite, unimaginative "willow"/"pillow" rhyme in his song "Song Sung Blue.")

(Sorry, Neil. I really do love some of your songs, but you come up with some real lyric groaners from time to time.)

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Cluin
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 08:55 PM

"Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb"

"Baby, you're the ginchiest!"


Ah, never mind... the WHOLE song was stupid beyond belief.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Cluin
Date: 08 Sep 07 - 09:22 PM

Then there was this gem by Clarence Carter:

(but you know, you can't help but like it, cheesy and fairly crude as it is... especially when the DJ plays it at a wedding recpetion and your elderly relatives are up on the dance floor and they think he's singing "Smokin'")


Strokin'

When I start makin' love, I don't just make love...

I be strokin'
That's what I be doin'
I be strokin'

I stroke it to the east
And I stroke it to the west
And I stroke it to the woman that I love the best
I be strokin'

Lemme ask you somethin'...
What time of the day do you like to make love?
Have you ever made love just befo' breakfast?
Have you ever made love while you watch the late, late show?
Well, lemme ask you this...
Have you ever made love on a couch?
Well, lemme ask you this...
Have you ever made love on the back seat of a car?
I remember one time I made love on the back seat of a car
And the police came and shined his light on me, and I said:

I'm strokin'
that's what I'm doin'
I be strokin'

I stroke it to the east
And I stroke it to the west
And I stroke it to the woman that I love the best
I be strokin'

Lemme ask you something...
How long has it been since you made love? huh?
Didja make looooove yesterday?
Didja make love las' week?
Didja make love las' year?
Or maybe it might be that you plannin' on makin' love tonight
But just remember
When you start making love
You make it hard, long, soft, short

And be strokin'
I be strokin'

I stroke it to the east
And I stroke it to the west
And I stroke it to the woman that I love the best
I be strokin'

Now when I start making love to my woman
I don't stop until I know she's sassified
And I can aaaaaaalways tell when she gets sassified
Because when she gets sassfied, she start caaallin' my name
She say: 'Cla'ence Carter, Cla'ence Carter, Cla'ence Carter, Cla'ence Carter
Oooooooo SHIT! Cla'ence Carter!'
The other night I was strokin' my woman
And it got so good to her, you know what she told me?
Lemme tell you what she told me
She said, 'Stroke it Cla'ence Carter, but don't stroke so fast
If my stuff ain't tight enough, you can stick it up my... WOO!

I be strokin'
Ha ha ha ha!
I be strokin'

I stroke it to the east
And I stroke it to the west
And I stroke it to the woman that I love the best
I be strokin'
I be strokin' ha ha ha ha!
I be strokin' yeah!
I be strokin'

I stroke it to the north
I stroke it to the south
I stroke it everywhere
I even stroke it with my... WOO!

I be strokin'
I be strokin' ha ha
I be strokin'

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Sep 07 - 07:24 PM

mg, Yorkshire Yankee, and Genie:

I've loved chris Williamson's "Song Of The Soul" since i first heard it, but the "...warrior...bore ya" lines are awful no matter how you pronounce them. For years, I've been singing "Come to your life like a lover, soon you'll discover...." It makes as much sense and is a lot less jarring.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Colin Randall
Date: 10 Sep 07 - 09:33 AM

Pop not folk, but I have always thought these - from Elton john's Candle in the Wind, lyrics by Bernie Taupin - were among the worst lines ever written, if only because they are so sloppy


Even when you died
The press still hounded you
All the papers had to say
Was that Marilyn was found in the nude


It is sloppy because of one word: WAS

If Taupin had written:

Even when you died/The press still hounded you/All the papers had to say/That Marilyn was found in the nude

...he would have been making the point he intended, ie that the evil press gleefully added that the body was naked. Instead, he suggests – absurdly of course – that the papers said ONLY that she was found in the nude. The reports of MM's death would, in those circumstances, have been very short indeed.

But then, maybe only a journalist would care.

Subject: RE: Not-So-Good Lines in Songs
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 07 - 09:47 AM

"Born a poor young country boy, Mother Nature's son...."

...and the rest of the words to it don't do a lot better!