I agree with those that say the music grows on you. I was working on an underground newspaper when I first ran into the ISB, and my first reaction was similar to Neil's, something like, "What are those awful singers -- can't even carry a tune-- nattering on about forever?"
However, some of the lyrics sort of perked down into the substrata of my mind and they seem to be irrevocably lodged there now -- if you look at Art's birthday thread, you will see I ended my post with "Happy happy happy all the time time time", which is the end of the couplet that starts "Dust be diamonds, water be wine..."
I think they appeal sort of like nursery rhymes do (nursery rhymes for 60's chronic adolescents?)
I'm not sure how many of you other musician types have your subconscious talk to you in song, but mine certainly does. I will find myself at a social gathering talking to a friend, and as I head to the buffet, I'll be humming. If I stop and pull the tune up into my conscious mind, I'll find I'm singing "You don't know, you don't know my mind, baby, baby...you may think that I'm laughin' but I'm just tryin' to keep from cryin'"
Huh, I say to myself. It hadn't occurred to me, but that was what I was feeling. The ISB is one of the main players in this concert. Lines like:
"Rulers like to lay down laws,
and rebels like to break them
The poor priests like to lie in chains
And God likes to forsake them
Or,"You know all the notes and you sing all the words,
but you never quite learned the song she sung
And I can tell by the sadness in your eyes
You never quite learned the song." Like many of the others, I listened to the first albums most, and they lost me later on with the cult stuff. And maybe it a function of the '60s and the subculture and the drugs. However, they sing to me still, in my own mind's voice.
Blessings,
Barbara