Help: lines that jump out at you

Subject: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:38 PM

I'm curious about something. Does anyone else learn a whole song for one line in it? Or, is there a strong line in a song in which you like the whole song? Example, Stan Rogers' MARYELLEN CARTER... With smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go...

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Bert
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:43 PM

Dammit Kendall. I did just that, with that same line in that same song.

Great bloody line isn't it.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: MMario
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:48 PM

frequently

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: gnu
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:54 PM

Oh yeah, big time.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Matt_R
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:56 PM

Yes I have! Lot's of time!

The Blackbird:
But let them deny me, let them do what they will
While there's breath in my body, she's the one I love still

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: gnu
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 09:59 PM

Oops !

Oh Yeah, big time. I find quite a few songs that, for me and perhaps me alone, revolve around that one line or phrase, which makes me have to share it with others and to try to convey that one thought with the delivery. Some of 'em just reach and grab you by the booboo.

gnu

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:00 PM

how about some examples of your own. What grabs you?

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Amos
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:02 PM

"Such a coaxsome elf, I was ashamed of meself
Fer to find I was truly there!"

did it for me and the Maid of the County Down. Another that caught my fancywas "Her masts and spars they shone like silver...", and the one about the long-tailed black man come up behind in Whoop Jamboree. Oh, and "My curse is on ye, Sweeny...ye have me fairly robbed!" from the Rocks O' Bawn. And "yer man, Nick McCann, from the Banks of the Bann". "Snugger with me than it is at sea...", "Dressed up in a lady's apron, I wandered most forlorn....", "five hundred brave Americans, a-whaling for to go...."; "When a man ends up on the smoking end of a long, black rifle..." "Don't you think dearest Phyllis, you had better agree...."...Oh! Cruel Barbry Ellen.... And I won't be reconstructed, and I do not give a damn! I could go on and on; every song I keep playing has a hook of a line in it (or more than one) which just won't let go, for whatever reason.

A

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Big Red
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:21 PM

I wish to the Lord I'd never been born, Or had died when I was young; And never had seen your sparkling blue eyes Or heard your flattering tongue.

ALL THE GOOD TIMES

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: gnu
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:24 PM

Well, right off, I was just talking about moose birds on another thread and that brought to mine Tull's "Sparrow on the Schoolyard Wall", which has many thought provoking lines and imagery. The Sparrow on the Wall, a child, is told truths profound and humourous, e.g., "Too many broths can spoil the cook."

Another, simply through association, is Tull's, from the same release , which I cannot name right off, White Innocence, a song in semi-balland form, of a young lady friend bidding the singer the last goodbye... " She turned and looked at me with white innocence, With the clearest eyes of forever grey...". Well, that grabbed me.

Well, there's a couple, Kendall. What about yours ? If I knew what kind of tunes you prefer, I might be able to cite some examples from that genre.

gnu

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: MMario
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:27 PM

from "The wolfhound" - oh faithful hound, oh trusty hound

from "3 Score and ten" - there was many a heart of sorrow

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: gnu
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:28 PM

In White Innocence, IN.... sorry

gnu

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Sorcha
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:41 PM

"in the early morning rain, with a dollar in my hand"
"wish I was a single girl again"
"know me if you will by the wind on the hill, for you'll know me by no other name"
"one toke over the line, sweet Jesus"
"I'd give all I own if I could atone, to that silver haired Daddy of mine"

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From:
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:50 PM

Kendall--

It's worse than that. The purpose of our evolving from the primordial slime to where we could wrap opposable thumbs around guitar necks is so that the couplet

Feed on your water, shovel in your coal, Stick your head out the window, watch the drivers roll.

could be written and performed. It's all down hill from here.

Seriously, I think if you look at how bits like this migrate from folk song to folk song, it's because those lines speak to people. It isn't just the singers, I found recently. Walking out of a hall where we had just done some old-timey stuff, I was buttonholed by an old man in the audience who just fed me back a half-verse out of 45 minutes of stuff--

That dirty little coward That shot Mister Howard Laid Jesse James in his grave.

I guess we're talking Jung here, or something. Shared subconscious images. To Hell with Jung. It's fun just talking "Kendall & me."

Chicken Charlie

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Old JoeBoy
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:51 PM

This is from "Drifter's Wind" by Chuck Pyle:

"Married life fit like a glove -- kinda tight and kinda thin."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: catspaw49
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:58 PM

Sure. For instance, all of these from the same songwriter.............

"Reality is bad enough, why should I tell the truth."

"I've got roots that need a plantin' and a love that needs a growin'. ... where my pride won't have to bend and my lips can taste the wind"

"In yesterday's 'Times' today I read, how Sgt. Pepper never played"

"But yesterday don't matter when its gone away."

"It's many a mile I have spent on this road. It's many a mile I have gone."

"My fingers they have turned to brass, my eyes have turned to clay."

Spaw

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Dave Swan
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:08 PM

Three Merry Men from Kent gives us this:

"and we shall be merry, merry here, for who can know where we may go to be merry another year..."

from Rathdrum Fair, this image:

"and the old mare will stumble and bite at the wind while you sleep in the saddle with your collar turned in"

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Matt_R
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:25 PM

"Your love is better than a warm trombone".

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Sorcha
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:29 PM

"trombone"?? Matt, I think you got a problem there, bud. Trombone? ok,.....bone, slide in, slide out, warm is better than cold.........uh, OK, I'll stop.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Gypsy
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:56 PM

I've sure done it with tunes. Love the b part to The Rose Tree, but the a part....ugh!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Matt_R
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 12:03 AM

"and it's a beautiful rain, beautiful rain, beautiful rain..."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: DonMeixner
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 12:12 AM

Almosy every line in MacPherson's Rant scream to be sung.

"It burns my heart, that I must depart, and no avenged be"

Gordon Bok's "Little River" has the same effect.

"Empty sounds from the breakers calling me, back to shore"

Jerry Jeff Walker's My Old Man

"Still in all, I recall I said when I was young, No one else could really sing the songs he sung."

Townes Van Zandt's Caroline

Her ways were free and it seemed to me, Sunlight walked beside her"

Too many to pick just several :-).

Don

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Bardford
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 12:31 AM

Sometimes, about all I remember from a song is one or two lines, or fragments. John Prine has some great ones:
"There's a hole in daddy's arm where all the money goes,"
and:"Old people just get lonesome, waitin for someone to say, hello in there, hello."

and: "Sittin' in my bathtub, countin' my toes
when the radiator broke, the water all froze
got stuck in the ice without my clothes
naked as the eyes of a clown."
Craig Moreau, from Calgary, wrote a song called The Final Price of Grain, about a farmer beset by bad times. Every time I hear it, these lines stick to the insides of my ears for a few days:
I was in the Navy, in the Navy I should have stayed
'Cause fighting wars off foreign shores beats farming any day."
Also the Rolling Stones Heartbreaker:
doodoo doo doo doo doo"
Cheers, Bardford

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,RW
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 12:43 AM

"Good king Wenceslas looked out on the feast of Stephen"

You gotta love a song that starts out with a name like Wenceslas. I also like the version from Walt Kelly's "Pogo":

"Good King Sauerkraut looked out on his feets uneven."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 12:53 AM

"See them tumblin' down, pledging their love to the ground."

Just about anything by Bob Nolan has great grabber lines. Also Tommy Makem:

"By far-off shores my feet have wandered,
Heard a stranger call me friend
Any time my mind was troubled,
Found a smile around the bend."

"Long ago, I used to be a young man,
And dear Margaret remembers that for me."

from The Dutchman by Michael Smith.

All the best.

Seamus

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: mousethief
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 02:23 AM

I learned to play "Pacing the Cage" by Bruce Cockburn just because of the first half-stanza, viz.:

Sunset is an angel weeping
Holding out a bloody sword
No matter how I squint, I cannot
Make out what it's pointing toward...

Ye gods and juleps, if I could write poetry that good.

Alex

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Nancy
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:17 AM

Most of the songs I love to sing have at least a line, usually a verse I really love

If it should be that your baby's a girl
Never you mind if her hair doesn't curl
Rings on her fingers, bells on her toes
A bomber above her wherever she goes...

Sleep is a river, goes on forever...
And for your boatman, choose old John o' Dreams

Ye haven't an arm, ye haven't a leg
Ye're a hopeless shell of a man on a peg
And you'll have to be put w' yer bowl ta beg
Johnny I hardly knew ya

So come all ye young sea-farin' men, And listen to me song
When you go off on them long trips, I'd have ye's do no wrong
Take my advice, drink no strong drink, Don't go sleepin' with no whores
But get married lads, and have all night in, and go to sea no more...

Getting out my guitar right now....

Nancy

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:37 AM

I visited my singing buddy Jim in the mountains today. I thought my visit two weeks ago was the last time I'd see him alive, but he surprised us - he's still hanging onto the life he has enjoyed so much. Two weeks ago, I thought he was the sickest man I had ever seen in my life; but he was still able to get out his guitar and sing four songs with me, and he played "I'll Fly Away" on my harmonica. Today, he couldn't speak; and he couldn't sit up unless I held him. I sat by him for two hours, singing to him and reminding him of all the good times we had singing together. I knew his wife before she met Jim, and I told him how intense and sincere and serious she was - and how wonderful it was that he had been able to teach her to laugh.

I've been trying to learn Bob Franke's "Thanksgiving Eve," and I sang it for Jim today. It's not a perfect song, but there are two lines in it that perfectly describe my friend Jim:

But the grace to accept every moment as a gift
Is a gift that is given to some

I told him I thought that gift was something we had in common, the thing that has bound us so close together. Jim couldn't say anything when I finished the song, but he squeezed my hand and smiled his marvelous smile. He's so sick, but I still had a delightful time with my friend Jim today.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: wdyat12
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 05:00 AM

Kendall,

My favorite is a line from Gordon Bok's "Peter Kagan and the Wind" which says it all for me.

" I'm not afraid wind." But, damnit he sould have been!

wdyat12

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Snuffy
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 07:40 AM

Then she made her way homeward with one star awake

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Matt_R
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 08:08 AM

"One light, one mind
Flashing in the dark
Blinded by silence of a thousand broken hearts"

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Midchuck upstairs when should be in office
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 08:47 AM

Well, this isn't a line, it's a whole verse, but:

"This old Martin guitar
Built in 1946
It's scratched and stained and splintered
With nails and guitar picks.
But it's been my close companion
Since 1962.
Please don't ask me to decide
Between this guitar and you."

- Tom Russell, What Do You Want From Me

Peter.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Fibula Mattock
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 08:56 AM

"Flow river flow, f*ck off to the sea" from Ding Dong Denny O'Reilly's (The Hairy Bowsies) album - a "geographical folk song" (i.e. songs about rivers, mountains etc.) Very moving.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:04 AM

I thought that line from County Down was ,,Such a winsom elf, I had to shake meself to see I was really there?

Ok good stuff folks. BTW Little River was written by Ruth Moore. Gordon made the tune.

a line from Dave Malletts Old Blue Ox. An old man wandered away from home looking for people who were long dead.."And 50 years just disappeared like minutes in his mind."

..and I saw what it had done, and I wished I was dead, never knew there was worse things than dying.. Eric Bogle.

Today will soon become tomorrow, how I'd like to leave the past behind, for 'though I know it only brings me sorrow, to love again would only be unkind..U.Phillips

for some will lead the crippled, and some will lead the blind, but what of alms for him whose wound is of the mind.. U.Phillips.

.."but Kagen reads it wrong this time" Gordon Bok

When he hits that low note on that giant 12 string guitar, it IS the crack of doom.( It's tuned down to C)

Sorry folks, I'm having one of my "What the hell is the point" days.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 11:05 AM

"'Have you heard the news?' he said with a grin
'The vice-president's gone mad!'
"Where?''Downtown''When''Last night'
'Hmmm... say, that's too bad!'"

Right, Spaw?

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 01:07 PM

When the government wiped out the Metis in Regina Sas. it goes.. The bullets flew and the cannons roared, the Metis' blood flowed like a river,Into the coolies where they ran to hide, it washed their dreams away, and their spirit died.. Bill Gallaher Victoria B.C.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson at work
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 02:47 PM

Yeats' poem about The O'Rahilly, which I don't think has been set to music (unfortunately it has the same meter as Yellow Rose of Texas, the tune to which I sometimes sing Emily Dickinson poems. But I digress)

because I helped to wind the clock
I come to hear it strike

(O'Rahilly explaining to Pearse and Connolly why he was fighting in the Easter Rebellion having argued so strongly in private against a rising)

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: chip a
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:09 PM

In silent white mansions of stone, Maggie, have each found a place of rest........or: My face is a well written page Maggie, and time alone was the pen. Short lines which, if said in other words, would take volumes. How 'bout: and then one night in some rented room, where curtains never hung....

Peace, Chip

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:22 PM

More than one line really, but I don't care:

So dry your eyes. no more tears
Hold me once and I'll walk out of here
Who knows one day, we'll meet again
But don't wait for me 'cos the wind knows my name...

Gets me every time. You all know that one, right?

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Matt_R
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:30 PM

Ah yes...Fairground Attraction...songs for a sunny summer afternoon...

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:37 PM

And for a rainy Sunday!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:37 PM

And for a rainy Sunday!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Kim C
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:48 PM

There were spaces between Donald and whatever he said
Strangers had forced him to live in his head

and

I hate graveyards and old pawn shops
Cause they always bring me tears
I can't forgive the way they rob me
) Of my childhood souvenirs

and

Blow up the TV

and

you're gonna make me lonesome when you go

and

I wish I was on yonder hill That every tear would turn a mill
Oh Johnny is gone for a soldier

and

The three men I admire most
The Father, Son and Holy Ghost
They caught the last train for the coast
The day the music died

and

If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice

and

I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am

and

With every heartbeat I still think of you
And remember our faded love

and

We loved each other then Lorena
More than we ever dared to tell

and

I'm lord and master of a fool's Taj Mahal
Who says you can't have it all

and

In my life I love you more

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:57 PM

I'll give you back your ring and letters, And the picture I love so well, And, henceforth we will meet as strangers, But, I will never say "Farewell".. (Fond affection) recorded by Joan Sprung.

And..."but, our good times are all gone, and I'm bound for moving on, I'll look for you if I'm ever back this way".. Four strong winds.

And, you're wondering what Marian found to do, That's better than coming to see you one last time.. Lonesome Robin by Bob Coltman

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 03:58 PM

What about this one:

Don't care if I sit here forever holding nothing but my heart

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Big Mick
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:01 PM

Pete, I love that line by the O'Rahilly.

"By trade I was a cooper, lost out to redundancy, like my house that fell to progress, my trades a memory" Pete St. John

"Sometimes she sees, her unborn children, in his eyes" Michael Smith

"Courage, brother, you do not walk alone. We will walk with you and sing your spirit home" Eric Bogle

"As through this world I travel, I've seen lots of funny men, some rob you with a pistol, others with a fountain pen" "as through this world I roam, I've never seen an outlaw, drive a family from their home" Woody Gutherie

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Kim C
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:03 PM

ooops....that should read

I wish I was on yonder hill
Tis there I'd sit and cry my fill
That every tear would turn a mill
Oh Johnny is gone for a soldier

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Hawker
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:06 PM

'But when the fish and tin are gone, what are the Cornish Boys to do?'
Cornish Lads by Roger Bryant

'Oh the rain is softly falling and the Oggy man's no more'
The Oggie Man by Cyril Tawney

'And I've woven meself too far in'
The four loom weavers lament

'When my days are over, Haul away to heaven'
Farewell Shanty

'We'll play the game over and over and over again!'
The Game of All Fours

'But all I could answer was Teddy O'Neil'
Teddy O'Neil

'Eee she were a big 'un - wi' emphasis on the Big'
Rawtenstall Annual Fair

Sowing in the morning, sowing seeds of kindness
Bringing in The sheaves

More? HUNDREDS!!! - though I have to say that I am also attracted by the tune and the way the words snuggle inot it, for instance, in 'She Moves Through The Fair' The words 'Like a swan in the evening moves over the lake - I first heard this sung by Josef Locke on an old recording of father in Law's, he sings it like she is mo-o-oving over the lake, it's so descriptive
Lucy

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Melani
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:19 PM


"We were ninety-one days to Montego Bay, pumping like madmen all the way..."

"If it weren't for the alligators, I would sleep out in the wood..."

"I will dress in men's clothing, to his regiment I'll go, and I'll be a true soldier, and I'll fight all his foes..."

"Perhaps in battle I might fall, from a shot from an angry cannon ball, and you so far from your daddy's hall..."

"The captain said, 'Let him be, for he's sober out to sea, and he bakes a better pie than my mother.'"

I could go on and on. Every song has a favorite line or verse.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:20 PM

If the kids are united they will never be divided!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:26 PM

sooooo many...

"come down off the cross, we could use the wood"
& "singin lead soprano in a jug band choir"- Tom Waits- "come on up to the house"
"Why must I holler , Why must I shake 'em on down?"- Bukka White
too many Dylan to even begin ,but here is a personal favorite-
" Was in another lifetime , one of toil and blood . When blackness was a virtue and the road was full of mud, I came in from the wilderness ,a creature void of form. Come in she said I'll give you shelter from the storm."
" I saw Judas Escarot carrying John Wilkes Booth... Down there by the train...."- Johnny Cash
"this time another year , you may be gone , to some lonesome grave yard.Who knows how long?"- old spiritual
I could go on, cool idea.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:39 PM

Any line from Banana Republics, perhaps this last verse:

Down to the Banana Republics it is not always as warm as it seems.

When none of the natives are buying any second hand American Dreams.

Expatriated American, feeling so a-lone.

Telling themselves the same lies that they told themselves at home.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: pastorpest
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:55 PM

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.

"Anthem" by Leonard Cohen

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 04:58 PM

Kiss me, please kiss me
Kiss me out of desire, baby, not consolation

Guess who...

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: harpmolly
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 05:07 PM

"what can I tell you, my brother, my killer, what can I possibly say? I guess that I miss you, I guess I forgive you, I'm glad you stood in my way... and I see you there with a rose in your teeth, one more thin gypsy thief..."

just about anything from Leonard Cohen is bound to knock me flat, though.

Too many Irish/Scottish/etc. songs to even begin. But how about:

"Oh, where's my love, she's so long in coming, And what detains her so long from me; Or does she think it a shame or scandal To see me die upon the gallow's tree?"

Or, on a lighter note,

"Before I got married I wore a black shawl; But now that I'm married I wear bugger-all!"

Had to learn "Do You Love An Apple," just to sing that. ;)

And, last but not least:

"Must I go bound while you go free, Must I love a man who doesn't love me? Must I be born with so little art As to love a man who'll break my heart?"

That one hits a little too close to home. Sigh.

Okay, enough outta me. But you asked. ;)

Moll

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: harpmolly
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 05:09 PM

Dammit! One of these days I'll learn to use line breaks. :P

Oh, well. You get the general idea. :P

M

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: tiggerdooley
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 05:23 PM

Take me out tonight, where there's music and there's people who are young and alive...
'There Is A Light That never Goes Out' by The Smiths.

OR
I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour
And heaven knows I'm miserable now
I was looking for a job and then I found a job
And heaven knows I'm miserable now...
'Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now' by The Smiths, again. I reckon that counts as the blues!

OR
Got a lot of you records in a separate stack
Some things that I might like to hear
But I guess I'll give them back
'Box Full of Letters' by Wilco. Cool break-up song.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: John Hardly
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 05:51 PM

Sing a song for the wrong
And the wicked and the strong
And the sick as thick as thieves.
For the faceless fear that was never so near
Too clear to mis-believe

Well the sea is jumping salty
And the porpoise has the blues
My recollection's faulty
And I cannot find my shoes
And my wiring is misfiring due
To cigarettes and booze

I'm behind in my dues

I just now got the news

He seems to tell us lies but still we will believe him
And together he will lead us into darkness, my friend.

--James Taylor


…Hello and goodbye..
Divided by a line down the middle of the road

--Pierce Pettis

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,nancy
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 07:34 PM

This is such a great thread....

I love every single line of Lather, by Grace Slick, but especially

...he produces the finest of sounds With a drum stick on either side of his nose Snorting the best licks in town...

Give yourself to love... and ...the rolling golden hills of California.......Kate Wolff

Lookin' for the heart of Saturday night...Tom Waits (among about a million others)

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 08:10 PM

Oh dear, what can the matter be,
Seven old ladies got locked in a lavatory.

A monkey fart should smell like a banana
English farts should smell like cups o' tea
The farting of a fairy should be very light and airy
When a father farts, I hope you'll think of me

Sheer poetry. Gets me every time.

All the best.

Seamus

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 08:48 PM

..I stood by your Atlantic sea, and sang a song for Ireland..

Dreaming in the night, I saw a land where no man had to fight.. Song for Ireland.

...if the ladies were squirrels with high busy tails, I'd load up my shotgun with rock salt and nails... U.Phillips

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: aussiebloke
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 09:18 PM

From 'The Overlander' - Aussie trad...

We steer up to those pretty girls, that dress themselves in grandeur
And while they sweat our checks they swear they love the overlander.

Chorus: Pass the bottle 'round me boys, etc...

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From:
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:43 PM

got to agree about if it weren't for the alligators I'd sleep out in the woods...

but my favorite is "Donald was the bravest man, and Donald he was mine." Highland Widow's lament.

I put my head into a cask of brandy...Peggy Gordon.

Fundy's long and Fundy's wide, Fundy's fog and rain and tide ...Fundy Bay by Gordon Bok...

Rifle to rifle and horse against horse..Fenian Men

One for the Morning Glory, two for the early dew, three for the man who wrote this song and four for the likes of you girl, four for the likes of you. Morning Glory

Tramp tramp tramp the boys are marching, cheer up comrades they will come..

et lux perpetua luceat eis...Catholic requiem

I found him worthy of his wound...Dainty Davy

mg

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: jaze
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:51 PM

If love means forever,expecting nothing returned, Then I hope I'll be given another whole lifetime to learn. Joan Baez

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: BRG
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 11:29 PM

Many by John Prine "There's a hole in daddy's arm where all the money goes"

Also agree with Kim C, I was struck by:

"There were spaces between Donald and whatever he said"

"Where have I been to, I don't know, broken fiddle and crooked bow,holes in my shoes and I'm walking slow as the last long shadows fall"

"The last thing I heard was a sound, not a word, the bangin' of the wheelhouse door"

"He smiled like the sharks off little Green Island, he had teeth all over his face" Too many Bok lines to mention, really

"I painted her as she might have been if the worst had been the best" Robert Service actually, but we sing it

"Every song in my breast dies a bornin', without you" Tom Paxton

"Next came the damn mosquitoes, they bit me fore and aft The way them diamond diggers bit was enough to drive me daft" (Reminds me of home) Trad

"A one horse place, a friendly face, some coffee and a tiny trace of fiddlin' in the distance far behind him" Dave Mallett

Cheers, Bruce

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Crazy Eddie
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 08:03 AM

"He had to try to satisfy a thirst he couldn't name,
Driven toward the darkness by the devils in his pain"

"And it's a hard, it's a hard, ......it's a hard rain 's, gonna fall"

"But nobody cheered, they just stood there & stared,
Then they turned all their faces away."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 08:06 AM

Bruce, you have been reading my mind!

..and Lindy Lou, crying and dying and the ocean roaring through.. (The wheelhouse door)

Gordon Bok and I have been close friends for over 40 years, and he can still mesmerize me in concert.(Or, in my living room even)

More.. then the busy years went rushing by us, we lost our starry notions on the way.. (Those were the days)

..They are gone where the forests of oak trees before, Are gone to be wasted in battle. (Dancing at Whitsun)

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Midchuck
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 08:08 AM

The old ways had their hardships,
And the winters were too lonely,
But they knew where they belonged,
In a world they could understand.
'Till the cities closed in on us,
And our one choice grew too simple:
You go broke from paying taxes
Or get rich from selling land.

- Dick McCormack, Voices in the Hills

Peter.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: mkebenn
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 08:50 AM

Lake Huron rolls, and Superior sings
in the rooms of her ice water mansions
Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams
her islands and bays are for sportsmen
And farther below Lake Ontario takes in what Lake Erie can send her
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
with the gales of November remembered. Mike

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: mkebenn
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 08:52 AM

YES, LINE BREAKS AND ALL!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 10:01 AM

Sometimes I think, you to sweet to die , and another time I think , you aughtta be buried alive- Richard "rabbit" Brown "james alley blues"

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 10:28 AM

Does "Stomping at the Savoy" count?

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Grab
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 11:34 AM

Mollificent, I'm with you all the way on "Famous Blue Raincoat", and most other Cohen songs! Other nominations (all a bit modern, but what the hell):-

The whole damn thing, every line, of "Sea Fever".

"The Reverend Green be glad to see you
When you haven't got a prayer -
Boy you got a prayer in Memphis."
(Marc Cohn, Walking in Memphis)

"Her mind is Tiffany twisted, she got the Mercedes bends"
(Eagles, HCal)

"The evening paper with horror tones,
But there's hope later for Capricorn"
(Dire Straits, Lions - and most of the rest of that song too!)
Graham.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: BRG
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 02:46 PM

Thanks, Kendall. I'm very much looking foward to meeting Gordon Bok in May. He's doing a concert here (and staying with us!)

A couple more that popped into my head:

"And with an achin' in my heart I'm gonna bite down and swallow hard" Iris Dement

"They already think my name is 'Where in the hell you been?' " John Prine

"You're a dirty, hungry, scaly bag of timbers" Gordon Bok (How could you not listen to the rest?)

This could go on forever...

Bruce

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Bert
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 04:05 PM

About the hemp rope on his neck, the golden ringlets clung. - Roddy McCorley

We've been together now for forty years, and it don't seem a day too much. - My Dear Old Dutch.

From cold and want her little one had died. - While London Sleeps.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Kim C
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 04:49 PM

You should have seen her running through the smoke
Draggin' that Navajo rug

and

I can still feel the eyes of those blue-bellied devils
As I walk around tonight through the concrete and metal

and

You ain't a beauty but hey you're all right

and

Of all the harm that ere I've done
Alas it was to none but me

and

You got me tied down with battleship chains
Fifty foot long and a two-ton anchor

and

I'd rather be lonely, I'd rather die
Six hundred sixty six times

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: gnu
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 05:02 PM

Just about every Irish Trad song has one of these lines for me, but I couldn't pick the one line that seemed to be my favourite. Then, it hit me. THE line of lines for me is definitely.... Give the shanty boys whiskey, there's nothin' goes wrong. ....because I heard my old man sing it from the time I was a wee tad and he was in those lumber camps. ( I know it's not ITrad ).

reminiscinggnu

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 06:18 PM

What great words- I just discovered I can get high just from reading!

"I need wings to fly, I need roots to grow"- Roots and Wings, Jackie Koresko
"Like the last leaf on the Autumn branch, comes a time when you must let go"- Changin' of the Seasons, Kathy Martin Fanning
"Down here a drop of water's just another way to pray" Canyon de Chelly, (Borrowed thought) Buddy Tabor
"...He'll tell you about a wreck on the highway, how they drank and they died..." Go Ask That Old Cowboy, Buddy Tabor
"They've all gone away', said the voice of a stranger"- Carter Stanley
"I felt my own music within me rise like the wind in the Autumn trees", River, Bill Staines
"I miss you, darlin', as heav'n would miss the stars above" Faded Love

So many. And so many more...

Ebbie

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Bert
Date: 29 Mar 01 - 10:51 PM

The rats have gone and we the crew,
Leave her Johnny leave her,
I think it's time that we left too,
It's time for us to leave her.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From:
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 05:34 AM

thought of more....

there's blood on the snow in the hills of Idaho..Fred Small??? Heart of the Apaloosa

heard the men and the monkeys in the jungle scream..Johnny Cash, Drive on

as when the heart indignant breaks to prove that still she lives...Thomas Moore, Harp that once

I often thought that God made the mixer and the hod so that Paddy could know hell above the ground.. Building up and tearing England down...??Behan???

Oft in the stilly night...Thomas Moore

Oh dear me the world is ill provided, them that works the hardest are the least provided...Ten and Nine..

mg

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Mad Maudlin
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 06:50 AM

One time around spun our gallant ship, two times around spun she, three times around spun our gallant ship and sank to the dark salt sea.

(The House Carpenter)

The men in the forest they asked of me: "How many strawberries grow in the salt sea?" I answered them back with a tear in my e´e: "How many ships sail in the forest?"

(I once loved a lass)

Shaking hands and fingers that do tremble, Soldier´s Joy has been a bitter pill...

(Michelle Shocked, "Shaking Hands (Soldier´s Joy)")

Pancho needs your prayers, that's true, But save a few for Lefty, too - He only did what he had to do And now he's growing old.

(Townes van Zandt: "Pancho & Lefty")

Oh I am a wild and lonely child, and the son of an angry land and with the dire wars raging I would offer you my hand for we are the children of darkness and the prey of a proud command.

(Richard Farina:"Children of Darkness")

plus my all-time favourite:

Mad Maudlin goes on dirty toes For to save her shoes from gravel.

(Mad Tom o'Bedlam)

There are more, of course, a lot of it depends on my mood. Those of you who mentioned "She moved through the fair", I agree with you- it's one of the most beautiful songs ever written!

Stumbling off to CD rack,

Mad Maudlin

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: JulieF
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 07:48 AM

Far too many to remember on a Friday afternoon. The one that comes to mind is the Bill Bragg track - New England

I saw two shooting stars last night

I wished on them but they were only satellites

Is it wrong to wish on space hardware

I wish, I wish, I wish you'd care

Julie

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Snuffy
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 08:26 AM

May the long time sun shine upon you,
All love surround you
And the pure light within you
Guide you all the way on.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Amos
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 08:27 AM

"But I take delight in the juices of the barley, and courtin' pretty wimmin in the mornin' so airly!"

and

"Last night I had the strangest dream, I have never had before!
I dreamt the world had all agreed to put an end to war."

and

"Ah, no, 'twas the truth in her eyes ever shinin'
That made me love Mary, the Rose of Tralee!"

and

"But not as deep, as this love I'm in --
And know not how I sink or swim."

and

"It was rainin' from the first, an' I was dying of thirst
So I came in here
An' your long time curses hurt, but what hurts worse
Is this pain in here!"

and

"I started out on Burgundy, but soon hit the harder stuff."

and

"I have met other horses that I couldn't riseAw, it's a long, long list a-windin', Kendall!! You really started sumpn.

Regards,

A

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Matt_R
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 08:36 AM

Battleship chains! Looks like Kim is a Georgia Satellites fan!! "I can't lick nobody, lick nobody but you..."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Midchuck
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 08:37 AM

One that jumps out at me for a different reason entirely:

From the Chieftains' version of "Lily of the West:"

"I stepped up with my rapier,
And my dagger in my hand.
I seized him by the collar there,
And boldly bade him stand."

I have this vision of the guy saying, "Here, would you hold one of these for a second?"

Peter.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Kim C
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 10:21 AM

Georgia Satellites ROCK!!!!!

Back to our regular programming....

the red-headed stranger had eyes like the thunder

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Blues Killer
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 01:02 PM

"When I'm drinking, be sure not to mess with me!"

Champion Jack Dupre

-Blues Killer

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Joy Bennett
Date: 30 Mar 01 - 02:57 PM

Ok, so slightly out of the genre, but from a Dan Hill song very long ago -- the one -night stand bar scene

"and the smoke curled round her fingertips like question marks in time."

I've never gotten that out of my head.

another line from that song "as she looked down at her lover, a friend of a friend of a stranger..."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 01:07 PM

.they found him on the plain,
His hands froze to the reins,
He was just 100 yards from Maryann...

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Ruthie A
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 02:26 PM

"If the ladies were all trout and salmon so lively Then divvel the lads would go fishing on Friday..." - Blackbirds and Thrushes

"Like a wave I'm breaking far at sea" - Exile

I have zillions more, but those two are my favourites. I cry all the way through The Drover's Boy, but that's a whole song and therefore probably doesn't count.

Ruthie

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: kendall
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 04:25 PM

and all through the night, a faded yellow light
Would burn inside the room where he would stand
And play the old Victrola, and drink his rusty wine
And conduct the Mozart music with his hard and shaking hand.. Phil Brown by D. Mallett.

...we wandered home through the public bars
we were 10 times less by one... (The Outside track)

..one day the boys called, but their pal didn't come
oh, where does he hide they did say
they searched all around and finally found
His old lifeless form in the hay... (Old Rover)

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Amergin
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 04:37 PM

But his touch and his breath
Were as cold as the death

Loch Lomond

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Roughyed
Date: 01 Apr 01 - 06:01 PM

Oh my love's rose up and she's opened the door And just like an angel she's stood on the floor Her eyes shone bright like the stars at night No diamonds could shine so. So in with my true love I did go.

Passion, eroticism and lyrical poetry all in one verse. How can you not sing it?

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: late 'n short 2
Date: 02 Apr 01 - 10:22 AM

Just a few that came to mind over the weekend:

"Another eye for another eye until we all are blind" (There Were Roses)

"And I somehow believe he's believin' he's holdin' her hand like before" (A Daisy a Day)

"yes I guess, they oughta name a drink after you"

"We'll never see what lies ahead if we keep on looking back" (Leaving the Land)
(and probably at least one line in just about every other Eric Bogle song)

I'm gonna have to start writing these down!

Dan

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: dwditty
Date: 02 Apr 01 - 01:24 PM

From Dave Van Ronk

"I'd be a fool if I didn't fall in love with you that night."

and from the same song:
"I'd trade my time in heaven for a day with you my dear."

of course there is always Barry McGuire's

"My blood is so mad, feels like coagulatin'."

dw

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,Maudlin Hart
Date: 17 Nov 08 - 07:46 AM

"Her breath began to speak as she stood right in front of me
Color of her eyes was the color of insanity..."
"She took me by the hand, I could see she was a fiery one
Her legs ran all the way up to heaven and past Avalon..."
"The apple now is sweet, oh much sweeter than it ought to be
Another little bite, I don't think there is much hope for me..."
All from Flogging Molly's "Devil's Dance Floor".

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Jan 10 - 10:26 PM

Found my cleanest dirty shirt - Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down/Kristofferson

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 10 - 11:46 PM

A bit late to correct a mondegreen 9 years later! but the quote back there from '4-Loom Weaver' rendered as "I have woven myself too far in" is actually "I have woven myself to t'far end": this should be got right, as it is a technical term, meaning to the far end of the loom so that he can weave no further.

I always love "She sez that we must marry and her daddy sez the same. I would make a run for Frisco But her daddy's got dead aim".


But among the greatest of creators of such memorable lines were not just 'the folk' or folkies, but such brilliant 30s-40s lyrists as Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Ira Gershwin, Johnny Mercer, Dorothy Fields, Al Dubin — just think of all the memorable lines from the standards of that great period... "When Broadway Babies say goodnight It's early in the morning"; "Oh no they can't take that away from me"; "People say in Boston even beans do it" ... [That's enough brilliant lines fro the 30s - ed]

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: quokka
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 12:21 AM

So many! Harpmolly I've got to second your choice of Famous Blue Raincoat - my favourite Cohen song.
From Nick Cave's 'The Ship Song':

Come sail your ships around me
and burn your bridges down
We make a little history, baby,
Every time you call around

And another Australian song - 'I Was Only Nineteen' by Redgum

And Frankie kicked a mine the day that mankind kicked the moon
God help me
He was goin' home in June

no matter how many thousands of times I have heard this song, it still sends a shiver down my spine everytime.

Another one:
The day Jeannie married was the day Jeannie died
And the day that young Anachie Gordon came home on the tide.

I have to stop now and go to work but I am thinking of heaps!
What a GREAT thread!!!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Mike in Brunswick
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 01:04 AM

A couple from Si Kahn:

I was too young to understand
The way he felt about the land
But I could read his history in his hand
Gone, gonna rise again.

From Gone, Gonna Rise Again

And

We did all the things that I'd read of in books
That I'd told all my friends that I'd done.

From Queen of the Cowboy Cafe

Mike

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Leadfingers
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 08:41 AM

Robb Johnston - 'Turn Around' :-

When they're sweeping up bits of the night that got broken

And washing the moon away .

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Mike in Brunswick
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 04:40 PM

Another one from Si Kahn's Queen of the Cowboy Cafe:

If I had known what would happen that day
I might have been better prepared.
But often what's not expected is best
Cause you don't have the time to get scared.

Mike

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: frogprince
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 05:20 PM

From "The Ballad of Penny Evans", by Steve Goodman:

"And now every month I get a check from an Army bureaucrat.
And it's every month I tear it up and I mail the damn thing back."

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: Joe_F
Date: 07 Jan 10 - 05:53 PM

If ever the dead could pray for the living
There was a new man's face in hell.
She pours a cup of coffee, drips carnation from the can
Let the hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.
Married girl, married girl, she rocks the cradle and cries.
Another ship for me, and for her another crew
Some helped in small ways, some helped in hallways,
Too late, but never mind
But not being married isn't what made him a dope
If ever you heard a little dog bark
She makes a small hole in the frost on the window
Brightest and best of the sons of the morning
Say, don't you remember? I'm your pal.
Walking in his footsteps in the sweet delta dawn.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: beeliner
Date: 08 Jan 10 - 11:56 AM

1. "My huckleberry friend...". Rumor has it that Mercer's pal Johnny Green actually contributed that line to "Moon River".

2. Every line of Townes VanZandt's "Silver Ships of Andilar". Absolutely chilling!

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 08 Jan 10 - 12:59 PM

Two lines really from Fore Day Creep

I'm a big fat mamma, got some meat shakin' on my bones.
And every time I shake some skinny gal loses her home.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: CET
Date: 08 Jan 10 - 08:25 PM

Talking about Townes Van Zandt:

"The dust that Pancho bit down south
Ended up in Lefty's mouth"

And here's one that I heard this morning on Archie Fisher's show on BBC Scotland. It's from a song called (I think) "Whiskey Lullaby":

"He put the bottle to his head and pulled the trigger".

I wish I'd caught the duo that sang it.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 08 Jan 10 - 11:24 PM

My preferred end to 'Willie More' -

The last heard of him he was in Montreal
Where he died of a broken heart

Not sure why I find this so moving and memorable but I do. Probably something to do with Jamesian 'specificity of reference'.

Subject: RE: Help: lines that jump out at you
From: GUEST,murrbob
Date: 09 Jan 10 - 12:00 AM

Most lines from "Springhill Mine Disaster"
Ditto "Peat-Bog Soldiers" Both of these sung by Luke Kelly

"And the people bowed and prayed,
To the neon god they'd made."Simon & Garfunkle

"Does any man know where the love of God goes?" Gordon Lightfoot

"And don't you know when kings can't win the game,
It won't be long 'til all the rules are changed;
And it's all justified,
When you're on the winning side."   Robbie O'Connel

And so many, many more!