Do people actually listen to lyrics?

[bipolarbear]

Yeah, there's lot's of those, I hear they even have a name for em'. That's why lyrics sites are so poopular.

My favorite is the enduring "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy..." by Jimi Hendrix. The real version being "'Scuse me while I kiss the sky..."

[SlowwHand]

Invalid poll.
Oh yeah. It's not a poll. It should have been a poll, but it's not a poll.

[Dis]

lyrics aren't necessary to make the song, but they do help.

I don't agree politically with a lot of Rage Against the Machine's lyrics, but they do improve the song (it's not like they are the most talented musically, so they need socially relevent lyrics)

Lyrics don't make the song compare the 2 versions of Raining Blood by Slayer and Tori Amos, they are completely different songs despite having the same lyrics. I happen to like both versions, but most hardcore fans of either artists only like one or the other. One is fast and furious while the other is slow, dark, and brooding.

sometimes I like pop songs with the stupidest lyrics just because it sounds good.

and then there is this:

http://dojo.fi/~rancid/loituma__.swf that song is crack cocaine. I had to stop it real soon after copying pasting the url, or I'll get addicted again.

[Dis]

I better stop before I turn this into a lryics thread. While I like complex metal lyrics like Metallica songs, sometimes I just like the silly stuff

I am the one, Orgasmatron, the outstretched grasping hand
My image is of agony, my servants rape the land
Obsequious and arrogant, clandestine and vain
Two thousand years of misery, of torture in my name
Hypocrisy made paramount, paranoia the law
My name is called religion, sadistic, sacred whore.

I twist the truth, I rule the world, my crown is called deceit
I am the emperor of lies, you grovel at my feet
I rob you and I slaughter you, your downfall is my gain
And still you play the sycophant and revel in you pain
And all my promises are lies, all my love is hate
I am the politician, and I decide your fate

I march before a martyred world, an army for the fight
I speak of great heroic days, of victory and might
I hold a banner drenched in blood, I urge you to be brave
I lead you to your destiny, I lead you to your grave
Your bones will build my palaces, your eyes will stud my crown
For I am Mars, the god of war, and I will cut you down.

Orgasmatron, Motorhead

here's some over the top lyrics by the over top band Manowar

He broke the laws of the elders
So they plucked out his eye,
Took his land and fortune,
Left him to die

Bound on the shoreline,
Left for the tide,
Sees his life blood leaving...
Circling lower the vultures fly

These bones may be broken
But the spirit cant die
And the gods see his anguish
And give him a sign

From the floor of the ocean
The ship of the lost souls rise
And they take him where no one sleeps
While the undead cry
Where no one sleeps while the undead cry

And in the world above
The elders sing,
On his land they live
Let deaths bell ring

He was met at the gate of hades
By the guardian of the lost souls,
The keeper of the unavenged
And he did say to him:
Let you not pass abandon return to the world from once you came
And seek payment not only for thy known anguish
But vindicate the souls of the unavenged

And they placed in his hands a sword made for him called vengeance
Forged in brimstone and tempered by the woeful tears of the unavenged

And to carry him up on his journey back to the upper world
They brought forth their demon horse called black death
A grim steed so fiercely might and black in colour
That he could stand as one with the darkness
Save from his burning eyes of crimson fire

And on that night they rode up from hell
The pounding of his hooves did clap like thunder

Burning, death, destruction raping the daughters and wives
In blood I take my payment in full with their lives

No one can escape me on black death I ride
When kissed by the sword of vengeance
Your head lays there by your side
I take the lives of all that I once knew
The torn flesh of a slow death waits for you

Burning, death, destruction raping the daughters and wives
In blood I take my payment in full with their lives

I spare not land or servants my wake is slow dead there
I take their wives and daughters
They stand there watching, watching
Hoping to get my life but when Im through they know they must pay

I'll stop now

[bipolarbear]

Jews write some of the best rap I've ever heard.

I was sitting on my fire escape and I saw...
sturdy bridges, decorated with dirty pigeons
a vagabond begging for three pennies and a princess
a junkie tourniquet surgeon urging the needle in
a batty senior citizen flashing that awful teethless grin
I saw a corner store merchant rest on a milk crate with a stog'
a pierced nose, a model with a stalker, cheap hooker, jay walkers
a table on a sidewalk with four old men slappin' dominos down
a city, a village, a neighborhood, a ghost town
I saw vandals catching tags and Puerto Rican flags
I saw a pregnant woman on the verge of bursting (boom)
I saw a blind man with a dog screaming 'someday I'll see it all'
and then he sat down with his hammer and saw
business men with multi-colored ties, cashmere checks
a nazi with tattoos on his neck, a Vietnam war vet
a Caucasian man with a limp and a cane, a pimp with his names
a thug circus, a pack of shook tourists hugging their purses
I saw freaks with rainbow streaks in dayglo hair
a mother smackin' the grin off her child, replaced it with a stare
a pothole, a storefront with a broken open sign
a hole in the wall bar kicking drunks to the gutter, it's closing time
I see a f**k up, a bum knuckle up with a taxi driver
a squatter, a grandfather, an angry right-to-lifer
I can see the roof garden on the apartment across the street

and kick myself because somewhere along the way I lost my seeds
I see a rat, a roach, a bat approach, a happy student
a black man with a horn and a will to make you sit and listen to it
I see a little girl on the corner with bubbles, braids and barrettes
I see a teen mother with similak pacifier and regrets
oh, a day turned stale, a hammer with a rusty nail, a failed marriage
a universe of brick buildings slightly off balance
a challenge, I see a chance to add real colors to my favorite palette
raise my mighty mallet towards the gods and swing my talons
I see a crack in the sidewalk
a slide show of six civilians gripping bottles of gideon
sitting inside bent meridian
there's a fun house ooh, a sun spout
spraying yellow beams above yellow back dreams
and children in the hydrants
tyrants(?), I see sirens
the wall to the glamor standard
a dead bird, a bent curb
a bus stop of commuters waiting to have their souls towed off to work
I seen the slap dash habits of bike messengers paws
and hug that good leaf on the way to damaged packages, dependence
oh my lord, I see bandwagons, all aboard
a carnival amusement park where a heart is a luxury
I see a gas galaxy huddled behind those pearly doors
maybe I should sit up on my fire escape a little more

[Adagio]

For music to be great it needs great lyrics


If it doesn't have lyrics at all, then it automatically goes onto my banned list, and the same goes for those where you can't hear what they saying... and the same goes for those who talks instead of sings

[bipolarbear]

I think Vivaldi's Four Seasons is great and it's lyricless.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

As far as I'm concerned, if you claim to like songs but don't bother paying attention to the lyrics, you don't really appreciate them.

It's like claiming "I really like the Mona Lisa, but I can't be bothered to put my glasses on to view it. It still looks OK all blurred and indistinct. And I really like Beethoven's 9th, but I stuff cotton wool in my ears and hum really loundly so that I don't hear it properly. And I'm married to Monica Bellucci but I don't have sex with her."

[bipolarbear]

Yeah, but not every song is better with the lyrics.

[Drake Tungsten]

As far as I'm concerned, if you claim to like songs but don't bother paying attention to the lyrics, you don't really appreciate them.

Lyrics are extraneous as far as music is concerned. They may add to the enjoyment of a good song, but they can't make a song good on their own and they certainly can't make up for a ****ty melody.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Adagio
For music to be great it needs great lyrics


If it doesn't have lyrics at all, then it automatically goes onto my banned list, and the same goes for those where you can't hear what they saying... and the same goes for those who talks instead of sings

How narrow-minded.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Dis
I better stop before I turn this into a lryics thread. While I like complex metal lyrics like Metallica songs, sometimes I just like the silly stuff

Metallica lyrics

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

Lyrics are extraneous as far as music is concerned. They may add to the enjoyment of a good song, but they can't make a song good on their own and they certainly can't make up for a ****ty melody.

Nah, I'd disagree. There are any number of blues tracks where a formulaic melody is made great by a killer lyric. The same's also true of a number of key lyricists- people like Billy Bragg, Elvis Costello, Eric Bogle etc.

An example is this one- the melody is average, but the lyrics are stunning.

Now when I was a young man I carried me pack
And I lived the free life of the rover.
From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback,
Well, I waltzed my Matilda all over.
Then in 1915, my country said, "Son,
It's time you stop ramblin', there's work to be done."
So they gave me a tin hat, and they gave me a gun,
And they marched me away to the war.

And the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
As the ship pulled away from the quay,
And amidst all the cheers, the flag waving, and tears,
We sailed off for Gallipoli.

And how well I remember that terrible day,
How our blood stained the sand and the water;
And of how in that hell that they call Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter.
Johnny Turk, he was waitin', he primed himself well;
He showered us with bullets, and he rained us with shell --
And in five minutes flat, he'd blown us all to hell,
Nearly blew us right back to Australia.

But the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
When we stopped to bury our slain,
Well, we buried ours, and the Turks buried theirs,
Then we started all over again.

And those that were left, well, we tried to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire.
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive
Though around me the corpses piled higher.
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head,
And when I woke up in me hospital bed
And saw what it had done, well, I wished I was dead --
Never knew there was worse things than dying.

For I'll go no more "Waltzing Matilda,"
All around the green bush far and free --
To hump tents and pegs, a man needs both legs,
No more "Waltzing Matilda" for me.

So they gathered the crippled, the wounded, the maimed,
And they shipped us back home to Australia.
The armless, the legless, the blind, the insane,
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla.
And as our ship sailed into Circular Quay,
I looked at the place where me legs used to be,
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me,
To grieve, to mourn and to pity.

But the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
As they carried us down the gangway,
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared,
Then they turned all their faces away.

And so now every April, I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me.
And I see my old comrades, how proudly they march,
Reviving old dreams of past glory,
And the old men march slowly, all bones stiff and sore,
They're tired old heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask "What are they marching for?"
And I ask meself the same question.

But the band plays "Waltzing Matilda,"
And the old men still answer the call,
But as year follows year, more old men disappear
Someday, no one will march there at all.

Waltzing Matilda, waltzing Matilda.
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
And their ghosts may be heard as they march by the billabong,
Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda with me?

[Drake Tungsten]

An example is this one- the melody is average, but the lyrics are stunning.

I disagree. Most people can't even remember most of the lyrics to the original Waltzing Matilda, Aussies included. The melody, OTOH, is a classic. Simple, but extremely memorable.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Adagio
For music to be great it needs great lyrics


If it doesn't have lyrics at all, then it automatically goes onto my banned list, and the same goes for those where you can't hear what they saying... and the same goes for those who talks instead of sings

so many great instrumentals

and you don't listen to classical?