acsgjjp@sunybcs.UUCP (Jim Poltrone) (11/06/84)
[We're pinheads now / We are not whole / We're pinheads all / Jocko Homo]
Someone else had said that story songs (e.g. "Taxi" by Harry Chapin and "The
Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" by Gordon Lightfoot) were good lyrics. I'd
have to agree--put the song on, close your eyes, and cast yourself as an
observer. And you are there, watching all these events transpire.
Another type of lyric that has this effect on me is one descibing a surreal-
istic scene, a la "Broadway Melody of 1974" by Genesis (Lamb Lies Down -- I
know, I should have mailed this to the guy at pur-ee, but this was on a
tape I had found a long time ago, containing assorted songs.) Allow me to
quote part of the words:
"...Two o'clock's bad, hot soul food
And the band plays 'In the Mood',
The cheeleader waves a cyanide wand
With the smell of peach blossom and bitter almond.
Carl Chessman sniffs the air
And leads the parade
He knows, in a scent,
you can bottle all you made. (?) unsure here
There's flower twos and blue suede shoes (?) "
Smiling at the majorette smoking Winston cigarettes --
And as the song and dance begin,
the children play at home with needles...needles and pins."
Keep in mind that "good lyrics" are purely an opinion; what I think are good
lyrics may be exactly someone else's idea of bad lyrics. Because of such
variance in the criteria, I motion to table this discussion on good lyrics.
--
From under the smogberry trees....
Jim Poltrone (a/k/a Poltr1, the Last of the Raster Blasters)
uucp: [decvax,watmath,rocksvax]!sunybcs!acsgjjp
ARPAnet, CSnet: acsgjjp%buffalo@CSNET-RELAY
"But someday soon we'll stop to ponder
What on earth's this spell we're under
We made the grade and still we wonder who the hell we are..."mike@smu.UUCP (11/08/84)
There's Howard Hughes with blue suede shoes, Smiling at the majorettes, smoking Winston cigarettes... The lyrics are on the album sleeves. Mike McNally ...convex!smu!mike