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  #21  
Unread 04-23-2017, 09:33 PM
William A. Baurle William A. Baurle is offline
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Mark,

Morrissey is famous for his privacy with respect to how he gets his jollies, and for his lyrics that perfectly describe a certain kind of person's difficulty with courtship and romance. I loved him the first time I heard him, because everything he sang, I felt, at one time or another. And his expression was poetic without being artsy-fartsy, eloquent and plain-speaking, without being over the top. To watch the old videos and see the Smiths perform, it's quite obvious how many individuals he reached.

One of my favorites is How Soon is Now, with these two verses opening up the song, which has one of the most haunting guitar bits ever put on record (by the genius, Johnny Marr):


I am the son and the heir
Of a shyness that is criminally vulgar
I am the son and heir
Of nothing in particular

You shut your mouth
How dare you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
Just like everybody else does...

Last edited by William A. Baurle; 04-24-2017 at 11:16 PM.
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  #22  
Unread 04-23-2017, 10:11 PM
Julie Steiner Julie Steiner is offline
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Suzanne Vega, telling it slant in 1987's "Ironbound / Fancy Poultry":

Quote:
Fancy poultry parts sold here
Breasts and thighs and hearts
Backs are cheap
And wings are nearly free
I find that devastatingly mundane, in context.
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  #23  
Unread 04-23-2017, 11:13 PM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
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Suzanne Vega wrote some powerful lyrics, such as those for "Luka". My brother has her autograph in an old passport of his.
I'm not sure what I wish I'd written, but I spent this afternoon listening to The Pogues on a 250-mile drive home:

"They died in their hundreds with no sign to mark where
Save the brass in the pocket of the entrepreneur."

That's "Navigator". I love that rhyme, and the song is great en bloc.

John
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  #24  
Unread 04-24-2017, 01:05 AM
William A. Baurle William A. Baurle is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Julie Steiner View Post
Suzanne Vega, telling it slant in 1987's "Ironbound / Fancy Poultry":



I find that devastatingly mundane, in context.
Deleted silly joke.

Last edited by William A. Baurle; 04-24-2017 at 05:04 PM.
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  #25  
Unread 04-24-2017, 02:30 PM
Gregory Palmerino Gregory Palmerino is offline
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"A little old lady got mutilated late last night.
Werewolves of London, again."

Can't help but love the alliteration in that line. Just heard the song this morning. Those L's just roll off the tongue singing along.
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  #26  
Unread 04-24-2017, 04:52 PM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
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Werewolves of London contains my favorite ever blues repetition:

"I saw Lon Chaney walking with the Queen,
Doing the werewolves of London.
I saw Lon Chaney JUNIOR walking with the Queen,
Doing the werewolves of London."

Great song.
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  #27  
Unread 04-24-2017, 05:06 PM
William A. Baurle William A. Baurle is offline
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Werewolves of London is my least favorite song of all time. Every time it comes on the radio, I can't hit the off button fast enough.

I just don't know what it is about that song, but I absolutely cannot stand it.

Funny how tastes can be so different.

Most of the rock music I love is trashed and held in the deepest contempt by a great many people. Ah, well.
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  #28  
Unread 05-02-2017, 06:17 PM
Jesse Anger Jesse Anger is offline
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Nice to see Morrissey getting a nod or two here. I'll add some lesser known and somewhat more contemporary names and lyrics to the thread. Any Tom Waits up? Didn't see any of his. I may have missed something, though.

Check out Sam Beam, goes by the name of Iron and Wine.


The Trapeze Swinger

Please, remember me
Happily
By the rosebush laughing
With bruises on my chin
The time when
We counted every black car passing
Your house beneath the hill
And up until
Someone caught us in the kitchen
With maps, a mountain range,
A piggy bank
A vision too removed to mention
But

Please, remember me
Fondly
I heard from someone you're still pretty
And then
They went on to say
That the pearly gates
Had some eloquent graffiti
Like 'We'll meet again'
And 'Fuck the man'
And 'Tell my mother not to worry'
And angels with their gray
Handshakes
Were always done in such a hurry
And

Please, remember me
At Halloween
Making fools of all the neighbors
Our faces painted white
By midnight
We'd forgotten one another
And when the morning came
I was ashamed
Only now it seems so silly
That season left the world
And then returned
And now you're lit up by the city
So

Please, remember me
Mistakenly
In the window of the tallest tower call
Then pass us by
But much too high
To see the empty road at happy hour
Leave and resonate
Just like the gates
Around the holy kingdom
With words like 'Lost and Found' and 'Don't Look Down'
And 'Someone Save Temptation'
And

Please, remember me
As in the dream
We had as rug-burned babies
Among the fallen trees
And fast asleep
Aside the lions and the ladies
That called you what you like
And even might
Give a gift for your behavior
A fleeting chance to see
A trapeze
Swing as high as any savior
But

Please, remember me
My misery
And how it lost me all I wanted
Those dogs that love the rain
And chasing trains
The colored birds above there running
In circles round the well
And where it spells
On the wall behind St. Peter's
So bright with cinder gray
And spray paint
'Who the hell can see forever?'
And

Please, remember me
Seldomly
In the car behind the carnival
My hand between your knees
You turn from me
And said 'The trapeze act was wonderful
But never meant to last'
The clown that passed
Saw me just come up with anger
When it filled with circus dogs
The parking lot
Had an element of danger
So

Please, remember me
Finally
And all my uphill clawing
My dear
But if I make
The pearly gates
Do my best to make a drawing
Of God and Lucifer
A boy and girl
An angel kissing on a sinner
A monkey and a man
A marching band
All around the frightened trapeze swingers
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  #29  
Unread 05-03-2017, 03:57 AM
William A. Baurle William A. Baurle is offline
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Oh never mind.

I think I had written a long semi-drunken fanboy post about Morrissey.

Last edited by William A. Baurle; 05-04-2017 at 12:33 AM. Reason: 'splainin'
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  #30  
Unread 05-13-2017, 07:38 AM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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Bill - shame, I'd have enjoyed those drunken ramblings!

Jesse - I've heard a couple of theirs. Yes, good lyrics.

Has anyone heard 'The Magnetic Fields'? The songwriter Stephen Merrit is like a millennial Cole Porter. Their album 69 Love Songs is pretty extraordinary. This is one...

Love is Like a Bottle of Gin

It makes you blind, it does you in
It makes you think you're pretty tough
It makes you prone to crime and sin
It makes you say thing off the cuff
It's very small and made of glass
and grossly over-advertised
It turns a genius into an ass
and makes a fool think he is wise
It could make you regret your birth
or turn cartwheels in your best suit
It costs a lot more than it's worth
and yet there is no substitute
They keep it on a higher shelf
the older and more pure it grows
It has no color in itself
but it can make you see rainbows
You can find it at the Bowery
or you can find it at Elaine's
It makes your words more flowery
It makes the sun shine, makes it rain
You just get what they put in
and they never put in enough
Love is like a bottle of gin
but a bottle of gin is not like love
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