Genius words/lyrics

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CockneyWanchor

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Sorry for the millionth music-based thread, folks. But hey, I seem to be the only punter who hasn't started one!

Just wondering what's the most surprising word / lyric-flex you've heard? Could be a weird word that's been crow-barred in, or a fantastic bit of rhyming. Hell, let's not rule anything out....I'm desperate for this thread not to be a Googlewhack.

To kick off:

The Kinks: And he goes to the regatta
And he adores the girl next door
Cause he's dying to get at her (From: 'Well Respected Man')

I've always admired how Kate Bush squeezed in the word 'asunder' (Running Up That Hill)

Also, David Gray using the word 'Rumpus' (Draw the Line)
 
Elivs Costello : New Lace sleeves

The salty lips of the socialite sisters
With their continental fingers that have
Never seen working blisters
Oh I know they've got their problems
I wish I was one of them
 
lefty goldblatt said:
Two for the price of one, in Genesis' " I know what I like"
You get the words lawnmower and wardrobe, without even a rhyme
Click to expand...

One of the best things about Genesis especially under Gabriel is that they wrote songs with timing and lyrics that didn't seem to need rhyming.
They just told a narrative.

Look at Squonk. (I know Gabriel had left) You're hard pressed to find a rhyme from start to finish.
 
This is genius.


Been climbing trees I've skinned my knees
My hands are black, the sun is going down
She scruffs my hair in the kitchen steam
She's listening to the dream I weaved today
Crosswords through the bathroom door
While someone sings the theme-tune to the news
And my sister buzzes through the room leaving perfume in the air
And that's what triggered this
I come back here from time to time
I shelter here some days
A high-back chair, he sits and stares
A thousand yards and whistles marching-band
Kneeling by and speaking up
He reaches out and I take a massive hand
Disjointed tales that flit between
Short trousers and a full dress uniform
And he talks of people ten years gone like I've known them all my life
Like scattered black and whites
I come back here from time to time
I shelter here some days
I come back here from time to time
I shelter here some days
 
When it comes to genius lyrics, for me it's not all about the rhyming, but the descriptive imagery.
Some people have a knack of giving you a complete mental picture of a situation in a few well chosen words. Poetry I suppose you'd call it.

I'm tempted to put the complete song down because I think it's poetry from start to finish, but here's a short extract (It's a long song) from Al Stewart's
Roads to Moscow. A song about a Russian soldiers experience in WW2.

"And the evening sings in a voice of amber, the dawn is surely coming
The morning road leads to Stalingrad, and the sky is softly humming

Two broken tigers on fire in the night
Flicker their souls to the wind
We wait in the lines for the final approach to begin
It's been almost four years that I've carried a gun
At home, it will almost be spring
The flames of the tigers are lighting the road to Berlin

Ah quickly we move through the ruins that bow to the ground
The old men and children they send out to face us, they can't slow us down

And all that I ever
Was able to see
The eyes of the city are opening
Now it's the end of the dream"
 
'On the avenue, fifth avenue, the photographers will snap us,
And you'll find that you're
In the rotogravure.'
From 'Easter Bonnet' by Irving Berlin.

A rotogravure was a print made by a process of the same name.
In the version made for England, it was changed to:
"And then you'll be seen
In the smart magazine."
 
Up the Junction by Squeeze deserves a shout even with the smelly nappy bit lol

I never thought it would happen
With me and a girl from Clapham
Out on the windy common
That night I ain't forgotten
When she dealt out the rations
With some or other passions
I said, "You are a lady"
"Perhaps, " she said, "I may be"
We moved into a basement
With thoughts of our engagement
We stayed in by the telly
Although the room was smelly
We spent our time just kissing
The Railway Arms we're missing
But love had got us hooked up
And all our time it took up
I got a job with Stanley
He said I'd come in handy
And started me on Monday
So I had a bath on Sunday
I worked eleven hours
And bought the girl some flowers
She said she'd seen a doctor
And nothing now could stop her
I worked all through the winter
The weather brass and bitter
I put away a tenner each week to make her better
And when the time was ready
We had to sell the telly
Late evenings by the fire
With little kicks inside her
This morning at four-fifty
I took her rather nifty
Down to an incubator
Where thirty minutes later
She gave birth to a daughter
Within a year a walker
She looked just like her mother
If there could be another
And now she's two years older
Her mother's with a soldier
She left me when my drinking
Became a proper stinging
The devil came and took me
From bar to street to bookie
No more nights by the telly
No more nights nappies smelling
Alone here in the kitchen
I feel there's something missing
I'd beg for some forgiveness
But begging's not my business
And she won't write a letter
Although I always tell her
And so it's my assumption
I'm really up the junction
 
Last edited:
From "Greatest of All Time"
They caught and drowned the front man
Of the world's worst rock and roll band
He was out of luck
Because nobody gave a fuck
The jury huddled all around the aqueduct
Drinkin' and laughin' and lighting up
Reminiscing just how bad he sucked
Singing "Throw him in the river
Throw him in the river
Throw him in the river
Throw the bastard in the river."

From "Underachievers March and Fight Song"
Underachievers
Attack at your leisure
Hoist up your guitars
And make them all believers
Underachievers
Total domination
Kill the billion years
Of total frustration


God damn, Archers of Loaf are glorious. What a band.
 
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