Lyrically Perfect Songs

[Blarg]

LOLs

[Oski]

[ QUOTE ]
Can we get your thoughts on Huey Lewis and the News too?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, since you asked nicely:

Their early work was a little too New Wave for my
taste. But then Sports came out in 1983, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically.
The whole album has a clear, crisp sound and a new sheen of
consummate professionalism that gives the songs a big boost.

As for Huey, he's been compared to ELvis Costello but I think Huey has a more bitter, cynical sense of humor.

In 1987 Huey released Fore!, their most accomplished album. I think their undisputed masterpiece is "HiP To Be Square," a song so catchy that most people probably don't listen to the lyrics. But they should because it's not just about the pleasures of conformity and the importance of trends. It's a personal statement about the band itself.

[rhymenocerus]

Any Bob (censored) Dylan obv

[katyseagull]

Since you mention Dylan, here's a good one -
(have to use your best Dylan impersonation if you sing along)


I once held her in my arms,
She said she would always stay.
But I was cruel,
I treated her like a fool,
I threw it all away.

Once I had mountains in the palm of my hand,
And rivers that ran through ev'ry day.
I must have been mad,
I never knew what I had,
Until I threw it all away.

Love is all there is, it makes the world go 'round,
Love and only love, it can't be denied.
No matter what you think about it
You just won't be able to do without it.
Take a tip from one who's tried.

So if you find someone that gives you all of her love,
Take it to your heart, don't let it stray,
For one thing that's certain,
You will surely be a-hurtin',
If you throw it all away.

[HollywoodDB]

I think most lyrics by The Weakerthans.

"I don't know what to do with my hands when I talk to you
and you don't know where to look, so you look at my hands"

I like that.

[untadam]

I've always found most of Elliott Smith's songs to perfectly describe drug/alcohol addiction and bad relationships.

[GinaSD]

Though it's not fancy or frilly, this one is one of my favorites...

Desperado, why dont you come to your senses?
You been out ridin fences for so long now
Oh, youre a hard one
I know that you got your reasons
These things that are pleasin you
Can hurt you somehow

Don you draw the queen of diamonds, boy
Shell beat you if shes able
You know the queen of heats is always your best bet

Now it seems to me, some fine things
Have been laid upon your table
But you only want the ones that you cant get

Desperado, oh, you aint gettin no youger
Your pain and your hunger, theyre drivin you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, thats just some people talkin
Your prison is walking through this world all alone

Dont your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky wont snow and the sun wont shine
Its hard to tell the night time from the day
Youre loosin all your highs and lows
Aint it funny how the feeling goes away?

Desperado, why dont you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, open the gate
It may be rainin, but theres a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you, before its too late

[Blarg]

Very sentimental, but so what:

The Rose

Some say love, it is a river
that drowns the tender reed.
Some say love, it is a razor
that leaves your soul to bleed.
Some say love, it is a hunger,
an endless aching need.
I say love, it is a flower,
and you it's only seed.

It's the heart afraid of breaking
that never learns to dance.
It's the dream afraid of waking
that never takes the chance.
It's the one who won't be taken,
who cannot seem to give,
and the soul afraid of dyin'
that never learns to live.

When the night has been too lonely
and the road has been to long,
and you think that love is only
for the lucky and the strong,
just remember in the winter
far beneath the winter snows
lies the seed that with the sun's love
in the spring becomes the rose.

(Ascribed to Bette Midler because she sang it, but she didn't write it.)

[Mat Sklansky]

Leonard Cohen - The Future Lyrics



Give me back my broken night
my mirrored room, my secret life
it's lonely here,
there's no one left to torture
Give me absolute control
over every living soul
And lie beside me, baby,
that's an order!
Give me crack and anal sex
Take the only tree that's left
and stuff it up the hole
in your culture
Give me back the Berlin wall
give me Stalin and St Paul
I've seen the future, brother:
it is murder.

Things are going to slide, slide in all directions
Won't be nothing
Nothing you can measure anymore
The blizzard, the blizzard of the world
has crossed the threshold
and it has overturned
the order of the soul
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant
When they said REPENT REPENT
I wonder what they meant

You don't know me from the wind
you never will, you never did
I'm the little jew
who wrote the Bible
I've seen the nations rise and fall
I've heard their stories, heard them all
but love's the only engine of survival
Your servant here, he has been told
to say it clear, to say it cold:
It's over, it ain't going
any further
And now the wheels of heaven stop
you feel the devil's riding crop
Get ready for the future:
it is murder

Things are going to slide ...

There'll be the breaking of the ancient
western code
Your private life will suddenly explode
There'll be phantoms
There'll be fires on the road
and the white man dancing
You'll see a woman
hanging upside down
her features covered by her fallen gown
and all the lousy little poets
coming round
tryin' to sound like Charlie Manson
and the white man dancin'

Give me back the Berlin wall
Give me Stalin and St Paul
Give me Christ
or give me Hiroshima
Destroy another fetus now
We don't like children anyhow
I've seen the future, baby:
it is murder

Things are going to slide ...

When they said REPENT REPENT ...

[niss]

I've always felt that, in its context (soldier off to Vietnam War) , Leaving on a Jet Plane is one of the most perfect songs, lyrically and musically.

All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go
I'm standin' here outside your door
I hate to wake you up to say goodbye

But the dawn is breakin', it's early morn
The taxi's waitin', he's blowin' his horn
Already I'm so lonesome I could die

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go

I'm leaving on a jet plane
Don't know when I'll be back again
Oh, babe, I hate to go

There's so many times I've let you down
So many times I've played around
I'll tell you now, they don't mean a thing

Every place I go, I think of you
Every song I sing, I sing for you
When I come back I'll wear your wedding ring

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go

I'm leaving on a jet plane
Don't know when I'll be back again
Oh, babe, I hate to go

Now the time has come to leave you
One more time, oh, let me kiss you
Close your eyes and I'll be on my way

Dream about the days to come
When I won't have to leave alone
About the times that I won't have to say ...

Kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go

I'm leaving on a jet plane
Don't know when I'll be back again
Oh, babe, I hate to go