A qn to keep you all going

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I asked this to worldofagwu as part of a MEME but felt it had wider potential (tho his answer was of course excellent):

Have the lyrics of a song ever changed your mind about a non-musical matter?

(WOA expanded the meaning to include "provided you with useful practical information" too which suits me!)

Comments

a sub-editor writes

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

"a knife a fork a bottle and a cork -- that's the way to spell new york"

[koganbot]

I don't think this is the sort of answer you're looking for, but when I was 12 and finally figured out that "She Loves You" and "You Can't Do That" and some other Beatles songs had smart lyrics, I also realized that teenyboppers weren't necessarily idiots.

[koganbot]

(This was in 1966, by the way, though the two songs I mentioned that helped light my inner lightbulb were from 1963 and 1964, respectively. I did like "Eleanor Rigby," a current Beatles hit, though that fit into a more standard model (for me, that is) of folk-music-type social concern that I was already at ease with.)

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

I kind of had the opposite; any attention I pay to Beatles lyrics makes me realise how often the 'canon' is assembled by imbeciles. In particular, if there has ever been a worse lyric than 'All You Need Is Love' then it melted the brains of everyone aware of it, and thus mercifully erased itself from history.

[koganbot]

Yeah, the lyrics to "All You Need Is Love" are terrible, and the music isn't much better (and I thought so at the time, too), but...

You don't judge James Brown by "Don't Be A Dropout" and "Let's Make Christmas Mean Something This Year," so don't judge the Beatles by "All You Need Is Love."

But the issue is more complicated, actually, since "All You Need Is Love" was presented as a major work and an event. Lennon's bullshit started with "Nowhere Man," and he often returned to bullshit (McCartney had similar bullshit, "Fool On The Hill," for instance, and then he had counter bullshit that was just as bullshit, when he went deliberately frivolous, "Silly Love Songs" for instance). The bullshit came as part of the Beatles' attempt to expand the range and import of their music; some of this attempt was by gesture and platitude, but that doesn't mean all of it was, and a lot of the resulting music was good. But I have some questions for anyone left reading this thread:

(1) To some extent the Beatles did expand their range, of subject matter, of the possibilities of their music, and the results were not uniformly bad by any means. "I Am The Walrus" was brilliant music even if some of the lyrics ("I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together") are idiocy and other parts are clear nonsense [some of which I think is good nonsense, however]. Sgt Pepper's really did add tremendous color to their sound; the album is overrated by those who automatically say "greatest album ever made," but tends to be underrated by people whose tendency is to slam it as "World's most overrated album." (I vote for Exile On Main Street and Blood On The Tracks; I might actually prefer Exile to Sgt. Pepper's, but its overratedness hasn't been challenged nearly to the extent that Sgt. Pepper's has.) But anyway, I wonder if the Beatles needed their pretentiousness and bullshit to expand their range. (By analogy, I don't know if Dylan gets to Highway 61 Revisited without some of the terrible lyrics in "My Back Pages" and "Gates Of Eden," for instance [not all of whose lyrics were terrible, mind you].) (Also, "Girl" is an ambitious song in the way that "Nowhere Man" is, and it's got great lyrics.) Also, their later period is rightly beloved by kids, for all its color and celebration.

(2) I wonder if the canonizers can tell the good stuff from the bullshit. Or, let's make this stronger: I wonder if the Beatles canonization is dependent on the bullshit.

--In any event, when he was good, Lennon (probably in interplay with McCartney in that period, though the great words did tend to have Lennon on vocals) was one of the great lyricists, even if what I think is good of his - "She Loves You," "You Can't Do That," "Ticket To Ride," "Girl," "It's Only Love" [very different message from "All You Need Is Love"], and scads of others, most from the era '62 through '65 - doesn't match up with a lot of other people's faves.

Incorrect possessive explained

[koganbot]

its overratedness hasn't been challenged nearly to the extent that Sgt. Pepper's has

If I'd done the possessive correctly I would have put "to the extent that Sgt. Pepper's's has," but that would have looked totally bizarre so I didn't.

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Hey, I like 'Let's Make Christmas Mean Something This Year'!

There are a couple of Beatles songs I will grudgingly admit have something - 'Strawberry Fields' is the only one that comes to mind right now - but part of my loathing for them is precisely that they did need bullshit to expand their range, while other acts were (with far less self-importance, and far better results) quietly making masterpieces like The Village Green Preservation Society or 'Won't Get Fooled Again'.

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

"Won't Get Fooled Again" was quiet?

I dunno, I find a lot of the bullshit very endearing. I like the catastrophes that ensue -- it was one thing that attracted me to the White Album, just how adamantly it refuses to cohere. This requires a LOT of bullshit, because there are plenty of great songs on there. But what I've noticed in returning to really early Beatles stuff (esp. their first) is what incredible economy there was in their songwriting, even in their bad ones; but maybe you can't "flesh out" a skeleton without including a buncha fat. <--metaphor skillz struggling today. (I'd say that the Kinks and the Who had plenty of fat, too, but most people don't "read" those bands as...well, sacredly, for lack of a better word, letting every song constitute something of great import. I think there are plenty of people who'd be offended if you suggested skipping through the late Beatles catalogue (I thought the LOVE idea was great, but I wasn't hugely fond of all their selections/sequencing -- interesting how difficult it is to integrate their early stuff! There's no fat in it, so you have to separate it out in an almost jarring sort of way), but I wonder if anyone would feel as strongly about, e.g., the Kinks. (My not knowing enough about the Kinks means I'm sorta bullshitting here.)

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

I think I'm using 'quiet' for the same complex of cultural associationa as you're using 'less sacred' - just to observe that it's not surrounded by so much fuss.

[worldofagwu.livejournal.com]

- this was my answer ( long-winded as ever ), just in case anyone's interested:

" well, i'm sure it must've happened but for the life of me i can't think of any specific examples

probly the first time i noticed lyrics = the jam or ( god help me ) toyah - i used to write 'em down in notebooks, exercise books etc - i loved "the stories" weller used to tell - but the politics were prob a bit beyond me

a bit later billy bragg's first two albs made a big impression - & that goincided w/starting to go to gigs regularly ( mostly benefits for striking miners or other anti thatcher things ) - but that was as much due to the influence of my friends as pop stars - & a reaction against the horrible govt of the time

i have learned a few bits of useful info from lyrics - i still can remember the lyrics to advice on arrest by the desperate bicycles ( i've never yet needed 'em - but just in case ) - also i've got a horrible feeling feeling that quite a lot of my info abt girls & human biology came from studying the lyrics to kate bush's first album ( - this was last thursday, obv )

unfortunately the lyrics to meat is murder failed to gonvince me - sorry moz...! "

The Specials "Too Much Too Young"

[mackromackro.livejournal.com]

"Too much too young
Your done too much much too young
Your married with a kid when you could be having fun with me"

Grabbed from the first Specials lyrics site on Google, so "your done" is obviously not the correct phrase, obviously, but it's the MESSAGE that counts!

This especially, although it was really the entire first album, is what got me out of my stupid stupid notion that my life would be a gaping miserable hole if I didn't try to have a family by a certain age.