Joseph Hanna
Active member
Yep. Jimmy Webb.
Galveston, The Highwaymen, Wichita Lineman, Up, Up and Away, MacArthur Park, By the Time I Get to Phoenix, Worst that Could Happen, co-penned Gentle on My Mind, and probably a bunch I’ve forgotten.
Tell me some bands/artists whose lyrics you really dig
- Thread starter PorterhouseMusic
- Start date
Yep. Jimmy Webb.
Galveston, The Highwaymen, Wichita Lineman, Up, Up and Away, MacArthur Park, By the Time I Get to Phoenix, Worst that Could Happen, co-penned Gentle on My Mind, and probably a bunch I’ve forgotten.
Serendipity Records
Well-known member
Yea, he was mentioned before you did
Awesome songwriter, somewhat underrated though? Or maybe under-credited? I find that songwriters often don't get their fair share of praise...True, but a smart songwriter gets the money. They get to avoid all the pitfalls of being a celebrity and can lead a normal life.Yea, he was mentioned before you did
Given a choice, I’d much rather be an unknown but rich songwriter than a rich rockstar.
How many people in the general public would recognize Dianne Warren on the street? Meanwhile, the artists doing her songs would be mobbed by fans.
Serendipity Records
Well-known member
Haha not me.Same... probablyI'm still in the celeb wannabe phase tho!
Serendipity Records
Well-known member
grimtraveller
If only for a moment.....
Almost every artist that has ever made a recording with lyrics has come up with at least one that's good. Even Kiss had some good lyrics at times.
Thing is, for me, good or great lyrics are pretty useless if the song in question doesn't tickle my fancy. And with that in mind, there are tons of songs out there over the last 70 years that are superb, but when you examine the lyrics, those lyrics are pretty shitty.
This is a good example, a cute piece of pop, with a flowing bass line, nice mellotron, sugary organ, interesting singing and put together well.
I love this song. But the lyrics are so rubbish that even now, 46 years since first hearing it, I still laugh. But it doesn't matter, I'm still listening to the song after 46 years. If the lyrics were really deep and brilliant, it would make no difference to my enjoyment of the song.
So lyrically, I live in a kind of duality. I like meaningful lyrics but they mean nothing if the song itself doesn't grab me.
Thing is, for me, good or great lyrics are pretty useless if the song in question doesn't tickle my fancy. And with that in mind, there are tons of songs out there over the last 70 years that are superb, but when you examine the lyrics, those lyrics are pretty shitty.
This is a good example, a cute piece of pop, with a flowing bass line, nice mellotron, sugary organ, interesting singing and put together well.
I love this song. But the lyrics are so rubbish that even now, 46 years since first hearing it, I still laugh. But it doesn't matter, I'm still listening to the song after 46 years. If the lyrics were really deep and brilliant, it would make no difference to my enjoyment of the song.
So lyrically, I live in a kind of duality. I like meaningful lyrics but they mean nothing if the song itself doesn't grab me.
grimtraveller
If only for a moment.....
Ha ha, don't tempt me....this is going to be a long one.
I'll start with Bruce Cockburn and Larry Norman, fly down through Bob Marley and Ijahman, middle out across Suzanne Vega and Melanie and enter the home straight of Joan Armatrading and Phil Keaggy.....
Mick Jagger used to write damned good lyrics. And Pete Townshend & Ray Davies have always been good in the lyrics dept.
But that's another thing, many lyricists that I like, I like in a particular phase in their life.
grimtraveller
If only for a moment.....
Lyrics are such a strange component of a song. They are paradoxical in that most "songs" have them, need them, and yet, they are not the dealbreaker in any song. As long as they fit musically with all that surrounds them, probably most listeners to a song rarely give much attention to what the lyric is actually saying. In saying that though, the lyrics can often prevent one from listening to or enjoying a song, depending on what is being said. And then there are those lyrics that just seem to convey something....quite what, it's not always known, but they do their job and can get a mass of people singing.
I think most lyricists are good lyricists because they can write a lyric that does its job, same way most bassists are at the very least competent, because even if they aren't flashy or innovative bass players, they can get the bass to do its job in the song.
Whoever wrote the lyrics in the Chinn-Chapman writing team were good lyricists. I can barely tell you what any of those songs by Mud, the Sweet or Suzi Quatro were about, but I've been digging them for 50 years.
Whoever did the lyrics in the Faulkner-Wood team that wrote for the Bay City Rollers were good lyricists. Despite their teenybopper image, the lyrics on some of the songs on the "Once Upon a Star" and "Wouldn't you like it" albums are smarter than the average bear.
In the early days of heavy rock, there were some excellent lyricists, despite the dumb image that was ascribed to the genre and the fake idea that it was a genre that was defined by doomy ideals and Satanism. Bon Scott of AC/DC was a wonderful lyric writer. He was both hilariously funny and when he wanted to be, deathly serious. As well as being the epitome of the street poet.
Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath was one of the deepest lyricists to emerge in the 70s. The breadth of subject matter that he covered just in their first 6 albums {at least 110 different subjects turn up in his lyrics} is pretty staggering.
When he wasn't trying to ape Black Blues writers, Robert Plant wrote some great lyrics, as did Roger Glover and Ian Gillan for Deep Purple.
Kerry Livgren and Steve Walsh often did the biz in sterling fashion for Kansas, Lemmy wrote some tremendous lyrics for Motorhead and Frank Marino was no slouch in the stuff he did for Mahogany Rush. Like many people, I can't ignore Neil Peart, but Geddy Lee, when he was ready, wrote good, intelligent lyrics.
Ted Nugent's lyrics were good, from the point of view that they revealed what was in his head and cleverly put to music too, and I think Rick Nielsen also came up with some good, intelligent stuff.
As good as Phil Lynott was as a lyricist, I can't help thinking he's somewhat overrated. But that doesn't take away his abilities in putting up some good words that are well served by the music he and the band often dressed the words up in.
Jimi Hendrix wrote interesting lyrics, but their impact and effect are often lost in his songs. Unlike Martin Turner of Wishbone Ash, who had this knack of making his lyrics so part of the song that they were indivisible from the music, at least on Ash's first 3 albums.
Irish outfit Tir Na Nog had the benefit of being a duo in which both members, Sonny Condell and Leo O'Kelly, could both write lovely songs with some of the most memorable lyrics. They are definitely a study in lyric writing, even if the band was never successful in their first run. Also in this vein are Dave Callinan {who is better known now as an author} and Mick Flynn who came together as Callinan-Flynn to record a supreme album, "Freedom's Lament." Both wrote, both did incisive lyrics that were as angry and social at times as O'Kelly's and Condell's were not angry, but social.
Eamon Carr was a hugely poetic drummer in Horslips. He was the guy that converted so many of the great Irish stories into listenable and easily digestible lyrics for the superb songs Horslips knocked out across their first 6 albums. And in some instances, they even sang in Gaelic and the lyrics sound brilliant, even though I haven't a clue what is being said ! It's the same with the Brazilian, Milton Nascimento, on his outstanding album, "Milton." Some of it is in Portuguese and it sounds wonderful. I even like his English songs on the album. The lyrics are good there too.
Gil Scott-Heron was an absolute beast of lyricism. Were it not for the fact that the music of his & Brian Jackson's bands {and his solo stuff} is just so insanely brilliant, I could almost be persuaded to say that his lyrics are the equal of the music.
But only almost !
Both Anne Herring and Stormie Omartian, though they resided within the "Christian pop/rock" side of things, were both really gifted lyricists {and Anne a superb songwriter. Stormie didn't have to be. Her husband Michael took care of that dept}. They both had things to say that went beyond the predictable and when their lyrics were entrenched within the gorgeous melodies that they ended up in, in the mid 70s, it became clear that here were two of the best that any genre has ever served up.
And then there's Bono. He gets pelters and quite rightly sometimes, for his over-pontificating, but as a lyricist, especially one who has been known to improvise lyrics, he's been fantastic. As have Sting and Stewart Copeland when they were in the Police and Sting beyond then.
I could go on, Ian Anderson for Jethro Tull, Pete Sinfield on early King Crimson {no easy thing considering how they are musically lionized}, our very own Supercreep, Perry Leopold, Phil May and Wally Waller in the Pretty Things' SF Sorrow/Parachute period, Alan Gorrie on Forever More's "Words on Black Plastic," David Bowie, Michael Nesmith in his Monkee days, Hugh Cornwell, Dave Greenfield and Jean-Jacques Burnel in the Stranglers early albums, Omar Lye-Fook, one of the best British writers of the last 30 years, Curtis Mayfield.........
I think most lyricists are good lyricists because they can write a lyric that does its job, same way most bassists are at the very least competent, because even if they aren't flashy or innovative bass players, they can get the bass to do its job in the song.
Whoever wrote the lyrics in the Chinn-Chapman writing team were good lyricists. I can barely tell you what any of those songs by Mud, the Sweet or Suzi Quatro were about, but I've been digging them for 50 years.
Whoever did the lyrics in the Faulkner-Wood team that wrote for the Bay City Rollers were good lyricists. Despite their teenybopper image, the lyrics on some of the songs on the "Once Upon a Star" and "Wouldn't you like it" albums are smarter than the average bear.
In the early days of heavy rock, there were some excellent lyricists, despite the dumb image that was ascribed to the genre and the fake idea that it was a genre that was defined by doomy ideals and Satanism. Bon Scott of AC/DC was a wonderful lyric writer. He was both hilariously funny and when he wanted to be, deathly serious. As well as being the epitome of the street poet.
Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath was one of the deepest lyricists to emerge in the 70s. The breadth of subject matter that he covered just in their first 6 albums {at least 110 different subjects turn up in his lyrics} is pretty staggering.
When he wasn't trying to ape Black Blues writers, Robert Plant wrote some great lyrics, as did Roger Glover and Ian Gillan for Deep Purple.
Kerry Livgren and Steve Walsh often did the biz in sterling fashion for Kansas, Lemmy wrote some tremendous lyrics for Motorhead and Frank Marino was no slouch in the stuff he did for Mahogany Rush. Like many people, I can't ignore Neil Peart, but Geddy Lee, when he was ready, wrote good, intelligent lyrics.
Ted Nugent's lyrics were good, from the point of view that they revealed what was in his head and cleverly put to music too, and I think Rick Nielsen also came up with some good, intelligent stuff.
As good as Phil Lynott was as a lyricist, I can't help thinking he's somewhat overrated. But that doesn't take away his abilities in putting up some good words that are well served by the music he and the band often dressed the words up in.
Jimi Hendrix wrote interesting lyrics, but their impact and effect are often lost in his songs. Unlike Martin Turner of Wishbone Ash, who had this knack of making his lyrics so part of the song that they were indivisible from the music, at least on Ash's first 3 albums.
Irish outfit Tir Na Nog had the benefit of being a duo in which both members, Sonny Condell and Leo O'Kelly, could both write lovely songs with some of the most memorable lyrics. They are definitely a study in lyric writing, even if the band was never successful in their first run. Also in this vein are Dave Callinan {who is better known now as an author} and Mick Flynn who came together as Callinan-Flynn to record a supreme album, "Freedom's Lament." Both wrote, both did incisive lyrics that were as angry and social at times as O'Kelly's and Condell's were not angry, but social.
Eamon Carr was a hugely poetic drummer in Horslips. He was the guy that converted so many of the great Irish stories into listenable and easily digestible lyrics for the superb songs Horslips knocked out across their first 6 albums. And in some instances, they even sang in Gaelic and the lyrics sound brilliant, even though I haven't a clue what is being said ! It's the same with the Brazilian, Milton Nascimento, on his outstanding album, "Milton." Some of it is in Portuguese and it sounds wonderful. I even like his English songs on the album. The lyrics are good there too.
Gil Scott-Heron was an absolute beast of lyricism. Were it not for the fact that the music of his & Brian Jackson's bands {and his solo stuff} is just so insanely brilliant, I could almost be persuaded to say that his lyrics are the equal of the music.
But only almost !
Both Anne Herring and Stormie Omartian, though they resided within the "Christian pop/rock" side of things, were both really gifted lyricists {and Anne a superb songwriter. Stormie didn't have to be. Her husband Michael took care of that dept}. They both had things to say that went beyond the predictable and when their lyrics were entrenched within the gorgeous melodies that they ended up in, in the mid 70s, it became clear that here were two of the best that any genre has ever served up.
And then there's Bono. He gets pelters and quite rightly sometimes, for his over-pontificating, but as a lyricist, especially one who has been known to improvise lyrics, he's been fantastic. As have Sting and Stewart Copeland when they were in the Police and Sting beyond then.
I could go on, Ian Anderson for Jethro Tull, Pete Sinfield on early King Crimson {no easy thing considering how they are musically lionized}, our very own Supercreep, Perry Leopold, Phil May and Wally Waller in the Pretty Things' SF Sorrow/Parachute period, Alan Gorrie on Forever More's "Words on Black Plastic," David Bowie, Michael Nesmith in his Monkee days, Hugh Cornwell, Dave Greenfield and Jean-Jacques Burnel in the Stranglers early albums, Omar Lye-Fook, one of the best British writers of the last 30 years, Curtis Mayfield.........