The Obvious Lyric

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randomhandclapsrandomhandclaps Frets: 20521
edited September 2013 in Music

In a world full of intricate metaphors and carefully crafted similes, occasional a songwriter ignores the convention on poetry and just states the damn obvious. 

Whilst working today the song In A Room by Dodgy came on the radio.  It feature the lyric -

"In a room there's only so much space." - Well that's what makes it a room.  A vast expanse of open space and it wouldn't be a room.

I can recall picking up on many of these lazy lyrics over the years but can't recall many.

Is there's a lyric you hear and think 'well bloody obviously'?  Or simply makes you cringe.

My muse is not a horse and art is not a race.
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Comments

  • dindudedindude Frets: 8534
    edited September 2013
    The one that always makes me cringe the most is Cherly Cole fight for this love. The verse below coupled with the way she un-sings it makes it at the very top of my when-music-goes-bad chart. 

    Now everyday ain't gonn' be no picnic 
    Love ain't a walk in the park 
    All you can do is make the best of it now 
    Can't be afraid of the dark
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  • ICBMICBM Frets: 71959
    edited September 2013
    Too many to think of (I suspect I might be blanking a lot out) but the one that first came into my head was Lenny Kravitz's even more than usually appalling Fly Away -

    I wish that I could fly
    Into the sky
    So very high
    Just like a dragonfly

    Which a three-year-old could have written...

    There's another verse as well which is just as bad, if I remember.

    "Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski

    "Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand." - Homer Simpson

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  • You could have pulled any lyric from Fly Away.  An old band's singer suggested covering it live when it was being used on the Peugeot ad - we play it a few time in rehearsal and the rest of us were 'No'.  Dire lyrics that song.

    My wife says the one that get her most irate is the success of the Des'ree song Life where she sings -

    I don't want to see a ghost

    It's a sight that I fear the most

    I'd rather have a piece of toast

    watch the evening news

    My muse is not a horse and art is not a race.
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  • "I Woke Up This Mornin'" Da Da Da Da Dah!

    Well of course you did or you'd be dead!

    Only a Fool Would Say That.
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  • @Bellycaster - good point.

     

    My muse is not a horse and art is not a race.
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  • martmart Frets: 5205
    edited September 2013

    "I Woke Up This Mornin'" Da Da Da Da Dah!

    Well of course you did or you'd be dead!


    Really? Have you never slept past noon? Obviously you were never a student! :)
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  • mart said:

    "I Woke Up This Mornin'" Da Da Da Da Dah!

    Well of course you did or you'd be dead!


    Really? Have you never slept past noon? Obviously you were never a student! :)

    Of course I've slept past Noon, but I've never heard the Lyrics. "I Woke Up This Art'noon"
    ;)

    Only a Fool Would Say That.
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  • Every fucking Christmas:
    "2000 miles, its very far..."
    Tipton is a small fishing village in the borough of Sandwell. 
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  • jaygtrjaygtr Frets: 218
    The problem is, when someone points out a naff lyric it's difficult to listen to the song properly anymore.

    Like "jailbreak" by thin lizzy

    "Tonight there's gonna be a jailbreak, somewhere in this town"

    Erm at the jail maybe?

    I can't listen now without smiling.
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  • vizviz Frets: 10645
    edited September 2013
    mart said:

    "I Woke Up This Mornin'" Da Da Da Da Dah!

    Well of course you did or you'd be dead!


    Really? Have you never slept past noon? Obviously you were never a student! :)

    Of course I've slept past Noon, but I've never heard the Lyrics. "I Woke Up This Art'noon"
    ;)


    Johnny Cash - Hit the road and go :) Slightly OT but my fave lyric is "you came windsurfing into my life".
    Roland said: Scales are primarily a tool for categorising knowledge, not a rule for what can or cannot be played.
    Supportact said: [my style is] probably more an accumulation of limitations and bad habits than a 'style'.
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  • I presume the Jailbreak lyric was tongue in cheek. Various little funnies in Lynott's lyrics.
    Tipton is a small fishing village in the borough of Sandwell. 
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  • Anything ever by James Blunt.

    "Those three Wise Men, they've got a semi by the sea"

    hehe. Semi.

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  • Anything ever by James Blunt.

    "Those three Wise Men, they've got a semi by the sea"

    hehe. Semi.

    Surely that lyric would be worse if they found the sea even more arousing.
    My muse is not a horse and art is not a race.
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  • frankusfrankus Frets: 4719
    edited September 2013
    The obvious lyric

    was penned in 1969 by John McCririck.


    To my mind, the concept of an "obvious lyric" is a peril of judging, slavishness to intellectualism and complacency to be avoided.

    So much of life is obvious we can't call it to mind all the time.

    There's the look, the sounds, the touch, the smell, the taste, the feelings...

    Sometimes the tautologies we create have a profoundness that some people get.

    ...and who's to decide what is obvious?

    By the time I recognize this moment
    This moment will be gone
    But I will bend the light
    Pretending that it somehow lingered on
    It's obvious, we all do it... it's good to remember we do it... it's even better to remember we all do it.

    Some people won't get that lyric, other people will - it resonates with their life experiences, to some people it'll be obvious - a song writer cannot wring his hands expecting acceptance of all his lyrics - he'd be repeatedly crushed by those people saying "I could have written that" and ignoring the fact that they didn't.

    "I woke up this morning" I got up and shook the living shit out of it until it was awake.

    If you don't like it, better it.

    A sig-nat-eur? What am I meant to use this for ffs?! Is this thing recording?
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  • I presume the Jailbreak lyric was tongue in cheek. Various little funnies in Lynott's lyrics.

    Without the tongue in cheek phrases that Phil Lynott placed almost randomly in a lot on Thin Lizzy's songs then I think they could have faced a lot more objection to some his lyrical content.  I think that approach of never quite knowing if he is being entirely serious was a very clever tact.  
    My muse is not a horse and art is not a race.
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  • I saw Mr Lynott live twice. A very long time ago but pretty sure he had a cheeky grin on his face through both gigs. Total star. Black Country lad, of course.
    Tipton is a small fishing village in the borough of Sandwell. 
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