submissions
| The Blue Nile – Let's Go Out Tonight Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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This beautiful fragile song outlines the desperation of a failing relationship, in my interpretation. The protagonist is clinging onto a situation that he knows is doomed (‘pray for me…’) and hopes that taking his partner out into downtown lights of Glasgow will rekindle something (maybe that’s where they met?), although he realises that it probably won’t. |
submissions
| Ryan Adams – Carolina Rain Lyrics
| 3 years ago
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I met Ryan Adams a few years ago and we got talking about this song. He confirmed that the song’s narrator is, indeed, a ghost, which is why he’s ‘still there at the banquet hall where the gun went off’. |
submissions
| Gangway – My Girl and Me Lyrics
| 6 years ago
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I love this song, I remember it getting a lot of radio play in the UK circa 1988. I was late teens then and just liked the song. Later, in my late twenties I had a girlfriend whom I met on the local bar circuit. We had a fast, wild and thrilling affair but I soon realised that our entire relationship, as exciting and fun as it was, was based entirely around going out and getting pissed. I realised that she was a borderline alcoholic and it all imploded spectacularly in a storm of recriminations, infidelity and yes, you guessed it, alcohol. I heard this song one day on a mix CD I’d made for the car years before and it all suddenly became totally relatable. |
submissions
| Yazoo – The Other Side of Love Lyrics
| 6 years ago
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I always thought this song was about the joy of, er, shall we say, backdoor fun. Haysi Fantaysee’s John Wayne Is Big Leggy was about the same thing, there must’ve been something in the air in 1982! |
submissions
| ABBA – Slipping Through My Fingers Lyrics
| 7 years ago
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This is such a beautiful, powerful song. I'm a 49 year old man and I can barely listen to it because it makes me cry.
Every parent knows that being a parent is equal parts joy, pain and guilt, and this song captures this perfectly.
The line:
'I let precious time go by
Then when she's gone, there's that odd melancholy feeling
And a sense of guilt I can't deny
What happened to the wonderful adventures
The places I had planned for us to go
Well some of that we did but most we didn't
And why, I just don't know...'
just kills me and is more confirmation, as if it were needed, of ABBA's genius. |
submissions
| Glass Animals – Gooey Lyrics
| 8 years ago
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It's about sex, about wanting to get it on. I read an interview with the singer where he said that his mum said she'd liked the tune but thought the lyrics were pure filth! |
submissions
| The Streets – Weak Become Heroes Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Such a fantastic, poignant song. Mike Skinner is a very overlooked lyricist, few have captured their surroundings and situation better.
The song is obviously about the early '90s rave scene, and while Pulp's 'Sorted For E's and Whizz' is dismissive and cynical, 'Weak Become Heroes' is affectionate and nostalgic.
As someone has previously written, the key verse in this song is: 'then girl in the cafe taps me on the shoulder / I realise five years went by and I'm older...' How time passes inexorably, how age creeps up on you, how you can one day turn around and everything has changed before your eyes.
I listen to this song a lot. I'm about the same age as Mike Skinner but I wasn't into the rave scene that much, but when I hear it I think about times in my life that were good, memories I have, people I knew, places I used to go to. Our past is what defines us, and while we can never go back there it's comforting to have those memories. Mike Skinner captures that feeling better than anyone else ever has. |
submissions
| Athlete – shake those windows Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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My favourite Athlete song by far. Just a song about nostalgia I guess, thinking back to listening to old skool hip hop in days gone by (possibly at university?). Love it. |
submissions
| Athlete – Best Not to Think About it Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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Yep - Joel Potts stated in an interview that the lyrics concern a couple on the edge of jumping from the World Trade Center, and the fear and helplessness they must have felt, followed by the inevitable peace. |
submissions
| Stereophonics – A Thousand Trees Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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The line 'It only takes one tree to make a thousand matches / It only takes one match to burn a thousand trees' is absolute genius. How easily rumours are spread and how easily the reputations of innocent people can be trashed forever. The imagery is spot on: lines like 'You can hear them in the school yard, scrap yard, chip shop, phone box, in the pool hall, at the shoe stall' really sets the scene of Chinese whispers and vicious gossips being passed around the town. The image of the photo of the man in question gathering dust behind the bar of the sports club having once been a local hero is almost cinematic; Kelly Jones packs enough material and intrigue for a novel or a movie into a 4 minute song. Kelly Jones is an amazing writer. I know you can't write about the goings-on in your home village forever but I wish he'd start writing like this again. He seems to have left that whole style behind. |
submissions
| Stereophonics – Just Lookin' Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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This song came out sometime after I'd just broken up with someone, and the lyrics really summed up how I was feeling at that time. I was single, having a good time, and weighing up my options - in no hurry to commit to anybody or make any decisions yet on where my life was headed - just looking, not buying. So much of what we see is false and meaningless. We worry about getting left behind and end up making rash decisions which come back to bite us - 'the more you fly, the more you risk your life'. This song made me realise I had to sort myself out first and take stock before moving on to the next chapter of my life. To take things slowly and make the right choices. |
submissions
| Stereophonics – Devil Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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One of the best things they've done in recent years. Dark, sexy tune. To me it's about a one night stand, possibly adulterous. He's trying to tempt a girl who is already with someone ('Ever dance with the devil baby?'), or he's already with someone and is trying get with the girl. I imagine the scenario playing out in hotel bar, two people away from home and alone for the night, looking for a bit of illicit company. |
submissions
| Chicane – No Ordinary Morning Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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I remember this song from when it was out around 2000 and it kind of washed over me, then years later I came across it again on You Tube. I'd just come through a very painful and sudden break-up, and this song hit the nail on the head for me - the lyrics made total sense. I love Tracey Ackermann's vocal too; she sounds stunned, numb - she plays the role of the character in the song very well. A bit of a lost classic, I think. |
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