submissions
| The Rolling Stones – Paint It Black Lyrics
| 7 days ago
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No more will my green sea go turn a deeper blue
The bereavement is causing the persona so much grief that he wants black, the colour of death, mourning, funerals, to replace all the other colours, especially warm, lively red. But the sea is different. Its colour depends on the colour of the sky: a green sea is what you see under a cloudy sky, and therefore on a cold day, so bathing is unpleasant. When the clouds go away and the sky is blue, the sea turns a deep shade of blue and also warmer, and becomes perfect for happy holiday activities - swimming, surfing, sailing, but he can't enjoy that or anything, so as far as he is concerned, the sea is an unhappy, cold green for ever. |
submissions
| The Kinks – Lola Lyrics
| 10 days ago
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Lola's bewildered lover had left HOME just a week before; certainly not 'left how', which has no meaning. |
submissions
| Peter Sarstedt – Where Do You Go To (My Lovely) Lyrics
| 19 days ago
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Not lowly brown tags - that would be meaningless in the back streets of Naples! Lowly-born tags were the signs, visible to the people around them, that they were hungry, underprivileged, neglected. |
submissions
| Eddy Grant – Gimme Hope Jo'anna Lyrics
| 1 month ago
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@[VanDiemen16:54939] Hi, Van Dieman! The sound of drums, setting the rhythm for soldiers to march by, would (if it had ever happened) have meant that other countries were considering taking military action against the SA government (and of course the whole country). Don't make me wait till the morning comes: morning is a new dawn, a new beginning, and the singer is simply tired of waiting! He wants change, and he wants it immediately. That would certainly have been a threat to the apartheid government, and they were well aware of it and would have taken stern action if it had ever happened. Which it didn't: the South African miracle of free and fair elections actually happened, and to this day I don't know what we did to deserve it. A story with a happy ending: OK, no country is perfect, but today's South Africa is very much better. |
submissions
| Bob Dylan – Boots of Spanish Leather Lyrics
| 1 month ago
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Why do the lyrics not appear? Please remove the nonsense that does, and put the rel words in its place - if necessary you can probably get them from Genius.com Thank you |
submissions
| Sugarplum Fairy – Everlasting Me Lyrics
| 1 month ago
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@[Scolopax:54809] Guys in glasses are typically nerds whom no respectable (?) rocker would take seriously. By noticing one and actually being kind to him, the band emphasise their tolerance of difference and their universal appeal! |
submissions
| Bryan Adams – Please Forgive Me Lyrics
| 2 months ago
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I'd love to love this song. But "Please forgive me, I know not what I do" spoils it for me every time. It sounds so fake! Why not "I don't know what to do"? Slightly different meaning, but at least it's good English. |
submissions
| The Beatles – The Fool on the Hill Lyrics
| 3 months ago
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@[bigbird1040:54438] Oh dear. Actually, the Fool on or off the hill must surely be anyone who still believes that Paul died. How they explain the ongoing presence of Paul and Ringo, and the long-time absence of George and John, only they know, or rather, think they know. |
submissions
| Hair – Hair Lyrics
| 3 months ago
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In the first stanza, it should be "It's not for lack of bread like the Grateful Dead" - neat little dig at a largely forgotten band, and of course bread (which is slang for money) rhymes with Dead, unlike break, which doesn't mean anything in context. |
submissions
| Claude King – Wolverton Mountain Lyrics
| 4 months ago
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A tribute to unrealistic stupidity. Who in their right mind would "fall in love" with someone he's never seen, who is said to be pretty, and who has a homicidal maniac for a father? Impossible to take it seriously, and a waste of a pleasant piece of music.
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submissions
| Leonard Cohen – Suzanne Lyrics
| 5 months ago
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And just when you mean to tell her that you have no love to give her
Then he gets you on her wavelength
makes no sense. Who is 'he', all of a sudden? But if 'she' gets you on her wavelength, everything is clear. Please fix what is probably a typo! |
submissions
| Albert Hammond – The Free Electric Band Lyrics
| 7 months ago
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Oh, and also: the teacher taught US values which we had to learn to keep. Not necessarily his values, though no doubt they looked as if they were. And the girl from Berkeley surely had DEEP-ROOTED attitudes and morals, not, of all things, the brutal ones! |
submissions
| 10cc – Dreadlock Holiday Lyrics
| 8 months ago
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@[Recker:53466] Queering someone's pitch is (dated) slang for messing them around, making life difficult for them. A cricket pitch has to be smooth, beautifully well prepared, and making it queer (as in, peculiar!) would be sabotage and would spoil the match. |
submissions
| Donovan – Jennifer Juniper Lyrics
| 8 months ago
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Where these lyrics show "Yes I do so", I have always heard, or thought I heard, "Yes, I do, sir", the implication being that the singer is telling Jennifer's father that he loves her and (maybe!) wants to marry her. Please confirm or deny. |
submissions
| Queen – We Will Rock You Lyrics
| 9 months ago
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A typo correction, not a question:
Buddy, you're an old man, poor man,
Pleading with your eyes, gonna make you some peace some day |
submissions
| Donovan – Lord of the Dance Lyrics
| 10 months ago
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Surely it's "hard to dance with the devil on your back"? "It's hard who dance ..." makes no sense. Thank you! |
submissions
| The Kinks – Lola Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Should be 'Well, I left HOME just a week before' Pity to spoil a great song - thank you! |
submissions
| The Scaffold – Lily The Pink Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Misprint, perhaps? "and now he joins in all their games" should be SHE because it's about how Jennifer Eccles gets popular with the boys after Medicinal Compound cures her freckles! |
submissions
| Boney M. – Rasputin Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Not full of ecstacy and vile! It makes no sense, and unlike 'fire' (the correct word), vile doesn't rhyme with 'desire'. |
submissions
| Boney M. – Rasputin Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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@[Hooters1:52290] 'Cat' was slang for a hip, fashionable, somewhat kinky, attractive person. And a cat who really was gone is just one of these people who went to extremes. |
submissions
| Kenny Rogers – Lucille Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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I'm on Lucille's side. Seems that her husband doesn't want a wife, lover, companion: he wants an unpaid child minder and farm labourer. |
submissions
| Johnnie Ray – Cry Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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In today's world, this doesn't really need saying. In the 1950s, though, tears were strictly for females: tiny boys were told that 'Boys don't cry', and this applied even more to men! Johnnie Ray was known to sob while singing, and became known as Johnnie 'Cry-Baby' Ray. Now, we can see that he was ahead of his time, recognising the need for catharsis. |
submissions
| The Beatles – A Day in the Life Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Surely the lucky man has made the grade? Which means, has succeeded. He hasn't made the grave or any grave: OK, he's made it into the grave, but he's actually succeeded in getting the *! out of life, making his escape from everything that's petty and unsatisfactory. |
submissions
| Bee Gees – Massachusetts Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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@[oooz:51750] Perhaps he is in what is now the real Massachusetts, but not the one he remembers and still longs for, although it's gone. |
submissions
| Glen Campbell – Gentle On My Mind Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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@[DaveLynn12:50507] if you can see a religious reference in this song, you need your eyes tested. Clearly your belief is real to you, but leave the rest of us to our own reality, please. |
submissions
| Fleetwood Mac – Songbird Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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One of my oldest and dearest friends died recently. With his last breath, he said he could see birds and butterflies! (And his niece, who wasn't there either ...) And my love for him has certainly not changed. Not the band's intentions, no doubt, but that is what it means to me. |
submissions
| Dexys Midnight Runners – Come On Eileen Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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@[matt1111:49779] Re Johnny Ray: he was the "blue-collar" crooner, which means that his appeal was to the working class (blue overalls rather than the bright white shirts/blouses of bankers and lawyers. Maybe 'caller' was a typo of yours, but it should be corrected anyway. Thanks for a good analysis! |
submissions
| The Shangri-Las – Leader of the Pack Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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The way the chorus behave just like teenagers trying to get info out of their friend is brilliant. Then, the times merge and blur: Jimmy won't be picking her up after school any more, but she can't get the words out. And as she explains about the end of her love affair, and of Jimmy, the chorus are so involved, they become like spectators. And for that reason I would change the spelling:
As he drove away on that rainy night
I begged him to go slow, whether he heard
I'll never know (know, know, know, know, know, know, know)
Look out, look out, look out
Surely that should be:
whether he hears I'l never know - and then the sound of a crash and the chorus surely are screaming No, no, no, no, no, no, no, rather than repeating her know, know ...? |
submissions
| Paul Simon – Mother and Child Reunion Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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I once taught a very difficult child - bright, didn't apply herself, rules didn't exist for her - whose story fits this song. Her parents' marriage was failing; he specialised in having affairs and walking away, very manipulative and unpleasant. My pupil, let's call her Clare, was abour 12, 13. One day she took her younger brother on a bus ride after school so they could watch a beautiful ship leaving the harbour. When they got home, she found a letter from her mother saying that she couldn't stand it any more and was leaving that day, on that very ship. Anyone might have developed behaviour problems. I tried to connect with Clare and sort-of did. She and her mother corresponded; after a couple of years, mother could buy her a ticket so they could be together again. This meant leaving the family - ghastly father, little brother, seriously withdrawn elder sister - and the only friends she'd ever known. (She was a Jew and loudly claimed to have a Muslim boyfriend!) So, the mother and child reunion! I don't know if it ever did work out or if her hopes were false. But the song brings it all back to me, every time. |
submissions
| U2 – With or Without You Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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This song means more to me than U2 ever intended. I first heard it when my four-year-old daughter was in hospital, comatose and dying. There was nothing that anyone, me, the doctors, whoever, could do, and my pain was intense. And suddenly there the whole appalling situation was, in the words and the music and Bono's incredible voice. The worst or best bit was 'I can't live with or without you': at that time she was still alive but unresponsive, both with and without life, and I felt the same: she wasn't with us any more but we weren't completely without her yet either. It's been more than 30 years, and I can listen to the song and, in a way, enjoy it - it is brilliant and beautiful - but the memories do come back. I wanted to clarify my previous comment: it didn't say enough. |
submissions
| Dexys Midnight Runners – Come On Eileen Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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'Endearing young chums' means nothing at all. 'Endearing young charms', however, completes the quote from an Irish (and Eileen is an Irish name) song written by Thomas Hood in 1808. The message is that love continues even when youth and beauty don't:
'Thou would'st still be adored as this moment thou art,
Let the loveliness fade as it will;
And around the dear ruin, each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still!'
And there's a second verse with the same message. |
submissions
| Boney M. – Rasputin Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[J:47341].J. The deadly disease was haemophilia, inherited by male children from their mothers. It prevents the blood from clotting, so a tiny bruise can result in the patient bleeding to death. Rasputin, like all faith healers, succeeded up to a point and did help the little boy to feel more confident. |
submissions
| U2 – With or Without You Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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By sheer chance, I heard this song for the first time when my four-year-old daughter was terminally ill and hospitalised. She died the next day. Very powerful associations. |
submissions
| U2 – Pride (In the Name of Love) Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[Berg24:47109] Bonhoeffer was executed by hanging: with a rope, not on barbed wire. That is surely a reference to trench warfare in World War 1.
Gandhi certainly resisted, but so did many others: Abraham Lincoln, why not? Edith Cavell? OK, she was a woman, but so what? MLK, and JFK; and Albert Luthuli, who also came to overthrow out of love..
One man washed on an empty beach: Normandy beaches weren't exactly empty, but at other times and places in WW2 it would fit. Not Casement, though: he was put ashore on a beach, arrested a good distance from it, and tried and executed in London. |
submissions
| Laura Branigan – Gloria Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[hferro:46333] A main line for trains is an important railway line. It runs between big cities: Paris-Rome, not Paris-Versailles. And we talk about catching a train; finding it and getting on board. If it's a mainline train, it's big and important and fast-moving and expensive. The contrast with catching someone on the rebound is that you could meet and link up with anybody on the rebound, but if you meet someone on the main line, you and he are going somewhere important and expensive for a good reason. Does that help? I hope so. |
submissions
| Meat Loaf – Objects in the Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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I can't agree with the lyrics at one point:
Those were the rights of spring and we did everything
There was salvation every night
There is a ballet, now a classic but very controversial when first performed in 1813, The Rite of Spring. Music by Stravinsky, danced by Nijinsky and for its time, sexually explicit! And these lyrics work much better with "the rites of Spring" than "rights", which doesn't even make sense. Clearly, what he and Julie were doing in the back seat was more like a youthful ritual than something they were entitled to. |
submissions
| David Bowie – Space Oddity Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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First, there's Ground Control. They really enjoy being in control: telling Major Tom in detail what to swallow, what to wear, pointing out that he might not be feeling very brave about his next step - the step outside his spaceship - and making him seem trivial: all that really matters on the ground is using him to sell shirts! Then there's Major Tom. Just a puppet really. Doing what he's told. Until he sees and understands the reality of space, the distant Earth, the immense distances, and how very unimportant he is in that context. How very unimportant people are. Planet Earth is literally and figuratively blue, and he can't make it better; nothing he does can possibly matter, least of all whose shirts he wears! "Tell my wife I love her very much" is a farewell message which Ground Control typically miunderstand: She knows! Of course she does; but they don't realise that it's his final Goodbye. His spaceship knows which way to go; he isn't needed there; even his death isn't important. No, he certainly can't hear them, and he never will. Not just a puppet of the Ground Control team any more; now he is his own man, making his own final choice. |
submissions
| Elton John – Crocodile Rock Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[opeth2009:45457] To quote from another rock classic: Still, a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. You are so far off target that you've probably bumped into yourself by now. |
submissions
| Culture Club – Karma Chameleon Lyrics
| 3 years ago
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Surely "Is there loving in your eyes all the way?" makes more sense than "Desert loving", which doesn't seem to mean anything. The song's theme is that the part-time partner is inconsistent, coming and going, sometimes loving and sometimes a rival. OK, maybe desert loving could be sometimes hot, sometimes very cold, always sterile ... but it's a stretch. |
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