| Steely Dan – Any World (That I'm Welcome To) Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| Any world will do | |
| The Hold Steady – Chillout Tent Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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Wow, never realized it but you've hit on something crucial. The voices (especially the female) sound shyly casual but also innocent. And anonymous. I feel it's subtly tragic they never saw each other again. Imagine Mick and Madonna singing this song (don't really, but bear with me), you'd be like "Big deal, you both fucked 100,000 people since then, including Marianne Faithfull, so ick," |
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| The Hold Steady – You Can Make Him Like You Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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Like most songs, it's about Donald Fagen. I'd never thought about two ways to read "you can make him like you". However, the idea of making him the same way you are fails for two reasons. There's always other boys and you came make him LIKE you is how the song sounds, which connotes differently than There's always other boys and you can make him like YOU. Plus the second version is a non sequitor |
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| The Hold Steady – Chillout Tent Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I feel strongly about this song. 1. It is unbelievably good. 2. Altho these guys would not exist without Springsteen, this song makes Springsteen sound like a corny grandpa. 3. This song is Romeo and Juliet for the ADD crowd. I mean this in a very good sense. 4. This song breaks my heart, so 5. I still wish the boy and girl somehow ran into each other after the song was recorded. 6, The girl's voice makes me really horny 7. Very few songs inspire a single comment, let alone seven, from me. 8. Or eight. Did I mention this song is unbelievably good. It should be a religion. They should offer it up as a Higher Power at Twelve Step meetings. 9. This song is unbelievably good. |
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| Steely Dan – Rikki Don't Lose That Number Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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Wow, I always thought the lyric was " . . . scared yourself, you turnin wrong" Not coincidentally, I always thought this was a love song from Rikki's first gay lover, from whom Rikki is fleeing, but who is not the only thing Rikki is fleeing. How do you reason with someone not just rejecting you, but rejecting your very sexuality. |
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| The Hold Steady – Sequestered in Memphis Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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Hey, the chorus isn't "Arrested in Texas, extradited to Memphis." You get subpoenad and sequestered when you're a WITNESS. He had a casual romp with a woman in whom the authorities have a keen interest. Also it's not an interview when you're the suspect, it's an interrogation. And his boredom and fatigue are part and parcel with his innocence. He's telling them it cant be important, it can't make any difference. It's the prerogative of a witness who's been subpoena'd and sequestered to ridicule the cops inquiries. It's a familiar comic tale of a guy who has a little fun only to find out it causes way more problems than pleasure. More funny if you think of the singer as married. He goes to Memphis on business, then has to explain to his wife in Texas why he's been subpoenad and flown back to Memphis to testify or whatever. |
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| Gang of Four – Armalite Rifle Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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This is just a perfect execution of the deadpan rave-up. Drily funny, deadly serious, while rocking your pleasure points to delirium. I agree with all the lyrical corrections except the versions I have definitely say "So does Dave." And I give full credit to those who hear Jon or John on their versions. Nobody's gonna mistake Dave for John. Back in the days of singles/EP's the Gang definitely gave you yer money's worth. This, Capital, To Hell With Poverty, are probably all in their top 10 if not 6, yet not on any contemporary album, er CD. |
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| Bruce Springsteen – Born in the U.S.A. Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I haven't read ALL the comments, but this is a very sophisticated lyric. It tugs you every which way. Certainly there's sympathy for the Vietnam vet, but the narrator's line about going to a "foreign land to go and kill the yellow man" reflects not just the government's policy miscalculation, but its racist underpinning, which the narrator fully adopts and endorses. The line about "they're still there, he's all gone", is heartbreaking, and yet bears within it resentment of enemies still living in what is in fact their home country, in which the narrator was an invader. From the first verse, the narrator's been fucked his whole life, and by the final verse, of what does he have to boast? The simple geographically accident that he was born here; to the extent that amounts to patriotism, it is patriotism as empty gesture a desperate grab for self-worth, from a man whose experience has provided him no reason to be patriotic at all. |
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| Peter Gabriel – Exposure Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| This song is about Donald Fagen | |
| Steely Dan – Pretzel Logic Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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"Fagen once said one of their songs contains a "hidden" account of Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch. I believe this is that song." That is one of the funniest things I've ever read, I guess especially if Fagen said it. My vote would go to "Aja". Fagen also said that one of their songs contains a secret narration of one of Ronald Reagan's surgeries, from the point of view of one of the polyps. |
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| Steely Dan – Any World (That I'm Welcome To) Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| If this song had somehow magically materialized in the discography of some sincere plodder like, oh, Bruce Springsteen, or Bob Seger, or Southside Johnny, or Bon Jovi, it would have reached iconic anthem status, the kind where a song is trotted out and sung along to for particular occasions like, um, graduations for people who didn't attend the graduation? Or, uh, the party kids throw the night before they run away from home? Hmm, maybe, uh, mass suicides? Ah, never mind. Great song, though, taken on its face, which nobody wants to do because nobody trusts the Dan. | |
| The Beatles – Polythene Pam Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I heart this comment | |
| R.E.M. – Voice Of Harold Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I like this better than Chinese Brothers. It's a great track and to throw those words on top and belt them just as fervently, it's the best joke they ever told, because although the album cover blurbs are the ostensible target, the band and its pretensions are as well. A stroke of genius. | |
| R.E.M. – Kohoutec Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I agree, I think this is their most beautiful (and powerful) song and one of the most beautiful in popular music. So there, I said it. Loss, regret, desire, just listen to that. You don't have to understand a word of the lyrics to know what the song's about. |
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| The Beatles – Polythene Pam Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I love how that central acoustic guitar riff is kind of spaced out and a little behind where you expect it to be and never quite interacts with the electric riff they way you'd expect until the song just takes off away from it and romps into the powerful percussive extravagance that ends it. The lyrics are Mr. Mustard narrating an ode to his sister. |
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| Genesis – Here Comes The Supernatural Anaesthetist Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| A way under-rated song that actually belongs to the Hackett and Rutherford and Collins who break loose in a pretty stunning little performance revolving around Hackett's guitar solo, but the rhythm guitar is steadily hypnotic and Collins vocalistics are gorgeous and playful, sort of bouncing off of the various melodic and rhythmic gestures, and then it suddenly winds out with another ominous and beautiful run by Hackett. It just has a very interesting and unique feel, intense, layered, yet unhurried and graceful. A gem. I loved Hackett's moments in their albums of this period. I can't judge his chops, but his ideas and sonic approach were special. | |
| Genesis – It Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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An unfairly forgotten and under-rated track from them, coming at the end of the fourth side (vinyl-speak). It could be a lot of things, but I think I hear Gabriel's good-bye kiss to Genesis and their fans here. I think it's about his Muse and where it's taking him. As for the music, there's actually a pretty rocking song buried in the mix beneath the vocals and synth fills. Mike and Steve (and Phil) must have been pissed, they sound like a hell of a party three blocks away. |
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| The Beatles – Love Me Do Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I felt the same way about "Knows Never Tomorrow" and "Nair" | |
| The Beatles – Tomorrow Never Knows Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I think this song is about what happens when two boys from Liverpool take a lot of LSD and how ultimately they both fall in love with the drummer. | |
| The Beatles – If I Needed Someone Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| The Beatles wrote such beautiful melodies and sang such gorgeous harmonies for lyrics often written about silly things. And don't misinterpret what I mean by silly. They were often silliest (and joyful) when writing about adult topics and most serious when writing about childhood or children. | |
| The Beatles – And Your Bird Can Sing Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I actually love that version as well, it always makes me crack up. But I always thought it was the two of them cracking each other up, an image I loved: the two old mates busting up in the studio giggling like genies. | |
| The Beatles – And Your Bird Can Sing Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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This is not a new thought, but sometimes, many times, it matters little what the artist thinks about the work, or what he/she says it's "about." When I hear or sing this song, what really resonates with me is the "you don't get me" and the "you can't see me" sung with such defiance and liberation because it's a wonderful realization. It means it's your problem and your loss that you don't get/see me, not mine. I'm not judging you, though, just let me know if a light goes off in your head. That's the words and the singing. Then those guitars sound wild and beautiful like animals released from a cage, racing around around each other, maybe even, uh, birds. |
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| The Beatles – Please Please Me Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Well to the "innocents", I have a question. How does he know he's pleasing her? And how does he know how he's pleasing her? An innocent explanation needs an explanation. She's happy with the attention and devotion he bestows upon her, it pleases her, right? So, what's the problem? If his company and affection make her happy, and she's made that known, why would he have to beg her please him in the same way. It's apparently not a situation where he's getting the cold shoulder and brush-off from a girl he desires, because his continued efforts would not PLEASE her, and he would not know that they PLEASE her, because he'd be getting the brush-off. That's a different lyric, that situation. I'm doin all this stuff trying to impress you and get your attention and affection and you don't give me the time of day. Plus that girl would not be "his" girl. He's doing something for his girl that makes her happy and if she did it for him it would make him happy, he knows it makes her happy, she knows he knows it makes her happy and it's to the point that he's pleading for it. So it's about unrequited foot massage? He does her taxes, but he can't stand to do his own? |
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| The Beatles – Please Please Me Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I love Lennon's "come on"s as well. They're almost comical, yet confident, buoyant, valiant, endearing, commanding, chiding, encouraging, reassuring, tender yet demanding, all at once. | |
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