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Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing Lyrics
Who's that stomping all over my face?
Where's that silhouette I'm trying to trace?
Who's putting sponge in the bells I once rung?
And taking my gypsy before she's begun?
To singing the meaning of what's in my mind,
Before I can take home what's rightfully mine.
Joinin' and listenin' and talkin' in rhymes,
Stoppin' the feeling to wait for the times.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
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And who's all hung-up on that happiness thing?
Who's trying to tune all the bells that he rings?
And who's in the corner and down on the floor?
With pencil and paper just counting the score?
And who's trying to act like he just in between?
The night isn't black, if you know that it's green.
Don't bother looking, you're too blind to see,
Who's coming on like he wanted to be.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
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And who's coming home on the old ninety five?
Who's got the feeling to keep him alive,
Though havin' it, sharin' it ain't quite the same,
It ain't no gold nugget, you can't lay a claim.
Who's seeing eyes through the crack in the floor,
There it is baby, don't you worry no more.
Who should be sleepin', but is writing this song,
Wishin' and a-hopin' he weren't so damned wrong.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
Where's that silhouette I'm trying to trace?
Who's putting sponge in the bells I once rung?
And taking my gypsy before she's begun?
To singing the meaning of what's in my mind,
Before I can take home what's rightfully mine.
Joinin' and listenin' and talkin' in rhymes,
Stoppin' the feeling to wait for the times.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
And who's all hung-up on that happiness thing?
Who's trying to tune all the bells that he rings?
And who's in the corner and down on the floor?
With pencil and paper just counting the score?
And who's trying to act like he just in between?
The night isn't black, if you know that it's green.
Don't bother looking, you're too blind to see,
Who's coming on like he wanted to be.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
Â
Who's got the feeling to keep him alive,
Though havin' it, sharin' it ain't quite the same,
It ain't no gold nugget, you can't lay a claim.
Who's seeing eyes through the crack in the floor,
There it is baby, don't you worry no more.
Who should be sleepin', but is writing this song,
Wishin' and a-hopin' he weren't so damned wrong.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
Who's saying baby, that don't mean a thing,
'Cause nowadays Clancy can't even sing.
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Perhaps I should call this "interpretation, "not "meaning" but I really think I understand it.
This is a song about an artist who thinks he has lost his muse. But that's the paradox: the song itself is beautiful and works. Perhaps it is not everything it should be in the eyes of he who wrote it, but the power of the increasing motion of the waltz cadence makes it perfect to me.
It's a song of regret for talent lost and wasted. It is self reproach, and a call to be honest. The "who" is a question: who is to blame for his inability to connect to his art and his audience? It is a song that says, "you know perfectly well that it is you yourself who is in your own way. Thus, nobody is stomping on his face, its an excuse he will no longer abide. He says to himself: You once "rang bells" that is you could hit the audience where they lived. You once could concentrate and work patiently with the "gypsy" which is inspiration. You pretend someone has kidnapped her, but you let her go yourself, "stopping the feeling", in order to be hip. The second verse shows him looking in all the wrong places. (By the way, "it can only be screened" should be "it can only be green") which makes sense if he is saying that only nature can bring back his talent, he can't get it artificially. In the third verse he's turning a corner, recognizing he still values what he does, although it gets harder to do it.
See what he does here and see if you agree: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0wzjXsG8ts
@sparrowC Your first half is excellent. I feel you've gotten it exactly. It's about Neil being the tortured artist, who has no confidence in himself. BTW, as someone else suggested wrongly, it wasn't the record company that didn't want Neil to sing this, it was Neil himself who felt he was awful. Neil's nickname was "Clancy" and the singing reference is obvious. Also, "paint a gold nugget, you can't lay a claim," meaning if you write a crappy song, but dress it up pretty, it's still false (crappy) you can't claim it's not. Neil was so insecure, as...
@sparrowC Your first half is excellent. I feel you've gotten it exactly. It's about Neil being the tortured artist, who has no confidence in himself. BTW, as someone else suggested wrongly, it wasn't the record company that didn't want Neil to sing this, it was Neil himself who felt he was awful. Neil's nickname was "Clancy" and the singing reference is obvious. Also, "paint a gold nugget, you can't lay a claim," meaning if you write a crappy song, but dress it up pretty, it's still false (crappy) you can't claim it's not. Neil was so insecure, as many artists were(are). If he couldn't even sing his own words, then what's the point of even writing new ones. All in all, you had a great interpretation.
I think the first verse is about people holding him down and stopping him from what he wants to do.
The second verse is definitly about people who worry too much about everything being perfect, that things are a certain way and you just got to deal with it. Ex.-tune all the bells, counting the score etc
The third is about how happiness is intangible and you just have to find it.
From what I remember its inspired by two events in Neil's early life and references them.
First, the person who is ringing the bells and the Clancy that can't sing references a boy that Neil went to school with that would run around ringing a small bell and singing at the top of his lungs. I don't remember what Neil said the boy had, but he was disabled. Someone took the bell from the boy and it took all the joy out of him and he wouldn't sing anymore.
Second, the lines "Who's seeing eyes through the crack in the floor, There it is baby, don't you worry no more. Who should be sleepin', but is writing this song, Wishin' and a-hopin' he weren't so damned wrong" These are about Neil himself. He watched an ex-girlfriend of his with another boy through the cracks in a floor.
The rest is vague, it seems to deal with the pressures of fame, but more likely about being an outcast or a fear of being misunderstood because this song was actually written well before Buffalo Springfield was together. Stephen Stills and Richie Furay they were in a folk singing group called the Au-Go-Go Singers and they first met Neil Young while they were Thunder Bay, ON in Canada. Neil took the around the town in his hearse, the same one he later drove to LA, and Richie first heard the song performed by Neil in one of the folk clubs and Richie began to sing it and cover it himself, which was one of the reasons Richie ended up singing it on the album and not Neil.
In 1966 I had the good fortune to do a recording session at Gold Star Studios in Hollywood with a 5 piece pop band, all teenagers. As we entered the studio to set up our instruments, we had to clear out the various items left from the preceding session. The sound engineer was very excited about the group that he had just recorded, a group called something like "buffalo springsomething". In the center of the studio was a music stand with a lyric sheet. A couple of the guys wandered over to the handwritten sheet and...
In 1966 I had the good fortune to do a recording session at Gold Star Studios in Hollywood with a 5 piece pop band, all teenagers. As we entered the studio to set up our instruments, we had to clear out the various items left from the preceding session. The sound engineer was very excited about the group that he had just recorded, a group called something like "buffalo springsomething". In the center of the studio was a music stand with a lyric sheet. A couple of the guys wandered over to the handwritten sheet and tried to make sense out of the words on the paper. A few minutes later the studio door opened with a young man making his way to the music stand, taking the lyric sheet, and dashing out the door without a word. It struck me as odd that he didn't bother to even say hi, smile, or explain what he was doing. I remember he had a jet black hair, and was wearing a green turtleneck, and what we called fruit boots. Years later I remember looking at a photo of the band and recognized Neil Young. But since Richie sang the song, I assumed he wrote it. It was not until reading this blog that I finally realized why it was Neil that burst into the studio to retrieve his lyrics.
@twarn85 Cool story, thanks
@twarn85 Cool story, thanks
Just beautiful. Like so many of Neil's early songs, the lyrics are very surrealistic, but so evocative. It's too bad that the rest of the guys in the Springfield didn't let him sing this one. Or maybe it was their manager or record label. I remember somebody saying his voice was "too weird" in this time period, leading to Richie Furay singing a lot of the Neil compositions.
Its about a school friend of Youngs who had MS
I thought it was another documented case of Neil chafing under being asked to follow someone else's lead, like the Management Group, Accounting Dept of the Record Company (other's laying claim to his gold nugget, the same creep working the record Co's 9-5).
Sounds like Neil was upset about not being allowed to sing his own songs. I love Neil’s music, but Richie Furay did a great job. As for the earlier remark about the boy with the bell - I think Neil could identify with being treated differently or worse. His kind of talent would have made him an outsider.