Worst Lines in Good Songs

[crisp]

I thought it was "She looks straight ahead, not at me"

Yes it is. The song is supposed to be sung by a man. Any third-person substitution is down to the incompetent singer.

Then there's always this immortal couplet from "These Foolish Things":

"A tinkling piano in the next apartment,

Those stumbling words that told you what my heart meant"

Wow. You're hard to please.

Oh, and Dylan and Reed are amateurs next to the likes of Mitchell Parish (who wrote the words to Stars Fell on Alabama).

[AllenLowe]

didn't he also write the lyric to Stardust?

Stairway to the Stars? and maybe some things with Frank Signorelli.

Edited December 1, 2009 by AllenLowe

[crisp]

Yes, yes and yes (Stairway to the Stars was written with Signorelli). He had a thing about stars.

[fasstrack]

Oscar Hammerstein wrote in You'll Never Walk Alone 'When you walk through the storm keep your chin up high. No one keeps their chin up---they do chin ups But a proper editorial correction was made by just about every singer who ever performed it, and they properly say 'hold your head up high'. I think even Hammerstein conceded the point eventually.

That's one reason I always preferred Hart......

[AllenLowe]

actually it was amended by Mrs. T. Woods to: "keep your metal golf clubs up high."

Edited December 1, 2009 by AllenLowe

[Larry Kart]

On the plus side, four gems by Howard Dietz, music by Arthur Schwartz. Yes, things can get a bit purplish at times, but the play of sound, accent, and emotion is something else IMO:

By Myself

I'll go my way by myself,

this is the end of romance.

I'll go my way by myself,

love is only a dance.

I'll try to apply myself

and teach my heart to sing.

I'll go my way by myself

like a bird on the wing,

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

I'll go my way by myself,

here's how the comedy ends.

I'll have to deny myself

love and laughter and friends.

Grey clouds in sky above

have put a blot on my fun.

I'll try to fly high above

for a place in the sun.

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

Alone Together

Alone together,

beyond the crowd

Above the world,

we're not too proud

To cling together,

we're strong as long

as we're together

Alone together,

the blinding rain

The starless night,

were not in vain

For we're together

and what is there

To fear together

Our love is

as deep as the sea

Our love is

as great as a love can be

And we can weather

the great unknown

If we're alone together

Dancing in the Dark

Dancing in the dark

'til the tune ends

We're dancing in the dark

and it soon ends

We're waltzing in the wonder

of why we're here

Time hurries by, we're here

and we're gone

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark

What though love is old

What though song is old

Through them

we can be young

Hear this heart of mine

Wailin' all the time

Dear one, tell me that

we're one

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark, dancing in the dark

Dancing in the dark

You and the Night and the Music

You and the night and the music

Fill me with flaming desire

Setting my being completely on fire

You and the night and the music

Thrill me but will we be one

After the night and the music are done?

Until the pale light of dawning and daylight

Our hearts will be throbbing guitars

Morning may come without warning

And take away the stars

If we must live for the moment

Love till the moment is through

After the night and the music die

Will I have you?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Someone ought to have rewritten every word of every song by Horace Silver (but left the music alone, of course). Teddy Edwards could have made a superb job of it.

MG

[crisp]

On the plus side, four gems by Howard Dietz, music by Arthur Schwartz. Yes, things can get a bit purplish at times, but the play of sound, accent, and emotion is something else IMO

Dietz is an amazing lyricist. "Some great Shakespearean scene / Where a ghost and a prince meet / And everyone ends in mincemeat." Beautiful.

The best lyricists in my view are Dietz, Dorothy Fields, Frank Loesser, Johnny Mercer, Johnny Burke, Carolyn Leigh, Irving Berlin and Cole Porter. Not an exhaustive list, but I would deliberately exclude some of the sloppier ones, such as Lorenz Hart, Ira Gershwin, Otto Harbach and Sammy Cahn, much as I love their work in spite of that.

[AllenLowe]

The Blind Girl From Ipanema

"but each day when she walks to the sea...

she smacks right into a tree....."

The Loose Girl From Ipanema

"tall and tan and 6 months pregnant..."

(she must have run into Stan Getz)

Edited December 1, 2009 by AllenLowe

[Tom Storer]

Dietz is an amazing lyricist. "Some great Shakespearean scene / Where a ghost and a prince meet / And everyone ends in mincemeat." Beautiful.

Yes, "prince meet"/"mincemeat" is something, all right. One of my favorites along the same lines is from Yip Harburg's "What Is There To Say":

My heart's in a deadlock

I'd even face wedlock

With you

[paul secor]

On the plus side, four gems by Howard Dietz, music by Arthur Schwartz. Yes, things can get a bit purplish at times, but the play of sound, accent, and emotion is something else IMO:

By Myself

I'll go my way by myself,

this is the end of romance.

I'll go my way by myself,

love is only a dance.

I'll try to apply myself

and teach my heart to sing.

I'll go my way by myself

like a bird on the wing,

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

I'll go my way by myself,

here's how the comedy ends.

I'll have to deny myself

love and laughter and friends.

Grey clouds in sky above

have put a blot on my fun.

I'll try to fly high above

for a place in the sun.

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

Alone Together

Alone together,

beyond the crowd

Above the world,

we're not too proud

To cling together,

we're strong as long

as we're together

Alone together,

the blinding rain

The starless night,

were not in vain

For we're together

and what is there

To fear together

Our love is

as deep as the sea

Our love is

as great as a love can be

And we can weather

the great unknown

If we're alone together

Dancing in the Dark

Dancing in the dark

'til the tune ends

We're dancing in the dark

and it soon ends

We're waltzing in the wonder

of why we're here

Time hurries by, we're here

and we're gone

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark

What though love is old

What though song is old

Through them

we can be young

Hear this heart of mine

Wailin' all the time

Dear one, tell me that

we're one

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark, dancing in the dark

Dancing in the dark

You and the Night and the Music

You and the night and the music

Fill me with flaming desire

Setting my being completely on fire

You and the night and the music

Thrill me but will we be one

After the night and the music are done?

Until the pale light of dawning and daylight

Our hearts will be throbbing guitars

Morning may come without warning

And take away the stars

If we must live for the moment

Love till the moment is through

After the night and the music die

Will I have you?

Those lyrics don't stand alone for me. They need the music (which is how they were meant to be presented) and a good singer for me to believe them.

I don't see the point of having these (or any of the other lyrics posted) stand by themselves. They were meant to be a part of a whole, and should be presented that way. And they were meant to be sung, not read.

[AllenLowe]

Tom: actually, I think it's:

"my heart's in a head-lock

I'd even wear dreadlocks"

Edited December 1, 2009 by AllenLowe

[AllenLowe]

"They need the music (which is how they were meant to be presented)"

I didn't know that.....

[AllenLowe]

Somewhere, overweight people,

Just like me,

Must have someplace where folks don't count every calorie.

Somewhere, over the rainbow,

Way up tall,

There's a land where they've never heard of cholesterol.

-Allan Sherman

Edited December 1, 2009 by AllenLowe

[Larry Kart]

On the plus side, four gems by Howard Dietz, music by Arthur Schwartz. Yes, things can get a bit purplish at times, but the play of sound, accent, and emotion is something else IMO:

By Myself

I'll go my way by myself,

this is the end of romance.

I'll go my way by myself,

love is only a dance.

I'll try to apply myself

and teach my heart to sing.

I'll go my way by myself

like a bird on the wing,

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

I'll go my way by myself,

here's how the comedy ends.

I'll have to deny myself

love and laughter and friends.

Grey clouds in sky above

have put a blot on my fun.

I'll try to fly high above

for a place in the sun.

I'll face the unknown,

I'll build a world of my own;

No one knows better than I, myself,

I'm by myself alone.

Alone Together

Alone together,

beyond the crowd

Above the world,

we're not too proud

To cling together,

we're strong as long

as we're together

Alone together,

the blinding rain

The starless night,

were not in vain

For we're together

and what is there

To fear together

Our love is

as deep as the sea

Our love is

as great as a love can be

And we can weather

the great unknown

If we're alone together

Dancing in the Dark

Dancing in the dark

'til the tune ends

We're dancing in the dark

and it soon ends

We're waltzing in the wonder

of why we're here

Time hurries by, we're here

and we're gone

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark

What though love is old

What though song is old

Through them

we can be young

Hear this heart of mine

Wailin' all the time

Dear one, tell me that

we're one

Looking for the light

of a new love

To brighten up the night,

I have you love

And we can face the music together

Dancing in the dark, dancing in the dark

Dancing in the dark

You and the Night and the Music

You and the night and the music

Fill me with flaming desire

Setting my being completely on fire

You and the night and the music

Thrill me but will we be one

After the night and the music are done?

Until the pale light of dawning and daylight

Our hearts will be throbbing guitars

Morning may come without warning

And take away the stars

If we must live for the moment

Love till the moment is through

After the night and the music die

Will I have you?

Those lyrics don't stand alone for me. They need the music (which is how they were meant to be presented) and a good singer for me to believe them.

I don't see the point of having these (or any of the other lyrics posted) stand by themselves. They were meant to be a part of a whole, and should be presented that way. And they were meant to be sung, not read.

Yes, of course, but I'm assuming that many here know the music that goes with these words and thus can appreciate how Dietz's lyrics and Schwartz's music work together.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Yes, of course, but I'm assuming that many here know the music that goes with these words and thus can appreciate how Dietz's lyrics and Schwartz's music work together.

And I've noticed that lots of hardcore jazz fans don't particularly like vocalists, so many might not know the words.

MG

[Teasing the Korean]

Nearly every Ellington instrumental that had lyrics added later has a clunker.

[fasstrack]

Nearly every Ellington instrumental that had lyrics added later has a clunker.

Johnny Mercer did a great job on Satin Doll. A lot of the other tunes had lyrics tacked on later, which always smells a little funny (i.e.: Concerto for Cootie/Do Nothin' Til You Hear From Me). I think Solitude is a beautiful, direct lyric about loneliness, and fuses with the melody beautifully. That one works well. Probably the melody and lyric were written contemporaneously or in close sequence to each other

[Noj]

I actually love Eddie's stuff no matter how awkward he gets...

[AllenLowe]

I, too, hate singers, based on a little bit of personal experience. As Al Haig said, "they all want to be actresses" (though he always named Helen Merrill as an exception to this rule).

[JSngry]

I love a good singer, when and where they exist. The voice = the original instrument, no?

Of course, in my experience, most "jazz" singers are mannered and effete and more concerned with conveying "exclusivity" than with making music. But most is not all.

OTOH, I've been blessed to work with a buttload of truly fine, occasionally, great blues & R&B singers, cats who intrinsically grasp that the communicative aspect of singing is probably how it all began, how it likely will all end, and that anything in the middle that loses sight of that is so much foo-foo de coo-coo. Them's the cats that tell the story and spreads the news. Would that more "jazz" singers understood. The few that have/do are magical.

The rest can get in line to ride the Irrelevancy Express.

[Brad]

Mannered and effete? That's a rather strong condemnation. Why do we reject singers in jazz but not in other genres?

[JSngry]

Condemn singers in jazz? Not me. No way.

Point out a characteristic that applies to many "jazz" singers (who I think are really cabaret singers more often than not)? Hell yeah. Why not?

[Royal Oak]

No-one mentioned Jim Morrison yet? That's assuming he wrote the lyrics. I remember there used to be a weekly feature in the New Musical Express (late 80s), named "Bismillah". It featured dire lyrics from pop songs.

[AllenLowe]

I hated the Doors(most boring group I ever saw) but actually thought Morrison was a decent writer -

as for singers, I'm sponsoring a Constitutional Amendment to outlaw scat -