Good Lyrics Hall of Fame

I've seen the world with a five-piece band,
looking at the back side of me.
Singing my songs, one of his now and then,
But I don't think Hank done 'em this way.

 

Bored in the role, but he can't stop
Standing up to sit back down
Or lose the one thing found
Spinning the world like a toy top
'Til there's a ghost in every town
Can't make a sound
- Elliott Smith, "Can't Make A Sound"

You change all the lead
Sleeping in my head to gold
As the day grows dim
I hear you sing a golden hymn
The song I've been trying to sing

Purify the colors, purify my mind
Purify the colors, purify my mind
And spread the ashes of the colors
Over this heart of mine
- Arcade Fire, "Neighborhood #1"

You've got a nerve to be asking a favor
You've got a nerve to be calling my number
I know we've been through this before
Can't you hear me, I'm calling out your name?
Can't you see me, I'm pounding on your door?

You've got a nerve to be asking a favor
You've got a nerve to be calling my number
Can't you hear me, I'm bleeding on the wall?
Can't you see me, I'm pounding on your door?

Can't you hear me when I'm calling out your name?

When I used to go out, I would know everyone that I saw
Now I go out alone if I go out at all

When I used to go out I'd know everyone I saw
Now I go out alone if I go out at all

When I used to go out I'd know everyone I saw
Now I go out alone if I go out at all

You've got a nerve to be asking a favor
You've got a nerve to be calling my number
I'm sure we've been through this before
Can't you hear me, I'm beating on your wall?
Can't you see me, I'm pounding on your door?
- The Walkmen, "The Rat"

 

On a Greyhound thirty miles beyond Jamestown
He saw the sun set on the Tennessee line
Looked at the young man who was riding beside him
He said I'm old, kind of worn out inside

I worked my whole life in the steel mills near Gary
My father before me, I helped build this land
Now seventy-seven and with God as my witness
I earned every dollar that passed through my hands

My family and friends are the best things I've known
Through the eye of the needle I'll carry them home

Days turn to minutes and minutes to memories
Life sweeps away the dreams we have planned
You are young and you are the future
Suck it up and tough it out, be the best you can


Rain hit the old dog in the twilight's last gleaming
He said, "Son it sounds like rattling old bones"
This highway is long but I know some that are longer
By sun up tomorrow I guess I'll be home

The hills of Kentucky cross the Ohio river
The old man kept talking 'bout his life and his times
He fell asleep with his head against the window
He said an honest man's pillow is his peace of mind

This world offers riches and riches will grow wings
And I don't take stock in those uncertain things

Days turn to minutes and minutes to memories
Life sweeps away the dreams we have planned
You are young and you are the future
Suck it up and tough it out, be the best you can


The old man had a vision, it was hard for me to follow
I do things my way, pay an awfully high price
When I think back on the old man and the bus ride
Now that I'm older I can see he was right


Another hot one out on highway eleven
This is my life, it's what I've chosen to do
There's no free rides and no one said it'd be easy
The old man told me this my son I'm telling it to you


Days turn to minutes and minutes to memories
Life sweep away the dreams we have planned
You are young and you are the future
Suck it up and tough it out, be the best you can

 

Got a bag of weed
and a bottle of wine
I'ma fuck that bitch
just one mo time

 

Lyrically, and perhaps overall, my favorite Clash song is "Lost in the Supermarket."

I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for that special offer, guaranteed personality
I wasn't born so much as I fell out, nobody seemed to notice me
We had a hedge back home in the suburbs over which I never could see
I heard the people who lived on the ceiling scream and fight most scarily
Hearing that noise was my first ever feeling, that's how it's been all around me
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for that special offer, a guaranteed personality
I'm all tuned in, I see all the programmes, I save coupons from packets of tea
I've got my giant hit discothèque album, I empty a bottle and I feel a bit free
The kids in the halls and the pipes in the walls make me noises for company
Long distance callers make long distance calls and the silence makes me lonely
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer, a guaranteed personality
And it's not here, it disappear
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer, guaranteed personality
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer, guaranteed personality
I'm all lost (I'm all lost in the supermarket)
I'm all lost (I can no longer shop happily)
I'm all lost (I came in here for that special offer, guaranteed personality)
I'm all lost (I'm all lost in the supermarket)
I'm all lost (I can no longer shop happily)
I'm all lost (I came in here for that special offer, guaranteed personality)
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer, guaranteed personality
I'm all lost, I'm all lost, I'm all lost
I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer, guaranteed personality

The couplet in bold ranks high among my all-time favorites.

 

Perhaps my favorite single line in a song comes from "Working Girls" by Joe Pernice"

Contemplating suicide or a graduate degree...


I also love the imagery in Phil Judd's early songs for Split Enz. In "Time For a Change" he sings "Like a parrot in a flaming tree, I know it's pretty hard to see..." And I love the end of his song "Sweet Dreams."

Well you wouldn't know me from a bar of soap
A part of the furniture
An ornament, a rocking chair
It's all very well to cry now
Sweet dreams, every once in a while.

 

This one has haunted me from the time Harry Chapin released it in 1974, when I still had big dreams of making it in radio. It especially rings true now:

Hello, honey, it's me.
What did you think when you heard me back on the radio?
And what did the kids say when they knew it was their long-lost Daddy-o?

Remember how we listened to the radio
And I said, "That's the place to be"
And how I got the job as an FM jock the day you married me?
It was two kids and I was into AM rock, but I just had to run around
It's been ages since I left you babe,
Let me tell you 'bout what's gone down:

I am the morning DJ at W.O.L.D.
Playin' all the hits for you
Wherever you may be
The bright good morning voice who's heard but never seen.
Ohh feeling all of 45, goin' on 15

The drinking I did on my last big gig
it made my voice go low.
They said that they liked the younger sound
When they let me go.
So I drifted on down to Tulsa, Oklahoma
to do me a late night talk show
Now I worked my way down home again via Boise, Idaho.
That's how this business goes.

I am the morning DJ at W.O.L.D.
Playin' all the hits for you
Wherever you may be
The bright good morning voice who's heard but never seen.
Ohh feeling all of 45, goin' on 15

I've been makin' extra money doing high school sock-hops
I'm a big-time guest MC.
You should hear me talkin' to the little children,
And listen what they say to me.
Got a spot on my head just begging for a new toupee
And a tire round my gut from sittin' on my butt,
but it's never gonna go away.

Sometimes I get this crazy dream that I just take off in my car.
But you can travel on ten thousand miles, and still stay where you are.
I've been thinkin' that I should stop disk jockeying and start that record store.
Maybe I could settle down if you'd take me back once more.

Ok honey I see.
I guess he's better than me.
Sure old girl, I understand,
You don't hafta worry I'm such a happy man.

W-O-L-D
W-O-L-D
W-O-L-D
W-O-L-D-D-D-D ...

 

Kristofferson at his best:

Well I woke up Sunday morning,
With no way to hold my head that didn't hurt.
And the beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad,
So I had one more for dessert.
Then I fumbled through my closet for my clothes,
And found my cleanest dirty shirt.
An' I shaved my face and combed my hair,
An' stumbled down the stairs to meet the day.

I'd smoked my brain the night before,
On cigarettes and songs I'd been pickin'.
But I lit my first and watched a small kid,
Cussin' at a can that he was kicking.
Then I crossed the empty street,
'n caught the Sunday smell of someone fryin' chicken.
And it took me back to somethin',
That I'd lost somehow, somewhere along the way.

On the Sunday morning sidewalk,
Wishing, Lord, that I was stoned.
'Cos there's something in a Sunday,
Makes a body feel alone.
And there's nothin' short of dyin',
Half as lonesome as the sound,
On the sleepin' city sidewalks:
Sunday mornin' comin' down.

In the park I saw a daddy,
With a laughin' little girl who he was swingin'.
And I stopped beside a Sunday school,
And listened to the song they were singin'.
Then I headed back for home,
And somewhere far away a lonely bell was ringin'.
And it echoed through the canyons,
Like the disappearing dreams of yesterday.

On the Sunday morning sidewalk,
Wishing, Lord, that I was stoned.
'Cos there's something in a Sunday,
Makes a body feel alone.
And there's nothin' short of dyin',
Half as lonesome as the sound,
On the sleepin' city sidewalks:
Sunday mornin' comin' down.

 

My favorite opening:

Whiskey bottle, brand-new car;
Oak tree, you're in my way ...

 

From Springsteen's "The River," which has epic lyrics in its entirety, too ...

Now those memories come back to haunt me,
They haunt me like a curse ...
Is a dream a lie if it don't come true,
Or is it something worse ...

 

Also "Take the ribbon from your hair, shake it loose and let it fall ..."

 

Since this is SportsJournalists.com ...

Drop kick me Jesus through the goal posts of life
End over end neither left nor to right
Straight through the heart of them righteous uprights
Drop kick me Jesus through the goal posts of life.