Layered Storytelling in Music

I have room for only one sweaty and conflicted male in my music catalogue. lol

 

As far as a series of songs telling one story, 'The Ballad of Cleopatra' is pretty good.

 

Jazz department: "The Clown" by Charles Mingus. Interesting sidenote: The narrator is Jean Shepherd, of "A Christmas Story" fame.

Yeah, it's different, but I was trying to think of something other than "My Old School."

Also: "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" (I heard The Temptations hated this song at first, but as it rocketed up the charts, they didn't hate it so much), "Hurricane" by Bob Dylan, and "The Last Time I Saw Richard" by Joni Mitchell are ones whose lyrics I enjoy.

 

I would also suggest "Copperhead Road."

 

"Too Drunk to Fuck" - Dead Kennedys

 

Every time he says, "I'M A LUMBERJACKER, BABY!" it opens up new synapses in my gray matter. Contrasted with the delicious subtext of the chain saw solo, this wins for me.

Like Nietzsche's Ubermensch, the lead singer, or dare I say it? Tome intrepreter of Jackyl, screams to all and sundry that he is the universe. These are his works, despair.

And yet, the chainsaw doesn't lie. It shreds the hubris of the SuperJackyl Man. It symbolizes, with bloody finality, that God is indeed very alive, and man is not master of his own destiny after all.

But seriously, how the fuck has no one brought up a Bob Dylan song yet? The Idiot Wind blows this thread. From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol.

 

The distant echo
Of faraway voices boarding faraway trains
To take them home to
The ones that they love and who love them forever
The glazed, dirty steps, repeat my own and reflect my thoughts
Cold and uninviting, partially naked
Except for toffee wrappers and this morning's paper
Mr. Jones got run down
Headlines of death and sorrow, they tell of tomorrow
Madmen on the rampage
And I'm down in the tube station at midnight
I fumble for change, and pull out the Queen
Smiling, beguiling
I put in the money and pull out a plum
Behind me
Whispers in the shadows, gruff blazing voices
Hating, waiting
"Hey boy" they shout, "have you got any money?"
And I said, "I've a little money and a takeaway curry
I'm on my way home to my wife
She'll be lining up the cutlery, you know she's expecting me
Polishing the glasses and pulling out the cork"
I'm down in the tube station at midnight

I first felt a fist, and then a kick
I could now smell their breath
They smelt of pubs and wormwood scrubs
And too many right wing meetings
My life swam around me
It took a look and drowned me in its own existence
The smell of brown leather
It blended in with the weather
Filled my eyes, ears, nose and mouth, it blocked all my senses
Couldn't see, hear, speak any longer
I'm down in the tube station at midnight
I said I was down in the tube station at midnight

The last thing that I saw as I lay there on the floor
Was "Jesus saves" painted by an atheist nutter
And a British rail poster read "have an away day, a cheap holiday
Do it today"
I glanced back on my life, and thought about my wife
'Cause they took the keys, and she'll think it's me
I'm down in the tube station at midnight
The wine will be flat and the curry's gone cold
I'm down in the tube station at midnight
Don't want to go down in a tube station at midnight
Don't want to go down in a tube station at midnight
Don't want to go down in a tube station at midnight

 

When I was a young man I carried my pack
And I lived the free life of a rover
From the murrays green basin to the dusty outback
I waltzed my matilda all over
Then in nineteen fifteen my country said son
It's time to stop rambling 'cause there's work to be
Done
So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun
And they sent me away to the war
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we sailed away from the quay
And amidst all the tears and the shouts and the
Cheers
We sailed off to Gallipoli
How well I remember that terrible day
When the blood stained the sand and the water
And how in that hell that they called suvla bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter
Johnny Turk he was ready, he primed himself well
He showered us with bullets, he rained us with
Shells
And in five minutes flat he'd blown us all to hell
Nearly blew us right back to Australia
But the band played waltzing Matilda
As we stopped to bury our slain
And we buried ours and the Turks buried theirs
Then it started all over again
Now those who were living did their best to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire
And for seven long weeks I kept myself alive
While the corpses around me piled higher
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over tit
And when I woke up in my hospital bed
And saw what it had done, Christ I wished I was
Dead
Never knew there were worse things than dying
And no more I'll go waltzing Matilda
To the green bushes so far and near
For to hump tent and pegs, a man needs two legs
No more waltzing Matilda for me
So they collected the cripples, the wounded and
Maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The legless, the armless, the blind and insane
Those proud wounded heroes of suvla
And as our ship pulled into circular quay
I looked at the place where me legs used to be
And thank Christ there was nobody waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared
And they turned all their faces away
And now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me
I see my old comrades, how proudly they march
Reliving the or their dreams of past glory
i see the old men, all twisted and torn
The forgotten heroes of a forgotten war
And the young people ask me, "what are they
Marching for?"
And I ask myself the same question
And the band plays Waltzing Matilda
And the old men still answer to the call
But year after year their numbers get fewer
Some day no one will march there at all
Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who'll go a-Waltzing Matilda with me?

 

Best story about heroin use?

 

This one definitely needs lyrics included, the greatest song ever written about a day at the track

Thanks and praises
Thanks to Jesus
I bet on the Bottle of Smoke
I went to hell
And to the races
To bet on the Bottle of Smoke

The day being clear
The sky being bright
He came up on the left
Like a streak of light
Like a drunken fuck
On a Saturday night
Up came the Bottle of Smoke

Twenty fucking five to one
Me gambling days are done
I bet on a horse called the Bottle of Smoke
And my horse won

Stewards inquiries
Swift and fiery
I had the Bottle of Smoke
Inquisitions and suppositions
I had the Bottle of Smoke

Fuck the stewards
A trip to Lourdes
Might give the old fuckers
The power of sight
Screaming springers and stoppers
And call out coppers
But the money still gleams in my hand like a light

Bookies cursing
Cars reversing
I had the Bottle of Smoke
Glasses steaming
Vessels bursting
I had the Bottle of Smoke
Slip a fifty to the wife
And for each brat a crisp new five
To give me a break on a Saturday night
When I had the Bottle of Smoke
Priests and maidens
Drunk as pagans
They had the Bottle of Smoke
Sins forgiven and celebrations
They had the Bottle of Smoke

Fuck the Yanks
And drink their wives
The moon is clear
The sky is bright
I'm happy as the horses shite
Up came the Bottle of Smoke