Great Lyrics - Examples of and how to write them

**Jonah** · 08-14-2015, 07:02 PM

English/American song lyrics is really special..
somehow in English the things that in other languages seem too simplistic or pretencious in English sound ok..

When The Beatles sang "I wanna hold your hand' it sounded like a young boy trying to express his sincere wish as good as he can... it was very simple but very convincing... in Italian, French, Russian, German translation it sounds funny and stupid (by the way I heard The Beatles' Gnrman version) but in English it works...

We should not forget that it's not real poetry - it should work with music - so it's difficult to judge lyrics without music..
and unfortunately professinal lyricists often produce quite poor works when they run out of time...

Just to name a few - Cole Porter was really special lyricist - his lyrics is so true that they sound almost like a natural monologue, imrovization.. he always has a phrase in his song that moves it all... he could find this phrase...
And he was not afraid to eb too low too conversational
you'd be so nice to come home to.. I've got you under my skin...

I like also Randy Newman's lyrics... he's dramatist, he is not afraid to sing from the name of different characters... his songs are monologues of very different people

'Body and Soul' is very simple but it just nails it all... 'you know I am yours for just the taking..' - 'body and soul' - with a good singer it can just tear you apart

'But beautiful' - there's so suddenly a switch from general specualation about what love is to such a personal: If you were mine I'd never let you go... very impressive and works great with music.

'Polka Dots and moonbeams' is also coll, to me it renders very well the feeling of this first meeting at the dances... suddenly I saw polka, dots and moonbeams all around a pug-nosed dream.. what else do you need?

Lots of songs.. I can't name it all

**fep** · 08-14-2015, 07:31 PM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

Thanks, Frank.
One thing we haven't talked about here is the distinction between 1) writing lyrics for a composed melody and 2) coming up with words and music at the same time. I tend to do the latter and am sometimes surprised later to see how the lyrics look typed up naked on a page. (1 and 2 do not exhaust the possible options.)

Music first was the natural way for me to write lyrics. Now though, I think it's best to write lyrics first and then write the music to the lyric. And, naturally the lyric is still free to evolve once the music is being added.

And this reminds me of an episode from 'In the Actors Studio' with Elton John. Bernie Taupin writes the lyrics first and then Elton John puts the music to the lyrics. Elton John works really fast, often less than 15 minutes to set music to a lyric.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-14-2015, 08:30 PM

Originally Posted by Jonah

We should not forget that it's not real poetry - it should work with music - so it's difficult to judge lyrics without music..
and unfortunately professinal lyricists often produce quite poor works when they run out of time...

That's a good point. Lyrics that might not seem like much by themselves can be magic in a song. (And lyrics that read fine might come from songs, for whatever reason, just don't work.)

**MarkRhodes** · 08-14-2015, 08:36 PM

Originally Posted by fep

And this reminds me of an episode from 'In the Actors Studio' with Elton John. Bernie Taupin writes the lyrics first and then Elton John puts the music to the lyrics. Elton John works really fast, often less than 15 minutes to set music to a lyric.

Those two were something. Wrote a lot of great songs. Seem as different as night and day, but the results!

**Philco** · 08-14-2015, 08:47 PM

Great lyrics?

"What a swellegant, elegant party this is"

Cole Porter strikes again. Written in the 30's and recorded in the 50's ? By Frank and Bing for the film "High Society"
One of my fave songs.

I still find myself saying ......"well, did you ever?"

**mercosound** · 08-14-2015, 09:00 PM

Your lips were like a red and ruby chalice, warmer than the summer night

The clouds were like an alabaster palace, rising to a snowy height

Each star its own aurora borealis, suddenly you held me tight

I could see the midnight sun

Leave it Johnny Mercer to rhyme "aurora borealis"; how'd he do that?

**Philco** · 08-14-2015, 09:53 PM

This song is part of my youth. It was everywhere. I didn't really like it that much (I was too cool to like mainstream!) and never really listened to the lyric......apart from the chorus.....some crap about a Yellow Brick Road. I really had no idea what it was about.

But my daughter played me this version and it really moved me. It allowed me to hear the lyric. And what a brilliant lyric it is. One of my favourites right now.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-14-2015, 10:01 PM

Originally Posted by Philco

This song is part of my youth. It was everywhere. I didn't really like it that much (I was too cool to like mainstream!) and never really listened to the lyric......apart from the chorus.....some crap about a Yellow Brick Road. I really had no idea what it was about.

But my daughter played me this version and it really moved me. It allowed me to hear the lyric. And what a brilliant lyric it is. One of my favourites right now.

You know, there's a lot of Elton John lyrics that I've heard many times yet never fully understood because of the way Elton sometimes accents words in an unexpected way, leaving to think, "Wha???"

**MarkRhodes** · 08-14-2015, 10:05 PM

Well, heck, here's the lyric in full.

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

By Elton John

When are you gonna come down
When are you going to land
I should have stayed on the farm
I should have listened to my old man
You know you can't hold me forever
I didn't sign up with you
I'm not a present for your friends to open
This boy's too young to be singing the blues
So goodbye yellow brick road
Where the dogs of society howl
You can't plant me in your penthouse
I'm going back to my plough
Back to the howling old owl in the woods
Hunting the horny back toad
Oh I've finally decided my future lies
Beyond the yellow brick road
What do you think you'll do then
I bet that'll shoot down the plane
It'll take you a couple of vodka and tonics
To set you on your feet again
Maybe you'll get a replacement
There's plenty like me to be found
Mongrels who ain't got a penny
Sniffing for tidbits like you on the ground
So goodbye yellow brick road
Where the dogs of society howl
You can't plant me in your penthouse
I'm going back to my plough
Back to the howling old owl in the woods
Hunting the horny back toad
Oh I've finally decided my future lies
Beyond the yellow brick road
Songwriters: JOHN, ELTON / TAUPIN, BERNIE
© Universal Music Publishing Group
For non-commercial use only.

I never knew Elton was singing "(Back the the) howling old owl in the woods / Hunting the horny back toad."

**Philco** · 08-14-2015, 10:13 PM

Bernie Taupin was always the real deal. The chord progression and melody are also stellar of course.
When pop was art.

**Philco** · 08-14-2015, 11:43 PM

Oh and Elton responds to Sara's version and sings a duet with her!
This is her own song, Just beautiful.Sorry it's not jazz but........good is good.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-15-2015, 09:43 AM

Originally Posted by Philco

Bernie Taupin was always the real deal. The chord progression and melody are also stellar of course.
When pop was art.

A fascinating thing about that pair of songwriters is that Elton sang a lot of lyrics that didn't sound like things one could see him doing, such as "crocodile rocking" or being called a "honky cat" or "hunting the horny back toad" or going to bars looking for fights ("Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting").

**mrcee** · 08-15-2015, 10:02 AM

True. It's usually said that a songwriter should write about things that they could at least imagine themself doing.

**kenbennett** · 08-15-2015, 10:17 AM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

On a lark, I sent an email to Pat Pattison (-the songwriter / lyricist / professor that fep mentioned above.) I asked Pat about 'awful' and 'troughful' in "Lush Life." Not that his response would be Gospel but I should like to hear it in any case. If I hear from him, I'll pass it along here.

I took Pattison's Berklee online course, the free one. I like his approach to rhyme and his method of preparing the materials before doing the actual writing. His concept of stable vs unstable is OK in theory, but in practice it sometimes seems a little arbitrary. The book that Frank mentioned is the textbook for the course. I didn't buy it. After I was a few lessons into the course, I saw the book at a friend's house, flipped through it, and decided the book wasn't necessary. Pattison is a good teacher.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-15-2015, 10:20 AM

Originally Posted by mrcee

True. It's usually said that a songwriter should write about things that they could at least imagine themself doing.

I think that's generally true, if only in the sense that if you're going to sing it for an audience, you have to be able to 'deliver' it. Randy Newman---who was mentioned above---writes a lot of lyrics "in character", so the audience doesn't think they are hearing "his" viewpoint but rather one that he is satirizing (-as in "Rednecks", "Short People", "It's Money That Matters" "I Love LA" and so on.)

Here's one I always liked, "It's Money That I Love."

Donald Fagen and Walter Becker (Steely Dan) have written a lot of lyrics that are not (generally) taken to be about themselves but rather about scenes they wryly observe. But of course, they can 'deliver' those kinds of lyrics.

And then there's Blue Oyster Cult (-a fave of my teenage years). I wouldn't call these great lyrics but they were not the average fare either. ("Hot Rails To Hell", "Seven Screaming Dizbuster", "Baby Ice Dog", "Career Of Evil")

**cosmic gumbo** · 08-15-2015, 01:57 PM

Isn't defining good lyrics and lyric writing methods a totally subjective topic? Who is to say Don Van Vliet's line "Magnet draw day from dark, sun zoom spark, sun zoom spark" isn't as great as something written by Harold Arlen?

**MarkRhodes** · 08-15-2015, 02:43 PM

Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo

Isn't defining good lyrics and lyric writing methods a totally subjective topic?

No, it is not totally subjective.

**Lazz** · 08-15-2015, 05:45 PM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

unlikely lyrics would get 'dinged' because so many sites post them. Yay!

Look out.
Those lyric sites have pretty much all been pursued successfully to get properly licensed.
They were easy to spot because that's all they do - publish lyrics.
jazzguitar.be is less easy to identify as a place for such breaches.
So they just haven't noticed.

**Lazz** · 08-15-2015, 06:28 PM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

you fail to realize: "troth full" does NOT rhyme with "awful." "Trough full" does.

Reminds me of all the fun I had disagreeing with Gene Lees.
"Talk", for him, rhymes perfectly with "clock" for instance.

I ran into similarly swamp-land once working up some Français for a song section.
A handy French writer-pal, helping me through the process, baulked at much of my rhyming.
"Tu t'en vas, adieu, amour et moi" worked quite happily with my pronunciation, but offended his more rigorous pedantry. Simile with "pluie" and "aussi", or "veux-tu" and "perdu". To him there was an illegal difference. But I couldn't hear it.

With the English-style ready conflation of "F" and "TH", "troth-ful" rhymes very easily with "awful".

You fail to realise: accent, tone, pronunciation.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-15-2015, 08:44 PM

Originally Posted by Lazz

With the English-style ready conflation of "F" and "TH", "troth-ful" rhymes very easily with "awful".

You fail to realise: accent, tone, pronunciation.

I haven't heard you speak and do not know your accent. Accents do vary. But I think it fair to say this: if Johnny Hartman sang "troth full" in "Lush Life", it would not rhyme with "awful". But the larger problem with "troth full" is that it makes no sense (in this context) to anyone but you. It would be a hindrance. "A troth full of hearts? What does that even mean?"

By the way, is there a recorded version of "Lush Life" in which you think the singer is actually saying "troth full"?

(There's a difference between arguing that "troth full" could have worked and that "troth full" is what Strayhorn actually wrote. He may well have written it. If he did, I think it a poorer choice than "troughful".)

destinytot · 08-16-2015, 07:51 AM

Originally Posted by Lazz

With the English-style ready conflation of "F" and "TH"..

I realise that it's a common phenomenon in non-standard varieties of English, but I was surprised when I first observed the conflation of those sounds among upper-middle-class Brits - I still find it a grotesque affectation.
But I can't reconcile it with Lush Life. Please could you expand?

destinytot · 08-16-2015, 10:38 AM

'The thot plickens'...

To my ears, there seems to be some unusual elision at @01:49. As the 'f' is enunciated in two instances earlier in the song ('life' and 'awful'), I rather suppose it's quite deliberate.

It sounds both odd and affected to me, but I do think Mr Strayhorn not only wears it well but makes it appear quite stylish. (Compared to other recordings, Billy Strayhorn's pronunciation sounds - er - distingué...) And, to me, that would be consistent with what Lazz has explained. EDIT Listening again, I do think the elision is deliberate - he's making the rhyme as close as he can.

**Jonah** · 08-16-2015, 12:21 PM

Sondheim should be mentioned too I think

**Jonah** · 08-16-2015, 12:31 PM

i think there's difference between

1) professional lyricist - those to whom composer or producers come with ready melody or a sketch asking to write words for it. These guys have to elaborate some approach, they should know tricks and use a lot of cliches.. and often it has nothing to do with self-expression or art or whatever... sometimes they do it better, sometimes worse - but what's important about them - they hire them because they can do it anyway

2) song-writers - those who compose it together words and music and for it's not the lyrics for melody but a song.. these would probably reject a job of just writing lyrics - especially if they do not feel like doing it... they are closer to poets, or 'bards', singing poets... they could be more pop in style like Cole Porter or Elton John, or closer to real poetry like Bob Dylan or Jonny Mitchell...

For example I mentioned The Beatles... obviously that MacCartney mostly wrote lyrics using lots of cliches - something about love, babe,... a couple of catchy lines and it's ok... more fun.. not too much obliging.. yt is closer to type 1

For Lennon in most cases it's personal experience - not necessarily direct - but still there's always something special behind his lyrics - even simple songs sound like 'true stories'.. like confessions.. he is more into type 2