Language usage: double entendres, hidden meanings, casually dropped revelations
36-22-36 Bobby Bland
“Baby can be tied, but not beat”
Two Lovers Mary Wells
Torn between Two Lovers Mary Macgregor
He Hit Me and It Felt Like a Kiss Crystals
Shake, Rattle, & Roll Joe Turner
Memphis Chuck Berry
“Memphis” deserves special treatment
Goodnight Irene Leadbelly
Leadbelly sang in the original . . .
“I get you in my dreams” (it's not even “I’ll” -- I will -- it's I do get, I've already gotten, I'm in the process of getting)
This vivid presentation was cleaned up for the version we all know
“I’ll see you in my dreams”
The next two hide their subversiveness behind already “racy” lyrics – both credited to others
In the Summertime Mungo Jerry
Decoy racy lyric is the “If her daddy’s rich …” bit. Truly subversive lyric is “Have a drink, have a drive …”
Cecilia Simon & Garfunkel
Decoy racy lyric is “Makin' love in the afternoon with Cecilia up in my bedroom ... When I come back to bed someone's taken my place." Truly subversive lyric is the elided line "I got up to wash my face” -- why did he need to do that?
You’re So Vain Carly Simon
The song is about him, so, though he may indeed be vain in other ways, his thinking the song is about himself is not evidence of his vanity, technically (whoever him is).
Killing Me Sofly Roberta Flack
Me and Mrs. Jones Billy Paul
Will It Go Round in Circles Billy Preston
Like the “Riddle Song”
Rich Girl Hall & Oates
He doesn't actually say, “You’re a bitch, girl.” He does say "it's a bitch," meaning her behavior, which has gone too far. If someone's behavior "is a bitch" it's not much further to say that they themselves are a bitch. Combine that with the (can't have been unintentional) mishearing, or hard-to-hearing of the [it's a], and you must come to the conclusion they intended to increase their chart position by the controversy of "seeming" like you're calling someone a bitch in a song, when (innocently) you claim you're not. This strategy had already been successfully used by Elton John and the Rolling Stones.
The Most Beautiful Girl in the World Charlie Rich
My Girl Bill Jim Stafford
Songs that awkwardly, or even ungrammatically, use (or misuse) the collective pronoun
Don’t Give Up on Us David Soul
Can’t Stop After 7
Lyrics: I’m diggin on you, you diggin on me, we diggin’ on we
Songs with other pronoun problems
Bad Case of Lovin’ You (Doctor, Doctor) Robert Palmer
“Doctor, doctor, give me the news / I’ve got bad case of lovin’ you”
First line, he's addressing the doctor. Second line he's addressing the song's love interest, unless he does indeed have the hots for the doctor
Bohemian Rhapsody Queen
“Mama, just killed a man / Put a gun against his head”
The protagonist perversely removes the “I” (“Mama, [I] just …”). Therefore, only hearing the song, not having the benefit of the lyric sheet, the listener doesn’t know about the comma and thinks that it’s his mama that killed the man. Even with the next line,
“Pulled my trigger now he’s dead”
the ambiguity continues because it could be his gun that his mother is pulling the trigger of. The ambiguity is resolved in the next two lines:
“Mama, life had just begun, / Only now I’ve gone ahead and blown it all away”
Where Does the Good Times Go Buck Owens
In country music's eschewing of "book learning" and general celebration of (let's call it) the authentic class, not the liberal elite, I suspect this bad grammar is intentional
Take the Money and Run Steve Miller Band
“Billy Joe . . .
killed a man
while robbin' his castle”
“Bobby Sue . . . took the money and run”
Should be "and ran"
Roll in My Sweet Baby's Arms Various
“I heard her parents
don't
like me”
“They drove me away from your door”
“Had my life to live over”
“I'd never go there any more”
Don't know how to recast this -- "If I had my life to live over, I wouldn't go there anymore." Except with his whole life to re-live, presumably in his new life he'd never go there, so there wouldn't by a more to go with the any -- or something like that
Nonsense and repetition in R&B
Can You Woo Woo Woo Jeffrey Osborne
(Pop, Pop, Pop, Pop) Goes My Mind LeVert
No Diggity Black Street
Yah Moh Be There James Ingram
Travelin’ Man Ricky Nelson
Racist and sexist
Young Girl Gary Puckett
Ageist and sexist. The self-sacrificing cradle-robber
Subcategory: sexism expressed via name forgetting
December 1963 (Oh What a Night) Four Seasons
What’s Your Name Lynyrd Skynyrd
Angie Baby Helen Reddy
False craziness – i.e., the self-congratulatory “I’m a rebellious free spirit” kind of craziness
Crazy Seal
Perhaps eligible for a cross-ref to Songs with bad grammar because of the un-ironically used oxymoron “a little crazy” (“You know we’re never gonna survive unless we get a little crazy”). Recalls the great Karen Black line from Can She Bake a Cherry Pie: “I’m almost not crazy anymore.”
You May Be Right Billy Joel
Songs with the theme of “I’m no good for you cause I crave the life on the road”
Ramblin’ Man Hank Williams
Freebird Lynyrd Skynyrd
Gentle on My Mind John Hartford
Heard It in a Love Song Marshall Tucker Band
This Old Cowboy Marshall Tucker Band
Lyrical enjambment, in which the second line begins (miraculously) before the first line ends
The Kids Are Alright The Who
“Better leave her behind with the kids are alright”
Overlapping word/phrase in brackets: “Better leave her behind with the kids [the kids] are alright”
Mr. Sellack The Roches
“Let the other forty-million, three-hundred and seven people who want to get famous”
Overlapping word/phrase in brackets: “Let the other forty-million, three-hundred and seven people who want to get famous [get famous].”
Dear Eloise The Hollies
“It’s beneficial to you must read in between the lines”
Overlapping word/phrase in brackets: “It’s beneficial to you [you] must read in between the lines”
In which a common phrase is (annoyingly) misused
First line of “Whiter Shade of Pale,”Procol Harum, is: “We skipped the light fandango.” The common expression is “Trip(ped) the light fantastic”
Wallflowers’ album title is: Bringing Down the Horse. The common expression is “bring(ing) down the house.”
The standard, “Side by Side” (I have it by Patsy Cline), goes “Oh, we ain’t got a barrel of money.” The common expression is “barrel of monkeys.”
Sign that technology is getting TOTALLY OUT OF CONTROL!!! (circa 1967) from Sonny Bono
“Electrically they keep a baseball score”
The Beat Goes On Sonny & Cher
“Sometimes I live in
the country /
Sometimes I live in town /
Sometimes I get a great notion /
To jump into the river and drown”
Goodnight Irene Leadbelly
“Hello,
darlin’ How’m I doin’? /
Well, I’m doin’ alright /
’Cept I can’t sleep /
And I cry all night ’til dawn”
Hello Darlin' Conway Twitty
“She had been born
with a face /
That wouldn’t let her get away”
Hollywood knights Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band
“I never kissed a
bear /
I never kissed a goose /
But I can shake a chicken in the middle of the room”
Let’s Have a Party Wanda Jackson
“Just like a car /
You’re pleasin’ to behold /
I call you Jaguar if I may be so bold”
Jeepster T-Rex
“Don’t walk
down lover’s lane /
Just go right on a sayin’ [pronounced
“sane”] /
‘I only want a buddy not a gal’”
I Only Want a Buddy Carter Family
“I don’t
want a bowl of little fishies /
He can’t take a goldfish for a walk”
How Much Is That Doggie in the Window Patti Page
“Looked like
sixty-five when he died /
He was a friend of mine
“Eddie, I miss you
more than all the others /
This song is for you my brother”
People Who Died Jim Carroll
“We’re not
the jet set /
We’re the old Chevrolet set”
We’re Not the Jet Set George Jones & Tammy Wynette
“Just like a ghost
you’ve been a-hauntin’ my dreams /
So I’ll propose on Halloween”
Spooky Classics Four
“My uncle Mort,
he’s sawed off and short /
He measures four feet two /
But he feels like a giant [pronounced “jint” with
long “i”] /
When you hand him a pint /
Of that good old mountain dew”
Mountain Dew Various
“She never gets
involved /
With blowing her cool /
She’s too busy painting sky /
With her classmates in school”
Superlungs My Supergirl Donovan
“When I get the blues I get me a rockin’ chair”
“Hi yo, hi yo Silver”
Honey Hush Joe Turner
“Other guys imitate
us /
But the original's still the greatest”
“It doesn't matter
where you've been /
You ain't been nowhere til you've been in . . .”
In Crowd Dobie Gray
“Rhododendron . . .
is a nice flower”
“Theory of the waltz . . . mashed potato schmaltz”
Do the Strand Roxy Music
“Roly poly, eatin'
corn and taters /
Hungry every minute of the day /
Roly poly, gnawin' on a biscuit /
Long as he can chew it it's okay /
He can eat an apple pie /
And never even bat an eye /
Roly poly, daddy's little fatty /
Bet he's gonna be a man someday”
Roly Poly Bob Wills
“You should see my
blue-eyed Sally /
She lives way down on Shinbone Alley”
Stay a Little Longer Bob Wills
“She was doin' a
dance without any shoes /
She was barefootin'”
Barefootin' Robert Parker
Is this an example of an "internal," (internally referenced "other work") a la “Tennessee Waltz"
“All
your friends
call you Lily Paloma /
But that’s not the way that you are /
It’s too much of a gentle misnomer /
For a shooting star”
On the Radio Al Stewart
Noteworthy lyrics, not necessarily good
“We
were so close /
There was no room /
We bled inside each other’s wounds”
Lay Down (Candles in the Rain) Melanie
Mungo Jerry’s “In the Summertime” presciently anticipates the problem of drunk driving, Melanie’s “bleeding inside each other’s wounds” anticipates the problem of AIDS
“There's
a flame from
the stack /
And that smoke's a blowin' black as coal”
Six Days on the Road Dave Dudley
Pre-pc admitting to air polution, like “In the Summertime” and "Lay Down"
I apologize for the fact that these tend toward the profane or scatological. Unfortunately I think it’s par for the course when dealing with parody lyrics
“Laxatives
will
happen /
It’s only shit and run /
I don’t want to smell it /
’Cause I know what I done”
to the tune of Elvis Costello’s “Accidents Will Happen”
“We
built this titty /
We built this titty /
We built this titty with silicone, /
Built this titty”
to the tune of Starship’s “We Built This City”
Parody lyrics, using “inversion” method
“What
a night for a
nightmare /
What a night for a feverish boy /
And I’ll be lost in a nightmare /
Seein’ how the world is being destroyed”
Daydream Lovin’ Spoonful
“I want to sleep ... in city that never wakes up!”
New York, New York Frank Sinatra
Presentation of or “analysis” of lyrics
Deck of Cards T. Thomas Tyler
Show hands dealing a deck of cards (?)
Hold On Wilson Phillips
The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia Vicki Lawrence
Angie Baby Helen Reddy
Ode to Billy Joe Bobbie Gentry
Harper Valley PTA Jeannie C. Riley
“I've got some real estate here in my bag”
America Simon and Garfunkel
Thematic similarity in the lyrics of "Rock and Roll Waltz" Kay Starr and "Surrender" Cheap Trick
Melodramatically misinformed about the law, in "Branded Man" Merle Haggard
"If
I live to be a hundred /
I guess I'll never clear my name /
Cos everybody knows I've been in jail /
No matter where I'm livin' /
I've got to tell em where I've been /
Or they'll send me back to prison if I fail"
Not telling people you've been in jail isn't a crime, as far as I know, or even a violation of parole