FAVORITE SONG LINES (Page 1 of 3)

With all the great songwriters that have been around, I'm sure we all have many lyrics that speak to us.  Of the dozens (if not hundreds) here are a few of mine:

"The Mississippi Delta was shining like a National guitar".......Paul Simon's "Graceland"

"Daddy's hands were soft and kind when I was cryin', Daddy's hands were hard as steel when I'd done wrong" .......... Holly Dunn's "Daddy's Hands"

"Rainy day people don't talk, they just listen till they've heard it all" .......... Gordon Lightfoot's "Rainy Day People"

"This old guitar taught me to sing a love song. It showed me how to laugh and how to cry"............ John Denver's "This Old Guitar"

"There's a hole in Daddy's arm where all the money goes"............. John Prine's "Sam Stone"

DE

Oh, there's just so many.  Earlier today I heard a John Prine song where he used the line "It takes two to make three."  Isn't that wonderful? 

From "Everybody's Talkin'" "I'm going where the weather suits my clothes."   Doesn't that give imagery of an ill-prepared person out of place? 

And not everything has to be amazing.  I rather like "A mirror that lies, a mirror that lies, that couldn't be me in that gorilla disguise" from Jimmy Buffett's "This Hotel Room." 

There's so many good ones from traditional country gospel too.  From "Everybody Wants To Go To Heaven But Nobody Wants to Die" and speaking of Jesus, "At the end, He knew His Father's friends.  He was brave enough going to his death, but He didn't want to die."  And from Oh Death, "Oh Death, where is thy sting?  Grave where is thy suffering?  You thought you had a hold on me, but you were wrong I've been set free!"  [That last is public domain - don't worry about the copyright of having too many lyrics]    These get right to the heart of the matter, don't they?  Agree with the concept or don't, they are powerful lyrics. 

My whole head is filled with nothing but old lyrics and movie scenes, so I'll be back to this time and again probably.

- Zurf

George Jones sings
I'll be over you when the grass grows over me.

The best rock lyric ever - But he cant be a man cos he doesnt smoke the same cigarettes as me - Jagger / Richards

In a song co-written by Steve Goodman and Jimmy Buffett titled Distantly In Love, they move the song forward by saying different ways to sum the verse in each chorus.  First, he's writing a letter he has no intention of mailing andd the chorus says "I can't help but be, ruled by my inconsistencies."  In a later verse, he talks of going off to a mutual friend of the missing woman to drink wine and look at old pictures of them together and the chorus says "I can't help but be ruled by my antiquities."  As the song wraps up, he explains how he has heard that the woman has moved on with another man and the singer has elected to forego any further attempts at contact and it wraps up "I can't help but be part of my own philosophy."  I love it when the chorus is used to reinforce and move the story of the song along. 

One song I'm learning now is by Neil Young and it is about a family losing their house.  The song is "This Old House" and there is no good line in the song.  The entire composition is an exceptionally bright star among a whole galaxy of wonder written by that worthy musician.  I'd be breaking the rules to post the lyrics here, so I recommend looking up the song lyrics or checking it out on Youtube.  It was released during the 1987 recession, but is as relevant if not moreso today given how the current recession and housing foreclosures are so integrally connected.

- Zurf

Beatles, Hide Your Love Away...Gather round all you clowns, Let me hear you say.

John Prine, Sam Stone...Jesus Christ died for nothing I suppose.

one of my fav's  is

Muddy Waters. 

"Give me champange when I'm thirsty,give me  reefer when I want to get high"

and Albert Coillins, "I ain't drunk, I'm just drinkin"

badeye   

Any line from Angel Eyes - Jeff Healey

Girls got lightnin' underneath her skirt, boys try to touch it for whatever its worth - Again Tonight - John Mellencamp

Any line from Human Wheels - John Mellencamp

there are some really great lines here. here's one from a band you might not have heard of ...

she wakes up. she makes up. she takes her time and doesn't feel she has to hurry, she no longer needs you. pm

yeah, a kick in the teeth

phill

Don't confront me with my failures, I had not forgotten them.

I don't recall the composer.  I heard Johnny Cash's version of "Unchained" first.  Johnny gave proper credit on his album by that title, but I don't have the album handy to check it.  Anyway, there's a line in there in which the singer is compared to a street lunatic by saying "we've both forgotten to go home."  I see a lot of power in that line - the recognition of mutual humanity and that sometimes it is despair that binds us one with another.  I love this song.  For some reason, I have had a very difficult time memorizing it. 

And speaking of despair, the single best country song line is from Merle Haggard's "Momma Tried" where he spends his 21st birthday in jail doing a life sentence.

One more for now.  Our own "Dirty Ed" has a way with simultaneously using multiple meanings of the same words.  A favorite of mine is in his song "Beer Belly" where he sings "Me and my beer belly will be hanging out tonight." 

- Zurf