# Album title is in a song, but it's not the song's title **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 3, 2009, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834 "2009-12-03T12:28:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/1 "2009-12-03T12:28:15Z")
Lots of albums have a “title track,” i.e. the album and a song therein have the exact same title. (Dire Straits - _Brothers In Arms_; Pink Floyd - _Wish You Were Here_; etc., etc…) So I heard Robert Cray’s _Right Next Door (Because of Me)_ this morning. The first line of the chorus is: “She was right next door and I’m such a strong persuader…” “Strong Persuader” is the title of the album on which this song appears, but it’s not the title of the song. What other examples of this do you know of? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/2 "2009-12-03T12:31:46Z")
The title of Paul Simon’s collection \*Negotiations and Love Songs \*comes from a line in his song “Trains in the Distance”. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/3 "2009-12-03T12:32:54Z")
Alanis Morisette’s album Jagged Little Pill is from the lyrics to a song on the album but they aren’t the title of the song. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/4 "2009-12-03T12:55:31Z")
Off the top of my head I can think of Guster’s "Lost and Gone Forever ", Splender’s “Halfway Done the Sky” and Counting Crows’ “Films About Ghosts”. But this happens A LOT. We could be listing for weeks. ---
**Author:** ![VunderBob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/839c29/32.png) [@VunderBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VunderBob)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/5 "2009-12-03T13:01:50Z")
Dire Straits’ _Making Movies_ is part of a lyric in “Skateaway”. “She’s making movies on location; she doesn’t know what it means.” ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/6 "2009-12-03T13:36:27Z")
The word “love” occurs in songs on both Aztec Camera’s and the Beatles’ albums of that name 🙂 (in the former case, I think it’s partly inspired by the opening line of the song “How Men Are”). “Selling England by the pound” (Genesis) is a line from “Dancing with the Moonlit Knight”. _Seven Worlds Collide_ by Neil Finn takes its title from the song “Distant Sun”, although the actual line is “seven worlds will collide”. The title _Bang!_ is taken from the song “Is it Like Today?” on the World Party album. It’s true, we could be here for a while. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/7 "2009-12-03T13:45:27Z")
I wanted to cite Steely Dan’s _Katy Lied_, but it seems “Doctor Wu” contains the phrases “Katy tried” and “Katy lies,” but not “Katy lied.” So how about– Jethro Tull: _Stormwatch_ (“Dun Ringill”) Kinks: _Everybody’s in Showbiz_ (“Celluloid Heroes”) Elvis Costello: _My Aim Is True_ (“Alison”) Elvis Costello: _Brutal Youth_ (“Favourite Hour”) ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/8 "2009-12-03T13:49:19Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > But this happens A LOT. We could be listing for weeks. Ah, but how often does it happen twice? The closing tracks of Pink Floyd’s _Dark Side of the Moon_ are _Brain Damage_, which has ‘I’ll see you on the dark side of the moon’, and _Eclipse_, in which the lyrics are followed by a bloke saying ‘There is no dark side of the moon really. (Matter of fact it’s all dark)’. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/9 "2009-12-03T13:59:50Z")
[Boys and Girls in America](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boys_and_Girls_in_America) by The Hold Steady. The line is used in two of the songs (_Stuck Between Stations_ and _First Night_). ---
**Author:** ![ErinPuff](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dbc845/32.png) [@ErinPuff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ErinPuff)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/10 "2009-12-03T14:35:29Z")
From a quick look through my iTunes library: _My Better Self_ by Dar Williams (line from “I’ll Miss You Till I Meet You”) _Castaways and Cutouts_ by the Decemberists (line from “Youth and Beauty Brigade”) _Only Way to Be Alone_ by Good Old War (line from “Window”) _Like Vines_ by the Hush Sound (line from “We Intertwined”) _Perils and Thrills_ by LittleHorse (line from “Running Just Ahead of the Devil”) _The Mission Before Us_ by LittleHorse (line from “George Mallory”) _I Guess I Was Hoping for Something More_ by Tarkio (line from “Kickaround”) _Big Beautiful Sky_ by Venus Hum (line from “Montana”) _The Colors in the Wheel_ by Venus Hum (line from “Genevieve’s Wheel”) _All Your Things Are Gone_ by Victory at Sea (line from “No Such Thing as Hearts”) ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/11 "2009-12-03T14:41:33Z")
_Under the Table and Dreaming_ by the Dave Matthews Band (line from “Ants Marching”) ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/12 "2009-12-03T14:49:38Z")
The title of Wilco’s _Yankee Hotel Foxtrot_ album is repeated at end of the song “Poor Places”, although not as lyrics, but from a snippet of a broadcast from a [numbers station](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station). ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/13 "2009-12-03T14:52:02Z")
Just off the top of my head: Pretty. Odd. Panic at the Disco (from the track That Green Gentlemen (Things Have Changed)) Nevermind. Nirvana (from Smells Like Teen Spirit) ETA: I forgot Good News for People who Love Bad News by Modest Mouse ---
**Author:** ![Orville\_mogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/aeb1de/32.png) [@Orville\_mogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orville_mogul)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/14 "2009-12-03T14:58:45Z")
Muse’s _Black Holes and Revelations_ (line from “Starlight”), though they also have a song “Supermassive Black Hole” from the same album, but no reference to revelations ---
**Author:** ![It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/it_s_not_rocket_surgery/32/312_2.png) [@It\_s\_Not\_Rocket\_Surgery](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/It_s_Not_Rocket_Surgery)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/15 "2009-12-03T15:20:56Z")
In the CD _Swamp Ophelia_ by the Indigo Girls, the term “Swamp Ophelia” only appears in the song “Touch Me Fall”. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/16 "2009-12-03T15:48:08Z")
This doesn’t quite fit but it’s odd enough that I thought I’d mention it anyway. The album “Starless and Bible Black” by King Crimson contains a song of the same name, but it’s an instrumental. But on their next album, “Red”, there was a song called “Starless” that had the refrain “Starless and bible black”. (The title track to the album “Red” was also an instrumental, but the album also contains a vocal track called “One More Red Nightmare”.) Somewhat similarly, the live Grateful Dead album “Steal Your Face”, which was sort of a companion piece to _The Grateful Dead Movie_, takes its title from the lyrics of “He’s Gone”, which appears in the movie but not on the album. ---
**Author:** ![KennerTheGreat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a8b319/32.png) [@KennerTheGreat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KennerTheGreat)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/17 "2009-12-03T16:06:49Z")
Alanis Morrisette’s _Jagged Little Pill_, in the song “You Learn” ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Lance_Murdoch)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/18 "2009-12-03T16:15:05Z")
XTC mad e a habit of titling their albums after lyrics off the previous album Apple Venus, Nonesuch and Oranges & Lemons. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/19 "2009-12-03T16:44:56Z")
Moody Blues – **On the Threshold of a Dream**. The phrase is spoken in one of the songs. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834/20 "2009-12-03T17:10:57Z")
> [@cjepson](#): > > This doesn’t quite fit but it’s odd enough that I thought I’d mention it anyway. The album “Starless and Bible Black” by King Crimson contains a song of the same name, but it’s an instrumental. But on their next album, “Red”, there was a song called “Starless” that had the refrain “Starless and bible black”. Yes’s _Relayer_ is like that. The word “relayer” doesn’t appear in the lyrics of that album, but it occurs prominently as a refrain in “The Remembering” from the previous album, _Tales from Topographic Oceans_. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/album-title-is-in-a-song-but-its-not-the-songs-title/519834.md?page=2)