Listen, I love music. But no matter how much I listen to a song, I don’t “hear” the lyrics. Sure, I can hear the words being said, but their meaning as a collective whole escapes me wholly. I honestly have no clue what most of the songs I listen to are about – and as proof, I submit my near inability to recite almost any song from memory.
I’m not quite sure what to pin as the reason for me not understanding the lyrics; though it might be a combo of things. Part of it, of course, is that it’s sometimes impossibleile to decipher what they’re singing without a cheat sheet. But beyond that, it might be that I just don’t care at all about what the singer has to say. All that matters to me is if the song sounds good – beyond that, little else matters. With all that said, I will concede I’ve looked up the lyrics to a few songs I’ve really gotten into, though I can’t say it ever made me appreciate them anymore.
Welcome to the club.
As most know, I lived in Germany many years and constantly had Germans begging me to translate the lyrics to their favorite songs into German.
Only then did I realized I had no clue what those groups were singing in English…even songs I had heard thousands of times. (Mick Jagger does NOT speak English!) And when I did try to translate, I couldn’t understand half of what they were singing!
Sure, there are some (very few) songs that are slow and easy to understand and the lyrics are interesting. But for the most part, I rarely, if ever, listen to the lyrics of a song either - well, maybe the chorus.
I would be the world’s worst karaoke singer, as I would probably read the lyrics and stop singing and say, “No shit? That is what this song is about?!?!”
You’re not alone, but we are decidedly in the minority.
Do you think that’s why Santana never became famous?
It seems like most people have no appreciation for a song unless there’s a story involved. It doesn’t even have to be a good story. Apparently, we can’t even use the word “song” unless it has lyrics.
I’m another one. There are songs that I have listened to for years without ever paying attention to what the words actually mean, beyond their being merely sounds that accompany the music. In part, it’s because I find many song lyrics to be incomprehensible, when I do actually get round to listening to them. Here’s a totally random but typical example, from a well-known song:
“Walking round the room singing Stormy Weather
At 57 Mount Pleasant Street
Well it’s the same room but everything’s different
You can find the sleep but not the dream”
WTF? I mean, nice tune, but what if anything do those words mean?
I don’t care about the lyrics in the sense that I don’t actively have to know what a song is about to enjoy it. Furthermore, if the songwriter has differing political views ( :rolleyes: ), I don’t really care. Some people’s opinion of music seems to hinge on the messages in the lyrics, and I don’t understand that mind-set at all.
I mean, there are songs that have lyrics that jump out at me. Mostly folky-type poetic stuff. Occasionally, but not often, they can heighten my appreciation for the song. And I like singing along with songs, so eventually I will find out the lyrics to my favorites. I can appreciate lyrics if they’re good, and totally ignore them if they aren’t, and all flavors in between.
So, I guess I’m not actually like the OP. I can turn a switch in my mind that allows me to care or not care about the lyrics depending on the song and the situation. For what it’s worth, I feel like I am in the minority when I discuss music with my friends, who actually do care about all the lyrics they listen to.
My thoughts exactly.
I often realise that I have been listening to a song, sometimes for years and don’t know the words. Doesn’t matter, treat the voice as another instrument.
A couple of examples.
I don’t speak French but wish I could. XXL
Or Japanese. I have a DVD film of this girl touring an island, meeting people and learning new songs. All in Japanese, no subtitles. It’s great although I can’t understand more than a few words and when she sings it matters even less.
TingTing, Moon Prayer
If you listen to Dead Can Dance or the quite similar Vas/Azam Ali, the ‘words’ aren’t words, it is a made-up language that means absolutely nothing, just to fit the voice to the music. Azam Ali does sometimes sing in Farsi but I would never know the difference.
Trying to understand Bob Dylan used to be an interesting exercise back in the distant past too.
I’m at two minds about it, if a melody is strong enough you can be singing your grocery list but when I hear a particularly inane lyric it cuts through me. I write songs myself and spend way more time on the lyrics than any other part of the songs.
To me, it’s apples and oranges. Both function independently in my mind, almost 100% of the time. In fact, I cannot think of one instance where I felt that either component was dependent on the other to make the song pleasing to me. I like lyrics once in a while, but it’s the music that makes me buy a record.
I tend to get actively annoyed when I can’t understand the lyrics to a song, even with effort. If the song is in English, or at least nominally so. I love it when the lyrics either match the music, or when the music and lyrics are actually clashing. One of my favorite songs is Rudyard Kipling’s Birds of Prey March, a very bitter anti-war screed, with the chorus, “The large birds of prey/they will carry us away/and you’ll never see your soldiers anymore,” set to a very cheerful, almost jingoistic, march. The disparity between the two factors of the song comes together to emphasize the bitterness and anger of the singer, making the whole more effective.
Having said that, I also do enjoy pieces where, because I can’t speak the language, the vocals are simply vox humana to my ear.
But my tastes for music tends towards the folky end of the spectrum, so that’s going to be a factor, too. To set up a comparison: There’s something wrong with a folk song where the vocals are completely incomprehensible, and from the little I’ve heard of it, that’s the goal for so-called kult metal.
I too have a foot in your camp: I enjoy songs in other languages - e.g. Bach’s Christmas cantatas - but they must be actual words that I can read in translation. Stuff like Carl Jenkins’ Adiemus leaves me cold.
There are those of us who listen to operas/operettas the same way. There are operas I’ve been listening to for up to 45 years, of which I know the general plot, but haven’t the faintest idea what they’re singing . . . some are even in English.
Patter songs, perhaps?
ETA: I’m such a lyrics geek that I slow down and listen obsessively to patter songs til I can say I’ve heard each vocal piece at least once to understand it… then I go back to enjoying the sound of the whole, without paying much attention to the lyrics anymore.
I think I’m especially that way because english isn’t my first language, but I listen almost exclusively to western music. And I am also speaking for many of my Korean friends who care even less what english lyrics have to say. That’s not to say very good lyrics don’t enhance the song, (even just good sounding lyrics) and there are some artists who write so well I always look up the lyrics to their songs.
I’m in the opposite camp. I have trouble enjoying a song, even one with a good melody, if the lyrics are inane or shallow. I enjoy good melodies, but the poetry of the lyrics is the more important aspect to me.
Yes and no. I usually dislike music without vocals and prefer songs to have clear lyrics that I can understand and appreciate but I couldn’t begin to recite the lyrics to the vast majority of the songs I most enjoy (most of which ***do ***have clear lyrics that tell a story that touches me) and don’t mind at all if I can’t understand what’s being sung. The human voice must be involved for me to really love most pieces of music, though.
I only speak English but have quite a bit of German music in my library because I like synthpop, EBM, and industrial, all of which have a german presence. I’ve also really been into the spanish (from Spain) Chambao lately and love Garmarna, which is Swedish.
It’s my experience that most people don’t care about lyrics. Even the ones who can understand them. This is probably good, since most pop songs have really dumb lyrics.
(My wife, to take an extreme example, remembers almost all the lyrics to a song on a first hearing–yet for all that has no idea what they mean. She can sing them without skipping a beat, yet ask her afterwards what she just sung (in her own words) and she has no idea. Even if the song has a perfectly unobscure meaning. Anyway, the meaning of the lyrics has nothing whatsoever to do with her enjoyment of a song or lack thereof.)
I actually prefer instrumental songs to songs with lyrics, and with the lyrical songs I like I tend to treat the singing as just another instrument. It’s always the melody and instrumentation that hooks me on a song, and if a lyrical song is stuck in my head, I’m just humming it, not actually singing it.
Some songs are treasured for their lyrics. Some for the music. Some for both. This doesn’t have to be an either/or thing.
The music I love the most has both going for it - great music AND great lyrics. If I’m listening to John Prine or Warren Zevon or Bob Dylan, I’m listening mostly for the lyrics. If I’m listening to the Steely Dan, or Supertramp or a lot of Blues, I’m listening mostly for the music. If I’m listening to Beethoven, I’m obviously not listening for lyrics at all.
The importance of lyrics definitely depends on the song. Sometimes they don’t matter, sometimes they’re the only thing worth listening to (i.e. when the music is very repetitive, which happens fairly often in folk), and sometimes they’ll actively drive me away from a song. Much rarer is when a certain lyric manages to combine with the music in a transcendent way, and this usually only happens for a line or two.
Radiohead’s Fake Plastic Trees is a near perfect marriage of the two, and the result is one very special song. Without the lyrics, the song would lose a lot of its power.
