Most annoying and/or insipid song lyrics?

[Ranger_Jeff]

@NDP

Unless Kool and the Gang did a cover version, that song is by K.C. and the Sunshine Band. Were they ones at the casino?

Then they’re at the casino down the beach singing “Get down tonight. Get down tonight.”

[Ranger_Jeff]

@njtt

Most of these are just bad songs. I offer “Horse With No Name”. As a song (or at least as a record, a performance) I rather like it, but the lyrics!
There were plants and birds. and rocks and things,
There was sand and hills and rings.
The first thing I met, was a fly with a buzz,
And the sky, with no clouds.
The heat was hot, and the ground was dry,
But the air was full of sound.
So, there were things were there? Interesting. And the heat, you would really describe that as being hot?

The plants, birds, things, sand, hills, and rings (rings?) all reappear in a later verse. I mean, you wouldn’t expect him to manage different imagery at this poetic level for each verse, would you? This time he is describing the seashore rather than the desert. Who would have thought that both things and rings would be characteristic of two such very different environments?

Don’t you get it? It’s like, the ocean is like a desert but all of its life is underground. It’s really deep shit. And if you smoke some really good shit, you’d appreciate it.

[Sahirrnee]

Having my baby

[Aspidistra]

@nearwildheaven

A song with lyrics that DO make sense, but is NOT appropriate for weddings even though it’s often sung at them, is Extreme’s megahit “More Than Words”. It’s a guy telling his girlfriend that she’s history unless she has sex with him. :smack:

I keep hearing that claim, but never seen it substantiated. (you could be the first!). The lyrics are telling me he just wants a nice hug.

My submission - Chumbawumba.

“He drinks a whiskey drink
He drinks a vodka drink
He drinks a lager drink
He drinks a cider drink
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the good times
He sings the songs that remind him
Of the better times”

Noooooooooo!

[WreckingCrew]

Foreigner’s Hot Blooded includes this winning couplet

“You don’t have to read my mind,
to know what I have in mind”

I can just see Lou Graham going “kind, rind, behind . . . ah, screw it.”

[Prof.Pepperwinkle]

Na na na na na na
Na na na na na na
Na na na na na na
Na na na na na.

[Sailboat]

@NDP

Anyway, it’s been nine years since this thread has been active. Two of the artists mentioned–Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston–have passed on. We need some newer crappy songs to name and shame here! There’s been a lot since 2003.

Well, we could always mine a rich vein of Kid Rock.

@WreckingCrew

Foreigner’s Hot Blooded includes this winning couplet

“You don’t have to read my mind,
to know what I have in mind”

Speaking of “rhyming” the same word, how about Kid Rock’s musically derivative “All Summer Long:”

And we were trying different things, we were smoking funny things

Not only is he rhyming the same word, it’s the most generic word possible.

[Ludovic]

@Procrustus

My vote for the worst lyrics ever written:

And they’re not even original lyrics, the writer heard someone speaking the lines on an album and for some reason thought they’d be awesome to sample into a song.

[nearwildheaven]

@njtt

Most of these are just bad songs. I offer “Horse With No Name”. As a song (or at least as a record, a performance) I rather like it, but the lyrics!
There were plants and birds. and rocks and things,
There was sand and hills and rings.
The first thing I met, was a fly with a buzz,
And the sky, with no clouds.
The heat was hot, and the ground was dry,
But the air was full of sound.
So, there were things were there? Interesting. And the heat, you would really describe that as being hot?

The plants, birds, things, sand, hills, and rings (rings?) all reappear in a later verse. I mean, you wouldn’t expect him to manage different imagery at this poetic level for each verse, would you? This time he is describing the seashore rather than the desert. Who would have thought that both things and rings would be characteristic of two such very different environments?

The song is about heroin addiction. :o

[Sparky812]

@Ranger_Jeff

According to the billboards, Kool and the Gang is still working the casinos on the Redneck Riviera. So, for going on 40 years they’ve been singing:
“That’s the way, uh huh uh huh, I like it uh huh uh huh!”

@NDP

Unless Kool and the Gang did a cover version, that song is by K.C. and the Sunshine Band. Were they ones at the casino?

@Ranger_Jeff

Then they’re at the casino down the beach singing “Get down tonight. Get down tonight.”

Kool and the Gang were the "Special Guest" for Van Halen's reunion tour last year! :confused:

@nearwildheaven

A song with lyrics that DO make sense, but is NOT appropriate for weddings even though it’s often sung at them, is Extreme’s megahit “More Than Words”. It’s a guy telling his girlfriend that she’s history unless she has sex with him. :smack:

@Aspidistra

I keep hearing that claim, but never seen it substantiated. (you could be the first!). The lyrics are telling me he just wants a nice hug.

Yep, nearwildheaven’s interpretation is a real stretch there, but if you’re gonna go with that one, you’d have to list almost every teen pop song ever.

Compare, for example, Van Halen’s “Finish What You Started” to “More Than Words”? Same message?
Besides, finding songs about “encouraging” people to have sex is like shooting fish in a barrel.

@nearwildheaven

And as many of you have already figured out, I’m a huge R.E.M. fan and have been almost from day one, and some of their early songs have no set lyrics. There was an alt-rock band that had some success in the late 1980s and early 1990s called the Cocteau Twins where nobody was any good at writing lyrics, so they just came up with syllables that matched the music, and that’s what was sung. I also remember hearing about a thrash-metal band called Obituary that could not provide a lyric sheet for the same reason.

R.E.M. fan who can’t cite any annoying and/or insipid lyrics?

[vontsira]

For me – Tom Jones’s The Young New Mexican Puppeteer is (including the title) the most cringe-makingly awful, stilted, clunky song lyric ever – in word-use, and re the premise, and imagery and narrative throughout.

[njtt]

@vontsira

For me – Tom Jones’s The Young New Mexican Puppeteer is (including the title) the most cringe-makingly awful, stilted, clunky song lyric ever – in word-use, and re the premise, and imagery and narrative throughout.

Yes, absolutely, but I don’t know if “insipid” is quite the word for it. For me, like quite a bit of Tom Jones’ stuff (most notably “Delilah”), and some Barry Manilow (“Cococabana”, “Bermuda Triangle”), falls into “so bad it’s good” territory.

[BobLibDem]

I can’t let a thread like this go by without:

We had joy, we had fun
We had seasons in the sun
But the stars we could reach
Were just starfish on the beach

[42fish]

From “My Way”:

Regrets, I’ve had a few
But then again, too few to mention

You just mentioned them in the previous &*$%ing line.

[Learjeff]

@jovan

Note, I’ve never heard Seasons in the Sun. Or I don’t remember. Not that I’d want to.

The music matches the lyrics.

@njtt

Yes, absolutely, but I don’t know if “insipid” is quite the word for it. For me, like quite a bit of Tom Jones’ stuff (most notably “Delilah”), and some Barry Manilow (“Cococabana”, “Bermuda Triangle”), falls into “so bad it’s good” territory.

That’s Cocobanana, bub.

@Khadaji

Not that I’m disagreeing or nothin’, but aren’t you kinda shootin fish in a barrel? Lets make it harder: Give me pop lyrics that aren’t insipid

Crash Test Dummies were better than most, in general. Bob Dylan had a few good ones (a few corkers too). Joni Mitchell’s “Help Me” is a great pop song in every regard, and though the lyrics aren’t deep, they’re well-matched to the spirit of the song. I particularly like the Jerry Douglas tune The Suit.

[GargoyleWB]

Country music has too many to list, but the ones that rise to mega-hit status deserve outing:

Jesus take the wheel
Take it from my hands
Cause I can’t do this on my own
I’m letting go
So give me one more chance
Save me from this road I’m on
Jesus take the wheel

[TreacherousCretin]

@42fish

From “My Way”:

Regrets, I’ve had a few
But then again, too few to mention

You just mentioned them in the previous &*$%ing line.

Ha! I never noticed that. Good one.

[ekedolphin]

It’s “Copacabana”, actually.

Anyway: I nominate “Motherlover”. Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg decide that, for Mother’s Day, they’ll screw each other’s moms, and get them pregnant. Um, okay.

It’s actually so outrageous that it crosses into funny, though.

I also nominate “Before He Cheats”, especially since the whole premise of the song is that the singer already vandalized her boyfriend’s car just based on the suspicion that he cheated. Also, I don’t think carving your own name into someone’s leather seats is a good idea. No jury in the world would fail to make you pay damages.

[Locrian]

The lamest lyric I’ve ever heard of all time belongs to Toto’s Africa.

“Sure as Killimanjaro rises like Olympus beyond the Serrrrrrengeti…”

[nearwildheaven]

Nobody’s mentioned Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” yet, have they? Do the “Glee” people not know that the song is about homeless teenage prostitutes?!?!?