To ask whether you’re a lyrics person?

[Forwardthinkingcrayfish]

Having heard various people say many times this year that Taylor Swift “is a lyrical genius”, it suddenly dawned on me that when I’m listening to any vocal music (even my favourite artists/bands) I don’t pay attention to the meaning of the lyrics!

Disclaimer: I’m a classically trained pianist (without wanting to come across as snobby… believe me I listen to cheesy pop too!). I believe my mind has been trained to focus on rhythm, chords, melody and some other aspects that, when put together, make the general “feeling” of a song for me… but lyrics really don’t fall into this list.

I genuinely think that a song could be about monkeys in a zoo or the treatment of sewage and if it’s sung with feeling, then I’ll enjoy it and wouldn’t probably pay any attention. I enjoy rap music because of the rhythmic and rhyming nature of the lyrics, but don’t especially care about the content of the lyrics themselves.

Of course, there is no right or wrong answer to this poll but I’m intrigued:

YABU - Lyrics are really important to me and I pay great attention to them when listening to a song
YANBU - I don’t/rarely pay attention to lyrics

I'm on the fence. I like a lot of alternative/'indie' music and appreciate the lyrics. But I also enjoy a good pop song or dance trackwith a catchy beat I can sing along to. I do have my limits with the latter though - nothing TOO cheesy and simplistic: then they just grate on me.

Same here, OP. I'm no musician,but I have a fairly musical ear. The odd thing is, I'm a linguist, so you'd think I'd be all about the lyrics. But for me with songs it's more about the tune and rhythm and the sound of the words, rather than what they are saying!

I definitely pay much more attention to lyrics than the tune/melody/whatever the word is. The lyrics are 95% of what I'm interested in in a song.

I'm a lyrics person. My husband is a music person. I ruined 'Norwegian Wood' for him by telling him what the song was about. He'd never really listened to it and thought it was just a tribute to cheap pine furniture.

I take absolutely no notice of lyrics other than notice if some of them are absolute nonsense.
I trained in classical music and am much more interested in what the tune sounds like.

And don't even get me started on The Lonesome Boatman by the Fureys.

I saw them live recently and they were great. That song is still very powerful.

Neither of your options, it’s both for me. It isn’t either or.

I wouldn't recognise a Taylor Swift song if I heard one on the radio, but lyrics are massively important to me. If a song has dull or cliched lyrics I find it really hard to enjoy, even if the tune is good and the singer has a great voice. If a song has great lyrics, I don't care how poor the voice is, or if the tune is a bit meh.

Taylor Swift's stuff , like Ed Sheeran's - does nothing for me. Songs that I couldn't sing back if I wanted to.

Lyrics are overrated. Can't even hear them most of the time. If I wanted prose I'd read a book. 🤷‍♀️

Totally agree about not being able to understand a lot of lyrics. I can't stand performers that you can't understand

I am absolutely a lyrics person, and I find the idea of Taylor Swift being some sort of lyrical genius absolutely laughable. She's deeply mediocre.

Try as I might, I can't concentrate on lyrics unless it's an unaccompanied song.

I play music professionally and I'll look out for the last lyric before the instrumental break or a key change or whatever, but it's something that I have to consciously do.

I also can't remember lyrics easily which makes it almost impossible for me to sing backing vocals or harmonies, unless they are just sounds rather than words.

I have recently started thinking about music I'd like played at my funeral (sorry to bring the thread down, but my younger brother died very unexpectedly last year, and it's brought a lot of stuff into focus). So I've had to start reading the lyrics of songs I like, just incase!

No, I'm not a lyrics person or a fan of "modern
music".

For me music and lyrics go together, and I like to know the lyrics, or at least have a sense of what they are, but I’ve got some foreign language songs on my playlist (Finnish, Serbian and Dutch spring to mind) which I really enjoy, even if I have no clue what’s being sung.

I don’t mind nonsense lyrics, but some lyrics really put me off songs… Abracadabra, Centrefold and Money for Nothing particularly spring to mind. The latter gives me the rage, even if it’s the cleaned up version.

I really hate it when good songs have absolutely rubbish lyrics. Like nearly every Oasis song - none of the words make the slightest sense though I can appreciate they’re catchy songs.

So Sally can wait, she knows it’s too late as we’re walking on by. My soul slides away, but don’t look back in anger, I heard you say.

WTF are you on about?

I realised a while back that I know all the lyrics to the songs from my teenage/student years, but now it's more about the music and I have no idea about the lyrics. I wonder whether part of it is that I used to buy albums and read the lyrics as I listened, or whether it's that as my hearing has got worse I struggle to pick them out.

Bassline, rhythm, chords, riffs, hooks, ornamentation/ad libs, melody and way, way, way down on the list comes working out what on earth they're mumbling, shrieking or wailing. Goes for all types of music - I'll be able to replicate everything about a piece except get the words right without finding out online or on a score what they are.

@CountingCrones

Thank you so much for that link. I really enjoyed it. Blue is one of my favourite albums.

Wish I'd read it before we went to Crete last year!

Definitely the lyrics for me but then I have no musical education or knowledge. This thread has helped me to understand why a family would choose " The Air That I Breathe" by the Hollies for their elderly mother's funeral.

Just to give an example of a recent song by TS - I really thought this could have been about my ex. Years of youth spent with a self confessed depressive, never happy to be happy for too long, desperate to push everyone away because they can't be happy because then who would they be, moves onto next girl to do same sob story - no matter how much you try to protect and nurture and love you simply can't. It stops being fun and they just drag you down until you end up having to save yourself by leaving. The typical they become so bad you have to be the one to break it off.

So Long, London - Taylor Swift

LyricsAboutQ&ACommentsSign Up
10
So Long, London
Taylor Swift
Track 5 on THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT: THE ANTHOLOGY

Producers

Aaron Dessner & Taylor Swift

[Verse 1]

I saw in my mind fairy lights through the mist

I kept calm and carried the weight of the rift

Pulled him in tighter each time he was driftin' away
My spine split from carrying us up the hill

Wet through my clothes, weary bones caught the chill

I stopped tryna make him laugh, stopped tryna drill the safe

[Chorus]
Thinkin', "How much sad did you think I had
Did you think I had in me?"
Oh, the tragedy
So long, London
You'll find someone

[Verse 2]
I didn't opt in to be your odd man out

I founded the club she's heard great things about

I left all I knew, you left me at the house by the Heath

I stoppеd CPR, after all, it's no use
The spirit was gonе, we would never come to

And I'm pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free

[Chorus]
For so long, London
Stitches undone

Two graves, one gun

I'll find someone

[Bridge]
And you say I abandoned the ship
But I was going down with it
My white-knuckle dying grip
Holding tight to your quiet resentment

And my friends said it isn't right to be scared
Every day of a love affair
Every breath feels like rarest air
When you're not sure if he wants to be there

[Chorus]
So how much sad did you think I had
Did you think I had in me?
How much tragedy?
Just how low did you
Think I'd go 'fore I'd self-implode?
'Fore I'd have to go be free?

[Verse 3]
You swore that you loved me, but where were the clues?

I died on the altar waitin' for the proof

You sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days

And I'm just getting color back into my face

I'm just mad as hell 'cause I loved this place for

[Chorus]
So (So) long (Long), London (London)
Had (Had) a (A) good (Good) run (Run)
A moment (Moment) of warm sun (Sun)
But I'm (I'm) not (Not) the (The) one (One)
So (So) long (Long), London (London)
Stitches (Stitches) undone (Undone)

Two (Two) graves (Graves) one gun (Gun)

You'll (You'll) find (Find) someone

Absolutely both for me.

I watched an interview with Perrie Edwards lately talking about the songs on her new album. She wrote a song with Raye about her fiance, Alex Oxlaide-chamberlain. She said it was about annoying things he does but very lighthearted. She asked him to listen to the song and he said he liked it. She was like "did you not realise i wrote that about you?" And he didn't have a clue cos he hears the music first. She is 100% a lyrics person.

Wow - such a strong correlation between classically trained musicians and not being into lyrics on this thread!

Interestingly, I’m quite good at picking up on lyrics and being able to sing along to songs from memory, it’s just that the lyrics don’t have any meaning to me. Another poster’s comment about the vocals just being another instrument hit the nail on the head for me!

This is me, too!