submissions
| Wilco – Bob Dylan's 49th Beard Lyrics
| 1 month ago
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The syntax suggests his growing the beard was part of his depression - shaving and other hygiene/self-care stuff can go out the window with it. Jeff did often have a scraggly one at this time (see lots of footage in I am trying to break your heart), sorta like Dylan's in the early 70s. The consciously folky melody and guitar part and number bit in the title add to the reference. |
submissions
| The Decemberists – January Hymn Lyrics
| 3 months ago
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Bleakness of January with spring feeling far away, paralleled with being alone while a significant other is physically far away, and suggesting both of them simultaneously, seemingly reminding narrator of his lonely childhood in a cold place (Meloy and Montana) and teenage heartache.
Guitar playing is a pastiche of Dylan's flat-picking style, especially his 1963-66 albums and 1992-93 folk cover albums. The G-G6-G7 turnaround is a direct lift, though the inspiration could be Donovan's own pastiche of this guitar style on "Catch the Wind".
The verse melody is a little like that of the Irish song "The Parting Glass", used by Behan for "The Patriot Game" and Dylan for "With God on Our Side", which uses the G figure. Ironically the melody for "what where the words I meant to say before you left?" sounds a LOT like that for "some people say there's a woman to blame..." from (of all things) Jimmy Buffett's "Margaritaville". |
submissions
| Dream Academy – Life In A Northern Town Lyrics
| 6 months ago
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About as strong a mainline shot of nostalgia as a song can be. Even if you don't have direct associations with the 80s, 60s, or Northern places, I suspect.
The imagery of brass bands and train stations evokes Northern England in an almost Beatle-esque way, appropriate given the reference in the second verse. There the desolation of Northern towns under Thatcher in 84/85 (also the era of Reagan, of course) is contrasted with the near polar opposite spirit of early 1963, when JFK was US president, and the Fab Four where bursting on the UK scene.
Whether the mysterious visitor is intended to be Drake or not, the song sure is an elegy for something. Apparently Nick Laird Clowes' mentor was Paul Simon; the description of a folk singer arriving, playing for young people and leaving on the train could be a mirror of the experiences Simon sings about in "Homeward Bound".... |
submissions
| The Band – The Weight Lyrics
| 9 months ago
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at least some confirmed and possible references:
(1) Nazareth, PA (home of CF Martin guitars).
(2) "Fanny" Steloff of Gotham Book Mart, where Robertson said he read the Bunuel scripts that influenced the song.
(3) Carmen, Anna Lee, Crazy Chester (an eccentric who carried a pop gun) are all apparently people Levon Helm knew in Arkansas.
(4) "Go Down, Moses" is an old African American spiritual.
(5) "Ol' Luke": Aside from St. Luke, and any person known to Helm, this bit could be a reference to Hank Williams' "Luke The Drifter" persona.
(6) Cannonball: a fast train, e.g. the "Wabash Cannonball" from the folk song, which does the Rock Island Line, itself the title of another folk song.
1, 4, 5 have biblical or mortality related double meanings as well as their Americana ones. Presumably intentional on Robbie's part given the Bunuel inspiration and how the biblical feel reinforced the "old weird America" stuff at the same time. |
submissions
| Warren Zevon – Jeannie Needs A Shooter Lyrics
| 9 months ago
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Another western tale, a little like Dylan and Levy's "Romance in Durango" but much less detailed (actually, like Dylan's own "Drifter's Escape" in that way, getting you to mentally fill in a vivid story with just a couple short, verses).
Narrator wants Jeannie, but her protective father has other ideas. One meaning of the title is him saying she needs him to shoot her dad, and then they'll escape together (the other is straightforwardly sexual).
In any case, she double-crosses him (probably intending to from the beginning) and her father shoots the narrator, presumably fatally. It's an economical lyric even by Warren's standards, with the twist of the shooter literally being the girl's father. |
submissions
| Van Morrison – I Shall Sing Lyrics
| 11 months ago
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Joy of singing. Nothing deep here. Van gave this one to Art Garfunkel, whose version is arranged more in the spirit of "Cecilia", and features Simon on guitar, possibly alongside JJ Cale and Larry Carlton. Van's version is a lot looser (we only have a couple takes, neither making Moondance, obviously), but sounds quite a bit clearer despite the instrumental chaos; the difference between engineering by Shelly Yakus and Roy Halee maybe, or that Art's was recorded Wrecking Crew style, and in a Cathedral. |
submissions
| The Wallflowers – Hand Me Down Lyrics
| 11 months ago
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@[ncc74656m:47322] For all the possibility it's about Bob, it's *really* harsh even for a strained father/son relationship; given the record came out a month before the 2000 election, a Bush angle is possible. |
submissions
| The Wallflowers – Three Marlenas Lyrics
| 11 months ago
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Starting off with the hair red/bed rhyme invites the Tangled Up in Blue comparison. The other similarity is the use of more than one POV, since the first and second verse are in the third person and the third verse (and chorus, sort of) is in first person. Which if any of the three aspects is the real person?
First verse she's making her way in the world in a slightly seedy way, maybe even as a prostitute. Second verse shows a desire to settle down and live an "honest life", and even a bit of devoutness since she's praying. Third verse has hints of doomed characters like in "Thelma & Louise" and shows a desire for freedom, even if it's the freedom of oblivion. Which part of Marlena will win out as the one she can trust as the real her? |
submissions
| Warren Zevon – Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Folks have got the gist of the song covered well by now, so on the trivia side:
you'll find a reference to this song in (of all places) "The Lost World: Jurassic Park". That movie's screenplay was written by David Koepp, a major fan of the song.
He named the big game hunter (played by Pete Postlethwaite) "Roland Tembo" in reference to the song, and then thought it would be fun to name his nemesis Van Owen, as in the song. Voila the "Nick Van Owen" character played by Vince Vaughn. |
submissions
| The Byrds – Lover of the Bayou Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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Mostly Louisiana Voodoo imagery and references - McGuinn and Levy were writing songs for a musical. The main character is a smuggler/gun runner in LA during the Civil War, and this song is sung by a Voodoo "witch doctor" (priest or Oungan). |
submissions
| Bob Dylan – Rambling, Gambling Willie Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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By early 1962 he could already synthesize typical elements of American folk song lyrics into a new(ish) song with ease.
Here he took the structure and melody of the Irish folk song "Brennan on the Moor" (as performed by The Clancy Brothers) as the basis for the song. |
submissions
| Oasis – Round Are Way Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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From Noel's era of throwing better songs away on B-sides. A Beatles pastiche but not too blatant...horns a bit like "Got to get you into my life", the backing vocals, and the Penny Lane style lyrical trip through their part of Manchester. |
submissions
| Warren Zevon – Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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@[schleg:43857] And now what, 19 years? That line is a twisted reference (as Warren could do so well), to the 1949 standard "That Lucky Old Sun (Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day)", recorded initially by people like Sinatra and Armstrong and later by Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Willie Nelson, Brian Wilson, Dylan, and countless others. |
submissions
| Grateful Dead – The Wheel Lyrics
| 1 year ago
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The song uses religious references and imagery for sure. Part of the lyric directly references the African-American spiritual "Ezekiel Saw the Wheel", which has the line "And the big wheel run by Faith, good Lord/And the little wheel run by the Grace of God..". in describing Ezekiel's vision in the Old Testament. But wheel symbols turn up elsewhere, notably in Hinduism and Buddhism, and Hunter seems to be getting at the 'cyclic nature of existence' sort of metaphor from those traditions (e.g., samsara). |
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| Bob Dylan – Lay Down Your Weary Tune Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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Dylan did write this at Joan's place in Carmel while staying there with her and her family. Seems to have been inspired by the natural beauty of the location and Joan's record collection (the tune is similar to "The water is wide" and similar folk ballads). He must've been thinking about a sort of "life is music/music is life" meta thing around this time; "The eternal circle" has a similar theme but with concert as metaphor rather than nature. |
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| Bob Dylan – She Belongs to Me Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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The mix of awe and sarcastic ambivalence (and the Egyptian ring) suggests he had Joan Baez in mind (if anyone) when writing this one. |
submissions
| Bob Dylan – You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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Possibly written about then-girlfriend Ellen Bernstein - she apparently stayed with Bob at his farm in Minnesota circa summer 1974 when he was writing tracks for BOTT. Whatever the inspiration, it's one of those rare happy-and-inspired songs of his. |
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| Bob Dylan – Gates of Eden Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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After "Mr. Tambourine Man" (~ Feb 1964), this seems to be chronologically the second song written (~June 1964) of the ones that ended up on "Bringing it All Back Home"; "It's Alright Ma" followed soon after that summer. Tambourine Man is dreamy but mostly not sinister; this song is much more nightmare like in both the words/imagery and music - having that darkly existentialist-ish feel that It's alright Ma has - though this one seems mostly to be about false promises and hypocrisy around religion or something than society in general (except for the motorcycle madonna and grey flannel elf). And both have the sort of grotesque characters that he used a lot more about a year later, on Highway 61 songs like Rolling Stone and Desolation Row. |
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| Bob Dylan – Gates of Eden Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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After "Mr. Tambourine Man" (~ Feb 1964), this seems to be chronologically the second song written (~June 1964) of the ones that ended up on "Bringing it All Back Home"; "It's Alright Ma" followed soon after that summer. Tambourine Man is dreamy but mostly not sinister; this song is much more nightmare like in both the words/imagery and music - having that darkly existentialist-ish feel that It's alright Ma has - though this one seems mostly to be about false promises and hypocrisy around religion or something than society in general (except for the motorcycle madonna and grey flannel elf). And both have the sort of grotesque characters that he used a lot more about a year later, on Highway 61 songs like Rolling Stone and Desolation Row. |
submissions
| XTC – Senses Working Overtime Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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First line is "the clouds are whey". Whey is the liquid from curdled milk and gets produced in cheesemaking; it evokes a slightly sour yellowish-white colour that clouds could be in unpleasant weather - this works with the sour chords and melody in the verse and also fits with the foodstuffs mentioned in the song: lemons, limes, pie, biscuits. Original use of imagery from a very original songwriter; this tune has Beatles-level hooks and melodies. |
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| Bob Dylan – A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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The song was written before the Cuban Missile Crisis, and already in early 1963 Bob\'s correcting Studs Terkel when the latter assumes it\'s"atomic rain" in an interview. Of course the same Dylan wrote "let me die in my footsteps", "Talkin\' World War III blues", "with god on our side" and so on around this time, so he could have been inspired by the threat of nuclear armageddon more generally. \n\nAnd/or armageddon in general - the comment about the dialogue between Jesus and (a rather Old Testament) God and such might well capture what Dylan was going for - he was no stranger to liberally using biblical imagery and motifs from the get-go.\n\nIt\'s also possible the "blue-eyed son" bit was just something that fit the phrasing of the Lord Randall ballad and he didn\'t think about it more deeply than that. Other than the "Been/Saw/Heard/Met/Going" thing a lot of the structure is secondary to how the imagery keeps raining down itself - first couple verses use lots of alliteration that then goes away.\n\nmusically, the drop D tuning and G and A chords that keep the droning D strings just sounds \'wet\', and the climb/descent from D to G/D to A/D and back to D really conveys the movement/journey aspect of the lyrics. |
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| Bruce Springsteen – Badlands Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[belindaSt:40673] \r\n\r\nHe definitely took the main riff (but changed it from minor to major) and the rhyming of \'good\' and \'understood\' in the chorus, but that\'s about it. |
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| Bob Dylan – Farewell Angelina Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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Bob apparently wrote this while at Baez\'s place in Carmel in late November 1964. Like with "Lay Down Your Weary Tune" written there a year before, he seems to have nicked a trad melody from her record collection; here "The Wagoner\'s Lad". \n\nHistory-wise, this would have been the week the US announced the escalation of the Vietnam War. \n\nThe holocaust idea is interesting, but seems like Bob more generally kicking at unpleasant parts of human nature: close-mindedness, unnecessary violence (and enjoyment of it), superstition. \n\nA sort of halfway point between his 1964 writing style with imagery of weather (like Mr. Tambourine Man, Chimes of Freedom) grotesque, circus-ish characters (Gates of Eden, MTM again) and playing cards (Jack of Diamonds) and his 1965 style where the characters get more absurd and specific (Rolling Stone, Tombstone Blues, Highway 61, Desolation Row) and the settings more urban. \n\nProbably gave it to Joan because he\'d written It\'s all over now, baby blue by the recording sessions, and it and Love Minus Zero did what he wanted from acoustic tunes better. |
submissions
| Elliott Smith – Division Day Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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This does seem to be about Elliott himself in a mostly straightforward way - the trauma of being abused apparently being the main cause of his struggles with profound Depression, addiction, and recurring suicidality, which ultimately took his life (\'he was murdered\' theories aside). \n\nThe title phrase might be a dark pun: Division Day is both the day when soul and body are divided at death and a day he might have thought about a lot: going to one of the bridges on Division Street in Portland to kill himself. |
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| Bob Dylan – Absolutely Sweet Marie Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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After well over 50 years people still seriously over-analyze a lot of his songs. \n\nThis one combines a smart-ass reference to sexual frustration, which may well be the main inspiration for the song, if any; (the trumpet line), random folk-blues bits (six white horses, down at the penitentiary), images for the sake of images (he\'s mentioned the yellow railroad being an example of using an image just because it\'s evocative, as in he saw a railroad track lit by the sun in a striking way and remembered it) and rhymes that are fun (happened/riverboat captain) but not meaningful. \n\nHis songwriting between Tambourine Man in 1964 and the Basement stuff in 1967 is mostly about surreal collections of images, often including surreal characters, and usually an overall vibe of dreamy, funny, or sinister.\n\n It\'s probably a mistake to think the characters correspond to real-life people the vast majority of the time, or that any narrative is really going on. \n\nA starting point like "I love Sara" or "damn, Edie Sedgwick or the Newport crowd or Grossman etc are getting on my nerves" or Bruce Langhorne having a big tambourine in the studio might be the starting point for songs that aren\'t really about those things or conscious parables for anything else. |
submissions
| Warren Zevon – Bad Karma Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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This one\'s ended up obscure, but is very catchy and the lyrics are a great example of Warren\'s humour even when he probably wasn\'t kidding about the song\'s message. \n\nAlso has the slightly odd combo of Michael Stipe and Stan Lynch singing backing vocals. |
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| Warren Zevon – Detox Mansion Lyrics
| 2 years ago
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@[Rickvee:40215] David Lindley doing the lead guitar (his lap steel slide style, like in his hit version of Mercury Blues; he played on four or five of Zevon\'s albums) over what sounds like a Peter Buck Rhythm part. |
submissions
| Wilco – Born Alone Lyrics
| 12 years ago
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I think Jeff Tweedy said that this song was put together using words and phrases from 19th century American poetry (including Emily Dickinson). that certainly comes across: "Mine eyes have seen the fury.." is reminiscent of "mine eyes have seen the glory..." from the Battle Hymn of the Republic by Julia Ward Howe.
also, the line "I was born to die alone" is meant in a defiant, triumphant way. It's great that Jeff is in a place where he can see that we're more alive when we recognise our mortality rather than deny it. |
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