Lyrics that make you grin (or frown...)

[rogerzilla]

Some of Difford's lyrics are very odd, a bit like English as a second language, for instance:

But behind the chalet
My holiday's complete
And I feel like William Tell
Maid Marian on her tiptoed feet
Pulling mussels from a shell

William Tell and Maid Marian?  "Robin Hood" would have scanned perfectly well, since "Tell" and "shell" don't actually need to rhyme.

[teethgrinder]

Not as bad as Thinn Lizzy.

Tonight there's gunna be a jailbreak,
Somewhere in this town.

 

[rogerzilla]

Zoo time is she and you time
The mammals are your favourite type, and you want her tonight
Heartbeat, increasing heartbeat
You hear the thunder of stampeding rhinos, elephants and tacky tigers
This town ain't big enough for both of us
And it ain't me who's gonna leave

Flying domestic flying
And when the stewardess is near do not show any fear
Heartbeat increasing heartbeat
You are a khaki-coloured bombadier it's Hiroshima that you're nearing
This town ain't big enough for both of us
And it ain't me who's gonna leave

Daily, except for Sunday
You dawdle in to the cafe where you meet her each day
Heartbeat, increasing heartbeat
As twenty cannibals have hold of you, they need their protein just like you do
This town ain't big enough for both of us
And it ain't me who's gonna leave

Shower, another shower
You've got to look your best for her and be clean everywhere
Heartbeat, increasing heartbeat
The rain is pouring on the foreign town, the bullets cannot cut you down
This town ain't big enough for both of us
And it ain't me who's gonna leave

Census, the latest census
There'll be more girls who live in town though not enough to go round
Heartbeat, increasing heartbeat
You know that:
This town isn't big enough,
not big enough for both of us
This town isn't big enough,
not big enough for both of us
And I ain't gonna leave

Bonkers!

[Deano]

Tips for Teens by Sparks is up there as well.

[rogerzilla]

The Bard of Barking:

She said "do these seats fold down"
I said "if you pull that handle"
All the time she'd been waiting for
Something with a little more
And all her mates on the new estates
Were walking out in confetti and sunshine


Her mother read her mail
And her dad was a policeman
Which I must say worried me
But some things have just got to be
So we passed very fast like ships in the night
Or cars in a contraflow system


Some people say love is blind
But I think that's just a bit short-sighted
Some people just want it now
It doesn't matter where or how
Satisfaction takes a second place
So long as they can get excited

[citoyen]

While we're with Sir William:

"How can you lie there and think of England / when you don't even know who's on the team?"

+1 to AWL re Up The Junction. I HATE that line!

[Ham]

Has no one yet nominated Macarthur Park for the ultimate frown?

I'd like to believe the urban legend that it was written for a bet, don't really care if it wasn't.

[cygnet]

Grins for these:

Boy wants a car from his Dad
Dad says "First you gotta cut that hair"
Boy says,"Hey Dad, Jesus had long hair"
and Dad says "That's right son; Jesus walked everywhere"

Silver Jews - The Frontier Index

Herman loves Pauline and Pauline loves Herman
They made love and gave birth to a little German

SFA

[matthew]

Not so much grin as hear for the first time and half way through realise the subject and think "has he really done this."

Hollow Point - Chris Wood

Awake arise you drowsy sleeper
Awake arise it’s almost day.
No time to lie, no time to slumber,
No time to dream your life away.

It was a gorgeous summer's morning
It was a gorgeous summer's day.
His cotton jacket was all he carried
As he walked out to face the day.

As he was walking he was wondering
With a little dream as a young man will
And never heard footsteps behind him
By the bus stop at Tulse Hill.

But from his front door they’d had him covered.
They were right behind him from the start.
And though the video was buggered
Someone decided he looked the part.

Here comes the bus, the front doors hiss
He climbs aboard and so do they.
And now he swings down to his seat -
It’s just another working day.

But there was something in the air that morning
As they came down to Brixton town.
They sealed the station without warning -
There was something going down.

And so they journeyed on and onward.
He called his friend just to explain
How he would be late and not to worry,
And so to Stockwell Tube he came ….

Now he’s on their cameras, he’s on their radar,
He’s on their crackling radios,
His Oyster Card is in his pocket,
At 10am through the gates he goes.

And down and down dropped the moving staircase,
Deeper down go the others too.
And through the hour glass the sand is falling -
There is nothing they can do ….

When the train comes in they are right beside him.
Some say three and some say four,
Some say the cameras they were not working
As he sat down near the open door.

If he’d have stopped, if he’d have listened …
Commissioner said that it was no good -
He said they gave him no instructions
That an innocent man could have understood.

Just a Brazilian electrician -
Christ only knows what he came here for.
The hollow point was the ammunition.
Now it’s our turn now for some shock and awe….

Awake arise you drowsy sleeper,
Awake arise it’s almost day.
No time to lie, no time to slumber,
No time to dream your life away.

It was a gorgeous summer's morning,
It was a gorgeous summer's day.
His cotton jacket was all he carried

As he walked out to face the day.

[Peter]

I love the lyricism of Squeeze. Labelled with Love's my favourite. However, some of their lines do grate:

I got a job with Stanley
He said I'd come in handy

That feels like they were just in a hurry when writing Up the Junction, though it doesn't feel too out of kilter with the rest of the lyrics.

I liked Labelled With Love so much, I bought the LP with it on.  It's very good but the way they deliberately set out to have every single rhyme on the record not quite rhyme is arch and heavy-handed, I think - and not a little irritating.  It would have been easier to get most of it to rhyme "properly"!

[citoyen]

Frown: "She blew my nose and then she blew my mind" - Honky Tonk Women, Rolling Stones

Grin: "I blew up your body but you blew my mind" - In Every Dream Home A Heartache, Roxy Music

[MattH]

How about Shake Your Euphemism by Blue Man Group? Not exactly highbrow Shakespearean prose, but it raises a grin. Lots of slightly different versions depending upon where they are performing (TV versions with the best quality youtube videos tend to be cleaned up), but it goes pretty much like this:-

It is time now to create the ultimate dance party.
You may already have a catchy melody, and a fierce groove, but that's not enough.
To take things over the top, you will need to employ the greatest weapon in the dance party arsenal:
you will need to start shaking your rear end.
Or as some people call it...

Your hind-quarters
Your backside
Your bottom
Your buttocks
Your rump
Your posterior
Your heiny
Your keister
Your tush
Your buns
Your bum cakes
Your junk-in-the-trunk
Your badonk-a-donk
Your squash tart
Your fanny
Your double-slug
Your wiggle bags
Your mud flaps
Your rump rockets
Your flesh pot
Your second face
Your bounce house
The jiggle twins
Jar Jar Binks
Your bubble pop
Your medicine ball
Your sonic boom

Ladies and gentlemen, please stand up.
and
SHAKE SHAKE SHAKE...
Your booty.
It's time to shake that freckle-muffin
It's time to bake that turkey stuffin'
Let your smiley bulldog loose
And put some goose in your caboose
Wiggle that rump-hump
It's time to jiggle that jump-pump
Dance to the beat that the DJ cuts
There's no "if"s or "and"s
JUST BUTTS.
Let's get it going,
Keep it going, don't stop
Use your bum to stir that soup
And shake it all around like
Blue Man Group

Shake your moneymaker
Your sit-biscuit
Your mumbler
Your chocolate cluster
Your rock tumbler
Your fun-cooker
Your subwoofer
Your horn section
Your Frodo
John Madden
Your launch pad
Moscow
The Outback
Your rotunda
The closer
The crock pot
Your jumbo-tron

You need to start moving your airbags
The happy walrus with no tusks
Your two boneless friends
Your George Foreman grill
Your dinner with André
The place where all burritos go
Minneapolis and St. Paul
Your giant fluffy bears
Ollie vs. Frasier
Your Elvis Aaron Presley
Your buttercup
Your monster truck
Your magnese
Your life's work
Your waffle iron
Your skin smurf
Your wiggle cloud

Ladies and gentlemen, it's time to set your air balloons free.
It's time to shake that freckle-muffin
It's time to bake that turkey stuffin'
Let your smiley bulldog loose
And put some goose in your caboose
Wiggle that rump-hump
It's time to jiggle that jump-pump
Dance to the beat that the DJ cuts
There's no "if"s or "and"s
JUST BUTTS.
Let's get it going,
Keep it going, don't stop
Use your bum to stir that soup
And shake it all around like
Blue Man Group

[Redlight]

"Excuse me while I suck your blood,
excuse me when I phone you,
I've got every one of your records, man,
doesn't that mean I own you?"

and:

If Christ had been born defective
To fulfil the maker's plan
Would it be as easily accepted
That God made man?

and many more

[Exit Stage Left]

Weary of the Waltz
 And mashed potato schmaltz
 Rhododendron
 Is a nice flower
 Evergreen
 It lasts forever

[citoyen]

But it can't beat Strand power!

(Er... wtf?)

[Juan Martín]

The Sphynx and Mona Lisa

[citoyen]

Lolita and Guernica...

Anyhoo, I'm reviving this thread because the sight of some Dairylea in the office fridge made this pop into my head...

"If you ever wondered how / You get triangles from a cow / You need butter, milk and cheese / And an equilateral chainsaw"

I don't think I'll need to say who's responsible for that one.

[tiermat]

Lolita and Guernica...

Anyhoo, I'm reviving this thread because the sight of some Dairylea in the office fridge made this pop into my head...

"If you ever wondered how / You get triangles from a cow / You need butter, milk and cheese / And an equilateral chainsaw"

I don't think I'll need to say who's responsible for that one.

Thanks to google I got that one, but not after thinking it was "X, Y and ZEE" by PWEI.

FWIW, the yours lyrics work to the tune of the PWEI song, and I thought the next line would be:

"Forests, profits, plastic High Streets"

[Quisling]

"Caught between that world and this, I'd sell my soul for a Bond girl's kiss" - James; nice sentiment
"and it's raining ice picks on your steel shores" - Soundgarden; great hard image!
"I am the operator of my pocket calculator" - Kraftwerk; makes me smile a lot that one.

[CrinklyLion]

Screw making love
It's way too ambitious
Let's get down on the rug
After you finish the dishes

Amy Rigby, Are We Ever Going To Have Sex Again.

[Mrs Pingu]

I bought her a dozen snow white doves
I did her dishes in rubber gloves
I called her Honeybee, I called her love
But she just still didn't want to
She just never wants to DAMN!

I sent her every type of flower
I played her a guitar by the hour
I petted her revolting little Chihuahua
But still she just didn't want to

etc....

Grinderman  - No Pussy Blues

[citoyen]

"Little old lady got mutilated late last night" - Werewolves Of London, Warren Zevon

Pure poetry!

[citoyen]

Grinderman  - No Pussy Blues

Amazing song.

[Deano]

"It's best to wake up all greasy and far away from home"

Leave the Mirror Alone by Herman Dune.

[Vince]

The rhythm section, section, section sticks, sticks, sticks, sticks together, gether, gether, gether

The Dancing Did