What are some of the very best passages, segments, quotations, rhymes, metaphors in lyrics that you've encountered? Stones, or non-Stones?

I start with Bob Dylan from "I Don't Believe You"

"Though her skirt swayed as the guitar played
Her mouth was watery and wet"

I just LOVE that line.

How about
"Tryin to stop the waves behind your eyeballs
Drop your Reds, drop your Greens and Blues"

My favourite song "plot" is the J. Geils Band's "Centerfold"-

Honey I miss your two tongue kisses, legs wrapped around me tight .......



ROCKMAN

two tongue?

I thought it was

two tone?

(see urban dictionary)

I'd also add just about any couplet from Before They Make Me Run


On the internet nobody knows
you're Mick Jagger

I was raised by a toothless, bearded hag,
I was schooled with a strap right across my back,

Quote
Edith Grove
I was raised by a toothless, bearded hag,
I was schooled with a strap right across my back,

That's all very unfortunate, but what are your thoughts about great lyrical passages?


On the internet nobody knows
you're Mick Jagger

I thought it was two tone?


Yeah always had a problem with that one ...
Sounds like tone yet always printed up in lyric books as tongue ....



ROCKMAN

Quote
camper88

Quote
Edith Grove
I was raised by a toothless, bearded hag,
I was schooled with a strap right across my back,

That's all very unfortunate, but what are your thoughts about great lyrical passages?

What can I say? Sometimes life imitates art!

I think all of "Midnight Rambler" is pretty good. And "Gimme Shelter". In fact most of the "Let it Bleed" album. "I'm sittin' in a bar, tipplin' a jar in Jackson". Classic. There's plenty of great lyrics to pick from the Stones golden era from the late 60's thru the mid 70's. And quite a few to pick from outside that era also.

Anyway, here is one of my favorite lyrics from my fellow Canadian Leonard Cohen (get well soon):
"I saw a beggar leaning on his wooden crutch,
He said to me, you must not ask for so much.
And a pretty woman leaning in her darkened door,
She cried to me, hey, why not ask for more?"

Thanks Tippytoe; I was hoping to discover new lines like the ones you posted.

Besides dozens of Stones passages I come to think of but one..
By some particular reason I stuck with this early in my life..

O come with me my little one, we will find that farm
and grow us grass and apples there and keep all the animals warm.
And if by chance I wake at night and I ask you who I am,
O take me to the slaughterhouse, I will wait there with the lamb.

Do ya recognize it.. ?
But since Im no longer sucha somantic, I dunno..

Cohen's Avalanche is a fantastic expression of jealousy and hurt (male) pride ["When I am not this hunchback that you see / I sleep beneath the golden hill"]

and many Tom Waits lyrics are equally brilliant:

God said don't give me your
Tin horn prayers
Don't buy roses off the street down there
Took it all and took the dirt road home
Dreaming of Jenny with the light brown hair
Night is falling like a bloody axe
Lies and rumors and the wind at my back
Hand on the wheel gravel on the road
Will the pawn shop sell me back what I sold

(Sins of My Father)

This is from My Back Pages by Bob Dylan. Great stuff.


"Crimson flames tied through my ears
Rollin' high and mighty traps
Pounced with fire on flaming roads
Using ideas as my maps
"We'll meet on edges, soon," said I
Proud 'neath heated brow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now"

"I wish that I knew what I know now
when I was younger"

Oh La la

CHICKEN SHACK - I'D RATHER GO BLIND

I would rather go blind, girl
Than to see you walk away from me

-------------------
Keep On Rolling

He's a ghost, he's a god,
he's a man, he's a guru
You're one microscopic cog
in his catastrophic plan
Designed and directed by
his Red Right Hand
Nick Cave.

Quote
TooTough
"I wish that I knew what I know now
when I was younger"

Oh La la

Oh yes; that line is probably my alltime favorite line in a song. What I always try to look for is :
Big thoughts expressed in small words.
In ither words, it doesn't take the 4 syllable babble of Jon Anderson to say something real.
Much of Iggy's "China Girl" has wonderful lyrics. And Nick Cave is one of the great great poets. Tom Waits of course. I don't like his older period much; the whole piano-man shtick.

One passage I really love is in The Divine Comedy's "Don't Look Down":
(I have to quote the whole passage because it just belongs together)

And without warning when we're almost at the top
The wheel that turns us all comes to a sudden stop.
The wind that's blown us dies a quick and painless death
The air gets clammy and we hold each other's breath
We get the feeling that we're not alone in this
And then a God who really ought not to exist
Sticks out a great big hand And grabs me by the wrist
And asks me "why?" and I say
"Well God, it's like this

It may be arrogance Or just appalling taste
But I'd rather use my pain than let it all go to waste
On some old god who tells me what I want to hear
As if I cannot tell obedience from fear
I want to take my pleasures where and how I will,
Be they disgraceful or distasteful or distilled
And to be frank I find that life has more appeal
Without a driver who's asleep behind the wheel"

Then God decides that he has taken quite enough
Of all this atheistic tosh I'm spouting off
And so he calls upon his favourite angel choir
To sing of times when men were filled with christian fire
But over-zealous angels flap their wings too fast
And cause the wind to blow and turn the wheel at last
And soon my feet are safely back on solid ground
And then I hear a voice say
"Don't look down!".

Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son"
Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on"
God say, "No." Abe say, "What?"
God say, "You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin' you better run"
Well Abe says, "Where do you want this killin' done?"
God says, "Out on Highway 61."

Marv Peck

Y'all remember that rubber legged boy

Images of broken light which
dance before me like a million eyes
That call me on and on across the universe
Thoughts meander like a
restless wind inside a letter box
they tumble blindly as
they make their way across the universe

John Lennon - Across The Universe

Here are some of the lyrics to the Stones classic "Doncha Bother Me," from the Aftermath alubm, which I always felt had clever, catchy lyrics.

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards

"Well Im looking for my face
And I got no place to go"

"Well, pick your own mind
And dont you touch mine no more"

"Well, the lines around my eyes
Are protected by a copyright law"

Rob

Quote
camper88
two tongue?

I thought it was

two tone?

(see urban dictionary)

You may think I'm kidding ,but I discovered the real lyrics very recently only...thought it was 2 tons kisses ,which meant for me a lot a lot of kisses....



I am a Frenchie ,as Mick affectionately called them in the Old Grey Whistle Test in 1977 .

If you're in love you can't beat that!!!:
(German original)
Wie vor Jahr und Tag ist immerfort
das Glück und Dein Name das selbe Wort
(translation - not that lyrical)
Just like a year and a day ago
happiness and your name are the same word
by German singer/songwriter (though musicwise it's a bit different) Reinhard May