The trend of Modern Lyrics

ThePrettyDamned

You're listening to the wrong music. 

Jez6345789

Well it must be because white rockers can't use the N word or the B word or anything sexist or racist or politically incorrect as they are strictly for bad boy rappers.

so when the record company says if you are stuck for ideas ed why not do something autobiographical.

we get an album about going down the chipper with me mum and dad 

ho hum 

jazz get more and more interesting these days lol

JezWynd

The 'classic' song structure of verse, chorus, bridge, outro fade has been usurped by machines, principally samplers. That's resulted in repetition ad nauseam. I blame Ride On Time. It's a field that's ripe for abuse, if you can come up with a catchy, snatchy couplet with a cool riff or sample to enforce it, the sky's the limit.

This refers to 'pop music', there's still plenty of good writing about.

EricTheWeary

Modern lyrics are terrible, you can't tell what they're singing, you can't tell if they are boys or girls, this popular music will all be over by Christmas, bring back national service, this hippity hoppity music will lead to unwanted teenage pregnancies, no proper songs have been written since Cole Porter, jumpers for goal posts...

Winny_Pooh

I find lyrics are better overall nowadays. Most of the good songwriters of the now have hindsight of all the stuff that came before them and are generally less tolerant of cliche. However, you're not going to hear any of it on the radio.

ICBM

I absolutely despise the sort of lyrics that seem to be an endless name-dropping of designer brands alternating with how the singer is God's gift to women.

That said, some of the old bluesmen weren't too far away from the second of those...

blobb

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vb_W7aMUu5I

TheBlueWolf

I like my dragons, Satan worship and fire

I agree there's always dross about, back then as well as now

Dominic

Bill Bailey sums it up perfectly there

TTBZ

randella said:

Dominic said:

Yes, but old bad was better than new bad 

Interesting thought - old bad was maybe backed up by better tuneage though? 

In in terms of modern (last decade or so) I like some modern lyrics that follow the everyday life observations thing. Arctic Monkeys' "Red Light Indicates Doors Are Secured" springs to mind:

Ask if we can have six in

If not we'll have to have two
You're coming up our end aren't you
I'll get one with you
He wouldn't let us have six in
Especially not with the food
He could have just told us no though
He didn't have to be rude

See her with the green dress

She talked to me at the bar
How come it's already two pound fifty?
We've only gone about a yard
Couldn't you see she were gorgeous
She were beyond belief
There was this lad at her side drinking his Smirnoff Ice
Can I buy you a tropical reef?

I agree there's dross about, but wasn't it always the case that you had to filter out the painting-by-numbers tripe in commercial music?

Love that first AM album, there's loads of great lyrics in it.

Jeremiah

strumjoughlamps

1993 is the year of my fave lyric

And there's blood on my teeth
When I bite my tongue to speak
Zip me down, kiss me there
I can smile now 

HAL9000

Moss said:

It sure was better in the good old days

Tutti frutti, oh rutti,
Tutti frutti, oh rutti,
Tutti frutti, oh rutti,
Tutti frutti, oh rutti,
Tutti frutti, oh rutti,
Wop bop a loo bop a lop bam boom!

thecolourbox

I've only glanced through this thread, so forgive me if I've got the wrong end of the stick - is the point made by this thread that rubbish modern lyrics are not as good as good old lyrics? But then also that there is good now and there was bad back then as well?

viz

There was that Exploited song, can't remember what it was called but the lyrics were:

Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence

Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence

Sex hahaha. Sex and Violence
Sex!! I love sex I love all them sex all them sex
Sex! Ha Ha!!

Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence

Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence
Sex and Violence. Sex and Violence

guitarfishbay

Why am I imagining those lyrics to the tune of Love and Marriage...

Dominic

thecolourbox said:

I've only glanced through this thread, so forgive me if I've got the wrong end of the stick - is the point made by this thread that rubbish modern lyrics are not as good as good old lyrics? But then also that there is good now and there was bad back then as well?

 There has always been some awful lyrics but it's more a comment on the strangeness of the Lyrics -as somebody above commented "like a rushed diary entry "
 The Ed Sheeran recent songs are a perfect example .
Strange Trend.
Yes ,I am a bit 'old ' but it's hard to argue with lyrics for songs like ;
 My Way
 It was a very good year (Sinatra also )
 and more modern ;You don't bring me Flowers -Streisand / Diamond
 Early Elton/Bowie/Beatles
 Living Years -Mike and Mechanics
 Alan Parsons Project -Old and Wise
Suede - Beautiful ones
Weller -You do Something to me 
etc etc..........There's been good lyrics in every Genre -not just old but this .." I went to the chippy and bought a sausage in batter and ate it before I went round to my mate and the leccy meter was empty..."type lyric is just shite
 

mudslide73

You say : "'Ere thrice the sun done salutation to the dawn" 

And you claim these words as your own 

But I've read well, and I've heard them said 

A hundred times (maybe less, maybe more) 

If you must write prose/poems 

The words you use should be your own 

Don't plagiarise or take "on loan" 

'Cause there's always someone, somewhere 

With a big nose, who knows 

And who trips you up and laughs 

When you fall 

Who'll trip you up and laugh 

When you fall

olafgarten

Dominic said:

No ,the Jarvis lyrics are brilliant 
don't confuse modern for old -there's loads of great modern lyrics
It's the dreadful Ed Sheeran type stuff that gets me .......like his latest rubbish
.......Same guitar chord plays for about 14 bars..and then something like ...
I broke my leg when I was 6 years old
I think it was my brothers fault 
or,one of his friends
we all went down to the Fish and chip shop
I didn't get a pickled onion
I got a pickled egg instead
I was going to get a steak slice but I changed my mind.......
...........well something like that anyway !.......equally terrible 

I think you've written his next hit. 

Dominic

..............and to think I wasted all those years in Nashville !