you wear your skirt like a flag

[Davey]

I love those colorful lyric fragments that stick in your head long after the music stops. Little musical vignettes that make you smile later. The latest full length from the National has a bunch of them, the one in the subject line from the song "Lit Up", which also comes with steady pounding drums and a great celebratory post-punk sounding chorus. No lyrics anywhere to be found in the liner notes or online (probably posted someplace but I didn't try very hard). Sometimes that bugs me these days in the internet age where I've become accustomed to having everything at my fingertips, but in this case I think it's refreshing because it forces me to pay more attention and try to decipher them just like when I was a kid. Nice album that's really been growing on me lately, definitely high on my year end list even though many people seem resistant, or even immune, to their charms. Not me, I'm way too easy

Any cool little lyric pieces that won't leave you alone lately?

[Mr MidFi]

Gather up enough colorful phrases and string them all together...and you have the recipe for Elvis Costello's career.

She sits alone, apart from the crowd
In a white dress she wears like a question mark

[Mike]

Not one to make you smile at all but a song about Fiona Apple's reputed rape experience, matched with a wonderful song it makes an extremely powerful lyric.

Is that why they call me a sullen girl, sullen girl
They don't know I used to sail the deep and tranquil sea
But he washed me shore and he took my pearl
And left an empty shell of me

Mike

[-Jar-]

lately it's been:

I'm on stand-by, according to the work order that you signed, I'll be down for some time

that's so damn clever.

-jar

[Davey]

Not one to make you smile at all but a song about Fiona Apple's reputed rape experience, matched with a wonderful song it makes an extremely powerful lyric.

Yeah, she had some pretty powerful lyrics on that debut. Did you get anything after that? I have that first one but never really listened to it very much so didn't get the next one. Some of the ideas on the debut just seemed underdeveloped to me and some of the lyrics a bit banal, but other times it all came together. She really has some supportive fans, that's for sure. Did you follow the "Free Fiona" campaign earlier this year that was trying to get Sony to release her third album that they were supposedly sitting on because there was no single? Of course Sony tells a different story about Fiona being unhappy with producer Jon Brion's handiwork and not delivering the recordings. Guess it's finally coming out next month in a rerecorded version done with producer Brian Kehew of "Moog Cookbook" reknown.

[noddin0ff]

Act your age,
Not your shoe size
Maybe we could do the twirl

Catchy, and oh, so useful in my life. (Prince: Kiss)

[Davey]

lately it's been:

I'm on stand-by, according to the work order that you signed, I'll be down for some time

that's so damn clever.

-jar

Ha ha, those Grandaddy guys do come up with some fun songs full of quirky phrases. For some reason I never connected all the dots with Sumday like some of the other afficianados of that warm and fuzzy analog synth sound around here, but do still like it, just don't love it like I do Slump which seems to have more of a melodic buzz to it, overall. Or maybe I just gave up on Sumday. Someday ... I dream at night of going home someday ... Somewhere so far away ... So dream, alright ... I know it's gonna take some time... I'm going home someday.

[Mike]

Yeah, she had some pretty powerful lyrics on that debut. Did you get anything after that?

I bought the second but to be honest it left me pretty cold, the one I keep going back to is the first. It's often the case great debut I suppose the result of fine tuning then when the artist gets the record deal they are pushed ino releasing a follow up and it's nearly always a let down, probably easier if you are in a band you can share ideas but for solo artists it must be a lot tougher.

I didn't realise she was in dispute with Sony I thought she had maybe just dried up but I spotted the other day she has another coming out but I'll probably not bother with it.

Cheers
Mike

[3-LockBox]

A song from the pop/soul group Cameo called She's Strange had a similar line...

* And its one, two, three, she's illusive to see
* Like the invisible man in drag
* And when you come to meet her, you need'nt greet her
* She'll be waving her shirt like a flag

Actually, that was one of my few 'liked' rap songs...its got a cool groove to it.