Have we lost the lyrics?

Well, I will admit that I used to obsess over lyrics myself.  I thought they were terribly important.  Until I realized that most of them were not 

Seriously, good lyrics are not easy to write, and I think a lot of bands put too much effort into something they simply are not good at (lyrics).

I do agree that people who download everything and listen on shuffle on their iPods are often missing some great lyrical concepts.  But I think that is true only a small percentage of the time.  Over the years, I've become less and less concerned with the quality of lyrics in the music I enjoy.  Most of what I love about Prog is the music anyway, not the lyrics.  On the whole, Prog bands at least seem to put more thought into their lyrics than most pop writers do, but I find that can often hurt the music, by putting the words above the melody and ruining what could have been a sublime vocal melody.  Besides, I'm starting to see something of an overkill in the Prog world of certain lyrical subjects and concept album topics.  Too much repetition and similarity of subjects makes it hard to recognize truly great lyrics when they appear.

Anyway, I doubt most of us on this site neglect lyrics, though I know there are a number of people here who prefer instrumental music.  But I suspect they were never all that interested in the lyrics anyway.  I have a friend who simply dislikes the human voice as an instrument.  It ruins the music for him..  It all comes down to what moves you and works for you I guess.

aapatsos wrote: Lyrics are supposed to play a crucial part in prog music (not only) and several bands/artists pay too much attention in their concepts, in order to make their outputs more ''complete''. As time goes by and more music is stored in hard drives rather than CDs, I get the feel that I don't pay too much attention on the lyrics. In the past, I used to be ''obsessed'' with the lyrics, notes etc on each CD. Are we missing a huge point in prog music by neglecting the lyrics? Do you get the same feel?

If lyrics are in my native language (Russian) they are extremely important. If lyrics don't touch me, the music does not exist for me, no matter how good or bad it is.

Edited by NotAProghead - November 18 2008 at 16:57

I actually prefer instrumental music. There are very few truly solid vocalists out there, and no matter how important the words are to a concept, a really bad vocalist can destroy really good music. Then there are those vocalists that are outstanding but ruin the musical experience with their concepts.


Edited by Tapfret - November 18 2008 at 17:49

Motorbreath, it's how I live my life,
I can't take it any other way
Motorbreath, the sound of living fast
It is going to take your breath away

cacho wrote: ^"Then there are those vocalists that are outstanding but ruin the musical experience with their concepts." I suppose you're talking about Jon Anderson?

I actually had a particular guy of Scandinavian lineage in mind, I was going to refrain from naming names and let others decide who is guilty in this case, as there are many.  Your answer is certainly viable on some level.

His another:

Other bands play
Manowar Kill!

Lyrics, believe it or not, used to matter a lot.  The writer was getting across a point.  What do the following have in common, given a song title of The Great Deceiver:

I find that most prog lyrics are pretty terrible. perhaps only Pink floyd and King crimson are exceptions

I don't really listen to lyrics, the sonics just have to fit in with the music, and I actually avoid them on purpose. I see (or hear) the voice as just another instrument.