Bad Lyrics in Prog

I am going to use one band to illustrate the worst of this plague on prog. Aryeon. Now, I'm sorry if I offended some Ayreon fans, but the lyrics he writes are just plain awful. It seems like this is the case with a lot of prog bands, and it seems as if it is most prevailant in prog metal. Now, I single out Aryeon because they seem the worst. Bad lyrics, for me, our lyrics that take away from the music. They are bad enough to make me cringe when I hear them. Maybe it's because I'm an English major and have read a lot of poetry, but I don't think this is the case. My dad, who hasn't read more than a few poems in his life, agrees. 

Now, don't get me wrong. I like Ayreon. But the lyrics make it hard. I have there newest album and "The Human Equation" (I think that's the name of it). I got to like THE, but it took some work.  I don't know if I will accomplish the same thing with 001011001110101001. I've only listened to the first CD, which has its moments, but I hope the second CD is better, especially lyrically, but I'm not holding my breath on that count.

Now, I don't want to pick only on Ayreon, so I wil risk making other people angry by listing some other bands I find this trend in, and again, my definition of bad lyrics is only when it takes away from the music. I don't read lyrics and anlyze them, it is pretty much what I hear. So, those bands are Dream Theater, Symphony X, Thought Chamber, The Flower Kings, and to an extent Evergrey, though I only have one of thier albums.

I can't be alone in this thinking.

... are the reason why non-english bands are so popular. 

Oh please, Arriving UFO and Circus of Heaven are pure cheese IMO.

I find prog has produced some very bad lyrics .To pretentious perhaps?

Luckily I don't listen to any prog involving dungeon and dragons.

I find the lyrics really depend of the context of the song,on paper they maybe excellent but if there's some dated instrumentation and vocal melody it can very easily offend my soul.

Lyrics are absolutely meaningless to me. As long as the lyrics sound nice, and fit well with the music. Some lyrics don't mean anything at all if you analyze them carefully, but during the actual event of listening, they just seem to flow and create peace in your mind. I view the vocals as an instrument, and words are nothing more than a musical expression that can be played on this instrument.

A good example of this would be Aisles of Plenty by Genesis; the lyrics are meaningless, but just sound so damn cool in the song.

A example of lyrics that detract from the music would be Circus of Heaven by Yes, even though it would be a terrible song no matter what the lyrics were, they just seem to make it WORSE!

i don't care about lyrics ,what really matters in prog is the music

see: Emerson Lake and Palmer

Ayreon's 1010100010101010010101010101010100000000001111111111110000000000 album is one of the more recent examples of absolutely atrocious lyrics as pointed out in the OP's post.
And before someone comes in and says "But it's about the concept of the album", so what? the lyrics are still terrible regardless.

There are 3 kinds of lyrics:

rpe9p wrote: I really dislike a lot of Spock's Beard's lyrics and I find that they detract from the music.  I am not a huge fan of their music anyway, but my friends who are say they love the lyrics, which I dont understand.

As I see it, in Spock's Beard's case, that they detract from the music isn't really a bad thing. ;)


Edited by Logan - February 23 2009 at 21:36