Prog often Plagued by Poor Lyrics?

The new Opeth album (which is now streaming on NPR - check it out) has some of the most atrocious lyrics ever sung. "Hey you, will you be true? Feel the pain, in your brain, insaaaannnneee..."  That's just one example of many. 

In answer to the OP:

I've thought this many a time. Like most of Nursery Cryme. Or sometimes it just sounbds corny or pretentious.

Kashmir75 wrote: I think many prog lyrics are much, much better than what you get in most pop songs.

Poor lyrics? Hardly... Jason Byron (maudlin of the Well, Kayo Dot), Rodger Waters (Pink Floyd) are both incredible lyricists. Steven Wilson (Porcupine Tree, No-Man, etc.) has a few duds, but overall, he is quite poetic. At times, Steven Wilson is such an utter sonic genius, I am in awe. The words flow so well, your tongue tingles as you say them. I don't have a clue what Peter Nicholls (IQ) is talking about, but have you ever heard more beautiful nonsense? And then there's Peter Hamill... Come on... Come Ooooon

Examples:

"An electric curent binds us together forever
I am a memory burnt onto thin air

When you call me with vibrations
In harmony with some Saturnine frequency
I spill outward, or flow, or list, or gel

It is somewhere between your mind and mine
Where, I cannot exactly tell
I want you to think about "93"

It isn't like planting a thought in your head
Or an image of a thought
But more like creating a thought
In sympathy with yours

The blind need to see
The deaf need to hear
We need to speak
I love you"

"A phantom blade in the gathering shade
A breeze in the hallway
Tomorrow it may rain again
I will not leave and
Nothing will be disturbed"

"And after a while, you can work on points for style
Like the club tie, and the firm handshake
A certain look in the eye and an easy smile
You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to
So that when they turn their backs on you
You'll get the chance to put the knife in"

"I had a dream.
Good-bye Max.
Good-bye Ma.
After the service when you're walking slowly to the car
And the silver in her hair shines in the cold November air
You hear the tolling bell
And touch the silk in your lapel
And as the tear drops rise to meet the comfort of the band
You take her frail hand
And hold on to the dream."

"Sullen and bored the kids stay
And in this way they wish away each day…
Stoned in the mall the kids play
And in this way wish away each day…

I don’t really know
If I care what is normal"

"I still wave at the dots on the shore
And I still beat my head against the door
I still rage and wage my little war
I'm a shade and easy to ignore"

"Who'll defy me now
And chase the lightning all to soon
What kind of mercy will you gain
Under the shadow of the moon"

"The only thing I want
Is taken out and rained upon
Heart beaten down
No surrender to the sacred sound

Light shatters the skeleton circus
And the carnival's deadly host
No memory nothing remembered
From the pages of the book of ghosts
Though the system stays in place
What if I'm no longer safe"

"Here at the glass - all the usual problems,
all the habitual farce.
You ask, in uncertain voice, what you should do
as if there were a choice
but to carry on miming the song
and hope that it all works out right.
Tonight it all seems so strange -
my spirit feels rigid,
my body deranged;
still that's only from one point of view
and we can't have illusion between me and you,
my constant friend, ever close at hand -
you and the undercover man."

"There's a house with no door and I'm living there
at nights it gets so cold
and the days are hard to bear inside.
There's a house with no roof, so the rain creeps in,
falling through my head as I try to think out time.
I don't know you, you say you know me,
that may be so,
there's so much that I am unsure of ...
You call my name, but it sounds unreal,
I forget how I feel, my body's rejecting the cure."

Edit: Some of the "Dogs" lyrics were written by David Gilmore, and some of "Laboratories of the Invisible World" were written by Toby Driver



Edited by DreamInSong - January 11 2012 at 15:18

Her name was Pat,
and we sat
under a treeeee
She kissed meeee~

(Not being hateful, I love that song. I'm just saying.)

ScorchedFirth wrote: prog058 wrote: This could also be called the Fish appreciation thread. Damn right, that man knows how to turn a phrase, he understands the power words can have. My other favourite would have to be Peter Hammill. Still life for example, I went and printed out at the library, just because I liked it so much. It really is like poetry, which is especially clear when it's laid out on the page as such.

I think you misread the intent of the comment you quoted.

Just a friendly warning, but there is a rule against posting full lyrics in the forum.

The Dark Elf wrote: Epignosis wrote: Just a friendly warning, but there is a rule against posting full lyrics in the forum. But if I edit out all the oh's and ay's the song will only be 30 seconds long.   p.s. I edited out the last few stanzas.

Alitare wrote: What the hell is wrong with a solid Roy Orbison single?