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Topic ClosedThe most clever thing you've heard in prog lyrics

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zachfive View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 08 2012 at 02:59
For clever KC lyrics I'd go with The Worlds My Oyster Soup Kitchen Floor Wax Museum. Always smile when I hear that one.

I always enjoyed the UK Danger Money line "I could show you no mercy, well they don't pay me for that."

A favorite Rush one that is border line clever is in part one of the Fear series. A song about how people perceive fear.

"To you, is it movement or is it action?
Is it contact or just reaction?
And you...revolution or just resistance?
Is it living, or just existence?
Yeah, you! It takes a little more persistence
To get up and go the distance"
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 08 2012 at 07:49
Most folks ignore The Final Cut, but it has my favorite moments from Roger Waters. Lyrically, it is Pink Floyd/Roger's peak - 

"Gunner's Dream"

Good-bye Mags. 
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. 
A place to stay 
Enough to eat

Admin Edit - deleted text due to possible copyright infringement

"Two Suns in the Sunset"

like the moment when your brakes lock
and you slide toward the big truck
and stretch the frozen moments with your fear
and you'll never hear their voices
and you'll never see their faces
you have no recourse to the law anymore
and as the windshield melts


Admin Edit - deleted text due to possible copyright infringement

"The Fletcher Memorial"

they can polish their medals and sharpen their
smiles, and amuse themselves playing games for a while
boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead 
safe in the permanent gaze of a cold glass eye
with their favourite toys


Admin Edit - deleted text due to possible copyright infringement

Bitter, bitter stuff.



It isn't prog, but the lyrical quality of Leonard Cohen needs to be mentioned.

"Everybody knows"

Everybody knows that its now or never
Everybody knows that its me or you
Everybody knows that you live forever
Ahh, when you've done line or two
Everybody knows that the deal is rotten
Old black Joe is still pickin' cotton
For your ribbons and bows
Everybody knows


Admin Edit - deleted text due to possible copyright infringement




Edited by ExittheLemming - June 17 2012 at 07:30
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prog4evr View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 08 2012 at 12:12
Originally posted by Ambient Hurricanes Ambient Hurricanes wrote:

Originally posted by Dayvenkirq Dayvenkirq wrote:

Originally posted by VanVanVan VanVanVan wrote:

The line in my sig I thought was pretty insightful.

Pardon me for this question that may sound pretty (for the lack of a better word) "basic" to you, but what's a sig? 
 
It's short for "signature," the short quote, phrase, or picture that you can add to the end of each of your posts.  You can create one of your own in the member control panel.
I go with my "sig" from Marillion Fugazi as well...
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 09 2012 at 09:06
Robert Calvert made a lot great ones. my favorite is this:

petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro d' Allah"


A shot of me as High Priestess of Gaia during our fall festival. Ceterum censeo principiis obsta
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 09 2012 at 10:53
Originally posted by Dayvenkirq Dayvenkirq wrote:

What is the most insightful thing that you have ever heard in all of the lyrics of the prog-rock catalog?

In my case, (as much as I hate to admit it) it was "You've got to get in to get out" on 'Carpet Crawlers' from Genesis' "The Lamb." 

How about you?
  ya but wernt they taking about a vacum cleaner?
....after all they were carpet crawlers?  eh?
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 09 2012 at 10:55
...ya know? ....then ya just dump the bag after ya vacum!!!!
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 10 2012 at 11:36
Originally posted by Cihan Cihan wrote:

This is gonna seem a bit lame, 
But I really thought the lyrics to Kansas's "The Pinnacle" were quite crafty.
Simple but had a huge impact on me when I first started listening to Prog rock.



Can't blame you ... if you did hear the stuff at a very young age.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 10 2012 at 11:40
Originally posted by BaldJean BaldJean wrote:

Robert Calvert made a lot great ones. my favorite is this:

petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro dollar, petro dollar,
petro d' Allah"

What does it mean?
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 10 2012 at 12:07
Like this small one :
where ego I go too
Prog is whatevey you want it to be. So dont diss other peoples prog, and they wont diss yours
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 11 2012 at 13:28
^ What song is that from and by who? 'Cause I can't find it in Google.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 11 2012 at 15:42
How can you fight a foe so deadly
When you don't even know it's there?
 - Tony Banks
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 11 2012 at 16:54
From Pat Traver's album Putting It Straight, it is kind of prog, i guess

from "Life In London", a song about the scene in England around 1977, I've always liked these lines

"Well, I'd like to see,
  Some peace and harmony
   Well, everybody thinks differently,
    But that shouldn't mean a thing,
     Shouldn't mean a thing"
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 11 2012 at 17:54
  "Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure

Out in the open

  Exposure"

or as Fripp put it:
"J.G. Bennett: It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering. It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering.

X-P-O-S-U-R-E
Exposure"


Edited by Slartibartfast - June 11 2012 at 17:57
Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 13 2012 at 13:37
"Strangers passing in the street, by chance two separate glances meet, and I am you and what I see is me" from Echoes by Pink Floyd. "I am you and what I see is me" What a line!
“Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. ”
― George Orwell
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 13 2012 at 14:06
Originally posted by Slartibartfast Slartibartfast wrote:

  "Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure
  Exposure

Out in the open

  Exposure"

or as Fripp put it:
"J.G. Bennett: It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering. It is impossible to achieve the aim without suffering.

X-P-O-S-U-R-E
Exposure"

I wonder what kind of exposure he was talking about. Limelight?

Originally posted by SigmundFloyd SigmundFloyd wrote:

"Strangers passing in the street, by chance two separate glances meet, and I am you and what I see is me" from Echoes by Pink Floyd. "I am you and what I see is me" What a line!

Thumbs Up Indeed.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 14 2012 at 03:04
Rush - Losing It

The dancer slows her frantic pace 
In pain and desperation, 
Her aching limbs and downcast face 
Aglow with perspiration 

Stiff as wire, her lungs on fire, 
With just the briefest pause, 
The flooding through her memory, 
The echoes of old applause. 


Peart really grew into a fantastic lyricist when he ditched the fantasy stuff, but for some reason that's all anyone seems to remember him for...

Admin edit: deleted text due to potential infringement of copyright laws

*Ta for the edit: it probably should have crossed my mind not to post the whole bloody thing. Sorry!


Edited by JS19 - June 17 2012 at 13:43
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 14 2012 at 03:08
Rush - BU2B

and

Rush - BU2B2

story of my life.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 17 2012 at 04:15
Everything under the sun is in tune
But the sun is eclipsed by the moon
-"Eclipse", Pink Floyd
 
I don't know how many people interpret this the way I do, but that's one of my favourite parts about music; it means different things to everyone.
 
Anyway, the way I see it, this means that everything might be a little chaotic, going poorly, or "out of tune" at the moment, but just like an eclipse, it'll pass. Then everything will be under the sun again, and "everything under the sun is in tune". I think it's worded cleverly too; everything's fine, except for the fact that actually nothing is at the moment. But it will be!
Those two lines single-handedly changed my view on music from something people listen to, to something people live through.
And everything under the sun is in tune

But the sun is eclipsed by the moon
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 17 2012 at 06:23
"Though the towers of the city
are denied to we men of clay
still we know we shall scale the heights some day.
Frightened in the silence-
frightened, but
thinking very hard,
let us make computations of the stars."
breathing, eating, defecating, screwing, drinking, spewing, sleeping...

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 17 2012 at 06:33
Originally posted by Gentle Gryphon Gentle Gryphon wrote:

I'll go with KC's Epitaph..Best one I've heard so far..
''Knowledge is a deadly friend,if no one sets the rules..The faith of all mankind I see,is in the hands of fools..''


I agree. But it's so difficult to say, because prog rock is here to say only clever ideas.
Under the rocks and stones,
there is water underground

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