Ember, thank you so much for turning us onto CocoRosie. While i have
not listened to them yet, i was so intrigued by the fragment of their Werewolf
lyric that you posted, that i have been reading alot of their lyrics and i like them
quite a bit. I definitely will be giving them a listen.

But now i'd like to focus on what you said about overlooking lyrics that did not makie sense. This is something that used to bother me for decades. I have always loved the lyrics to John Lennon's I Am The Walrus. John never pretended that those lyrics made any sense. He was just having fun playing with the sounds of words. As a matter of fact, John wrote 2 short books that are entirely filled with nothing more than puns and wordplay.

However, it has always bothered me that so many of Bob Dylan's songs, especially from what is considered to be his peak period in the mid-sixties, did not seem to have any meaning,he just seemed to be writing lyrics that sounded good. And since Dylan has almost always been extremely reluctant to explain what his songs meant, it has often been difficult to ascertain if many of his songs meant anything at all, or if he was actually trying to communicate something, but he was just doing a terrible job at communicating his meaning. This is the main reason why so many people, including Joni Mitchell, have considered Dylan to be a literary con artist.

I'll give you an example. My favorite Dylan lyric has always been Desolation Row, and many consider that song to be one of his best. But i never have been able to understand what alot of those lines meant. For example:
"Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood with his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago with his friend, a jealous monk
Now he looked so immaculately frightful as he bummed a cigarette
And he went off sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet"
Now, i love the way that particular juxtaposition of words sounds, but i haven't the faintest of ideas what that means.

So, i had struggled with this dilemna for several decades, whether or not it was important for song lyrics to mean anything, or if merely being an interesting choice of words is sufficient for a song lyric to be worthwhile.
My confusion about this question was not finally resolved until around a decade or so ago when i read an essay by Edgar Allan Poe called The Poetic Principle. While Edgar Allan Poe is best known for his tales of horror and suspense and his poem The Raven, he also wrote countless essays about various subjects, including literary theory.

In The Poetic Principle, Poe explores the question of whether or not it is necessary or not for a poem to reveal some aspect of what he refers to as Truth, or if merely using a beautiful combination of words would constitute a good poem.

His conclusion was that a beautiful combination of words is merely enough for a poem to be considered a good, or even a great poem.

Reading The Poetic Principle had an enormous effect on my life. I was now finally able to enjoy, without feeling guilty, those lyrics of Dylan's, and some other lyricists, that did not seem to make any sense, but merely sounded interesting. You can read the entire essay The Poetic Principle here:

Poe's The Poetic Principal

I have also pasted below parts of the essay that sum up Poe's main point below:

"It has been assumed, tacitly and avowedly, directly and indirectly, that the ultimate object of all Poetrv is Truth. Every poem, it is said, should inculcate a moral; and by this moral is the poetical merit of the
work to be adjudged......

With as deep a reverence for the True as ever inspired the bosom of man, I would, nevertheless, limit, in some measure, its modes of inculcation......

Thus, although in a very cursory and imperfect manner, I have endeavoured to convey to you my conception of the Poetic Principle. It has been my purpose to suggest that, while this Principle itself is, strictly and simply, the Human Aspiration for Supernal Beauty, the manifestation of the Principle is always found in an elevating excitement of the Soul—quite independent of that passion which is the intoxication of the Heart—or of that Truth which is the satisfaction of the Reason."




Last edited by ManInTwoSocks; 03/25/18 05:35 PM.
Matador is beautiful,a symphony of style
Excitement is ecstatic, passion places bets
Gracefully he bows to ovations that he gets
But the hands that are applauding are slippery with sweat
And saliva is falling from their smiles

Phil Ochs- Crucifixion