Album Rating: 2.0

"What's the point in being vague? To make me seem "smarter"?"



There's a way to be decipherable and direct while still having nuance and subtlety. I feel like you're seeing this in black-and-white terms; either being completely blunt, or being indecipherable. There's absolutely a sweet spot in the middle, as well as a way of pulling it off that doesn't sound pretentious

Album Rating: 1.0

From that Kaonashi song



"I don't believe in Jesus 'cause he wasn't there for me

I don't believe in my dad for the same exact reason

Every man in my life commits some sort of treason

And then puts the blame on me, as if I'm the reason why

Father figuratively, you hung me from the family tree

Because the fruits of my labor fell too far"



I'm sorry but that is bad writing. Like just spelling it out at the beginning past the point of beating you over the head, and then a cliched, clumsy metaphor, *even introduced by the word "figuratively"* just to make sure you aren't confused about using beaten-dead-horse (see what I did there?) figures of speech

Album Rating: 1.0

Like, compare that to a Mountain Goats lyric about a similar broad concept:



"I'm in the living room watching the Watergate hearings

While my stepfather yells at my mother

Launches a glass across the room, straight at her head

And I dash upstairs to take cover



Lean in close to my little record player on the floor

So this is what the volume knob's for"



See the specificity? Putting you directly in the mindset of the experience as it's happening? Not a metaphor in sight, but an intensely powerful image that doesn't need to spell out what it means, because the meaning is right there in front of you.

The POINT is that symbols and metaphor are actually much more efficient at conveying emotion than literal descriptions of objects/events. "My favorite vase broke and I'm upset" vs "the shards of the vase lay prone and humiliated, a sonnet reduced to a jumble of letters". The latter invites you to wonder about the situation, to sympathize with an outside perspective. The other might as well be a tweet.

Spelling things out in all caps is an option though! Sometimes bluntness adds to the intended effect, sometimes the message doesn't need any real poetry to shine, but it is by no means more "authentic" or "earnest" across the board and it's actually extremely normal and reasonable to prefer some degree of the nonliteral in your art

best lyrics ever are "suzanne" by cohen discuss

i dont know how anyone could disavow lyrics that go 6 inches below the surface like you do venin. lyrics that are straight to the point have no lasting value or anything to grip hold to.

“There's a way to be decipherable and direct while still having nuance and subtlety. I feel like you're seeing this in black-and-white terms; either being completely blunt, or being indecipherable. There's absolutely a sweet spot in the middle”

Agreed. There are so many ways to word things and so many writing styles that you could tackle any one topic from billions of different wordings or angles and subtleties.

Like, you could be straight to the point with a nuance of the point or perspective that gives it some insight or poeticism that doesn’t necessarily require or involve metaphor

The line of traffic comes to a stand still
For the love King, out in the morning air
I find a place I started from
The wild is calling, this time I follow
Easter parade

In the bureau typewriter's quiet
Confetti falls from every window
Throwing hats up in the air
A city perfect in every detail

Easter parade

I know you, birthday cards and silent music
Paperbacks and Sunday clothes

In hallways and railway stations
Radio across the morning air
A crowd of people everywhere
And then the people, all running forward

Easter parade

from The Blue Nile's Easter Parade is much more beautiful and worthwhile than "I'm feeling nostalgic and sad because of it"

and that's probably not even a good analysis of the meaning of the lyrics but that just goes to show how much more depth there is and room for interpretation

Album Rating: 3.5

@Tundra: thanks for the rec, song's cool af

@porc: tbh in Kao's case it really doesn't matter if those are technically "bad" bc it essentially reads like Peter just spilling his thoughts out on the page and it doesn't need to be "amazing" lyricism like that Mountain Goats to resonate with people because he delivers it so earnestly. "Bad" lyrics can easily be saved if the performance is so raw that it's less "they have no talent" and more "they're just letting it all out in the way they know best." Intense lyrical debates in those instances come off like they're telling the writer how they're "allowed" to express their emotions.

Album Rating: 1.0

Yeah that's fair and I don't know that song so I can't speak to the effect, and there's quite a bit of music I dig with bad lyrics, it's not the be all end all of a good song.



But we were having a discussion specifically about good v. bad lyrics

Album Rating: 3.5

"i dont know how anyone could disavow lyrics that go 6 inches below the surface like you do venin. lyrics that are straight to the point have no lasting value or anything to grip hold to."

i don't "disavow" them, I just don't get why EVERYONE has to be "super deep and profound" and if they're not as deep as the ocean they're trite and not worth latching onto. vocal delivery is just as important.

see, punk lyrics (which a lot of these genres derive from) were never supposed to ALWAYS be the deepest things imaginable, they're punchy and straight to the point typically. Like go look back at Minor Threat and Black Flag lyrics. you don't always have to be the most amazing lyricist. you just have to have a point to make.

idk straight to the point lyricism comes off as much more disingenuous imo. like there was no effort put into them so i dont feel any connection at all

Album Rating: 2.0

It very much depends on presentation and execution. Earnest lyricism can go a long way, but the language employed to convey meaning can really change perception.

Album Rating: 3.5

@drifter: it really REALLY depends on the situation. Sometimes the song comes off like they're just trying to gather their thoughts in a way that makes some semblance of sense even when things sound like they're falling apart - Kaonashi, for instance. I'm usually not hypercritical of lyrics unless they're like REALLY REALLY bad. Earnest lyrics that aren't the most "profound" are usually a lot better than say, soulless partycore trite.

ye lot of nuance

Album Rating: 2.0

Personally, I think 100% blunt lyrics work best when such phrases are interweaved with more richly metaphorical phrases. It makes the payoff all the more potent as the audience doesn't really see it coming, and it cuts through the established wordplay like a left hook. Basing entirely around unbridled honesty usually leads to awkward phrases, and in that regard it ropes back around to the specific words used and, in the case of music, how well the vocalist sells the prose.

Album Rating: 3.5

personally i'm really not one to hyper-analyze the "depth" of lyrics, i'd be a hypocrite if i couldn't write anything better lol like go read the lyrics on my tracks and you'll see that I'm not exactly the best "poet" so it's like, why critique in someone else what I can't exactly surpass in myself? that's something I've been working on in other situations.

Album Rating: 2.0 | Sound Off

venin i don't think someone who is having a meltdown and is just 'spilling their thoughts' writes shit like "Father, figuratively, you hung me from the family tree, because the fruits of my labor fell too far". I'd probably agree with you more if the lyrics didn't sound like they're so laboured and still attempting to be 'lyrical'

Album Rating: 2.0

I mean, if that standard of "if you can't do it, say nothing" is applied to anything, then there wouldn't be much to discuss here lol, I don't think that's a good reason to not engage in a conversation. We're dealing with a subjective topic.



Lyrical analyses can be fun! Certainly depends on context, as some bands/genres/etc. prioritize them more than others.

Album Rating: 3.5

@Fogza: i mean fair enough tbh

@mars: that's more a me thing tbh it's just not really my thing to judge someone on something that I can't do better. like people can bag on craig mabbitt or whoever's lyricism all they want but if I can't outdo them poetically I don't see the point in ME being so hard on them. especially when...for almost a decade, some of their songs really got me through shit.