Only words?

It has been said to me often by reasonably intelligent people who have quite good taste themselves that most people don't  bother about words in songs. As long as there is a catchy tune and the words and music don't obviously jar then that's all that matters. I will never accept this. I accept ( I have to really) that to some people words are not important. I have even known singers - even some technically accomplished singers - who don't seem to pay much attention to the words. I cannot understand that at all. To me, the lyric is crucially important to a song. In my time, to pay the rent, I have sung some songs that I am not mad about but I have never sung a song where I couldn't find at least a tiny emotional connection to it in myself. (Fortunately the Birdie Song does not have a lyric...)

One singer I worked with for a while,  who shall remain nameless, liked to sing the song "The One I Love" written by David Gray - a song I like myself. I used to wonder what the nameless singer  thought it was about, as his delivery suggested a punchy Rocker rather than a song about a soldier dying in battle, remembering dancing with his wife at his wedding. At one point the lyric is:

Don't see Elysium don't see no fiery hell...

My erstwhile musical partner blithely sang:

Don't see Eseelium, don't see no fiery Hell...

An easy mistake to make - except that if you like the song enough to sing it, you ought to find out what the words mean if you don't know - and he didn't. When we spoke about it, he was quite surprised at my explanation of what was meant by Elysium. He had no idea of what it was and had never bothered to find out.

When I hear a great lyric it gives me a huge buzz. When I first heard Deacon Blues by Steely Dan the lyric impressed the hell out of me and I had to go and find out why Alabama was called "the crimson tide" and why it was relevant to the song.  But even hugely commercial pop songs are often heavily reliant on the lyric. "Lady in Red" by Chris de Burgh (a song I have always hated) would not have been the commercial success it became if it had been called "Lady called Senga" or "Lady in Off-White".

There is a website called Kissthisguy.com which deals in misheard lyrics and there are a lot of real crackers in there. Go and have a look. Here are a few I know of personally - not mostly committed by me although I have had my moments:

"Gogo said he found a car in a field..." for "Gold coast slave ship bound for cotton fields..." from The Stones Brown Sugar.

"Standing on your mother's corpse... for  "Standing on your mother's porch..." from Bryan Adams Summer of 69

"Grim poodle-basher on a forty-five..." for "Brim full of Asher on the forty-five..." by Cornershop

Most musicians have a fund of these but go and visit the website. There are some really funny misunderstandings.  http://www.kissthisguy.com/

And my advice is, for what it's worth, if you don't know what it's about, don't sing it. We entertainers have enough opportunities for making fools of ourselves without tempting fate.