So many lyrics in each of the various stanza paragraphs. I know one, for sure: "The transitive nightfall of diamonds" comes from 'Dark Star' by the Grateful Dead.
I'm pretty sure there was a Joni Mitchell lyric in there, too.
As I read this post, I was consciously thinking of Nick Drake's 'Time Has Told Me.' I'm sure it is there somewhere... hiding (or I missed it).
Thanks for playing along, Michael! I was in danger of having too many Nick Drake titles or lyrics (day is done, time of no reply), so I cheated slightly on the one you mention and wrote 'Time hasn't told me' instead in the opening paragraph. Yes to Joni Mitchell (twice): slightly adapted lines from 'The Circle Game' and 'River'. I was led to quoting the Dead by thinking about John Oswald's Grayfolded project, where he takes 100 clips from Dead gigs to make an epic 'Dark Star': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1M25uZFeQI&list=PLOmR_eXYHEFAy8EnPA5AgmU7AOpAfK-LY&index=10
Nice one, Richard. Even before I got to the end of the piece and your Spot the Lyric invite, I was congratulating myself on spotting Napalm Death's 'you suffer, but why'.
"And I tried real hard not to make this song sound like some other song that I might have written before / And if I did, that’s because it’s my style and style is based on limitations
I tried real hard not to make this song sound like some other song some other singer-songwriter might have written before / And If I did, that’s ‘cause it’s music / And music’s based on repetition"
Which I think speaks to the arrow/cycle tension that you write about; with the songwriter trying to make progress but stuck in the cycle of limitations and repetition (which is not so much a trap as the nature of life).
(From the same album, "Don't Leave Your Records In The Sun" is a joke about the unidirectional nature of a record groove (and time?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXh1IWAKw3c )
You mention "The January Man"; one of the only recordings of Dave Goulder on YouTube is his "Seven Summers" which is also about time (in this case explaining to a seven-year-old that her sense of time isn't askew, but that the summer has been so cold & wet that it doesn't feel like a changing of the season: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xw742jFWCu8
"Inside his taxi Time moves through the city / He finds a place to have a rum and coke / He smiles a lot but he's not one for pity / He makes old men live backwards for a joke / Across the room a girl dressed all in feathers / They meet and soon they're dancing close together / She's being clever says she could dance forever"
You see in that verse how dense Michael Smith's songwriting is, there's both the line about nostalgia ("He makes old men live backwards for a joke") and the dark humor at the turn of phrase "she could dance forever" (which, of course, would require that time stop, which it won't).
[1] It occurs to me that his image of time has some overlap with the way that Neil Gaiman's endless.
"They had music, art and fashion, there was dinosauric passion / And I think they'd be enraged and mortified / That when they`re mentioned today it's only to say: / Their brains were small and they died."
One of the most famous references to time in a song lyric is from "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald" -- "Does any one know where the love of God goes / When the waves turn the minutes to hours?"
On a lighter note, a song specifically about the nature of music as a way to organize time is Aretha Franklin's "Mr. D.J. (5 for the DJ)" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUF-njIVpmQ
"So I decided, yes, I did / Give them a little tune they / Could take five on / Because I know they get tired / Playing them records all day long,"
(looking that up now I'm delighted to see the top YT comment, "Hello beautiful people! I am the bassist on this song. It's one of the funkiest songs I've ever played on. She let me play what I wanted and I am proud to be on it. ")
Also on the sillier (and more obvious) side, "Rock Around The Clock"
Another great piece and fun read, Richard!
So many lyrics in each of the various stanza paragraphs. I know one, for sure: "The transitive nightfall of diamonds" comes from 'Dark Star' by the Grateful Dead.
I'm pretty sure there was a Joni Mitchell lyric in there, too.
As I read this post, I was consciously thinking of Nick Drake's 'Time Has Told Me.' I'm sure it is there somewhere... hiding (or I missed it).
Thanks for playing along, Michael! I was in danger of having too many Nick Drake titles or lyrics (day is done, time of no reply), so I cheated slightly on the one you mention and wrote 'Time hasn't told me' instead in the opening paragraph. Yes to Joni Mitchell (twice): slightly adapted lines from 'The Circle Game' and 'River'. I was led to quoting the Dead by thinking about John Oswald's Grayfolded project, where he takes 100 clips from Dead gigs to make an epic 'Dark Star': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1M25uZFeQI&list=PLOmR_eXYHEFAy8EnPA5AgmU7AOpAfK-LY&index=10
Nice one, Richard. Even before I got to the end of the piece and your Spot the Lyric invite, I was congratulating myself on spotting Napalm Death's 'you suffer, but why'.
Yes! It probably took us both longer to type it than it did for them to play it!
A fun set of notes and provocations. I immediately think of a couple of songs (some of which you'll recognize that I've shared before).
First I think of the line from John Hartford's "Trying To Do Something To Get Your Attention" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eHUVcOyPlE
"And I tried real hard not to make this song sound like some other song that I might have written before / And if I did, that’s because it’s my style and style is based on limitations
I tried real hard not to make this song sound like some other song some other singer-songwriter might have written before / And If I did, that’s ‘cause it’s music / And music’s based on repetition"
Which I think speaks to the arrow/cycle tension that you write about; with the songwriter trying to make progress but stuck in the cycle of limitations and repetition (which is not so much a trap as the nature of life).
(From the same album, "Don't Leave Your Records In The Sun" is a joke about the unidirectional nature of a record groove (and time?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXh1IWAKw3c )
You mention "The January Man"; one of the only recordings of Dave Goulder on YouTube is his "Seven Summers" which is also about time (in this case explaining to a seven-year-old that her sense of time isn't askew, but that the summer has been so cold & wet that it doesn't feel like a changing of the season: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xw742jFWCu8
Finally, I love the line from Michael Smith's "Time Is Moving In The Hallway" which personifies time[1] ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um1W4Lvexe4 )
"Inside his taxi Time moves through the city / He finds a place to have a rum and coke / He smiles a lot but he's not one for pity / He makes old men live backwards for a joke / Across the room a girl dressed all in feathers / They meet and soon they're dancing close together / She's being clever says she could dance forever"
You see in that verse how dense Michael Smith's songwriting is, there's both the line about nostalgia ("He makes old men live backwards for a joke") and the dark humor at the turn of phrase "she could dance forever" (which, of course, would require that time stop, which it won't).
[1] It occurs to me that his image of time has some overlap with the way that Neil Gaiman's endless.
Thanks for these examples. I’ll add them to a playlist I’m making that works through various time references.
Two more that I thought of, both touching on the subjective experience of time:
The Cure "10:15 Saturday Night" reflects the feeling of time passing agonizingly slowly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7UHKOvB_Mc
Pulp "Sorted For E's and Wizz" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxDKjzNKIsM
"At four o'clock the normal world seems very, very, very far away
All right
In the middle of the night
It feels alright, but then tomorrow morning
Oh, oh, then you come down, oh"
A few other random thoughts.
A song that covers a fairly grand scope of time is, "Their Brains Were Small and They Died" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHMZ5qWBxr0 / https://mudcat.org/@displaysong.cfm?SongID=7212
"They had music, art and fashion, there was dinosauric passion / And I think they'd be enraged and mortified / That when they`re mentioned today it's only to say: / Their brains were small and they died."
One of the most famous references to time in a song lyric is from "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald" -- "Does any one know where the love of God goes / When the waves turn the minutes to hours?"
On a lighter note, a song specifically about the nature of music as a way to organize time is Aretha Franklin's "Mr. D.J. (5 for the DJ)" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUF-njIVpmQ
"So I decided, yes, I did / Give them a little tune they / Could take five on / Because I know they get tired / Playing them records all day long,"
(looking that up now I'm delighted to see the top YT comment, "Hello beautiful people! I am the bassist on this song. It's one of the funkiest songs I've ever played on. She let me play what I wanted and I am proud to be on it. ")
Also on the sillier (and more obvious) side, "Rock Around The Clock"
And that makes me think that there are a bunch of songs about days of the week, "Friday I'm In Love", "Stormy Monday" ( https://substack.com/@earnestnessisunderrated/note/c-78250742 ), etc . . .
indeed, see the Book Of Days playlist https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3zmuozM7jAtLmnq5sEgeMb?si=nFPVS2jpQguiXIRGtzd9HA&pi=u-qPAJgsLBSVyL