SongLyrics » Gavin Paul

Lyricapsule: Bob Dylan is Born; May 24, 1941

Gavin Paul — Fri, 24 May 2013 15:30:36 +0000

Robert Allen Zimmerman, the name his parents gave him, was born in Duluth, MN on this day in 1941. At some point en route to his iconic status he changed his name to Bob Dylan, on account of his adoration for poet Dylan Thomas, with Bob being the abridged version of Robert. There’s a famous quote from Rebecca Leung’s 2005 biography Dylan Looks Back that sums up the enigmatic greatness he would master: “You’re born, you know, the wrong names, wrong parents. I mean, that happens. You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free.” Truth or not, here’s to you Bobby D, year 71, and forever going your own way:

You say you love me
And you’re thinkin’ of me
But you know you could be wrong
You say you told me
That you wanna hold me
But you know you’re not that strong
I just can’t do what I done before
I just can’t beg you anymore
I’m gonna let you pass
And I’ll go last
Then time will tell just who fell
And who’s been left behind
When you go your way and I go mine

Lyricapsule: Bonnie & Clyde Gunned Down; May 23, 1934

Gavin Paul — Thu, 23 May 2013 15:00:22 +0000

Out on a rural Louisiana road on this day in 1934, two of the “public enemy” era’s most infamous celebrities, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, were gunned down by a quartet of Texas officers, ending a two-year run of robberies and murders. Some say they wouldn’t have been celebrities if not for a cache of photos and poems the two left behind on one of their many run-ins with law enforcement throughout the midwest. Bonnie, who in reality, possibly never did any of the killing, was immortalized in newspapers smoking stogies and fawning over Clyde, that America ate up in illicit stacks. Hollywood didn’t sink its teeth into the folklore of it until the late 60s via Aurthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde, but when it did, Merle Haggard followed suit a year later. Even got his wife, country singer Bonnie Campbell to duet, on “The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde,” a knee-slapping eponymous title-track tale of the famous couple’s glory days:

Bonnie was a waitress in a small cafe
Clyde Barrow was the rounder that took her away
They both robbed and killed until both of them died
So goes the legend of Bonnie and Clyde

Lyricapsule: Neil Young Records ‘Ohio’ With CSNY; May 21, 1970

Gavin Paul — Tue, 21 May 2013 15:00:17 +0000

Neil Young went into the studio on this day in 1970 with David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, 17 days after four unarmed, peacefully protesting students at Kent State University were shot and killed by National Guardsmen and 21 days after President Nixon took over the three national televisions stations of the time to announce the American invasion of Cambodia and cut “Ohio,” a seething three-minute ballad that would become an anthem of anti-Nixon, anti-war sentiment. Inspired by John Filo’s iconic image in Life magazine, depicting a 14-year old runaway named Mary Ann Vecchio, kneeling and screaming over the dead body of student Jeffrey Miller, Young didn’t hold back on who he thought was at fault in this nine-line howler, aching in the fade with Crosby screaming “Four, why? Why did they die?” [LISTEN]

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming
We’re finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio
Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago
What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?

RIFF’d: Daft Punk’s ‘Random Access Memories’

Gavin Paul — Mon, 20 May 2013 14:33:43 +0000

On their fourth opus – their first since 2005′s Human After All – basically, the iconic French house synth robo impregnators made 2001: A Space Odyssey for disco children of the early 80s. There’s no evil computer named HAL, but familiar dancefloor vocoder babble is all over the magical place, that with the help of a super space crew of Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter, and everyone from MJ stand-in Pharrell Williams to Animal Collective‘s Noah Lennox, randomly try to access monolith-cryptic memories, complete with the sonic equivalent of Kubrick’s light-tunnel freakout scene laced with recordings from the last US trip to the moon, Apollo 17.

Ditching both the synthetics of their EDM inclinations for an analogue, warm sound and their distilled catch-phrases of “Around the World” yore, along the ride they let sentiments float and grow, in which they fall in love with music again and again, meditate on the space between notes, question their confidence and of course stay in orbit long enough to see both the sun and moon in less than and hour and a half to “get lucky.” So go the Punksters’ best RIFFs for this epic ride called Random Access Memories.

‘Give Life Back to Music‘

Dance-pop’s iconic knob-twiddlers ditch samples, hire a bevy of live talent on Columbia’s dime to “Give Life Back to Music.” Could have gone one of two ways. Thank the underground 80s disco Gods of LA yore that the two helmet-wearing French are the best nerds for the job. Queue the vocoder; [LISTEN].

‘The Game of Love‘

Odd placement for a comedown track, following a dance-floor sentiment like “Give Life Back to Music.” But fitting blues realism, perhaps, as life can’t be one forever hot-step. Who knows, maybe the love game is an allegory for the music business. Still, though, why the heartache so early? [LISTEN]

‘Giorgio by Moroder‘

Another oddly placed A-side gem pays homage to invaluable Daft Punk inspiration, Giorgio Moroder, as the French knob-twiddling nerds dress an interview with the modulator pioneer in a jazz-funk number, scratch sessions and Human League synthesizer work, turning progression into gospel: [LISTEN]

‘Within‘

Side-A, if you’re listening to Random Access Memories in succession, starts to make more sense as a package downer here, with Daft Punk’s pill of choice, the vocoder, narrating a sad robot, key-twinkled ballad about looking within one’s strung-out robot soul to find emptiness. The ironing:

‘Instant Crush‘

The last in a series of A-side downers, king Stroke Julian gets a feathery Auto-Tune assist to lounge-funk preach familiar apathetic gospel way too early for a mid-life crisis, but just right for a ‘random access memory’ and the feeling that most friends are never what they appear to be: [LISTEN]

‘Lose Yourself to Dance‘

Easily the diamond prism moment of Daft Punk comeback verite, rife with disco bell sparkles, handclaps and robo-mod talk boxin’ – “c’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon” and don’t dare try and fight Pharrell‘s best MJ howls, nor Nile Rodgers’ laser funk sweeps, “lose yourself,” brother, “to dance:” [LISTEN]

‘Touch‘

There’s an obvious agenda on this cheeky ‘random’ comeback dancefloor slap, teasing hips when Daft Punk feels like it, filling lots of space with comedown sentiments. Studded with 70s pop heavyweight Paul Williams, vocoder babble and sweeping love rhetoric, consider this its satin bridge: [LISTEN]

‘Get Lucky‘

Daft Punk back their weight in LP4 hype with a Pharrell-studded dance-floor burner, letting his inner soul-glow simmer and hip-pop for a good 2:00 with Nile Rodgers’ chest-tight funkisms, before torching in the robot crunch choir on a forever mission to stay up all night and get lucky: [LISTEN]

‘Beyond‘

EDM shackles broken, DP reprise 70s pop maestro Paul Williams‘ orchestral thumb to space-funk cruise toward the dream beyond the dream, reinvigorating their tuneage hearts, as if for some reason one was still shocked to learn the French dancefloor robots have immensely progressive souls: [LISTEN]

‘Fragments of Time‘

“Face to Face” robo-funk stud, Todd Edwards, returns to the party on this reflective, good ol’ days number when DP were playing at everyone’s house, not just James Murphy‘s, to put the RAM ethos into dad-rock, smooth cruiser context, where random memories forever become timeless melodies: [LISTEN]

‘Doin’ it Right‘

Aside from Pharrell‘s Mars-walk on “Lose Yourself to Dance,” the ‘magic’ spoken of in this slow-roller is proof why DP are as coddled as they are by every spectrum of the music community - Noah Lennox as the arbiter of sonic umami, with a robo-vocodor cohort hitting the secret chill key: [LISTEN]

‘Contact‘

Led with audio of the last moon-bound Apollo 17 crew attempting to make sense of mysterious flashes of light, DP go out on RAM with a 2001: A Space Odyssey light-tunnel bang, capturing both their full-band organic clatterings for the future and their forever Discovery chase of yore: [LISTEN]

The Best Lyric Vids of the Week: Volume XX

Gavin Paul — Fri, 17 May 2013 19:20:17 +0000

Mid-century b-roll footage, videogame promos, sunburnt sketchbook journeys and more as we encounter another week of new ways to drop a verse and song on your eyeballs in live real text time. Watch out for Shooter Jennings, he’s a “motherfucking gunslinging.” And also, don’t miss an opportunity to “walk around like a skeleton,” of course.

The Front Bottoms – ‘Skeleton‘

Laced around an oddly amusing deep 60s attempt at a kooky Turkish thriller called Kilink Soy Ve Oldur - translation: Kilink Strip And Kill – Jersey freewheelin’ folk-punksters The Front Bottoms have some fun with their equally oddly amusing tune about getting too high, feeling lonely and sleeping in the front seats of cars. To borrow the song’s vernacular – the scrolling chunky verses feel fucked, but in a good way, as you root for this man in a skeleton suit:

And I got so stoned
I fell asleep in the front seat
I never sleep in the front seat
I’m too tall
But I got so stoned

Shooter Jennings – ‘The Gunslinger‘

Lil’ Waylon‘s getting feisty. Don’t mess with the dude, or call him an outlaw. Why are little kids getting shot? And why does everyone love mid-century b-roll footage so much? All said, the country rough rider theme fits the vid block lettering trick, so Shooter, consider yourself not messed with:

Don’t call me an outlaw
I’m a mother fucking gunslinger
You want to run your mouth all day long
You’d better keep your eyes on my motherfuckin’ trigger finger

Nico Vega – ‘Beast‘

Here’s a new one, to Best Lyric Vids at least – a videogame hybrid drawn from sludgy psych-blues crew Nico Vega’s 2009 gem, “Beast.” Not only that, but it’s a volatile political statement the same, cut with footage of renegade videogame Bioshock Infinite, and skewering text that pops out of TV screens. Not too shabby ING, or whoever put this together in a non-nerdy way:

Stand tall for the beast of America
Lay down like a naked dead body
Keep it real for the people working overtime
They can’t stay living off the government’s dime

Thirty Seconds to Mars – ‘The Race‘

Cut with repurposed space footage from Jordan Catalano and crew’s first epic single, “Up in the Air,” and consecutive number, “Conquistador,” with some added HD animal footage of cheetahs and hawks and wolves and such, some equally spacious text takes over your eyeballs to basically make a tale about love’s painful side as cinematic as possible, which is fitting for such an overreaching, tired cinematic band with the emotional depth of a junior highschooler:

Love is a dangerous game to play
Hearts are made for breaking and for pain

John Fogerty – ‘Mystic Highway‘

Leading the storied Creedence heart’s 9th forthcoming solo effort, Wrote a Song For Everyone, John Fogerty (May 29), reveals this invigorating, western-loving, horseshoe-splayed stop-motion sketch, narrating a sunburnt road-lovin’ tale that negates everything his peers, The Band, tried to preach with The Last Waltz. To hate the road or to love the road, that is the rocking man’s question:

This old road has been my lifeline,
My companion and my friend
Like a rope around the universe,
Ain’t no beginning ain’t no end

Lyricapsule: The Beach Boys Drop ‘Pet Sounds’; May 16, 1966

Gavin Paul — Thu, 16 May 2013 17:09:14 +0000

One of the defining albums of the progression of rock, The Beach Boys‘ Pet Sounds dropped today in 1966, all at once signifying mastermind Brian Wilson’s decent into his own mind hell whilst raising the orchestral bar for harmony and concept, and darkening the rose-colored glasses America’s youth viewed the band through. Of the many bittersweet perfect pop moments, “God Only Knows” is rightly the death knell of the West Coast innocence that spawned them:

If you should ever leave me
Though life would go on believe me
The world could show nothing to me
So what good would living do me

Dungeonesse – ‘Dungeonesse’

Gavin Paul — Wed, 15 May 2013 21:28:34 +0000

Things take an odd turn when Baltimore’s purported “only openly gay rapper,” DDm touts his luxurious Boss style from the seat of an Escalade on “Cadillac,” as a Nintendo space-ship explosion crunches about its bridge, but the general motive is clear on this one-off project from fellow “Charm City” scene heavyweights, Jenn Wasner (Wye Oak) and John Ehrens (White Life): “reclaiming pop music; placing it squarely in the hands of, I dunno, say a couple of regular nerds from Baltimore,” so says Wasner in a press release.

Why the two chose the name ‘Dungeonesse‘ is a mystery. Letter-for-letter it means nothing. Could be an Alaskan crab metaphor? A reference to an England headland? The world may never know. Though we’re going to tie it to the feminization of ‘dungeon’ for kicks, which’d fit right in with its 10-song, 35-minute stretch of Mariah Carey throwback, guitar-less pop. Particularly the sparkling, ides of the 90s-era opener “Shucks,” and its sedating twirl of a young love chorus in the throws of naiveté: [LISTEN]

I know it doesn’t look like much
But it’s love
And I know that it’s good enough

As much as Wasner and Ehrens muscles are not use to the hip-popping slides of a bygone era – at least, construction-wise; who knows, they may be dancefloor heroes – and aside from misstep “Cadillac,” this project is an imperfectly perfect peach, that shows a bit of mold at the end. Love is very much like a dungeon, which Wasner doesn’t fully reveal until closer “Soon,” waning on its bubbly chillwave coattails, “you can’t erase the pain.”

Before this, you’re taken for a sweet-sixteen ride stroked with tinges of Washed Out, Ace of Base and Alliyah, as Wasner waxes on about early swooning euphoria, from the shoulder-pad pop of “Private Party” to the hazy, seductive 3 a.m. dreams of “Wake Me Up,” pining, cooing, chasing a fleeting love. “I’m a prisoner of your past,” Wasner even teases on the claustrophobic blip-bloopery of “Anywhere You Are.”

Do these sentiments make for a timeless ride? Not really. But how much do you remember some of your crushes that turned sour? And wouldn’t you rather just tear up a dance floor to the bright moments?

Told you it’s alright, and I told you that I’m over it
And if I didn’t lie I would leave without knowing it
I’d better stay tonight, I can feel it taking over me

Lyricapsule: Lewis & Clark Head West; May 14, 1804

Gavin Paul — Tue, 14 May 2013 19:35:23 +0000

Lewis & Clark took off from St. Louis on this day in 1804, embarking on the head-west journey of all journeys west to study, catalogue and map unknown ‘murrica. ‘Dudes put the Rocky Mountains on the map! Literally. Among many other discoveries. Discovery being the currency of the times, this is a thread that has been encoded into America’s DNA, and can’t not be thought of when listening to any folkies spawned in the land that became everybody’s land – except the British – like this crew from Pennsylvania, Lewis & Clarke, spawned 200 years after the original eponymous crew. Dig on the tongue-in-cheek wistful journey of “Comfort Inn” and bridge the gap:

She will pick you off the ground
Off the sidewalks of this town
She will take you to the river
And she’ll baptize you
With her grace

Lyricapsule: Battle of the Sexes; May 13, 1973

Gavin Paul — Mon, 13 May 2013 17:28:29 +0000

The first of three chest-puffing tennis matches that became one of the main veins leading to the heart of second-wave feminism began on this day in 1973, coincidentally on Mother’s Day. Dubbed the Battle of the Sexes, 55-year-old 30s thoroughbred Bobby Riggs spearheaded the playful misogyny, egging on the world’s best women’s tennis champs of the era.

30-year-old Australian Margaret Court was the first to take his challenge. Though Court couldn’t see the bigger equality picture beyond the cash purse – $10,000 – future Battle of the Sexes contender Billie Jean King, who would be the first to defeat Riggs, knew the stakes in a time of bra-burning, maternity and credit liability workforce wars. King’s match was even more theatrical, too, Riggs entering the nationally televised match on a rickshaw supported by a gaggle of scantily-clad models, King on a Cleopatra beefcake chair ride.

Both playful and contentious, so goes another chapter in the book of man vs. woman, which calls for one of the best lyric battles of all time, Irving Berlin‘s 1946 classic “lesson in long-distance spitting,” “Anything You Can Do,” from Broadway’s Annie Get Your Gun, performed here by Howard Keel and Betty Hutton for the 1950 silver screen adaptation. Here’s looking at you, gender equality:

Howard Keel: I can drink my liquor faster than a flicker
Betty Hutton: I can do it quicker and get even sicker
Keel: I can open any safe
Hutton: Without being caught?
Keel: Sure
Hutton: That’s what I thought, you crook

The Best Lyric Vids of the Week: Volume XIX

Gavin Paul — Sat, 11 May 2013 00:23:20 +0000

Indie ivy leaguers make the champagne pop and lyrics ding-a-ling, Matisyahu shoots the pop moon, Aesop Rock melts comic-sprawled brains with a rubik’s cube boardgame maze and more in week week the 19th in the year’s best lyric videos. Because videos are simply better with sentiments scrawled in real time.

Vampire Weekend – ‘Ya Hey‘

Never ones for clarity, indie rock’s ivy league elite pay homage to their NYC stomping grounds in this cryptic champaign party that’s actually quite elegant, sexual even in a new century moden megalopolis way, as lyrics go from block to serif narrating a tale of something broken hearted perhaps? In that sense, the question mark is apt:

In the dark of this place

There’s the glow of your face

There’s the dust on the screen

Of this broken machine

And I can’t help but feel that I made some mistake

But I let it go

Dillinger Escape Plan – ‘Prancer‘

Evidence of a farewell with the “swan song” intro? Perhaps. Either way the iconic Jersey mathcore screamarians pretty much nailed the disoriented thrasher vid, scrawling lyrics across the screen in nightmarish blurry whirrs, never really depicting a clear field shot. Then again, there’s some surprisingly pro-life sentiments laced throughout, in their own unique morbid, way:

How could it all be

We’ll never be dead

Just mirrors running scared

Slicing wrists while we look for our own mortality

The Uncluded – ‘TV on 10‘

Making Kimya Dawson‘s twee talk-singing tolerable, Aesop leads the pack on this sprawling, refreshing comic-text maze in which viewer discovers rhyme and reason in real time, navigating rubik’s cube, stream-of-consciousness sentiments like a board game in the end. Boring crossover project not, one, bit:

You were in the hearts of the pos

Annotate

se you were raised in

Spoke of in the same breathe as powerful and brave men

Learned life outta death, live with his friends

Five in the den with the TV on 10

Matisyahu – ‘Live Like a Warrior‘

Dude’s come a long way from the bearded hasidic reggae rap of yore. This is some Pac-Sun pop candy, floating around some odd mosaic that is warrior only in the sense of those cheap bicep tattoos bros get that flare out like the ‘w’ in Wu Tang. But faux embers make sense, and one can’t argue with a positive message like so:

You give your heart they go on attack
When there’s nothing left for you,
Only thing that you can do, say
Today, today, live like you wanna,
Let yesterday burn and throw it in a fire, in a fire, in a fire,
Fight like a warrior

The Maine – ‘Love and Drugs‘

Ah, to be young and from some era where reel-to-reel is still used. Despite the tired love and drug metaphors and the Counting Crows plug, the space on this black and white gem is superb, combined with fragile, sinewy handwritten verses and a bedroom capsule scene:

Debilitated feelings
Sprawled across the bed
She’s spinning
‘Perfect Blue Buildings’
While I’m counting crows inside my head