These ones are quite bad:
I am trying to be heroic,
In an age of modernity.
I am trying to be heroic,
because all around me history sings
as are these ones quite cringeworthy as well:
I am on
Switched on
A sudden clearness, a clarity
Hidden away, in every locked toilet
I've been waiting for you in the Joiners Arms
This has kept me amused for about 2 minutes. ^_^
those are properly bollocks.
I admire his balls for placing such weight on his vocals and lyrics when they are so cripplingly terrible.
that one about eating foie gras with disdain
That one about him being on the roof with his shotgun
and a packet of sandWITCHES no doubt
He achingly wants to be a OK computer lyricist and fails miserably. Poor lad
YES! I fucking hate that line.
Really? You order expensive food and don't like it? Bugger off.
it's an almost exact quote from american psycho, in a song about american psycho.
i don't think bloc party eat foie gras on a regular basis.
in saying that, i really don't like that album at all.
*less than zero
i am a retard. i should sleep more. or less.
i must have missed the bit in american psycho
when he goes "east london is a vampire, it sucks the life right out of you" or whatever it is :P
yeah, ignore me.
really, ignore me.
^ co-sign this
lol @ Kele, the big spanner.
I seriously don't see how they're that bad
It's really just the "I AM A PROPHET" way he sings them.
i'd rather have overly earnest lyrics than lyrics which people write just to fill out their songs.
Where to start.
Lets drive to brighton on the weekend?
Something about sudoku?
Ugh ugh ugh.
Oh no no no
clearly
East London is a vampire.
^this, completely
Were the lyrics on the first album
just as bad or did I not notice then cos the music was good, not this generic disco-driven epic madness?
no they werent that bad
some occasional mistakes like price of gas, bu actually pretty good.
making it all the more heartbreaking.
i thought they were still pretty bad
and Kele's hyper-earnest delivery makes them a helluva lot worse
i just thought they were well-suited
and any cock-ups werent as blatant because they were in better songs and were better sung
his delivery was RIGHTEOUS on the first album/early demos and b-sides
now its just 'hyper-earnest' and boring
i like
the East London line if you sing it in a George Formby accent. try it...
the line in the song
not the closed tube line. obviousl.
waiting for the 7.18...
where to start
this corker is from their latest effort:
When you shouted at me
I saw my father in the second grade
Concerned and kind
Yet unable to reach me
or how about:
Drink to forget your blues on the weekend
Think about more things to buy
The TV taught me how to sulk and love nothing
And how to grow my hair long
It's the way they go "And how to grow my hair...LOOOOOOOOONG"
admittedly
slightly dodgy
but Kele can be forgiven for the work of genius that is Silent Alarm.
two more years just give me two more years
two more years just give me two more yearstwo more years just give me two more yearstwo more years just give me two more yearstwo more years just give me two more yearstwo more years just give me two more years
like your dad and his mates singing down the pub
That's the one I thought of
when I opened this thread, the 'shouted at me' bit from Flux. All the other inane shit on Radio 1 just floats past in the background, but that line is like someone bashing two tin trays together. If it wasn't for that shit about 'she's 30, she's 30, blah blah dirrrty', it'd be the worst lyrics I've heard all year.
what the fuck?
he actually namechecks the Joiners? oh dear! such a good venue deserves to be mentioned on a better album :-(
the worst is the sudoku bit. because only morons play sudoku anyway.
how about
there might be ones who are smarter than you.
that have the right answers THAT WEAR BETTER SHOES.
yeah. piss poor.
i actually remembered the worst
bit of all
'and planes fly into towers'
and the towers bit echoes no to show us all how significant it is.
dear holy god thats bad.
Waiting for you in the Joiners Arms
Anone know if that is a metaphor of some sort, or a reference to the actual Joiners Arms?
I'll join your arm
i just researched
apparently its a gay bar in evil east london. thankfully.
would it really be that bad
if a band you don't like namechecks a venue you do like? really?
pretty bad
i love that venue so much, it would be like if kelle sang a song and said
'oooh modernity is so rubbish
but i really do like jamie summers'
I would actually have been quite proud
I love the Joiners, would have been nice to see it referenced in a song or something, so many bands have played there over the years.
I don't think Bloc Party
have especially bad lyrics.
In fact, I quite like the new album lyrically.
and I'm right and you're ALL wrong. Especially Summers.
Especially Summers
is my own brand of aftershave made from my semen.
So....
that's why you smell like wanking?
:P
yeh
tasty.
tasty indeed.
i dont think so either.
i happen to agree with you.
and the lyrics in Song For Clay are from a book.
Less Than Zero.
Not kele's words.
admittedly he chose to use them.
but not his words.
i like them myself, but am biased towards bloc party.
*some of the lyrics are from LTZ
I actually like the lyrics in that songs, cos I kinda can see what he's driving at i.e. The parallels between 1980's LA and the London of today.
i am trying.. to be heroic..
were the first ones that came to my mind whilst this thread loaded too
All the 'Weekend...' lyrics
are all horribly pretentious
The Joiners Arms
is a pub on Hackney Road in Shoreditch. I'm guessing there's more pubs with that name, but it's probably that one that he's referring to since he has got the whole going out in east London is a bit shit, empty and vacuous thing going on I think.
Not that I like them or feel the need to defend Bloc Party, but there's bands with worst lyrics out there I reckon.
I was indifferent
when I found out that he was namechecking the Joiners Arms in Shoreditch, and not my local, the Joiners Arms in Finchley Central.
Surely they're the definition of not being pretentious
given they're all about things he knows and actually about (somewhat boring) real life. Where's the pretention?
Being a man made me coarse,
When I wanted to be delicate.
I called up Eugene told him I was drowning,
I called up Eugene told him I was drowning.
What an amazing clunker of a line that is.
ehh
but points for getting the name "Eugene" into a song
It's his dad's name
isn't it?
It doesn't really matter to me who
Eugene is; I just know it hits like a dead weight when he says the name. Completely pulls you out of the song, and makes me reach for the skip button without fail.
I don't think Kele's lyrics are THAT bad
He definitely intended for the lyrics on AWITC to be less veiled and more blunt, so in those terms they are probably something of an achievement...
Can someone explain to me why
I am trying to be heroic,
In an age of modernity.
I am trying to be heroic,
because all around me history sings
are such bad lyrics? I'm really struggling here. I mean, at least they have a certain poetry, they suggest stuff much as Radiohead's lyrics do.
Compare to something like Kate Nash from Foundations where I'd say they're really dull and bad.
Or indeed Noel Gallagher, who mostly just strings together a series of somewhat pretty rhyming couplets.
I think Bloc Party's post-Silent Alarm output has been pretty piss poor (and sections of Silent Alarm weren't much better) but I think it seems odd how much people reckon his lyrics are awful.
Yeah
Some of the lyrics in this thread are pretty clunky, but I don't see why the "trying to be heroic" one is particularly bad.
I say good on him for trying to say something, but he probably should'ave toned it down a bit and tried to leave out a few "very very clever insights on, like, society and shit"
It's funny that a couple of posts up
you mentioned how mentioning the joiner's arms was the very definition of not being pretentious, then post up the most pretentious example of all ;)
For me, that kinda sums up why I think he's one of the worst types of lyricist; hell, no let's not say lyricist, let's say writer. He veers wildly between flowery prose (history, heroics, delicacy and coarseness) and clunky, irritating prosaics. It reminds me of Adrian Mole's nemesis: the archetype of an awful 'street poet..'
Ah yes, how 'ironic'...
I was simply pointing out to you, in a branch of the thread which was discussing the lyrics about the Joiner's Arms, that those sorts of lyrics were the definition of not being pretentious.
You were citing all lyrics on Weekend... as being such but clearly they're not, eh?
I think you're right that he's strangely inconsistent. I find his delivery of lyrics to be irritating on 'A Weekend...', mainly because he pronounces 'th' as 'f' - a personal thing there. But while you can certainly point out some bad lyrics from Bloc Party, using those lines seems silly.
If we're going to chuck out some lyricists for the sake of a few dodgy lines let's make sure we chuck Sonic Youth in there for lines like "Why are you so mean-o?"
Or not.
I never said it was all pretentious!
I think you might be mixing me up with annoying_person.
The word that really sums up Kele's lyrics for me is contrived. Not a word of it sounds flowing or natural to me, and as I said before it detracts from the overall experience of listening to the album. Sure, I get this with other artists on occasion (the Sonic Youth example is a good 'un too); but it's rare that any lyricist manages to stuff so many 'gah' moments into such two album's worth of material.
Whats that one?
about 'teachers training day'.
pigeon detectives have the worst lyrics though, 'she's on her knees, he's 22!, does that really make any difference?'
that teacher's training day
really bugs me. and the fact that it's echoed by the backing vocals.
And the other song, with the robot voice proclaiming that "We. Are. In. A. State. Of. Flux." makes me think the future must be a really bad place, like Shoreditch crossed with Blade Runner, or something.
"I'd eat more wild fruit and blackberries"
urgh...the way this line is delivered is excrutiating
Sometimes I despair of posts like these.
That "teacher's training day" line aside, there's nothing very much wrong with Bloc Party lyrics. There's a few clunky moments on 'A Weekend In The City', but nothing outrageously bad, and fair play to Kele - I actually kind his lyrics on the whole, there's something affectingly childlike about them.
Anyway, almost no examples given above are actually that bad at all. I think they've just sold too many records and the NME likes them too much for most people on here's liking. And I think most of you know that's the case.
*I actually LIKE his lyrics on the whole
More crack for me, please, Mum.
Come on now
You're pulling out the age-old irritant of telling other people why they think things. I don't take any issue with Kele's lyrics because they sold too many records; I kinda love Bloc Party a bit, to be fair. So I can tell you, with some personal confidence, that I don't like these lyrics based on their content rather than what's going on with the band.
Fair enough if you do, s'all subjective innit.
No!
You're all wrong and I speak a Universal truth by virtue of DIVINE RIGHT. Bow down to me, for I have dominion.
I hold a dominion of submissive neutrality!
"Tell my wife I said hello"
Hang on,
why am I defending Bloc Party with such virility? It's not like Kele ever sends me a birthday card, the FUCKER.
and this one
"I'd like to stamp on the face of every young policeman"
yes Kele but no doubt you would dial 999 when your house is burgled or you get beaten up.
Oh, wait, hang about
Kele asked me to ask you to send him your new address; I kinda forgot, but the next time I saw him he seemed a bit pissed off that you hadn't bothered. Naturally I made a strong case for your side of things, while carefully avoiding the topic of my own error (the man gives off a powerful, eye-watering stink when angered, and I had a wedding to attend after all).
kele
is a poseur, pseudo-intellectual schoolyard prattler. i would hate to have seen what he wrote on his schoolbag and i loathe listening to his sting-like socially conscious 'yearning' faff. he is an amateur and i you have spent any time around shoreditch you will know that he is as much of a socialite vacuity as all the other pink-trousered goons bragging about snorting ket doen the george and flagon.still - the band have a fine drummer.
By the way (non-BP related)
I can't believe that this actually exists:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lyrics-Sting/dp/1847371671
fucking hell
terrifying that that has a market
maybe they will do a "Kele from Bloc Party" volume next
commerce dressed up as
rebelllion....
LOL
pretty much everything on that album. fucking cringeworthy.
This Modern Love
'You told me you wanted to eat up my sadness' - tragic.