Blackbird feels allegorical to me - beautiful, but a different type of poetry.
Penny Lane draws you into a world, though the characters are described from a distance, unlike the pathos of Eleanor Rigby;
Penny Lane, there is a barber showing photographs
Of every head he’s had the pleasure to know
And all the people that come and go
Stop and say hello
Love the shift from major to minor key!
I was in Liverpool in October and it’s neat to actually be at the shelter in the middle of the roundabout - it’s just as described. It’s right across from the church where Paul McCartney sang as a choir boy. Nearby, John Lennon belonged to the church where he met Paul and in whose graveyard Eleanor Rigby is buried.
Really? This is the PARENT CAFE, and no one suggested this?
My child arrived just the other day
He came to the world in the usual way
But there were planes to catch, and bills to pay
He learned to walk while I was away
And he was talking 'fore I knew it, and as he grew
He’d say, “I’m gonna be like you, dad
You know I’m gonna be like you.”
And I immediately thought of songs from Bob Seger, like “Roll me Away”:
Took a look down a westbound road right away I made my choice
Headed out to my big two wheeler I was tired of my own voice
Took a bead on the northern plains and just rolled that power on
Twelve hours out of Mackinaw City stopped in a bar to have a brew
Met a girl and we had a few drinks and I told her what I’d decided to do
She looked out the window a long long moment then she looked into my eyes
She didn’t have to say a thing I knew what she was thinkin
"I wish I found some better sounds no one’s ever heard,
I wish I had a better voice that sang some better words,
I wish I found some chords in an order that is new,
I wish I didn’t have to rhyme every time I sang,
I was told when I get older all my fears would shrink,
But now I’m insecure and I care what people think."
Right off the bat, it tells you that it is a song about a kid coming of age… Like many of our kiddos.
It’s funny, this thread and I just read an online article about how Joan Baez’s “Diamonds and Rust” was about her and Boy Dylan. “I’ll be damned, here comes your ghost again”. Fits this thread. The words plus the tune which is kind of haunting.
Long ago, and, oh, so far away
I fell in love with you before the second show
Your guitar, it sounds so sweet and clear
But you’re not really here, it’s just the radio
I am a lineman for the county and I drive the main road
Searchin’ in the sun for another overload
I hear you singin’ in the wire, I can hear you through the whine
And the Wichita lineman is still on the line
Wasted and wounded
And it ain’t what the moon did
I got what I paid for now
See you tomorrow
Hey Frank can I borrow
A couple of bucks from you
To go Waltzing Matilda
Waltzing Matilda
You’ll go Waltzing Matilda with me
Tom Traubert’s Blues/ Three Sheets to the Wind in Copenhagen- Tom Waits
Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river
You can hear the boats go by
You can spend the night beside her
And you know she’s half crazy
But that’s why you want to be there
As she feeds you tea and oranges that come all the way from China
And just when you want to tell her
That you have no love to give her
She gets you on her wavelength
And she lets the river answer
That you’ve always been her lover
And you want to travel with her
And you want to travel blind
And you know that she will trust you
For you’ve touched her perfect body with your mind.
Jessie is a friend,
Yeah, I know he’s been a good friend of mine
But lately something’s changed
It ain’t hard to define
Jessie’s got himself a girl and I want to make her mine
I hear the train a comin’
It’s rollin round the bend
And I ain’t seen the sunshine
Since I don’t know when
I’m stuck in Folsom Prison
And time keeps draggin’ on
But that train keeps a rollin’
On down to San Antone
Folsom Prison Blues-Johnny Cash
Lots of Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Tom Waits, Bruce Springsteen, Leonard Cohen is very evocative.
"Sam Stone came home to his wife and family
After serving in the conflict overseas.
And the time that he served had shattered all his nerves
And left AV little shrapnel in his knee.
Leader of the Band – Dan Fogelberg again (his lyrics are sheer storytelling poetry)
An only child, alone and wild, a cabinet maker’s son,
His hands were meant for different work and his heart was known to none.
He left his home and went his lone and solitary way
And he gave to me a gift I know I never can repay.
She looked me over and I guess she thought I was alright,
alright in a sort of a limited way for an off night.
Paul Simon - I Know What I Know
The last time I saw Richard was Detroit in '68,
And he told me all romantics meet the same fate someday
Cynical and drunk and boring someone in some dark cafe
