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11.20pm
1 November 2012
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Here are just a few I can think of:
“And though she feels as if she’s in a play… she is anyway.” — priceless!
“The clouds will be, a daisy chain, so let me see, you smile again… Dear Prudence , won’t you come out to play.” — very evocative.
“So, I lit a fire, isn’t it good, Norwegian Wood .” — almost sounds as if John burnt some furniture (though previously he had “noticed there wasn’t a chair”…)
“Hold you in his armchair you can feel his disease!” — surreal, yet vivid
“Sit beside a mountain stream, see her waters rise.” — brilliant! not “waters fall” but “waters rise”!
“Desmond stays at home and does his pretty face…” — devilish!
“What do you see when you turn out the light?”
“I can’t tell you, but I know it’s mine…”
— Ha!
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5.18pm
14 December 2009
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The one that immediately comes to mind is “You were in a car crash/And you lost your hair”, which tickles me everytime.
Also, “Man you been a naughty boy, you let your face grow long” really stands out.
Paul: Yeah well… first of all, we’re bringing out a ‘Stamp Out Detroit’ campaign.
5.49pm
20 January 2012
Offline Of the lines in “Walrus,” for some reason
Man you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allan Poe
grabs me every time, in a song full of wacky lyrics.
Similarly,
A soap impression of his wife which he ate and donated to the National Trust
There’s lots of them, yes?
It's gotta be rock and roll music if you wanna dance with me
7.13pm
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1 May 2011
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Most of I Am The Walrus – “Sitting on a cornflake waiting for the van to come” & “Elementary penguin singing Hari Krishna” are another 2.
Still gets me that people dislike the song because the lyrics make no sense. Erm, that was the point of the song.
I like the lines of Dig A Pony “pick a moon dog etc” plus “Why don’t we do it in the road” is out there. Certainly not something folk would expect nice clean Paul to sing or write.
"I told you everything I could about me, Told you everything I could" ('Before Believing' - Emmylou Harris)
7.38pm
20 January 2012
Offline There was a time when I used Beatle lyric fragments as titles for mix tapes. I had started with “Happiness Is A Warm Gun ” and segued to “I Am The Walrus ” before I moved on to another source altogether.
So my first was “She’s Not a Girl,” and my last was “Kicking Edgar Allan Poe.” I love all of that imagery.
It's gotta be rock and roll music if you wanna dance with me
8.09pm
1 November 2012
Offline Von Bontee said
The one that immediately comes to mind is “You were in a car crash/And you lost your hair”, which tickles me everytime.Also, “Man you been a naughty boy, you let your face grow long” really stands out.
That first one indeed is a great line — but all this time, I thought he was singing “You were in a car crash/And you lost your head”…! As you may know, with an English accent, the word “hair” can be pronounced without that “r” sound, so it can sound like “head” anyway. I much prefer the “hair”!
“Man you been a naughty boy, you let your face grow long” is nice. I don’t recall what song that’s from.
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8.13pm
1 November 2012
Offline BluemeanAl said
Of the lines in “Walrus,” for some reasonMan you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allan Poe
grabs me every time, in a song full of wacky lyrics.
Similarly,
A soap impression of his wife which he ate and donated to the National Trust
There’s lots of them, yes?
Both excellent examples. I think John had much greater talent than Paul for quirky turns of phrase (after all, his little novel, A Spaniard in the Works is just chock-full of them). Many here may already know that Paul’s lyric in Hey Jude — “the movement you need is on your shoulder” — was indeed his own, but that he was unsure of using it, until John encouraged him and told him it was very good.
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8.17pm
1 November 2012
Offline meanmistermustard said
Most of I Am The Walrus – “Sitting on a cornflake waiting for the van to come” & “Elementary penguin singing Hari Krishna” are another 2.
Still gets me that people dislike the song because the lyrics make no sense. Erm, that was the point of the song.I like the lines of Dig A Pony “pick a moon dog etc” plus “Why don’t we do it in the road” is out there. Certainly not something folk would expect nice clean Paul to sing or write.
Yes, in fact that entire song is just one big quirky nonsenical song — a genre unto itself. (Maybe Zappa wrote a couple of like that too).
Paul’s “Why Don’t We Do It” doesn’t have much variety and it’s very raunchy, but I wouldn’t say it’s quirky per se. The lyrics are meant to be brutely about when “the rubber meets the road” (pun intended) between a man and woman who dig each other. It’s sort of the supremely Anti-Romantic Song. But I don’t think it’s a counter-Paulish song: it only goes against the grain of those who have a prejudice about Paul, that he can only sing sappy love songs or snappy pop songs.
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9.27pm
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1 May 2011
Offline Thats the people who i was talking about.
"I told you everything I could about me, Told you everything I could" ('Before Believing' - Emmylou Harris)
6.33am
23 January 2011
Offline I know it’s fairly straightforward, but I always liked the sound of, “And it doesn’t really matter if I’m wrong/I’m right/where I belong/I’m right where I belong.” It’s weird and doesn’t make sense and also makes a lot of sense. Does that make sense? 
I also find, “No one I think is in my tree,” to be an awesome line because I’m just enough of an egotist to slyly identify with it. I just get that line.
"You can manicure a cat but can you caticure a man?"
John Lennon- Skywriting by Word of Mouth
7.39am
14 October 2012
Offline “It’s been A Hard Day’s Night / And I’ve been working like a dog/ It’s been A Hard Day’s Night / I should be sleeping like a log,”- before I was really aware of the Beatles, or even aware that this was a Beatle song, I used to love those lines.
“I’ve got a chip on my shoulder that’s bigger than my feet,”
“I’m gonna love her till the cows come home,”- pfft, he said cows!
“I told her I didn’t and crawled off to sleep in the bath,”- pfft, he said bath!
“It’s a dirty story of a dirty man/ And his clinging wife doesn’t understand,”
All of Penny Lane , Lucy In The Sky and I Am The Walrus
“And of course Henry the horse dances the waltz!”- Weirdly, this is the line that got me into the Beatles; the first time I listened to Love was the first time I really sat down and properly listened to the Beatles, and it was this line in Mr Kite/ I Want You/ Helter Skelter that first made me think, “This band is epic,”. Of course a horse should waltz.
“Show me round those snow-peaked mountains way down South/ Take me to your Daddy’s farm/ Let me hear your balalaikas ringing out/ Come and keep your comrade warm!”- Only Paul McCartney could get sex references and Communism into one verse
“And curse Sir Walter Raleigh, he was such a stupid GIT!”- pfffffft….oh John, you are just so awesome
“Eating chocolate cake in a bag/ The newspaper said, “She’s gone to his head/ They look just like two gurus in drag!”
And finally….”Joan was quizzical/ Studied pataphysical/ Science in the home,”- Who else but the Beatles could get away with rhyming quizzical and pataphysical?
"I don't think we were actually swimming, as it were, with shirts on, 'cos we always wear overcoats when we're swimming,"-
George Harrison, Australia, June 1964
9.42am
23 January 2011
Offline bikelock28 said
“It’s been A Hard Day’s Night / And I’ve been working like a dog/ It’s been A Hard Day’s Night / I should be sleeping like a log,”- before I was really aware of the Beatles, or even aware that this was a Beatle song, I used to love those lines.
“I’ve got a chip on my shoulder that’s bigger than my feet,”-
“I’m gonna love her till the cows come home,”- pfft, he said cows!
“I told her I didn’t and crawled off to sleep in the bath,”- pfft, he said bath!
“It’s a dirty story of a dirty man/ And his clinging wife doesn’t understand,”
All of Penny Lane , Lucy In The Sky and I Am The Walrus
“And of course Henry the horse dances the waltz!”- Weirdly, this is the line that got me into the Beatles; the first time I listened to Love was the first time I really sat down and properly listened to the Beatles, and it was this line in Mr Kite/ I Want You/ Helter Skelter that first made me think, “This band is epic,”. Of course a horse should waltz.
“Show me round those snow-peaked mountains way down South/ Take me to your Daddy’s farm/ Let me hear your balalaikas ringing out/ Come and keep your comrade warm!”- Only Paul McCartney could get sex references and Communism into one verse
“And curse Sir Walter Raleigh, he was such a stupid GIT!”- pfffffft….oh John, you are just so awesome
“Eating chocolate cake in a bag/ The newspaper said, “She’s gone to his head/ They look just like two gurus in drag!”
And finally….”Joan was quizzical/ Studied pataphysical/ Science in the home,”- Who else but the Beatles could get away with rhyming quizzical and pataphysical?
I was just gonna quote a few of the things you did, but I like this whole post. I especially agree with the Back In The USSR and Maxwell’s quotes. I love the word balalaika. Only Paul, I swear. And “take me to your daddy’s farm,” is so innocently dirty. I love it.
"You can manicure a cat but can you caticure a man?"
John Lennon- Skywriting by Word of Mouth
10.11am
1 November 2012
Offline Thanks bikelock and Kedame for your interesting posts.
One clever gimmick in “Back in the U.S.S.R.” is how McCartney ingeniously turned the standard musical trope of the partial repetition into a political pun —
Back in the U.S. —
Back in the U.S. —
Back in the U.S.S.R.!
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8.15pm
Reviewers
14 April 2010
Offline “Birthday ” – Yes we’re going to a party party
To the fountain of perpetual mirth, let it roll for all its worth. And all the children boogie.
6.10am
3 October 2012
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8.52pm
12 November 2012
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"The world is a very serious and, at times, very sad place - but at other times it is all such a joke."-George Harrison
2.13am
1 November 2012
Offline How could I forget?
John’s wickedly cheeky riposte to Paul’s Pollyannish “Got to admit, it’s getting better, it’s getting better, all the time” —
“It couldn’t get no worse!”
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1.34pm
19 September 2012
Offline Was listening to “1985” by Paul and I love the line: “Well I just can’t get enough of that sweet stuff” which in turn reminded me of “We’re Sgt. Pepper ‘s One and only Lonely Hearts Club Band”. I love these catchy internal rhymes!
6.24pm
Reviewers
Moderators
1 May 2011
Offline Heading into the solo works from Awaiting For You All
“while the pope owns 51% of general motors and the stock exchange is the only thing hes qualified to quote us”
Such a great line and says everything about where George was and what he believed.
"I told you everything I could about me, Told you everything I could" ('Before Believing' - Emmylou Harris)
3.26am
1 November 2012
Offline meanmistermustard said
Heading into the solo works from Awaiting For You All“while the pope owns 51% of general motors and the stock exchange is the only thing hes qualified to quote us”
Such a great line and says everything about where George was and what he believed.
Did the Pope own 51% of General Motors? I’d like to see a credible link substantiating that.
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