Who do you think is the ultimate /lit/ songwriter?

>>7321026
It can't be anyone but Leonard Cohen, he actually is a poet with moderate acclaim

It's Pouya.

>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6haE-gmZOc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYqRcJKhNiE

Canibus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enGMSRo5U5g

Power Electronics is the only /lit/ genre of popular music.

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It's obviously Morrissey

Link related: http://www.passionsjustlikemine.com/influence-liter.htm

Joanna Penguin Newsom

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you're all wrong

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>>7321121
>Joanna 'that ass' Newsom

>>7321141
based

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another better one

>>7321121
>>7321026
these + nick drake, neil young probably

>>7321026
Gareth David of Los Campesinos!

Don Mclean and Maynard James Keenan are the ones that come to mind. Although I wouldn't really call MJK an "ultimate" songwriter but he is as good as anyone else if that makes any sense.

nick drake, townes van zandt, bob dylan, lou reed

Dear /mu/,

Please stop coming here and fishing for approval of your favorite singer-songwriters. Stop making these off-topic threads and stop posting here until you've actually read a book.

Sincerely,

Everybody

>>7321188
Yes, what you say about Keenan makes sense. But how is McLean any better (as in "more /lit/") than Van Zandt?

Isaac Brock
>Here's the man with teeth like god's shoeshine
>He sparkles, shimmers, shines

>>7321201
OP here.
Dear anonymus,
Songwriting is poetry as long as it is well written, in case you didn't know.
Go be a purist-lit-partisan somewhere else.
Sincerely,
Everybody other than you.

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Here's another.

Books? I read Chronicles volume 1 from Dylan almost 10 years ago. Still wondering if thats just a tease. How Not to Run A Club by Peter Hook is a perfect way to conclude (close down) a generation.

Other good musician bios/autobios? Billy Bragg's 'Still Suitable for Miners' is best title.

>>7321173
have these guys 'sobered up', or do they still make jangles for car commercials? I listened to their first album years ago, and my memory of his lyrics is that they were flowery to the point of being a bit try-hard in their references.

>>7321203
Honestly the answer is as simple as I am not familiar with Van Zandts work. I actually strongly dislike country/folk/s-songwriter but I was fortunate enough to grow up with Mclean when I was a kid.
I would invite you to listen to such songs as "Vincent" which is perhaps the most /lit/ song I can think of, "American Pie" (duh) knowing that it is about the death of Buddy Holly which he admired dearly and "Magdalene lane".

Additionaly maybe "Mountains O'Mourne" and "Yonkers Girl" of which he wrote neither but it shows his great passion for folk tradition and music (I think most people also agree with my assumption that a great lit songwriter must also have great delivery).

So what should I listen to by Van Zandt?

>>7321341
I will happily heighten my interest in McLean then, thank you.

As for Van Zandt (about whom I could say what you say about McLean, I suppose), I recommend that you listen to such songs as "Lungs", "Highway Kind", "Fare Thee Well, Miss Carousel" and "St. John the Gambler".

>>7321026

Nas is better at poetry than most contemporary poets.

>>7321395

>Excerpt of Nas:

I'm living where the nights is jet-black
The fiends fight to get crack, I just max, I dream I can sit back
And lamp like Capone, with drug scripts sewn
Or the legal luxury life, rings flooded with stones, holmes
I got so many rhymes, I don't think I'm too sane
Life is parallel to Hell but I must maintain
And be prosperous, though we live dangerous
Cops could just arrest me, blaming us, we're held like hostages
It's only right that I was born to use mics
And the stuff that I write is even tougher than dykes
I've taken rappers to a new plateau, through rap slow
My rhymin' is a vitamin held without a capsule
The smooth criminal on beat breaks
Never put me in your box if your shit eats tapes
The city never sleeps, full of villains and creeps
That's where I learned to do my hustle, had to scuffle with freaks
I'm an addict for sneakers, 20's of buddha and bitches with beepers
In the streets I can greet ya, about blunts I teach ya
Inhale deep like the words of my breath
I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death
I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times
Nothing's equivalent to the New York state of mind

>Excerpt of Mira Gonzalez:

last night i cried for no discernible reason

last night i cried for no discernible reason
in an apartment that doesn’t belong to me
in front of a person who also doesn’t belong to me
(because people can’t own other people)

i say that i don’t like owning things
but i’m not sure if that’s entirely accurate

i used to only cry alone
i have cried more in front of people in the last 6 months
than in the last 5 years of my life combined
probably…

crying seems funny, to me

i am on a very crowded train
passing grand central station
it is 9:01AM and i am officially late for work

i am late for work because i slept 15 minutes past my alarm
then i had sex
then i stopped for coffee

i am late to work every day
when you’re an intern nobody cares what you do

the main thing I am learning at my internship
is how to look busy when i’m not doing anything
also, i am very good at making photocopies now
and putting labels on things

today i got an email from a woman in human resources
she was upset because i haven’t gone to any of the ‘intern events’
because the ‘intern events’ count as your lunch break
and i want to eat lunch alone
i have become very good at avoiding other interns

at 5pm i will take a crowded train to my second job
at my second job i have learned how to answer phones
and transfer calls to the appropriate extensions
and smile at people
and bring people coffee
and call the car service
and process fed ex packages

today my brother emailed me while having a good drug experience
i want to have fun when i take drugs
but it’s difficult, sometimes

also, i want to lose 20 pounds
but i think that is an unrealistic goal
considering i don’t exercise
and my diet is terrible
and i am unmotivated

It doesn't even fucking rhyme.

Andrew Bird is my favorite singer songwriter and I think he's pretty /lit/. He actually covered Van Zandt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWDdzcTgZdM

His adaptation of a Galway Kinnell poem called "First Song" is also really good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbDVrl9n-Co

>>7321026

not townes.

>>7321426
Wow, constructive contribution right here

>>7321392
Btw I guess I should also explain the song Vincent to everyone since I hyped it up to be "the most /lit/ song ever" instead of strangely assuming that everyone would know.
The song is about Vincent van Gogh and his painting starry night (among others). Vincent was of course somewhat of a savant, brilliant painter that fequently suffered from bouts of mental illness/depression and eventually ended up killing himself. And if you care to entertain the thought, Don Mclean is touching something very soulful here in this song in the classical theme about the tormented artist creating beautiful works of art through great pain.

Thanks for tips I will listen!

>>7321417
it's fine just to mention the song titles. rather than shitting up the thread with copypasta

>>7321212
Not him but your post is completely retarded.

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Literally the two Titans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A6gkzSv8so

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1I9GqxDA4ac

>>7321516
It's actually alright you know

>>7321417
triggered. i have gradschool friends who are grills, and this whole 'confessional poetry is subversive regardless of how first-world my suffering is, because i'm a grill' meme is everywhere.
also, if you're in an MFA program where 'eating a full cake in front of the class because you're kinda fat and a grill' is considered a poem,
just,
ughhg

>>7321154
shadowboxin punch the wall
one-a-side football
what's the score, one-all
woulda beena coppa, too small
woulda beena jockey, too tall
knees up knees up, head the ball
nervous energy makes him tick
he's a health fanatic he makes you sick

>>7321523
tom waits is faux hardboiled LA irony. he's a schtick, a meme

>>7321528
It's inaccurate and his tone is unbearable. He disregards the fact that calling lyrics plain poetry at all is ridiculous because there are vast differences between the two, namely, the fact that lyrics can't really into metre.

>>7321512

No.

>>7321531

Apologies.

>>7321523

I really like Nick Cave. Which is why I was saddened to read his endorsement of Ben Brook's lolito.

I feel like the guy from the National has a really good turn of phrase and knack for simple but effective metaphor. He reminds me of Carver or Yates or someone like that.

>>7321535
>he's a schtick
Well, yeah no shit. I don't actually think Johnny Depp is a fucking pirate.

it;s a hexen hour

>>7321542
>lyrics can't really into metre

Who says they necessarily need to, to be defined as poetry? And which metre?
Also, we're not on /mu/ but you should know that music requires metre too, and if you sing something onto a muscal metre you have to combine the musical metre and the lyric. Therefore, those lyrics clearly "can into metre".

>>7321141
I want a fucking facebook troll!

Lyrics are always secondary in music and have no merit apart from being not distracting.

Music is pure form and all other arts aspire to this.

Good day.

>>7321163
Neil Young doesn't even read books, he makes this point in memoir.

>>7321572
>I don't actually think Johnny Depp is a fucking pirate.
but leonard cohen is a real songwriter and poet, while tom waits is a guy with a cool voice in drunkface

>>7321589
Well then, either operatic lyrics are secondary, or opera is not music.

>>7321597
They are.

>>7321212
Lyrical poetry in the context of modern music is not the same thing as poetry in the form of verse. You're fucking retarded.

Avey tare.

>>7321592
cohen is a hack with a very narrow fan base

Nick Drake's lyrics don't stand up on paper.

>>7321546
Ultra Cave fan here too. He also endorsed a book called American Purgatorio which i read on the basis of. Its nothing special and i imagine that, as a man as well read as he is, he was paid too.

>>7321607
Neither do Dylan's.

>>7321592
Does Tom Waits not write his own songs/poems?

>>7321607
very few do, and 'standing up on paper' should not be criteria for the literariness of a song's lyrics

>>7321604
The guys in AnCo are all terrible lyricists. Like, occasionally they'll hit on a good line, but it seems to be completely up to chance.

>>7321615
What should the criteria be then? Literariness is silly way to judge lyrics anyhow.

>>7321615
> for the literariness of a song's lyrics

lol you're one of those who think a long comic book justifies it being called a graphic novel

>>7321601
Who said "modern music"? You could name librettists for all I care.

Mark Kozelek.

>>7321621
naw senpai, 'graphic novel' is a special word for when a comic book is really long to compensate for its shit art

>>7321592
Waits hasn't used the drunk persona in almost three decades.

MC Ride desu

>>7321606
>cohen is a hack
Jesus fucking christ man get a hold of yourself. I've heard some pleb shit but damn you take the cake bud. Really.

>>7321677
this

>>7321684
Not him but Cohen's songs is caricature of poetry. There's nothing human in Cohen's songs at all. He writes shoes too big to fill

>>7321646
This. And Mule Variations is some of his best work based on lyrics

>>7321624

>Kozelek
this t b h

Father John Misty can write some good lyrics

Not even memeing, it's beefheart

Van Morrison should be considered for that stream bb.

>>7321030
>>7321112
these two

>>7322004
j. tillman, his other stage name, also has really fucking good lyrics

>>7322053
You mean his real name?

Yeah ive only got into him recently. Fear Fun seems a way better album than ILYHB

>>7321026
>>>/mu/
Saged
Hidden
3.2.1
Fug off

If i went into /mu/ and talked about on topic threads I get deleted get out.

>>7321523
That is Benicio Del Toro on the left not Nick Cave

>>7322112
No, that's nick cave.

>>7321026
>songwriter
kek

>muh open chords on an acoustic guitar

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>>7321026
>Townes Van Zandt

fucking love Live at the Old Quarter

>>7322305
>When you can make a straight edge negro cry his eyes out because of muh open chords on guitar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTGKzWDakK8

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GOAT

http://youtu.be/2NOc1Gnu18I

>>7322604

http://youtu.be/pWStaRmuXzY

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this man desu

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Yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon

>>7322912
glad you quoted lyrics from one of the two good albums they've released.

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>>7322937
I enjoyed In Rainbows and The Bends quite a bit. And I have a love hate relationship with Amnesiac. I've no idea what you are talking about. I'm trapped in this body and can't get out.

>>7321417
All the self-proclaimed "sad girls" write like this all the time and I never understood why. That poem wouldn't be out of place on an anorexic girl pity-party xanga blog from the early 2000s (and on tumblr today).

>>7321877
What makes Cohen such a fascinating musician is his total ability to surrender himself to the song, enter, and deliver it so personally. On his first three albums there are lapses of poetry that I've yet to hear anything come close to. The Sisters of Mercy, Bird On The Wire, Avalanche. How could you hear a song like Suzanne and say that there's nothing human in his songs? I've never heard anything like that.

laura stevenson - wheel (2013) is my favorite album of all time

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I never realised the lengths I'd have to go,
All the darkest corners of a sense I didn't know.
Just for one moment, I heard somebody call,
Looked beyond the day in hand, there's nothing there at all.

>>7321026
I know I'll get shit for this since John Green loves this band, but the Mountain Goats. They feel like Joyce at times, elevating the value of regular shitty life with clever analogies and whatnot.

>>7322937
>two good albums
Yeah, fuck no to that. Is it uncool to like OK Computer now?

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thomas campion

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Meloy is up there

Jackson Browne for the little bitch in all of us

>>7321200
/thread. But i would switch nick drake for neil young, joanna newsom (even though i cannot stand her voice) or morrisey

bob dylan is pretty based

>>7321112
>BULBOUS SALUTATION

Through early morning fog I see
Visions of the things to be
The pains that are withheld for me
I realise that I can see

That suicide is painless
It brings so many changes
And I can take or leave them if I please

The game of life is hard to play
I'm gonna lose it anyway
The losing card of some delay
So this is all I have to say

That suicide is painless
It brings so many changes
And I can take or leave them if I please

The sword of time will pierce our skin
It doesn't hurt when it begins
But as it works its way on in
The pain grows stronger watch I bring

That suicide is painless
It brings so many changes
And I can take or leave them if I please

A brave man once requested me
To answer questions that are key
Is it to be or not to be
And I replied oh why ask me

That suicide is painless
It brings so many changes
And I can take or leave them if I please

>>7321212
gay

Toby Keith
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhr2g746MPg

PJ Harvey

>>7321237
nah, they're goat

Bob Dylan

As much as I don't like The Mountain Goats fanbase, John Darnielle really can be a fantastic writer sometimes. He doesn't fall into that trap many songwriters do of not telling a story with a song, or of just pumping out borderline gibberish.

Also his novel Wolf in White Van, while overwrought, was quite beautifully written as well.

To name another favourite of teenage girls I would say Mewithoutyou have some really well written songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qN_j1bz3i4s

It is Ezra Furman.

>>7323915
/thread

This is the only good answer in the thread.

>>7321417

>It doesn't even fucking rhyme.

Actually kill yourself.

Frank Zappa.

Check out things like Stinkfoot and Fembot In A Wet T-Shirt.

>>7325099
I very much agree.