In terms of literary merit and virtuosity, has any songwriter

>>9128226
all leftist cucks

>>9128234
I know you're baiting, but.. who do you think are the greatest songwriters who aren't "leftist cucks"?

>>9128226
Georges Brassens, Charles Aznavour, Fabrizio de André, Lucio Dalla come to mid.

I dont get what is so great about all those hacks
>caring about the lyrics
If you dont get moved just by sounds music is not for you
Stick to memes

Fabrizio de André, Brassens, Jacques Brel, Barbara, Schubert...

>>9128266
this post triggers me

I think theres a few contemporary lyricists. I dunno if anyone can ever have the same impact as dylan again but Dan Bejar, Bill Callahan, Spencer Krug, David Berman, Cass Mccombs are a few who i think have legitimate literary merrit.

Conor Oberst

Warren Zevon > all that trash.

>>9128568
patrician choice desuuu

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>>9128226
Cobain > all other lyrical songwriters

>>9128226
The answer is no

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if she puts out one more like this, she'll surpass Dylan

>>9128626
Is this a bad joke?

>>9128642
It's crazy to even assume that dylan could even compete with her.

Mangum is a great lyricism.
Communist Daughter holds great literary value.

>>9128653
I think Highway 61 is a squiggly equals sign to this one, and her other work feels weak compared to it.

Valentine is one of the best things I've ever heard. (and barring the repetition being a little overzealous for a poem, it's a damn good read)

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>implying anyone can even come close to his ability to capture the existential boredom of living in one of the richest countries in the world

>>9128661
Oh i love that song.
I always thought HW61 and BOB were just decent. And everything else he's since put out is trash.

Townes Van Zandt

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>>9128678
>that seemingly random string swell in the middle of the song

this album has good lyrics, but i doubt most would agree with me here

>>9128707
On GP makes me feeeeel

>>9128226
Joanna Newsome

Van Morrison.

>>9128612
please stop it with these posts, it isn't funny

>>9128707
>Singer-Songwriters
>Posts Meme Grips

>>9128859
i assumed we were talking about lyricism
Ride is a great lyricist

John Darnielle

>>9128872
I agree. Amazing, surreal, expressionistic stuff

>>9128843
ok. ok. wow. just... ok.

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I feel like Eno's early 70s glam material doesn't get enough love lyrically.

>>9129019
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) is probably my favorite album for rock lyrics

>>9128226
Early Cohen beats Dylan.

Dan Bejar, Jacques Brel

>>9128679
This

>>9130071
First two albums are very good.

>>9128226
Leonard Cohen > Townes Van Zandt > Tom Waits > Bob Dylan > Joni Mitchell > Patti Smith > Lou Reed

This is only lyrically.

>>9128226
Thom Yorke
Whoever writes for NMH
Beck
Lou Bega

macklemore

>And Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot fighting in the captain's tower
>While calypso singers laugh at them and fishermen hold flowers
holy... I want more
such erudition

What does lit think of these lyrics?
http://www.johnnyparry.com/page13/page13.html
(click an album heading to see that album's lyrics)

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David Thomas (Pere Ubu) is by far the most intelligent lyricist.

You people are just posting basic musicians that you enjoy who have decent lyrics. Anyone can right clever lyrics. To make an actual commentary on something is another matter.

>>9131615
>I spent the day under the water, today.
>I was a big pink ball at the bottom of the sea,
>The broad green sea.

>The fish came and looked at me,
>Looked at me at the bottom of the sea.
>There I was for all the fish to see,
>Sitting on the yellow sand at the bottom of the sea,
>The broad green sea.

>The sea is a big, green lens.
>The birds looked down at me,
>Sitting on the sand at the bottom of the sea,
>The broad green sea.
>And the waves rolled in,
>The waves rolled in,
>And I rolled in.
>The waves rolled out,
>And the waves rolled out.
>The waves rolled out and I rolled out.
>Back & forth,
>And back & forth at the bottom of the sea,
>The broad green sea.

>I spent the day under the water.
>I spent the night on the beach.
>I was beached.
>Beached!
>Then I got bleached.
>Bleached!
>Washed up.
>Bleached white as a bone.

>So
>So, that's my story.
>Sad but true.
>(Let this be a lesson to you)

So deep

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Anal Cunt is way better.

Srsly tho, giving him the nobel was stupid. The nobel prize is a fucking joke.

whoever writes the lyrics for Van der Graaf generator desu

Jeff Mangum, David Thomas, Richard Dawson really made me think.

Bob Dylan, Joanna,Leonard Cohen, Waits,Nick Drake are just above the others but haven't really touched me. Well maybe 2-3 tracks from Rain Dogs

Townes van Zandt, Leonard Cohen, Tim Buckley, Nick Cave
All surpass Dylan

>>9131584
lmao no

Patti Smith > Bob Dylan > Leonard Cohen > Townes Van Zandt > Lou Reed > Tom Waits >>>Dogshit >>>> Joni Mitchell

American Pie

Impressed. Many great lyricists mentioned extra Dylan. Wd add Dean Wareham of Galaxie 500\Luna fame.

>>9128727
definitely top tier writing in all her stuff desu

Oh, and Neko Case and Aimee Mann.

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This guys totally changed my life, thanks mostly to the lyrical master that is Greg Graffin. It's a shame the band made a silly turn towards the pop punk around "the new america".

> everyone is looking for something
> and they assume somebody else knows what it is
> no one can live with the decisions of their own
> it seems so they look to someone else
> to tell 'em what to be
> tell 'em what to wear
> tell 'em what to say
> tell 'em how to act and think and compel others compulsively
> until the world is all like them

> a righteous student came and asked me to reflect
> he judged my lifestyle was politically incorrect
> I don't believe in self important folks who preach
> no Bad Religion song can make your life complete
> prepare for rejection you'll get no direction from me
> you'll get no direction from me
> you'll get no direction from me

I get the shills just by ctrl+V'in this here.

>>9131989
It sounds like you really don't understand what Pere Ubu's first 4 albums were about.

The song makes perfect sense, you're probably a bit of a pleb though.

>>9128249
Douglas Pierce

>>9132118
I was just shitposting but
>what Pere Ubu's first 4 albums were about
Elaborate on this? The Modern Dance is the only one I've ever perceived to have a clear theme or "concept".

What's your interpretation of the lyrics in >>9131989?

>>9132182
The first four albums are all about the rise of certain beliefs and ways of thought in modern day civilization.
"Modern Dance" is pretty basic to be honest, but it's the introduction to their avant garde albums which are about this. Most of the songs on it are about a feeling of entrapment in industrial life.
>"My baby says we can live in the empty spaces of this life"
New Picnic Time and The Art of Walking are all about traditional subjects in music, but seen through the eyes of someone who suffers from extreme anxiety. I interpret the lyrics you posted as the speaker recounting their day and feeling washed from situation to situation, completely helpless of their outcome, as if they're an object at the bottom of the sea. Being "washed up and bleached" is their mental exhaustion at the end of the day from this. Pere Ubu pretty much headed the New Wave movement and are one of the most influential bands of all time.

Sorry for the wall, I get geeked when I talk about stuff like this which probably is pretty meaningless to everyone else.

>>9128266
>implying words don't create evocative sounds
>implying text doesn't add additional meaning
>implying the interplay between lyrics and instrumentals doesn't enhance emotionality
>implying it's an either/or between good songwriting and good composition
>implying wanting more to art is bad
Stop posting.

>>9132055
>Tim Buckley
Seeing this made me happy. Thanks anon.

>>9132254
Good post. I prefer their first two albums so I haven't listened to New Picnic Time or The Art of Walking as much, but they're both pretty good.

David Thomas is one of my favourite lyricists but usually I find it hard to find concrete meaning in any Pere Ubu songs, more just a vague sense of alienation and anxiety in post-industrial society, like you said. Dub Housing seems more broad and concerned with metaphysical and epistemological matters, there's a lot of biblical imagery and stuff too.

>Have you heard about this house
>Inside, a thousand voices talk
>And that talk echoes around and around
>The windows reverberate
>The walls have ears
>A thousand saxophone voices talk

>You should hear how we syllogize
>You should hear
>About how Babel fell and still echoes away,
>How we idolize,
>Theorize
>Syllogize
>In the dark,
>In the heart

>All I hear is...
>Talk
>All I hear is...
>Talk
>Hear the sound of the jibberty jungle
>In the dark, a thousand insect voices chitter-chatter

>The sun goes up
>Goes over
>Goes down
>I seek sleep
>I sleep
>I forget

>>9128878
Only correct answer

Lemmy is better than Dylan

>>9128626
I can't get passed this one. I really enjoy Nirvana and am impressed by what Kurdt was able to do with limited talent. This isn't an insult... he made something beautiful and incredible but wasn't very talented. His songwriting has limited subjects, a handful of metaphors and images that he recycled, and he was incapable of writing in anything but the first person. But he was able to create something that conveyed authenticity and sincerity, even when he was being ironic. He seemed so genuine and unaffected and this made up for his limited abilities at guitar and songwriting. And this is part of why he gravitated toward punk, right? It's no surprise, though, that he felt he had nothing else to say and couldn't conquer his sense of writer's block. He'd pushed himself as far as he thought he could go.

>>9128226
I know a lot that are better, not sure if you understand Spanish though. And of course Dylan had some influence on some of them

>>9128679
>>9131411
Steve Earle, please put your clothes back on and get off of my coffee table

>>9128226
Phil Elverum does more for me than Dylan. His next Mount Eerie record fascinates me because, on the few songs I've heard, he's communicating genuine pain and loss and does so by eschewing the metaphors that usually fill his songs. The greatest pain can only express itself plainly and without ornamentation.

>>9132064
Disappointingly underestimated and underrated imo my dood

There are no good songwriters. Go back to riddit you rong generashun dongwipe.

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>>9128226

>Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child's balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying

Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool's gold mouthpiece
The hollow horn plays wasted words
Proves to warn that he not busy being born
Is busy dying.

Temptation's page flies out the door
You follow, find yourself at war
Watch waterfalls of pity roar
You feel to moan but unlike before
You discover that you'd just be
One more person crying

So don't fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
>It's alright, Ma, I'm only sighing


No MAINSTREAM OR POPULAR singer/songwriter/band has come close to Bob Dylan's literary level and output. They will tell you about some dindu at their local poetry bar or some shit or some B artist don't listen to these redditors anon.
People forget how popular he was in the day. Lets compare the few lines above to a modem "artist"- I'm talking of course of the epic literary output of "Rae Sremmurd" and perhaps their finest song:"Black Beatles"

>That girl is a real crowd pleaser
Small world, all her friends know of me
Young bull livin' like an old geezer
Quick release the cash, watch it fall slowly
Frat girls still tryna get even
Haters mad for whatever reason
Smoke in the air, binge drinkin'
They lose it when the DJ drops the needle

Gettin' so cold I'm not blinkin'
What in the world was I thinkin'?
New day, new money to be made
There is nothing to explain
I'm a fucking black Beatle, cream seats in the Regal
Rocking John Lennon lenses like to see 'em spread eagle
Took a bitch to the club and let her party on the table
Screaming, "Everybody's famous."
Like clockwork, I blow it all
And get some more
Get you somebody that can do both
Black Beatles got the babes belly rolling
She think she love me
I think she trollin'

She's a good teaser, and we blowin' reefer
Your body like a work of art, baby
Don't fuck with me, I'll break your heart, baby
DnG on me, I got a lot of flavor
15 hundred on my feet, I'm tryna kill these haters
I had haters when I was broke, I'm rich, I still got haters
I had hoes when I was broke, I'm rich, I'm still a player
I wear leather Gucci jackets like its still the 80's
I've been blowin' OG Kush, I feel a lil' sedated
I can't worry about a broke nigga or a hater
>>>>>>Black Beatle, bitch, me and Paul McCartney related

>>9128234
Dylan is no cuck.

how could anyone dislike Bob Dylan?

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>mfw no one mentions Blond on Blond

>>9134250
I love Dylan as much as the next guy, but leopard skin pillbox hat says other wise

"Well, I asked the doctor if I could see you
It's bad for your health, he said
Yes, I disobeyed his orders
I came to see you but I found him there instead
You know, I don't mind him cheatin' on me, but I
Sure wish he'd take that off his head
Your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat"