Bryan Adams: Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?

So i knew i was overdue to post something here at Lyrics, Weakly, but i wasn’t sure which song to post. But then, like a bolt from the blue, this past Tuesday i heard Bryan Adams’s 1995 #1 hit “Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?”

Now, i realize that i’m wading into dangerous territory here—if you read the comments on the sort of site that collects user comments about songs, you discover that there are people out there who really, really, really love this song, and by featuring this song here i’m certainly likely to draw their ire. However, if this blog is about anything, it is about truth, justice, and the American way, where “the American way” is defined as “the right to point out that songs are really, really, really bad”.

Well, that and the right to point out that, despite my utter loathing of AutoTune, Bryan Adams may be the poster child for a singer where i really, really, really wouldn’t mind having his voice subjected to the process.

But even if somebody with a much smoother voice were to sing this song, i still wouldn’t be a fan of it. Why not? Well, let’s take a closer look at the lyrics:

To really love a woman
To understand her

Oh, cool! This is a how-to song! Not only are we going to learn how to love women, we’re going to learn how to understand them, too!

You gotta know her deep inside

So i need to know about her insides? Cool, that’s easy.

Hear every thought, see every dream

Well, now this might be a bit more difficult.

But really, Mr. Adams, are you sure that knowing so much about her dreams is really a sign of love? I’d think of it as more a stalker thing, myself.

And give her wings when she wants to fly

I’d actually advise against this, given claimed historical experience.

Then when you find yourself lying helpless in her arms
You know you really love a woman

Please excuse me for a moment while i figure out what lying helpless in someone’s arms has to do with loving them.

Hmmm…

No, hold on, i still haven’t figured it out.

No, still trying.

Ah! I’ve got it!

When you love a woman you tell her that she’s really wanted
When you love a woman you tell her that she’s the one

Okay, so i’ve had some fun with the first few lines of this song, since Mr. Adams was providing some very bizarre advice—but then he turns around and gives us this, the sort of thing you’d find in any sort of relationship self-help book?

I suspect that it may be the result of this song being written not just by Mr. Adams, but also by Michael Kamen and Robert John “Mutt” Lange, and the three of them working together just threw lines out there, figuring that something had to stick. Now, i don’t know who wrote which part of this song, but my vote is that the sensible lines came from Mr. Lange, for no reason other than him having the nickname “Mutt”.

’Cause she needs somebody to tell her that it’s gonna last forever

Or, in other words, she’s insecure.

So tell me have you ever really, really, really ever loved a woman?

Let’s see…Yes on the telling her it’ll last forever, yes on telling her she’s the one, yes one telling her she’s really wanted, no on hearing every thought she has…Dang! And here i’d been thinking i was in love with—really, really, really in love with—a woman, what with me having been married to her for nearly fifteen years and all, but i guess i’m not. Glad Mr. Adams was here to set me straight!

To really love a woman

But fortunately, Mr. Adams will now tell me what i need to do!

Let her hold you ’til you know how she needs to be touched

Um, Mr. Adams? I’m cool with the let her hold you part of the advice here, and i think that that’s actually rather good advice. But how in the world is letting her hold me going to let me know how she wants to be touched? I mean, why not just ask her? Wouldn’t open, clear communication about physical needs and desires be more effective than hoping for a Vulcan mind meld sort of experience with…

Oh, sorry—that’s right, you’re the teacher, i’m just the student. I’ll be quiet now.

Please, Mr. Adams, teach me. Teach me what i must do.

You’ve gotta breathe her

Huh?

I mean, since she’s isn’t made of oxygen, i don’t really see how i’m supposed to do that.

Therefore, i assume you mean this as a sort of metaphor—but no matter how much i try, i can’t figure out how exactly this metaphor works. I guess that means there’ll be some clue to it in the next line.

Really taste her ’til you can feel her in your blood

Um, dude?

I mean, i know that this isn’t without precedent in the natural world, but beyond the fact that it’s usually the other way around, i have to say that i’m just really, really, really not into eating other people.

I can sense your disappointment from here. Sorry.

And when you can see your unborn children in her eyes
You know you really love a woman

Oh.

Oh, my.

You know, after hearing that line i don’t think that i really, really, really care that i’ve disappointed you, Mr. Adams.

I mean, seriously. If you look on the intertubes, you find lots and lots of people who say that this is the most romantic line of any song ever recorded.

No, i mean it. Really, really, really seriously.

But as always, i tend to subject lines like this to a “singles bar” test—that is, would it come across as creepy if it were used as a pick-up line in a singles bar. Well, let’s imagine the scene:

Mr. Adams: I love you.
Random woman: Get out of here.
Mr. Adams: No, i mean it. I really, really, really mean it.
Random woman: What?
Mr. Adams: I know i love you, because i can see my unborn children in your eyes.
Random woman: Um, bouncer? Can i have your help over here?

See, it just wouldn’t work.

Of course, if you see unborn children in anyone’s eyes, i’d suggest that it’s time to excuse yourself from the room, and never to return. Of course, that’s just me, and i’m clearly just not romantic enough to really, really, really love a woman.

And then we get the chorus again. Just to remind you, it’s all the things that you do when you really, really, really love a woman.

When you love a woman you tell her that she’s really wanted
When you love a woman you tell her that she’s the one
’Cause she needs somebody to tell her that you’ll always be together
So tell me have you ever really, really, really ever loved a woman?

But apparently that’s not all! Mr. Adams provides us with some additional things you need to do:

You got to give her some faith

Okay, fine—but how exactly do you do this? Faith is an abstract concept, and a very personal experience—how do you give that to someone?

Well, unless Mr. Adams means that you’re supposed to give her cheaply made shoes. That i could certainly do.

Hold her tight
A little tenderness
Gotta treat her right

Here’s the sanity of “Mutt” showing up again, i’m thinking.

She will be there for you, taking good care of you
You really gotta love your woman, yeah

Well, at least we know that Mr. Adams isn’t entirely altruistic in the whole enterprise—after going through all the trouble of saying nice things to her, telling her she’s the one, hearing her thoughts, giving her wings and shoes, there’s payback. I wonder if there are any clues about what she’s supposed to do in the next couple lines?

And when you find yourself lying helpless in her arms
You know you really love a woman

You know, i’m actually still trying to figure this one out, trying to figure out the conversation that would lead up to this sort of feeling.

“Hey—that rag smells of chloroform”
“That’s not chloroform, babe, it’s love!”

Apparently, she’s supposed to supply the drugs.

And now, to review:

When you love a woman you tell her that she’s really wanted
When you love a woman you tell her that she’s the one
’Cause she needs somebody to tell her that it’s gonna last forever
So tell me have you ever really, really, really ever loved a woman?

Well, according to Mr. Adams, the answer is no. So hey—to my wife, sorry about that.

Just tell me have you ever really, really, really ever loved a woman?

Um, dude, i already answered this question. It’s really, really, really annoying when someone keeps asking a question once it’s been answered.

Just tell me have you ever really, really, really ever loved a woman?

In all honesty, have i really, really, really loved a woman? Yes. Stalked and been dangerously obsessive about her? I really, really, really hope the answer is no.

Wham!: Last Christmas

So Lyrics, Weakly has been silent for a long time—and I can tell you precisely where the blame lies: Kurtis Blow’s favorite sport. Yes, one of my children decided to play basketball this past fall, and it basically sucked away all the time i would have spent bringing joy to you, the reader of this blog.

But this leads to a problem—how are songs going to receive the mockery they so surely deserve? This is a problem, particularly during this time of year, when we get subjected to the same horrible, horrible Christmas songs over and over (and over) again. Well, i hear your pain—and so i’m back, at least until my daughter decides she wants to play lacrosse or something equally time-intensive, and i’m back with a Christmas song that really defies all logic.

The song? “Last Christmas” by Wham! (and many others, most recently Taylor Swift—but Wham! gets all the credit for being first).

(You really need to click on the link to the video and watch it all the way through, by the way. I mean, there’s the 80stastic hair everybody in it has, but i also like to imagine it as a movie, providing dialogue. The dinner scene’s the most fun for that. In other news, i probably need to develop different hobbies.)

Yes, 1984 may not have brought us into a dystopia of thought crimes and memory holes, and it was actually a pretty good year for music, but it still brought us songs like this one.

(I find it somewhat amusing, by the way, that the album this song came from was titled Music from the Edge of Heaven. I suspect that that’s actually correct—it was found there as it was about to be pushed off of that edge so that it would fall into hell, where it more properly belonged. But no, George Michael had to rescue it and bring it to earth, where it gets to torture our ears every. single. year.)

So let’s get on to the lyrics, shall we?

Last Christmas I gave you my heart
But the very next day you gave it away

See, we’ve got an issue with logic already.

Fine, Mr. Michael, you gave her (we’ll go with her, given the video) your heart. Taken literally that’d be disgusting and a bit extreme, though certainly not without precedent. (It’d also be a bit counterproductive, since you’d be dead within a minute of giving the gift, maybe longer if you laid down first. But i digress)

But we know you don’t mean it literally (though, after listening to this song every other hour for the month between Thanksgiving and Christmas, we might wish you did). You mean it figuratively—you mean that you told her you were in love with her.

Fine. And on Christmas, too. How cute.

But then, on Boxing Day, she gave it away. (Which, given the origins of the holiday, makes sense, at least as long as she gave it away to a commoner.)

But, tell me, how exactly did she give your heart—that is, your expression of love—away? I mean, if i were to say to you something completely random, like, oh, say, “Wang Chung didn’t last nearly as long as Wham!, but their stuff has actually aged better”.

At this point, Mr. Michael, i have given you a metaphorical bit of my mind. However, it’s not actually possible for you to give a bit of my mind, even that particular bit of my mind, to someone else. You could give them a bit of your mind, certainly, and that bit of your mind might have the same content as mine (which would be refreshingly honest of your mind, by the way), but it wouldn’t be mine. My mind isn’t for you to give away.

Same with hearts.

So anyway, we’ve got an impossible situation, but fine, we’ll roll with it—we’ll take your word for it and pretend that it’s possible. So then—now that you’ve gotten into this, how are you going to deal with it?

This year to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special

Um, doesn’t this just kind of prove my earlier point? If she actually was somehow able to give away your heart after you’d given it to her, you wouldn’t have it to give away to someone else. Since you have it, that means that she didn’t actually give it away—well, unless she gave it back to you. If that’s the case, though, then you should be happy that your circulatory system is whole again, and you should really stop complaining.

Last Christmas I gave you my heart
But the very next day you gave it away (you gave it away)
This year to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special (special)

Yes, he sang it again.

You know how most pop songs, you might have the chorus three times, maybe with an extra one at the end with some vamping thrown in? This chorus gets repeated six times (with occasional minor variations in the backing vocals)—and it gets repeated more times in the extended mix, if i understand correctly.

There's an extended mix of this song? Why yes, yes there is. It goes by the name of the “Pudding Mix”. I never knew Bill Cosby sang with Wham!, but then again, i don’t know a lot of things about the band, like whether the exclamation point at the end is actually a sound we should all be saying, like with the band !!! or when Xhosa clicks are phonetically transcribed.

Once bitten and twice shy

I am not posting a link to Great White’s cover of “Once Bitten, Twice Shy” here. You should all be in awe of my self-restraint.

I keep my distance but you still catch my eye

Or, in other words, Mr. Michael is now stalking her.

Tell me baby, do you recognize me?

Well, if you’re wearing a good enough disguise, then no, she won’t.

Well, it’s been a year, it doesn’t surprise me

Okay, this is just a bizarre line. I mean, i can’t figure out what it’s supposed to mean. Is it supposed to mean that it’s been a year and so it doesn’t surprise you that she doesn’t recognize you, or does it mean that it’s been a year and so you expect that she recognizes you, what with the anniversary of the day she gave away your heart and all? Either way, i’m managing not to care.

(Happy Christmas)

In the song, this line is whispered almost menacingly. I worry a bit about your mental stability, Mr. Michael.

I wrapped it up and sent it
With a note saying “I love you”, I meant it

Aha! (Or, as we might say if we were talking about a much better 80s hair-band song, a–ha!) All is clear now.

When he talks about giving her his heart, he actually means he gave her a present! (According to the video, it was apparently actually a particularly hideous jeweled brooch.) She seems to have not liked the present, and so she then proceeded to regift it to someone with poor enough taste to want it.

Now I know what a fool I’ve been
But if you kissed me now I know you'd fool me again

So if she’d just kiss you, you’d provide her with more tacky jewelry? Sounds fair to me.

(More seriously, lose the desperation, Mr. Michael. It’s not helping your cause.)

Then we get two more repetitions of the chorus, leading us to the bridge.

Oh, oh my baby

Exciting bridge.

Crowded room, friends with tired eyes
I’m hiding from you and your soul of ice

I’m trying to picture this—a big living room, people hanging around after a long evening of drinks and gossip, Mr. Michael crouching down behind the couch…

Maybe they’re tired because they’ve all spent too much time on the edge of nervousness, waiting for your inevitable snap. Or maybe you’ve already snapped, and you’re keeping everyone around to hide you from this woman with a soul of ice, who, because of that soul of ice, um, doesn’t…really want…to, um…find you.

Yeah, Mr. Michael? I think we’ve found a problem with your logic. I mean, i know this will shock you, but if she doesn’t care about you, then you have absolutely no need to hide from her.

She’s just not that into you.

My god, I thought you were someone to rely on

I’m resisting the urge to take this line and go on a riff about how it’s a statement on the existence of a loving yet distant god in relation to the problem of evil. Not because i think it wouldn’t amuse me, but because this song is starting to bore me, and i still have more than a verse to go.

Me, I guess I was a shoulder to cry on

So you caught her on the rebound and expected it to work out long-term? Dude, even a simple Google search would give you better advice.

A face on a lover with a fire in his heart

Honestly, i have no idea what this means. All i can come up with is images involving fire from zombie movies, and you can thank me now for not inking to any of them.

But whatever it means, it must be important, because Mr. Michael later repeats the whole verse it begins at the end of the song.

A man undercover but you tore him (me) apart

No, Mr. Michael, we’re on to you now—we know that it wasn’t really your heart, it was jewelry. Yeah, we know that means you’re out some cash, but don’t make it out to be some sort of medieval torture.

Ooh hoo, now I’ve found a real love
You’ll never fool me again

Well, unless your old love kisses you—then you’ll be a fool again, and presumably just as unfaithful to your current fling as your previous fling was to you. Yeah, way to promote “real” love, Mr. Michael.

And then we get two more repetitions of the chorus, plus one more repetition of the verse immediately above. I’ll be merciful and omit them, leaving you with the feeling that love is simply a game in which people tread on each other’s feelings with no worry for how the other might feel.

No, that won’t do, we need something more upbeat—Christmas is coming! Therefore, in honor of the phrase “a man undercover” in that last verse, as my Christmas present to you i give you what has to be one of the five best television theme songs ever, complete with Ted Koppel hair and mid-60s dancing white kids in the background.

(p.s. This was post number 50 for this blog. Here’s to hoping i have the time to post number 51 next week!)

Bonnie Tyler: Total Eclipse of the Heart

This week the Lyrics, Weakly wayback machine takes us all to 1983 and Bonnie Tyler’s biggest hit single, the #1-in-many-nations song “Total Eclipse of the Heart”.

You should, by the way, definitely click on that link to experience the legal acid trip that is the song’s video. And then, after you do so, you should experience this alternative version.

But enough about the video—this blog’s about the lyrics. It starts with a line by a male backing singer who reappears a few times (occasionally accompanied by an entire chorus of backing singers), so i’ll place those lines in parentheses (as i usually do) so you can tell them apart from the the bits that Ms Tyler sings.

(Turn around)

Odd. It seems that Ms Tyler is starting the song by facing away the guy she’s singing to. Unusual, but i’m sure there’s a reason for it.

Every now and then I get a little bit lonely
And you’re never coming round

But he just asked you to turn around! That means he’s here, right? So he’s come around to see you—but i guess you just haven’t noticed yet, since you’re facing away from him and all.

(Turn around)

So he realizes she must not have heard him the first time, so he’s repeating himself so that she will turn around and they can chat.

It’s nice to see a nice, ordinary domestic situation appearing in popular songs, you know?

Every now and then I get a little bit tired
of listening to the sound of my tears

Wow—you have really, really amazing hearing, Ms Tyler!

(Turn around)

So why can’t you hear this guy?

Every now and then I get a little bit nervous
That the best of all the years have gone by

I’d be most nervous about the hearing loss that performing music all these years has left you with, actually.

(Turn around)

Okay, dude, this is starting to get weird—it’s clear that she can’t hear you, even though she can hear the sound of her own tears falling. I’m starting to think that it may actually be that she’s ignoring you on purpose.

Every now and then I get a little bit terrified
And then I see the look in your eyes

Okay, Ms Tyler, i have to say that this doesn’t really make sense to me. I mean, what with your repeated refusal to turn around so that you can actually see any part of this guy, least of all his eyes, i’m not sure that you have the right to make such a claim about the calming effect of any part of his anatomy. I mean, for all you know his eyes aren’t very calming at all.

(Turn around bright eyes)

Good idea, dude—mix it up a little. Makes sense, since it was pretty clear by now that your original approach wasn’t working.

Every now and then I fall apart

Falling apart is, i have just learned, pretty expensive. (Maybe you’d be better off with a cheaper option?)

(Turn around bright eyes)

You’d think that by now you’d’ve learned that just repeating yourself over and over isn’t helping, dude.

Every now and then I fall apart

Yes, we know—unlike you, we could hear you the first time.

(Turn around)

You know, this is starting to seem a little passive-aggressive of you. I mean, you could always just walk around to the other side of her, after all.

Every now and then I get a little bit restless
And i dream of something wild

Ms Tyler, this is a family blog—we’d appreciate you keeping things a bit more innocent, okay?

(Turn around)
Every now and then I get a little bit helpless
And I’m lying like a child in your arms

Wait—you’re lying in his arms but you’re facing away from him? You mean all this time you’ve been spooning? And you’re still acting like you can’t hear him? I really don’t understand y’all’s relationship at all, i must say.

(Turnaround)
Every now and then I get a little bit angry
And I know I have to get out and cry

But i thought you were tired of listening to the sound of your tears? You’re not making logical sense, Ms Tyler!

(Turn around)
Every now and then I get a little bit terrified
but then I see the look in your eyes

Yes, i know—you’ve already told us, remember? No need to repeat yourself.

(Turn around bright eyes)
Every now and then I fall apart
(Turn around bright eyes)
Every now and then I fall apart

I give up.

But wait—new stuff!

And I need you now tonight
And I need you more than ever

Um, he’s right behind you. You’re in his arms. I’m pretty sure that means you’ve already got him.

And if you’ll only hold me tight
We’ll be holding on forever

Well, at least you would be if it weren’t for that pesky mortality problem.

Erm, wait. Wrong mortality. Try this one instead.

Ahem. Yes. Well. Back to your regularly scheduled snark.

And we’ll only be making it right
Cause we’ll never be wrong together

Um, isn’t that a bit of a self-fulfilling statement?

We can take it to the end of the line
Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time
I don’t know what to do and I’m always in the dark

I have no idea what this is about. I mean seriously, this makes no sense.

We’re living in a powder keg and giving off sparks

But how are you always in the dark if you’re giving off sparks? I don’t get the logic here, really i don’t.

And a powder keg with sparks? See also mortality, above.

I really need you tonight
Forever’s gonna start tonight
Forever’s gonna start tonight

Um, if you give a starting point and no ending point, you’ve pretty much defined the starting point of a potentially infinite span of time.

Or, in other words, see also tautology, above.

Once upon a time I was falling in love
But now I’m only falling apart

Okay, this song has really dumb lyrics, but i’m willing to give credit where it’s due: Nice use of the verb “falling” in two completely different but parallel ways.

There’s nothing I can do

Well, what about trying turning around?

A total eclipse of the heart
Once upon a time there was light in my life
But now there’s only love in the dark

Love in the dark ages? There’s one i haven’t heard about in a long time. I have to admit that i never saw this particular pop culture reference coming—i mean, a CBS afterschool special promoting sexual abstinence isn’t what i’d’ve expected Ms Tyler to be into—but so it goes.

Nothing I can say
A total eclipse of the heart

Nthing you can say? Well, then, why didn’t you not say it?

(This then gets not not said twice more. And no, i don’t have the stamina to reproduce the repetitions here.)

(Turnaround bright eyes)

The background singer has now been joined by an entire chorus of background singers. Given that we’d established earlier that he and Ms Tyler are spooning, this ranks somewhere between creepy and kinky. And here i’d thought that we had an agreement to keep this somewhere to the innocent side of the ratings.

Every now and then I fall apart

Ms Tyler apparently feels strongly enough about this that she repeats it yet again after this. Maybe it’s a warning about her personal state of existence?

But anyway, then we get a repetition of the verse where Ms Tyler informs us she’s always in the dark except for the sparks that blow up the powder keg she lives in, and it continues to not make any sense.

Not that that’s a surprise.

But i’ll skip all of it, except to say that she closes by repeating the words Total eclipse of the heart several times, giving me the excuse (as if i needed one!) to post this.

Spice Girls: Wannabe

So this week Lyrics, Weakly takes a trip back to 1996 (well, more 1997 in the United States), and specifically back to the start of the whole Spice Girls phenomenon and their debut single, “Wannabe”.

Yep, they named a song allegedly about girl power and friendship (though, as you’ll see below, it really seems to be about much weirder stuff than that) with a word denoting someone trying to fit in with a group that’s more popular than they naturally are. Something’s really rather bizarre about that disjunction, you know?

But the Spice Girls really were a bizarre thing overall, weren’t they? They claimed to be all about girl power, but they were also presented so as to appeal to a pretty wide range of male fantasies (the redheaded one, the athletic one, the rich and well-dressed one, the dark-skinned one, and—most creepily—the one presented as a large-breasted fifteen-year-old). Basically, the Spice Girls were a heterosexual Village People.

Anyway, here are the lyrics to the song. All of the Spice Girls take various turns in this, but i’m not about to try to identify which one delivers which line, or which one is the lead singer—i’m really not taken enough with them to spend that much effort on figuring out which voice is whose. You’ll just have to take it as a given, then, that there’s a good bit of call-and-response going on here, and so the pronoun shifts aren’t actually as jarring as they might look in print.

That said, the discourse incoherence is jarring at times. Like, oh, in the very first verse…

Yo, I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want

Cool. I mean, it’s not like I have the means of giving it to you, what with you being in a British band and me being on the other side of the Atlantic and all, but it’s nice to know what’s on your Christmas list. You know, should i ever be in a position to provide you with what you really, really want.

So tell me what you want, what you really really want

And this comes from someone else in the band. Nice of her, i think—she hears that her bandmate has a need, and so she signals that she wants to know the details of the request, presumably so that she can fulfill the need (at least, if she has the resources to do so).

I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want

No, dude, your friend already said you should tell her—if you repeat this in that context it simply sounds like a desperate plea for attention. And, of course, you being a Spice Girl, you wouldn’t want to give the impression that you’re after undue attention, would you?

So tell me what you want, what you really really want

Nice of her friend—i’d’ve already walked away. (But then again, i have better things to do with my time than engage verbal teases in conversation—i mean, i could be at YouTube watching Russians yodel or something useful like that.)

But it appears our tease of a Spice Girl is finally going to give an answer, namely:

I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna

With this much buildup, it must be something amazing!

I wanna really really really wanna zigaziga ha

Or not.

Seriously, every time i hear this verse (and i’ve been hearing it way too often writing this up) i feel like i’ve been rickrolled. I mean, zigaziga ha?!? Seriously?

But maybe this bit of arcane cant will be explained in the verses that follow. I mean, there’s no way we’ll be left with something that meaningless, right?

If you want my future forget my past

Read: I know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. And i plan to invoke my fifth amendment rights should you ask how i came by that knowledge.

If you wanna get with me better make it fast
Now don’t go wasting my precious time
Get your act together we could be just fine

It appears that the particular Spice Girl who’s singing here is really, really worried about her biological clock. This is perhaps unexpected, given that the oldest of them was about 24 years old when this song was released, but i suppose that that only goes to show how much value our modern Angloamerican society places on motherhood. There’s a sociology dissertation in there waiting to be written, i’m thinking.

(If you’re interested, i’ll even provide you with a title to use: On the Relationship Between Lyrical Content of Modern Dance Songs and Maternal Longing: A Post-Lacanian Analysis. No, no need to thank me—you don’t even have to acknowledge my contribution if you use it. In fact, upon further thought, please don’t acknowledge my contribution if you use it.)

I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want

You’re just toying with us now, aren’t you?

So tell me what you want, what you really really want

You know, this response has gone beyond niceness—it’s now just enabling. You really want to avoid these sorts of co-dependence issues, you know.

I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna
I wanna really really really wanna zigazig ha

Well, i guess we should at least be happy that she only claimed she’d tell us what she really, really wanted once before providing us with this line this time.

Small blessing—it’s all about counting the small blessings.

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends
Make it last forever friendship never ends

So this starts out actually making sense—if you want to be some particular Spice Girls’ lover you first have to pass through the gauntlet of being approved by her friends. Fine—that’s ordinary enough. But if you’re going to make such a request, you could at least give a rational reason for it. But the reason that’s given here? Because friendship never ends.

Right. That’s why all of you have been hanging out with the same people since kindergarten, right?

Of course not! Friendships ebb and flow—it’s part of the whole circle of life thing. There’s no shame in admitting that you won’t always be friends with the people you’re friends with now—just deal with it.

Of course, there may be shame in admitting you’re a very young woman with biological clock neuroses, but we’ve already dealt with that line of the song.

If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give

I’m guessing they named themselves the Spice Girls because Material Girl was already in use?

Taking is too easy, but that’s the way it is

First, i wish to highlight the triteness of the way this line ends—i mean, that’s the way it is? What, was the Pop-Song-O-Matic 5000 down the weekend this song was written, so they couldn’t come up with anything better? Even worse, is is, as far as i can tell, being used here as a rhyme for give. Really? You couldn’t even have come up with something that rhymed with the word give?!?

Here, try this: Taking is too easy, so that’s how you will live. It’s no better than the actual line in the song, sure, but i spent all of about four seconds on it and it actually rhymes—and it was easy to come up with, and i’m an amateur!

Second, taking is too easy? Um, you just said that this guy has to give—sounds like you’re gonna be doing some taking, but he doesn’t get to. Sounds, um, fair. You know, if you come across someone who really is that desperate to sleep with you, that is.

What do you think about that now you know how I feel
Say you can handle my love are you for real

If he’s imaginary he can handle anything you want him to handle, i’m thinking.

I won’t be hasty, I’ll give you a try

But earlier you said you wanted him to hurry—but you reserve the right not to?

Yeah, i’m calling you out right here as nothing but a manipulative b…um…ackbiter.

If you really bug me then I’ll say goodbye

First of all, by now the guy you’re singing to may be craving such a release.

But also, what’s the big deal about this? I mean, isn’t that the way romantic relationships work? Seriously—we don’t dwell on it all that much, but there’s a reason there are a lot of breakup songs, it’s because people end relationships with some frequency.

Face it, this doesn’t make you special. At all.

Yo I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want

I already know what you want, what you really, really want—you want to be able to dictate all of the terms of your relationships. And i suspect you’re going to be successful at that, too. Amazing what semi-attractive people are able to get away with, isn’t it?

So tell me what you want, what you really really want
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna
I wanna really really really wanna

Might i suggest a chocolate biscuit?

zigaziga ha

No such luck.

By the way, according to various sources on the internet, one of the Spice Girls has informed the world that zigaziga ha actually means sex. I think this is like Bryan Adams claiming that the song “Summer of ’69” is actually about sex, not about 1969—if you say something stupid in a song and people call you on it, claim it’s about sex. Somebody’ll believe you.

You know what? I don’t.

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends

I didn’t mention it earlier, but if this song is about sex, this is an almost-creepy line—to “get with” someone is to engage in romantic touching, possibly even sexual acts. So, once again if this song really is about sex, it seems to also be about polyamory.

Not necessarily an intrinsically bad thing, but not something my obviously old-fashioned-and-stuck-in-the-simpler-times-of-the-eighties self is really comfortable with pre-teens singing about, you know?

Make it last forever friendship never ends
If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give
Taking is too easy, but that’s the way it is

Another option: Taking is too easy, but my brain’s like a sieve.

And now we get told about various personality traits of members of the group—and i’ll warn you, things get somewhat less family-friendly here.

So here’s a story from A to Z, you wanna get with me
you gotta listen carefully

So if i don’t want to get with you, i get to ignore you? Cool—two wins with one action!

We got Em in the place who likes it in your face

Oh. My.

I’m trying to maintain a PG rating here, i really am, but…

Wow. There’s really not much i can say about this one, then, is there. (Warning: Link almost certainly unsafe for work.)

We got G like MC who likes it on an

This is, quite seriously, the entire line. As a result, i really do have nothing to say about this—mainly because there’s no actual propositional content.

Next!

Easy V doesn’t come for free, she's a real lady

So whichever Spice Girl happens to be V, i’m finding it impossible to come up with a non-sexual reading for this. In fact, i’m finding it impossible to come up with a reading for this in which her sexual activities are, um, non-professional. Well, i guess we now know the sort of women the soccer players are into these days.

And as for me you’ll see

Hey! Finally! We’re going to find out what the lead singer wants, what she really really wants.

It’s about time.

So what is it? Let’s listen carefully, as we find out that she wants the object of her affections to…

Slam your body down and wind it all around
Slam your body down and wind it all around

Um, yeah.

Well, at least we have a better idea of where this singer gets her inspiration.

(And then we get a reminder that if you want to be her lover, not only must you perform acts designed to create pain for yourself, but you also must get with her friends. I’ll skip it, which brings us, blessedly, to the end.)

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta
You gotta, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta

Maybe the problem is actually that she’s a stutterer?

Slam, slam, slam, slam
Slam your body down and wind it all around
Slam your body down and wind it all around
Slam your body down and wind it all around
Slam your body down zigaziga ah
If you wanna be my lover

Sorry, not interested, you’re asking for too much that isn’t really my kind of kink. Thanks for being up-front with your desires, though—it’s certainly saved us both a lot of time.

Blink-182: All the Small Things

This is a momentous episode in the broadcast history of Lyrics, Weakly: This is the first song that’s being covered here by request of one of my children. Yes, I’ve dealt with some songs because my children have drawn my attention to them, but this one was an actual request from a child, since, as she said herself, the words to it make absolutely no sense.

It almost brings a tear of paternal pride to my eye, it does.

Anyway, the song that was requested was a song by Blink-182 (or, according to some sources, Blink 182—i’ve run across some intense arguments on the net about putting in or leaving out the hyphen, and you know, i don’t care enough to even link to them), the 2000 top-ten hit “All the Small Things”.

I’ll happily admit that it’s a fun song to listen to, but it’s not one i ever really got into—and i also never took the time to listen to the lyrics. Now that i have, i can say that this is one of the most non sequitur-laced songs out there. I mean, it certainly wouldn’t displace my nominee for the top spot in that category, but it may well be in the top five.

This is not an honor to covet.

But enough about that—you’re not here to hear me talk about non sequiturs, you’re here to hear me point them out as they come up. So sit back and listen to the words that Blink-182 guitarist Tom DeLonge came up with, presumably while he was so shorted on sleep that he couldn’t think straight.

All the small things

Oh, cool—Mr. DeLonge is apparently writing a song about really small things, like the three-and-a-half-inch long Madame Berthe’s Mouse Lemur, or the 1.3 gram Etruscan Shrew, or the four-inch long Barbados Threadsnake, or maybe even the 139-micrometer long parasitic wasp Dicopomorpha echmepterygis. It’s always good to see a punk-pop artist taking an interest in the life sciences.

According to the always-reliable Wikipedia page for this song, though, Mr. DeLonge wrote this song for Jennifer Jenkins, the woman who later married him. I’m rather surprised she didn’t take being compared to a parasitic wasp rather personally, but then again i’m not a rock star’s girlfriend.

True care truth brings

What does this line even mean? I mean, i haven’t even ripped it out of its syntactic context—it really makes no sense.

Oh well, everybody has a bad line now and again. I’m sure it won’t happen again, right, Mr. DeLonge?

I’ll take one lift
Your ride best trip

I’m trying hard to make sense out of this, i really am.

But the best i can do with this is that Mr. DeLonge is promising Ms Jenkins that he’s going to bum rides off of her. I wouldn’t have thought that such behavior was an auspicious sign for a relationship, but what do i know?

Always I know
You’ll be at my show
Watching, waiting
Commiserating

Commiserating about the fact that she has to listen to songs like this, I’m thinking.

(Sometimes a lyricist just hands you a gift, you know?)

Say it ain’t so

Okay. It ain’t so.

I will not go
Turn the lights off
Carry me home

Okay, we’ve got issues again.

After all, if you get carried home, Mr. DeLonge, you’re presumably being carried from a place that is not home. Therefore, if someone fulfills your request for carrying, you will in fact be going from the not-home place you were at when you first made the claim that you will not be going.

In any event, you end up not telling the truth, and that as a result of your own ordering of others around. Hope that teaches you a lesson.

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Wow. Now i see why Mr. DeLonge gets all the adoring fans, what with being able to write lyrics that get to the heart of human relationships so concisely as this very line.

Late night come home
Work sucks I know

Dude? You’re a big-name rock star. Even if you hate your job, none of the rest of us want to hear it, okay? (And we wouldn’t believe you anyway.)

She left me roses by the stairs
Surprises let me know she cares

Yes, of course—this is the way i know my wife cares for me, when she leaves roses some place other than, say, in a water-filled vase on the table. It really lets me know that romance has reached its greatest heights when roses are just left any old place to die.

Say it ain’t so
I will not go
Turn the lights off
Carry me home

Wait a minute—this is sounding familiar. In fact, if i recall correctly, it was the lead-in to the line that…Oh, please, not that again—not already!

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Yes, already.

(And then we get another repeat of the chorus, skipped here, but thankfully without yet another “na, na, na” drone.)

Keep your head still
I’ll be your thrill

Just for a moment, imagine someone saying this to you in real life: “Keep your head still, [insert your name here], I’ll be your thrill!”

I submit that this can only mean that something dangerous is about to happen, and it’s going to come at your expense. Basically, it’s time to run away.

But somehow, here it’s romantic. Right? Or something.

The night will go on
My little windmill

My little windmill?!?

This has got to be the worst pet name in the entire English language since Percy Bysshe Shelley used to call Mary Wallstonecraft Shelley “Pecksie”.

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Oh, no—stealth “na, na, na”s!

And after that, we get repeats of previous choruses—but i think we’ve heard quite enough already, yes?

In closing, though, i must say that i’m very happy that Mr. DeLonge and Ms Jenkins ended up getting along so well. After all, judging by the romance level of the images in this song i’m sure i wouldn’t be happy in a relationship like this, but different strokes and all that, right?

Sonny & Cher: I Got You Babe

Sonny & Cher: I Got You Babe

Here at Lyrics, Weakly headquarters, my method of choosing a song to discuss generally follows the following schema:

1. Are there any outstanding requests?
1. If yes: Pick one of them, discuss it.
2. If no: Proceed to the next step.
2. Listen to the radio for a couple days. With all the dumb songs out there, something’ll come up by Tuesday.

This past week, though, has been pretty crazy, and i haven’t gotten as much oldies/​classic rock/​today’s top hits/​mix of the 70s, 80s, and whatever radio station listening in as i usually do. As a result, i arrived at a point where i needed to write up a song, but i didn’t have a song to write about.

And then deep memory rescued me.

True story from my twisted life: Somewhere in my parents’ house is an old VHS tape that contains video footage of one of my sisters and me singing along with Sonny & Cher’s 1965 chart-topper, “I Got You Babe”. The best part? I sang along with Cher, and she sang along with Sonny, not ’cause we were being silly (though we certainly were), but because Cher sounds so much more guy-like than Sonny in this song.

Anyway, it’s time to move on to the lyrics. This is a duet, which means i probably ought to show who sang what. So i’ll be italicizing the words Cher sang (like i do with most song lyrics on this blog), underlining Sonny’s lines, and marking the lines they sang together with both underlining and italics.

They say we’re young and we don’t know
We won’t find out until we grow

If you look through the lyrics of this entire song, you’ll find no real hint about what it is they say that Sonny and Cher allegedly don’t know. Quite seriously, i’m curious. Maybe they don’t know the rules to Parcheesi? ’Cause i could totally help them out on that one.

Also, at the time this song was released Sonny was 30 years old, Cher was 19. Yeah, Cher, you might have been young and not known whatever it was, but Sonny clearly was at least old enough to know how to stay this side of legal.

And finally, i find it telling that Cher doesn’t specify exactly what sort of growing was to be involved in letting them find out what they didn’t know. Given these before and after album covers, i’m suspecting it had to do with some sort of plastic surgery.

Well I don't know if all that’s true
’Cause you got me, and baby I got you

Well, Sonny, of course you don’t know if it’s all true—it’s a statement that can’t be evaluated for truth. Maybe if we knew what they say you don’t know, well, then you could tell if it was true or not. As it stands, though, it’s not possible to say one way or the other because you don’t have the information you need.

This lesson in hermeneutics brought to you be the letter B, the number 2, and Donald Rumsfeld.

Babe
I got you babe
I got you babe

True fact (at least according to Wikipedia, so you know it must be true): Sonny Bono wrote this song to capitalize on the popularity of the term ‘babe’. Were he alive today, i’m thinking he’d’ve written a much more aggressive version of the song, titled “I Pwned You Babe”.

They say our love won’t pay the rent

There are, however, some people who actually do pay their rent that way. Apparently they, whoever they might be, are simply underinformed and are passing their lack of knowledge on to the two of you.

Before it’s earned, our money’s all been spent
I guess that's so, we don’t have a pot
But at least I’m sure of all the things we got

Oddly, even though they didn’t have a pot, they very clearly did have pot, judging by the way Cher’s playing with her hair in every single mid-60s video of them singing this song i’ve ever seen. Amazing the difference a single determiner makes!

Babe
I got you babe
I got you babe

Yes, we know—you already told us, remember?

I got flowers in the spring

Unlike everyone else, right?

I got you to wear my ring

’Nother deep memory: Back in the early 80s, when i was of an age that Mad magazine was the height of middle-class subversiveness, they ran an article with reasons we should love various celebrities. One of the entries was for Cher, and i remember two of them. One of them was “She’s really attractive, if you get turned on looking at a pencil”, but that’s not important right now. The one that’s important for the last line of the song was “We should all be grateful to her for keeping Sonny Bono off welfare all those years”. Apparently men actually do come out financially better in marriage than women!

And when I’m sad, you’re a clown
And if I get scared, you’re always around

I would just like to say that i would not find having a clown around comforting. That is all.

Don't let them say your hair’s too long
’Cause I don't care, with you I can’t go wrong

This is a nice sentiment and all, but it really is a whiplash-inducing non sequitur.

Then put your little hand in mine
There ain’t no hill or mountain we can’t climb

Every time i hear this line i get an image of Sonny and Cher, hand in hand and dressed in beaded-fringe hippie garb, walking up K2 until they succumb to hypoxia. A bit morbid, i’ll admit, but you have to remember that this is the duo that did not only this song, but also “Baby Don’t Go”, after all.

I got you to hold my hand
I got you to understand
I got you to walk with me
I got you to talk with me
I got you to kiss goodnight
I got you to hold me tight
I got you, I won’t let go
I got you to love me so

You know, i had some stuff to talk about here, but i just don’t have the energy. I mean, all this lovable-and-cute-beyond-imagining schmoopyness is threatening to throw me into sugar shock, and i’m not even diabetic.

I got you babe

Yes, i know—remember, i already said there was no need for you to mention it anymore.

I got you babe

Stop, please. Pretty please?

I got you babe

You’re just doing this to annoy me now, aren’t you?

I got you babe

Yes, yes you are.

I got you babe

That’s okay, i know of something even more annoying than this song! (Only just marginally, though.) So there!

The Outfield: Your Love

This week i was going to run another request, but i’ve had a song going through my head for several days and i figured the only way to banish the demons would be to share it with you. Therefore, i present the Outfield’s 1986 top-ten hit “Your Love”, the only major hit i’m aware of that used its music video to highlight the professional and personal issues involved when a band shares its rehearsal space with an artist specializing in representational abstract art.

Fun fact! The Outfield were, according to their Wikipedia page, originally called the Baseball Boys. This is actually somewhat interesting, since they’re from London, where baseball isn’t traditionally a big deal. It is, however, not interesting enough for me to think about any further.

The song “Your Love”, despite being an absolutely horrible song, has had many opportunities to burn itself into our brains. Aside from being utterly inescapable in the mid-80s, it appeared in one of the many versions of Grand Theft Auto, and it’s currently used as an intro song whenever a number of major league ballplayers come up to bat. I’m willing to give Frank Catalanotto and Josh Willingham a pass on using this song, since they’re outfielders and this is the biggest hit by a band named after their position, but Kelly Johnson and Gordon Beckham both play infield positions, and so they have no excuse for choosing such a terrible song.

Incidentally, as i was finishing up my comments for this song’s lyrics (yes, i write the intros last), i discovered the blog Awesomely Bad Lyrics has done its own commentary on this song, including mentioning the whole baseball connection. Interesting. Anyway, it was cool finding that blog, almost like discovering a long-lost (and somewhat fouler-mouthed) older cousin that hasn’t been updated in a couple months. Worth poking around, particularly since it seems the only songs that blog has covered that i have are this one and, since it’s so horrible that it must be mocked by everyone, Starship’s “We Built This City”. (Here’s my take, here’s the take at Awesomely Bad Lyrics.) That blog has gone over a few more that need to be discussed here eventually, though—Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart”, Boston’s “Amanda”, Europe’s “The Final Countdown”…

But yeah, you’re right, now i’m just stalling before having to move to the horror that is “Your Love”—the song “Your Love”, that is, i’m sure your own personal love is actually a wonderful thing, a shining light of pure crystal brightening the darkness. The love of John Frederick Spinks, member of the Outfield and writer of this song? Not so much.

Josie’s on a vacation far away

Just to orient the reader, Josie appears to be Mr. Spinks’s significant other. It’s kind of hard to tell, though, ’cause this is the last we hear of her. In particular, we never hear of her coming home, at least not in this song—maybe in another one one day?

Come around and talk it over
So many things that I wanna say

In another item to orient the reader, this song is one long seduction attempt—so, as you might expect, it’s mainly one line after another. So what sort of smooth line is Mr. Spinks going to use on the object of his desire?

You know I like my girls a little bit older

Oh.

Um, okay.

I mean, points for not going the Benny Mardones route here, but i’m kind of wondering if you’re aware that stating right up front that you’re after someone older, and then strongly implying that you’re trying to seduce the woman you’re talking to precisely because she’s a bit older…Well, i’m just thinking that your odds of success have just dropped a bit.

Not to say that mom-age types aren’t desire-worthy—hey, i’m married to one myself!—but you might want to try a little more subtlety with your target demographic next time.

And speaking of subtlety…

I just wanna use your love tonight
I don’t wanna lose your love tonight

Nope, no danger of that here.

I ain’t got many friends left to talk to
No one’s around when I’m in trouble

Not trying to mess with your obviously smooth self, Mr. Spinks, but might i suggest, oh, not insulting people? And then maybe, once you get that down, you can move on to not propositioning women near the beginnings of your conversations, or at least waiting to do so until a full three or four minutes after mentioning the name of the other woman you are currently involved with. Once you get those down, you might find that you have more friends—and, in fact, not only might you find more people around when you’re in trouble, you might find yourself getting in trouble less often.

What’s that? Thanks for the advice, but no thanks? You do what works for you? No, no problem—go right ahead. Please do continue.

You know I’d do anything for you

You mean like leave Josie for her?

Stay the night but keep it undercover

Well, apparently not.

So let’s tally this up: Mr. Spinks has propositioned a woman by saying she’s old and he just to use her sexually for a night, and he wants to make sure nobody knows about the booty call.

That’s classy right there.

I just wanna use your love tonight
I don’t wanna lose your love tonight

This couplet bugs me—the second line implies what is, to my mind, a frankly unhealthy possessiveness toward the woman he’s trying to woo. I mean, fine, the first line says pretty bluntly that he’s after a one-night stand that’s all about him, but then the second line makes it sound like he’s assuming it’s a done deal.

You know what, Mr. Spinks? She’s still allowed to say no.

Tryin’ to stop my hands from shakin’

Shaking with frustration? Dude, just because you’ve always gotten everything you’ve wanted up to now in your life does not give you the right to get this angry.

Somethin’ in my mind’s not makin’ sense

It’s not just your mind, Mr. Spinks, trust me.

It’s been a while since we were all alone

I suspect that’s entirely purposefully done on her part. I know it would be if i were her.

(Warning: The audio on that link might not be entirely safe for work, depending on where you work.)

I can’t hide the way I’m feelin’

And here the logic, such as it is, comes crashing to a halt. I mean, didn’t you sing, just a few lines ago, that you want her to stay the night but keep it undercover? And now you can’t hide things? Dude, if you’re gonna talk about it, you’ve got to give her the green light to do the same—it’s just fair.

Of course, given the odor of combined uncontrolled desperation and barely controlled anger that you’re exuding in this song, i don’t know that she’d actually want to go bragging about her one-night stand with you to her friends. But you know, to each her own.

As you leave me please would you close the door

Oh, that’s real nice—hey, the sex was great, make sure you close the door so i don’t have to get up and do it myself.

Basically, continued classiness.

And don’t forget what I told you

Um, that she’s old, you’re after her for one night’s sex, and you don’t care about her feelings or opinions on the matter? Yeah, i don’t think you have to worry about her forgetting that—and, i suspect, she may end up making sure none of her friends forget it, either.

Good luck finding another alternative to Josie, dude.

Just ’cause you’re right, that don’t mean I’m wrong

You know, in general this is technically true—but still stupid.

In this particular case, though, if she’s saying no to your sexual advances, you’re wrong. Hope this helps clear things up. Have a nice day.

Another shoulder to cry upon

Emotional blackmail? Still stayin’ classy, i see.

I just wanna use your love tonight
I don’t wanna lose your love tonight

And then this gets repeated over and over, with some occasional vamping between lines.

My advice to Ms. Not-Josie: While Mr. Spinks is distracted from paying attention to his singing, run, don’t walk, to the nearest courthouse. You’ll thank yourself for it in the morning.

Color Me Badd: I Wanna Sex You Up

Over the past few weeks, i’ve gotten a few requests for songs that should be featured on Lyrics, Weakly—and so today we reach into the vault for the first of these, Color Me Badd’s 1991 hit, “I Wanna Sex You Up”.

“I Wanna Sex You Up” was a big international hit, hitting #2 in the United States (while topping the R&B and dance charts) and getting double platinum status, and hitting #1 in the United Kingdom and New Zealand. I was fortunate to be living in Austria at the time, where it missed the top ten (peaking at #11), so i avoided having it burned into my brain quite as intensely as people living in much of the rest of the world did. Therefore, for me this is just an amusing memory of the early 90s; for the rest of you, i apologize for bringing up something quite as traumatic as this is likely to be. However, in my defense, i will point out that i’m not the first to bring this song back from the dead, since (according to the song’s Wikipedia entry) it was semi-recently covered by the Acafellas on an episode of Glee, giving those of us who don’t watch that show yet another reason to be happy about our entertainment choices.

The scary thing, by the way, is that this was not Color Me Badd’s highest-charting US hit—those were the followup singles “I Adore Mi Amor” and “All 4 Love”, which both hit #1. It’s this one, though, that has created the deepest memory scars for many people.

(By the way, the #1 song in Austria while “I Wanna Sex You Up” was topping the charts elsewhere? “Joyride” by Roxette, which topped the Ö3 Austria Top 40 for ten weeks, comparatively not a bad choice by the Austrian people at all. Of course, earlier in the year—yes, this was 1991—the #1 song for six weeks was “Unchained Melody” by the Righteous Brothers, which is also not a bad choice but certainly an interesting one.)

Anyway, i’ve put off getting to the lyrics themselves for long enough, so i should move on to them now. There’s no reason for you to be in quite such a hurry to reopen old memories, though, and so i’d suggest taking a moment to watch the literal version of the song’s video.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]

I have to admit that i’m not entirely sure if i got this line (these lines, actually, as you’ll see) correct. First of all, the ah may actually be aw—and even though those are pronounced the same by most North Americans, they’re different-sounding words for me, but i can’t tell which was intended here. Similarly, and more importantly for the meaning of the passage, i can’t tell whether the you is that or actually yeah.

You know what, though? I actually don’t care.

Also, you’ll notice that i put this line in brackets. That’s because there are four main types of lines in this song: lines sampled from other songs, lines delivered by the backup singers, a deep-voiced spoken interlude, and lines delivered by the lead singer. Just to keep things straight here, i’ll be putting the sampled lines in [square brackets], the background vocals in (parentheses), the spoken interlude in {curly brackets}, and the lines from the lead singer without any special marking at all.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled discussion.

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

Repetition, apparently to help people like me who aren’t entirely sure of the lyrics.

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

Doesn’t help, though.

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

What in the world does this have to do with the rest of the song, anyway?

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]

Were that that were true!

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

You’re kidding, right? I mean, we’re getting into “Hanky Panky” territory here.

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]

Or maybe this is a true statement, and that song is actually a good one.

But at least this signals the end of the intro—the seduction is about to begin.

Come inside, take off your coat
I’ll make you feel at home
Now let’s pour a glass of wine
’Cause now we’re all alone

’Cause, you know, people never, ever drink wine when they’re in groups of more than two.

I’ve been waiting all night
So just let me hold you close to me
’Cause I've been dyin’ for you girl

Death? Wow—that seems a little bit extreme.

To make love to me
Girl, you make me feel real good
We can do it ’til we both wake up

Now, i’m not going to claim to be fully versed in all possible permutations of human sexual experience, but i’m having trouble imagining how this is supposed to work. After all, i’m pretty sure he just told her he wanted to have sex with her while they were both asleep. I mean, i suppose it can be romantic under certain circumstances to say that you plan to have erotic dreams about the object of your desire, and even to say that you wish the object of your desire to have erotic dreams about you, but it seems kind of out of place here.

Maybe this is actually a suggestion that they take Ambien together.

Girl, you know I’m hooked on you
And this is what I’ll do

More evidence for my Ambien theory.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

Oh, please, not again.

(I wanna sex you up)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
All night

Ticking, tocking, never stopping, alling nighting sexing upping—you know, it’s kind of comforting to be faced with just an old-fashioned love song, comin’ down in three-part harmony.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(You make me feel real good)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
I want to

This is, seriously, the end of this line. Dude wants to.

Glad to know.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[I know you not gonna sing that song!]

That’s what we were hoping, at least.

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the]

Yep, this is the end of this line, too. Now, i realize that sampling technology wasn’t as advanced in 1991 as it is now, but it’s not like they were cutting tape up into scores of pieces to do this—they just had two samples (one saying To the ah tick tock you don’t stop, and one with the To the left off). You would think, then, that the producers would have been able to keep from including just the beginning of the longer sample before they managed to turn off the sampler—or at least that they would have fixed that in post-production.

Or maybe this line is actually reflecting the band’s adherence to the Japanese aesthetic of wabi-sabi, and so they had to include an imperfection to remind their viewers of the imperfection inherent in this sphere of existence, just as if this track was an ikebana flower arrangement.

Well, either that or they simply messed up. Yeah, probably that.

Let me take off all your clothes

Pretty forward of you, dude—but i guess you’ve poured enough wine into her by now that it doesn’t matter.

Disconnect the phone so nobody knows, yeah

Seriously, what’s the point? I mean, i can see disconnecting the phone so that y’all don’t get interrupted, but why would anyone know you’ve gotten her naked just because the phone’s not off? I mean, unless you’re expecting that you’d answer the phone during sex, but you’d have to have extremely poor taste to do that, right?

Let me light a candle so we can make it (better)

The word better is in the background vocals, presumably to make sure it gets your attention. Leaves me wondering: Better than what?

Makin’ love until we drown

Today’s real-world survival hint: If you are in danger of drowning due to your sexual conduct, try putting less water into the jacuzzi next time. Or maybe wear equipment more appropriate to the venue.

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Dig
Girl, you know, it feels real good
We can do it ’til we both wake up
Girl, you know I’m hooked on you
And this is what I’ll do

So once again we’ve been reminded that the gentlemen of Color Me Badd have sex while they sleep. However, the last line of this verse implies that we’re about to be told how exactly they go about doing this. I have to admit that, as ashamed as i am to say this, i’m kind of curious. So…

[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Yeah
(I wanna sex you up)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Makin’ love until we drown
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[I know you not gonna sing that song!]

And with this, we learn that Color Me Badd are collectively a big tease.

{Ah, girl, you just make me feel so good}

And here we have the deep-voiced spoken interlude.

{I just wanna, I just wanna look at you}

This is either a lie, or Color Me Badd have the most um, unique definition of “I wanna sex you up” that i’ve ever come across. Apparently it involves being (wait a moment while i scan through the lyrics to this point) naked, drunk, lit by candles, asleep, and underwater. Yeah, i guess maybe it’s that.

{Don’t say anything at all}
{Just lay back, and enjoy the ride, yeah}

You know, i’m a guy, and this just pushed the squickmeter to eleven.

Everybody out there who’s into guys, you could do the whole world a serious favor by withholding any sort of riding to a guy who refers to sex as “the ride”. Please?

All I want to do is
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
All night
[The the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(Girl, you make me feel good)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
I want to
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]

To be entirely honest, Color Me Badd is starting to sound a bit desperate here.

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]
Make sweet lovin’ all night long
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
Feels so right it can’t be wrong

Something feeling right isn’t a valid bit of evidence for it not being wrong.

My proof? It presumably felt right to record this song.

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Don't be shy girl, rescue me

The first Google hit for “rescue” is an a capella quartet. The second hit fits my opinion of this song much better—plenty of products to help this girl get rid of the pests in her life, or at least the pests in the same room body of water as her.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
Open up your heart, and I’ll set you free

Dude, it ain’t her heart you’re trying to open up. At least be honest with her about that!

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]

So not only are most of the lines in this song sampled from other sources in a desperate attempt to pad this song’s length, they repeat one of them over fifty times. You know, i’m starting to develop some opinions about y’all’s songwriting abilities—and let’s just say they’re somewhat short of positive.

Oh, I wanna touch you in all the right places, baby

This has got to be one of the worst pickup lines ever.

[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
I wanna make love to you
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Yeah
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]

Again with this line! Please, just make all the tick-tocking go away. Please?

All night, all night, yeah
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[To the ah tick tock you don’t stop]
You me
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]

Just stop, and i’ll say nice things about you.

[I know you not gonna sing that song!]

Okay, you’re right, i won’t.

But at least by this point the song is on fadeout, and even though it’s a really., really slow fadeout it means it’s almost done!

Which, in a way, is the best thing i’ve been able to say about this song in this entire post.

Make sweet lovin’ all night long
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Feels so right it can’t be wrong
[I know you not gonna sing that song!]
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
Don’t be shy girl, rescue me
[Ah tick tock you don’t stop]
(I wanna sex you up)
Open up your heart and I’ll set you free

Yep, this really is the way this song ends—with arguably the worst line found in the entire song.

But you know what? I suspect the gentlemen of Color Me Badd actually ramped up the quality of their lines for this song, and that they’re usually not even that smooth.

(p.s. The audio in that last link isn’t entirely safe for work. You’ve been warned.)

Frankie Valli: My Eyes Adored You

This week Lyrics, Weakly moves into dangerous territory: criticizing an Italian-American from New Jersey.

The 1975 song “My Eyes Adored You” was actually recorded by the Four Seasons with Frankie Valli as lead singer, but their label wouldn’t release it. (Many other labels rejected the song after that, by the way. It’s somehow comforting to know that stupidity isn’t new to the music recording industry—they’ve been working on getting things wrong for a long time.) Frankie Valli bought the rights to the song, and finally got it released—but the label that released it didn’t want it released as a Four Seasons song, they wanted it released as a Frankie Valli song. As a result, it was Frankie Valli’s first solo #1 hit, even though it wasn’t actually a solo recording.

Confused? Yes? Well, welcome to logic, Recording Industry Association of America style.

Incidentally, while Frankie Valli was still working on getting himself established as a singer, he worked as a barber as his day job. I’ve got nothing to say about that, really, except that i find it both highly amusing and actually pretty cool.

Anyway—this song is actually pretty nice to listen to, if you’re in the mood for overt sappiness. (And aren’t we all, every once in a while?) Just make sure that you don’t pay too much attention to the lyrics when it comes on the radio. I mean, the weirdness starts with the very first line:

My eyes adored you

From Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary:

Main Entry: adore
Pronunciation: \ə-ˈdȯr\
Inflected Form(s): adored; ador·ing
1: to worship or honor as a deity or as divine
2: to regard with loving admiration and devotion
3: to be very fond of

So Frankie Valli’s eyes either worshipped this woman, regarded her with admiration or devotion, or were very fond of her.

The odd thing is that such actions generally require a brain. The idea that Frankie Valli’s eyes might actually be independently sentient and capable of acting on their own frightens me, for some reason.

By the way, all this talk about worship and eyes is reminding me of what is easily the creepiest song the B–52’s ever recorded.

Though I never laid a hand on you my eyes adored you

I don’t get the cause and effect relationship here. That is, this is set up as something where you’d expect a cause and effect relationship (one’s eyes would normally adore someone precisely because you laid a hand on the object of the adoration), but it’s a twist where the effect occurs even without the expected cause. You know, like if someone said “Though i’ve never liked coconut, i adore piña coladas”.

Well, that’s all well and good, except that there is no such expected cause and effect relationship between laying one’s hands on someone else and adoration. Basically, Mr. Valli, you’re fulfilling metrical requirements at the expense of logical requirements.

Oh—and what exactly does Mr. Valli mean by I never laid a hand on you? ’Cause to me, that means you hit the person you’re talking to, and that’s just not cool, not to mention a very unlikely situation to have linked to adoration.

Even if you’re talking about a softer, more romantic touch (and next time you talk about sweet caresses, please choose a different turn of phrase), there’s still no cause and effect relationship, or at least not in that direction—generally, one desires to touch someone else because one adores that person, rather than adoring someone because you have touched them.

I have to admit that when i started this blog i didn’t expect that i’d be giving out relationship advice.

Like a million miles away from me you couldn’t see how I adored you

It amazes me how easily logic got thrown out the window so that the meter would work in the previous line, but then meter gets completely ignored here. Go figure.

Oh—and it isn’t really all that hard to see things that are a million miles away. I mean, the sun is over ninety million miles away, and it’s so easy to see that it can blind you.

So close, so close and yet so far

Random cliché!

Carried your books from school
Playing make-believe you’re married to me

I myself am a married man, and though i can’t presume to speak for all married men, and certainly not for married women, i don’t spend a lot of time carrying my wife’s textbooks. In fact, i didn’t do so even when she was actually recently in (grad) school.

Essentially, Mr. Valli, no matter how much you may have been into this girl, she was calmly and rationally analyzing the situation to determine whether you would be an acceptable partner in a long-term relationship. However, since you didn’t act in ways that might have matched her expectations of such behavior (might i suggest that a neck rub when she was looking tense or a friendly hug when she was feeling sad might have been a better choice than never, ever touching her in any way at all), she never reciprocated your desire. Sorry it didn’t work out for you, better luck in the future.

You were fifth grade, I was sixth

Two things:

First, a quick memo to Benny Mardones: If you’re gonna go after minors, it’s better to be eleven than to be thirty-three (or more). Just sayin’.

Second, is this the way they really talk in New Jersey? ’Cause for me, there’s a missing preposition (namely, ‘in’) before each of the ordinal numbers in that line. I may be wrong in this—and it’s entirely possible, since in the New York City conurbation, including at least much of North Jersey, people often wait ‘on line’ rather than ‘in line’, so there are other prepositional things going on there already—but unless advised otherwise, i’m going to attribute this to being an instance of ignoring English grammar in the slavish service of metrical faithfulness.

When we came to be walking home every day over Barnegat Bridge and Bay

Well, except, of course, when meter gets ignored.

Really, Mr. Valli, could you just make up your mind whether you want the metrical pattern of this song to be regular or not? I’m having trouble keeping track.

Anyway, Barnegat Bay is supposed to be a fairly scenic place, and so conducive to this sort of unrequited desire, i figure. Oddly, i can’t find a bridge on or near Barnegat Bay named “Barnegat Bridge”. As far as i can tell, though, this line is a tribute to a wooden bridge that was replaced with the (now structurally deficient) Thomas A. Mathis Bridge in 1950.

No snark in that last paragraph, just the results of a brief bout of geekery-inducing internet research. Sorry—i’ll try not to lapse into seriousness any more.

Til we grew into the me and you
Who went our separate ways

Obligatory Journey reference!

(Not to mention this highly amateurish but rather endearing version, and this much more professional but thoroughly hilarious one.)

Then we get the chorus again.

Headed for city lights
Climbed the ladder up to fortune and fame

See also ‘Metaphors, mixed’.

I worked my fingers to the bone
Made myself a name

I never realized how lucky i was that my parents simply gave me a name. I can’t imagine having to build my own—i mean, where would i get the materials?

Funny, I seem to find that no matter how the years unwind,
Still I reminisce about the girl I miss
And the love I left behind

You know, it really sounds like you stayed in love, and she never was in love with you. Therefore, you didn’t leave it behind, since there was nothing to leave behind—in fact, if anything, you brought it with you. As a result, Mr. Valli, i’m afraid that i’m going to have to recommend that you be placed in Remedial Logic 099.

(I’ve never actually been a student or a teacher at a college that offered Remedial Logic, but i’m thinking that it would have to be the most horribly frustrating class to teach ever. “No, Frankie, saying ‘But i’m right’ more often than the person you’re arguing with doesn’t constitute well-formed evidence for a claim…”)

And then we get the chorus again, again.

All my life I will remember how warm and tender
We were way back then, oh baby

Dude, she just wasn’t that into you. I know it’s harsh to hear it, but really, it’s time to get over it and move on.

Though I’m feeling sad regrets I know I won’t ever forget
You, my childhood friend

And then we’re given one last bizarre cause-and-effect relationship to mull over. I mean, Mr. Valli is saying he won’t ever forget some girl he knew when he was a preteen despite the fact that he’s feeling regret? Seriously, how does that connection between those things even work? I guess, hypothetically, he wouldn’t be feeling regret if he’d forgotten her, but then it’d be something like “I’m feeling no regrets though i haven’t managed to forget” or somesuch—really, the opposite of what he’s saying. I think he’s trying to say “I’m feeling sad regrets because i know i won’t ever forget”—but that doesn’t work with the meter, and as we’ve already learned, this song is all about throwing logic out the window in order to preserve the meter, except of course for when the metrical pattern gets completely ignored.

(And then, just to mess with us, Mr. Valli closes us off with one final repetition of the chorus during the fadeout, so as to remind us that his eyes have achieved sentience and are capable of emotional reactions—like you hadn’t been properly creeped out by that idea yet.)