The Beach Boys Lyrics Thread: post the gauchest lyrics u got

[Myk Luhv]

This is a thread about your "favourite" mismatched, creepy, or just plain shitty lyrics by this wonderful band The Beach Boys. Because we want this thread to have content, at least try to explain why you're choosing your lyrics and what you "like" about them, jerks. Go!

As for mismatched -- by this I mean the lyrics and the backing music don't seem to work well together -- I think I'd have to go with either "Student Demonstration Time" (which would probably double for gauche/shitty too) or "Salt Lake City". Why? With the former, Mike takes what is actually a pretty rockin' backing track that doesnt seem (to me) forced, and throws some amazingly insulting lyrics over it about how you shouldn't engage in protesting because you might get hurt, so you should just go 'way until it's done and keep safe. Yeah, f*** you, milquetoast liberal! The latter because "Salt Lake City" has a really fantastic backing track (hmm, this surely seems like it'd be a common theme...) with lyrics about going to Salt Lake City, Utah, its cool teens and their places to hang out, and the jumpin' radio station they have. Come on, Mike/Brian. We know you're both more ambitious than that!

Creepy? Well, take your pick: "Lazzy Lizzie" for Brian's leering at (at most?) high school girls on their walk home in his van; "Hey Little Tomboy" for being obviously sexist and offensively heteronormative; I think "Never Learn Not To Love" is a creepy song because its idea of love is pretty unhealthy, but we know who wrote that and I suppose it shouldn't be surprising...

As much as I love Love You it does of course have some abysmal lyrics on it: "Love Is A Woman" is my chief culprit, but "I Want To Pick You Up" isn't too far behind -- probably thanks to Dennis's creepy-sounding vocal! I think some of the problem is that much of the subject matter had, of course, been touched on by the group before in comparatively much more sophisticated ways -- for instance, "Kiss Me Baby" compared to "The Night Was So Young". (This isn't necessarily bad though since I obviously love that song despite how "basic" it is -- and it's a nice window into 1976-77 era Brian, of course, especially getting this "updated" perspective.)

Anyway now you can post lyrics you think are creepy/gauche/mismatched/that you dislike for whatever reason (keyword being: reason; explain why!)

[phirnis]

Maybe the Love You lyrics are a lot easier to swallow if you're not a native speaker. At least that's the impression I get, as I personally don't mind ANY of the lyrics on that album, in fact I think for the most part they're very effective (if a little bit awkward at times, I'll admit that), whereas even some of the more hardcore BW/BB fans don't seem to ever grow tired of pointing out just how bad or creepy they think that lyrical material is.

Personally I think that particular writing style is a very nice and intriguing contrast to the kind of widespread lyrical pretension that the seventies had brought through musical genres such as progressive rock (which imho had its genuine high points too, mind you). To a certain extent the group had embraced that on the Surf's Up LP and I think with the help of Jack Rieley they did very well, but this was several years later and I'm glad BW tried an entirely new (and very personal) approach by 1976/77.

[MyGlove]

That section of Got to Know the Woman. c'mon c'mon and do the chicken. could have been filled with something a little less corny. but hey maybe it wasn't corny back in 1970. but i still can't listen to that without feeling a little bit embarrassed. especially with other people. i love the rest, its just that one part.

[Alan Smith]

When Girls Get Together again taps into that pouch of chauvanism and creepiness common amongst the vaults material.

It's an indepth insight into what "girls" discuss (not) that ends with the vaguely dubious notion of 3 little girls talking of little boys and getting home before it's dark.

Oh, and it's mismatched a possibly unmatchable and dire backing track

[SBonilla]

That section of Got to Know the Woman. c'mon c'mon and do the chicken. could have been filled with something a little less corny. but hey maybe it wasn't corny back in 1970. but i still can't listen to that without feeling a little bit embarrassed. especially with other people. i love the rest, its just that one part.

I'm OK with The Chicken. Rufus Thomas and Jackie Lee were too.

[The Heartical Don]

Roller Skating Child ('so cold I go brrrrr')

Mona (lyrics not entirely, um, spontaneous, IMHO)

[Synthesiser Patel]

"Mike takes what is actually a pretty rockin' backing track that doesnt seem (to me) forced, and throws some amazingly insulting lyrics over it about how you shouldn't engage in protesting because you might get hurt, so you should just go 'way until it's done and keep safe. "


Staying "out of sight" whilst the National Guard sprays bullets around indiscriminately sounds like pretty good advice to me.  At no point does the lyric implore the listener not to protest.

[SMiLE Brian]

Surfin- don't know what they were thinking on that one.
Jack Rieley's lyrics period.

[Mikie]

What's wrong with Surfin'?  For high school kids, that ain't bad.

[SMiLE Brian]

What's wrong with Surfin'?  For high school kids, that ain't bad.

It was joke about this thread.

[filledeplage]

When Girls Get Together again taps into that pouch of chauvanism and creepiness common amongst the vaults material.

It's an indepth insight into what "girls" discuss (not) that ends with the vaguely dubious notion of 3 little girls talking of little boys and getting home before it's dark.

Oh, and it's mismatched a possibly unmatchable and dire backing track

It seems the opposite of chauvinism, and an attempt of an understanding at a world of feminism, and a world and culture of communication that women have engaged in forever.  Almost the concept of noses pressed to the glass, not in a voyeurism sense, but an attempt to understand what goes on in an apparent world, closed (or apparently, closed) to them.

The mandolins in the background conjure an European image, perhaps Italian.

Maybe this board could use some more ladies...

Frankly, I think it is a little avant garde.   

[Autotune]

I always felt that When Girls Get together is a sort of lyrical nod to "Girl Talk", that Brian may have heard from the Four Freshmen.

[hypehat]

I love the backing track to When Girls Get... way too much to let the lyrics bother me. Although they aren't exactly Dylan.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Maybe the Love You lyrics are a lot easier to swallow if you're not a native speaker.

It's interesting how that works--I'm a native speaker of some brand of English, so I can't experience the Beach Boys any other way, but I listen to quite a lot of Italian opera, and some French as well, and, although I know those languages on some level, I get the feeling that, even if I were totally fluent, I wouldn't really be socially equipped to get if these words are corny.  Opera in English almost always sounds slightly corny to me, with plenty of exceptions.

But for all I know, "Al lampo dell'armi quest'alma guerriera vendetta farà, non fià che disarmi la destra guerriera chi forza le dà", which sounds magnificent to me, is terrible, corny Italian.  I know precisely what it means...so I suppose non-native speakers are in a unique position to evaluate Beach Boys' lyrics.

[Alan Smith]

When Girls Get Together again taps into that pouch of chauvanism and creepiness common amongst the vaults material.

It's an indepth insight into what "girls" discuss (not) that ends with the vaguely dubious notion of 3 little girls talking of little boys and getting home before it's dark.

Oh, and it's mismatched a possibly unmatchable and dire backing track

It seems the opposite of chauvinism, and an attempt of an understanding at a world of feminism, and a world and culture of communication that women have engaged in forever.  Almost the concept of noses pressed to the glass, not in a voyeurism sense, but an attempt to understand what goes on in an apparent world, closed (or apparently, closed) to them.

The mandolins in the background conjure an European image, perhaps Italian.

Maybe this board could use some more ladies...

Frankly, I think it is a little avant garde.   

Do ya?    I can't sign-up for avant garde but I like your reply, well played.

I think "The Night was so Young" would go a long way to appealing to female fans, I will suggest that to the focus group over in the sandbox 

I love the backing track to When Girls Get... way too much to let the lyrics bother me. Although they aren't exactly Dylan.

I admit to liking the drum sound - "Doom, Da-Dooom"

[shelter]

As for mismatched -- by this I mean the lyrics and the backing music don't seem to work well together

'Our Car Club'. At the time their most mature and sophisticated backing track - with lyrics that sound like they were written by a nine year old.

[filledeplage]

When Girls Get Together again taps into that pouch of chauvanism and creepiness common amongst the vaults material.

It's an indepth insight into what "girls" discuss (not) that ends with the vaguely dubious notion of 3 little girls talking of little boys and getting home before it's dark.

Oh, and it's mismatched a possibly unmatchable and dire backing track

It seems the opposite of chauvinism, and an attempt of an understanding at a world of feminism, and a world and culture of communication that women have engaged in forever.  Almost the concept of noses pressed to the glass, not in a voyeurism sense, but an attempt to understand what goes on in an apparent world, closed (or apparently, closed) to them.

The mandolins in the background conjure an European image, perhaps Italian.

Maybe this board could use some more ladies...

Frankly, I think it is a little avant garde.  

Do ya?    I can't sign-up for avant garde but I like your reply, well played.

I think "The Night was so Young" would go a long way to appealing to female fans, I will suggest that to the focus group over in the sandbox  

I'm sticking by my guns here...for years the terms,"mysogynistic" and "macho/sexist" have been hurled at the Beach Boys music, without "taking the music as a whole corpus" and looking at the subleties in between. This is a really subtle old world flavor, with the mandolins, which originated in Italy as some sort of lute, which Brian and Mike may have taken from, perhaps observing their grandmothers or grandaunts, and observing groups of elder ladies and young women and girls, in their travels around the world.  One can't help but notice such things, in Italy, Ireland, France, or Greece. I don't exclude other countries, but won't venture an opinion because I haven't been.

It's sort of a difficult concept for guys to grasp, except, often when visiting my aunt, for drinks, (adult beverage time!) my mother used to say," it was 5 o'clock somewhere." with my girl cousins, (we are badly outnumbered) when the door opens, and one of the guys come through the door, we hear, "Hen Party!" We laugh, but that is the same concept, I think the song captures - the "perception" that it is a "girls only" gathering.  It is the perception of a Secret Society of the Ladies, and, to an extent, it might be...I wonder how a Women's Study course would interpret this song.

Girl Talk. The boys want in. It ain't happening! Hence, the song!  

[Summertime Blooz]

This is a thread about your "favourite" mismatched, creepy, or just plain sh*tty lyrics by this wonderful band The Beach Boys. Because we want this thread to have content, at least try to explain why you're choosing your lyrics and what you "like" about them, jerks. Go!

As for mismatched -- by this I mean the lyrics and the backing music don't seem to work well together -- I think I'd have to go with either "Student Demonstration Time" (which would probably double for gauche/sh*tty too) or "Salt Lake City". Why? With the former, Mike takes what is actually a pretty rockin' backing track that doesnt seem (to me) forced, and throws some amazingly insulting lyrics over it about how you shouldn't engage in protesting because you might get hurt, so you should just go 'way until it's done and keep safe. Yeah, f*ck you, milquetoast liberal! The latter because "Salt Lake City" has a really fantastic backing track (hmm, this surely seems like it'd be a common theme...) with lyrics about going to Salt Lake City, Utah, its cool teens and their places to hang out, and the jumpin' radio station they have. Come on, Mike/Brian. We know you're both more ambitious than that!

Salt Lake City was just recently cited as the gayest city in America (I thought it was San Francisco). God Only Knows what goes on down at the lagoon these days, but Brian and Mike probably never imagined it when they wrote this song.

[Myk Luhv]

Or maybe they did -- "Salt Lake City, we'll be coming soon"

[Iron Horse-Apples]

I've always found the lyric "I met you last summer when I came up to stay with my gran" partucularly grating

Gran has no place on a pop song. Especially funny as Brian wanted to submit the song to the Beatles. Can't see the John Lennon of "You Can't Do That" going to stay with his gran. Or maybe I can.......

[Eric Aniversario]

The whole beginning part of "Everybody Wants To Live"...weird, awkward, dark, nonsensical, and hilarious all at the same time!

[phirnis]

Maybe the Love You lyrics are a lot easier to swallow if you're not a native speaker.

It's interesting how that works--I'm a native speaker of some brand of English, so I can't experience the Beach Boys any other way, but I listen to quite a lot of Italian opera, and some French as well, and, although I know those languages on some level, I get the feeling that, even if I were totally fluent, I wouldn't really be socially equipped to get if these words are corny.  Opera in English almost always sounds slightly corny to me, with plenty of exceptions.

But for all I know, "Al lampo dell'armi quest'alma guerriera vendetta farà, non fià che disarmi la destra guerriera chi forza le dà", which sounds magnificent to me, is terrible, corny Italian.  I know precisely what it means...so I suppose non-native speakers are in a unique position to evaluate Beach Boys' lyrics.

Wonderful reply, thank you.

In 1980s Germany there was a very popular thing called "Neue Deutsche Welle" (German New Wave), which had its very own trademark style of combining these very simplistic and often awkward lyrics bordering on actual nursery rhyme with the up-to-date synthesizer pop music of the day. I did grow up on this stuff, whether I enjoyed it or not, and that's probably another reason why the lyrics Brian penned in 1976 don't seem that weird or unusual to me.

[filledeplage]

I've always found the lyric "I met you last summer when I came up to stay with my gran" partucularly grating

Gran has no place on a pop song. Especially funny as Brian wanted to submit the song to the Beatles. Can't see the John Lennon of "You Can't Do That" going to stay with his gran. Or maybe I can.......

Back-in-the-day...when this music and the lyrics were composed, families would swap kids, or take their kids for a week or two, and kids went to their grandparents homes, often when school went out...that was called your vacation!!

Before Facebook, and hockey and soccer camp was conceived, that  is one way that "social opportunities" presented themselves, so, it would not be weird in the 60's for someone to visit their Gran, and, and with some of your other cousins, there, "vacationing" at the same time would get to know the kids in that area and come back every year and hang out.  New phone numbers and prom dates for all!

I bet the Beatles, vacationed with their extended families as well.  These guys are for the most part, born during, or just post World War II.  The music may be timeless, but, affected by the époque in which it was written.  I find the lyrics kind of sweet, bringing back those times when all the cousins hung out and became more like brothers and sisters.  Makes it cool to party with them later on!   

[Magic Transistor Radio]

I'll Bet He's Nice: "I bet he show's you quite a ball. Please don't tell me if its true. Cuz I'm still in love with you pretty daughter..."

Hey Little Tomboy

School Girl

Mainly because men in their 30s are singing it. The first one is a bit over the top though!

[filledeplage]

I'll Bet He's Nice: "I bet he show's you quite a ball. Please don't tell me if its true. Cuz I'm still in love with you pretty daughter..."

Hey Little Tomboy

School Girl

Mainly because men in their 30s are singing it. The first one is a bit over the top though!

Pretty "darlin'" (not daughter, ewwww!)

Hey Little Tomboy - retro song...

School Girl (one more semester and we're on our way) similar to Wouldn't It Be Nice!