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Post by Chesapeake on Dec 17, 2019 11:45:47 GMT -5
Ever heard a song you think is just brilliant, except for as few as one lyric that kind of wrecks it for you? I'm a great admirer of Steve Gillette, especially his ballad of tragedy and young love, "Darcy Farrow." Except for one little thing. "Young Vandy in his pain put a bullet through his brain." Ewwwww. |
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Post by millring on Dec 17, 2019 12:25:12 GMT -5
Billy Joel's "You're My Home". I love it musically. Even lyrically it's just fine .... until he sez "....instant pleasure dome" just to rhyme with "home". yee gods. He really couldn't think of another rhyme with "home"? Sure, he wrote it before the invention of the online rhyming dictionary, but "instant pleasure dome"? yee gods.
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Post by millring on Dec 17, 2019 12:26:27 GMT -5
Incidentally, if the thread title had been spelled out "Songs Two" I would have felt compelled to point out that "Songs Two" sounds just like "Song Stew".
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,910 
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Post by Dub on Dec 17, 2019 14:05:39 GMT -5
The Carter Family’s Wildwood Flower always drives me nuts. They didn’t write the song. It was probably a hundred years old when they got it. (Well, at least seventy.) But I can’t help thinking that they, or their source, misheard the lyrics. It’s supposed to be a jilted girl weaving various flowers into her hair.
Oh I’ll twine with my mingles and waving black hair,
With the roses so red and the lilies so fair,
And the myrtle so bright with the emerald dew,
And the pale and the leader and eyes look like blue.
I will dance, I will sing, and my life shall be gay,
I will charm every heart in his crown I will sway,
When I woke from the dreaming my idols was clay,
And all portion of love had all flown away.
We sort of get the sense of what the song is about but we really doubt it was written that way. And of course it wasn’t. The original, published in 1860 as I’ll Twine ‘Mid the Ringlets, actually makes sense. There were printed versions of the original song but A.P. evidently never saw a printed copy and learned the song through oral tradition.
The original:
I'll twine 'mid the ringlets
Of my raven black hair,
The lilies so pale
And the roses so fair,
The myrtle so bright
With an emerald hue,
And the pale aronatus
With eyes of bright blue.
I'll sing, and I'll dance,
My laugh shall be gay,
I'll cease this wild weeping
Drive sorrow away,
Tho' my heart is now breaking,
He never shall know,
That his name made me tremble
And my pale cheek to glow.
I'll think of him never
I'll be wildly gay,
I'll charm ev'ry heart
And the crowd I will sway,
I'll live yet to see him
Regret the dark hour
When he won, then neglected,
The frail wildwood flower.
He told me he loved me,
And promis'd to love,
Through ill and misfortune,
All others above,
Another has won him,
Ah! misery to tell;
He left me in silence
No word of farewell!
He taught me to love him,
He call'd me his flower
That blossom'd for him
All the brighter each hour;
But I woke from my dreaming,
My idol was clay;
My visions of love
Have all faded away.
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Post by Chesapeake on Dec 17, 2019 14:23:50 GMT -5
It cracks me up every time I hear those misheard lyrics in "Wildwood Flower." Obviously (I guess) transcribed by A.P. from some Poor Valley farmer who heard it that way from his/her grandma. I have to believe that sophisticated performers who sing it like that know better, but are doing so in homage to the folk tradition.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,910
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Post by Dub on Dec 17, 2019 14:54:02 GMT -5
A misheard lyric is known as a mondegreen. I’ve always loved the origin of that word.
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Post by coachdoc on Dec 17, 2019 14:59:36 GMT -5
Ever heard a song you think is just brilliant, except for as few as one lyric that kind of wrecks it for you? I'm a great admirer of Steve Gillette, especially his ballad of tragedy and young love, "Darcy Farrow." Except for one little thing. "Young Vandy in his pain put a bullet through his brain." Ewwwww. I've been thinking about that song all day. I used to perform a rickety version of it. I was contemplating this a.m. relearning it and when performing it, with an additional comment, after I sing the previous line,make a sudden dramatic stop and announce that "I am about to sing the line with the most gratuitous rhyme in all of contemporary folk songwriting, then singing "Young Vandy in his pain, put a bullet through his brain" then calmly completing the tune. |
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Songs II
Dec 17, 2019 15:20:19 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by drlj on Dec 17, 2019 15:20:19 GMT -5
I cannot recall the song, but years back some C&W guy sang this phrase.
“...One more slow dance
with her arms around me
One more long glance
Nothing will slow down me...”
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Post by dradtke on Dec 17, 2019 18:12:16 GMT -5
Forever endeavor, Amen.
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Post by Cosmic Wonder on Dec 17, 2019 18:24:02 GMT -5
Yummy Yummy Yummy I got love in my tummy.
I’ve hated that from the first time I heard it.
Mike
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Post by Village Idiot on Dec 18, 2019 10:53:31 GMT -5
I always thought Ian Tyson wrote Darcy Farrow. I even read a story once about why he wrote it. I also though everything on the inter web is true. Isn’t it?
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Post by coachdoc on Dec 18, 2019 11:18:24 GMT -5
No, no, no. Steve Gilette wrote that. I knew that back in the 60's. (and forgot it in the 80's) And it is still true.
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Post by billhammond on Dec 18, 2019 11:35:46 GMT -5
I always thought Ian Tyson wrote Darcy Farrow. I even read a story once about why he wrote it. I also though everything on the inter web is true. Isn’t it? From the pedia of Wiki: Darcy Farrow is a song written by Steve Gillette and Tom Campbell, and first recorded in 1965 by Ian & Sylvia on their album, Early Morning Rain. Gillette released his first recording of it in 1967 on his self-titled album, Steve Gillette. The song has been covered by more than 300 artists, including, most notably, John Denver, who recorded it three times and included the song in his live performances. It is included on the latest tribute album, The Music Is You: A Tribute To John Denver, released on April 2, 2013.[1] Other artists who recorded "Darcy Farrow" include Chesapeake, Jimmy Dale Gilmore, Nanci Griffith, The Kingston Trio, Tony Rice, Josh Ritter, Linda Ronstadt, Ian Tyson (solo), Matthews' Southern Comfort, Danny Quinn and many more. The song was written in 1964, inspired by something that happened to Gillette's little sister, Darcy, when she was 12. She was running behind her horse chasing it into the corral when she was kicked. She broke her cheekbone but had no lasting ill effects. Campbell took a melody that Gillette had written and came up with a story about two young lovers and a tragic fall. The place names are actual places around the region of the high valleys and the Walker River in Nevada, where Tom lived when he was eight or nine years old. |
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Post by Chesapeake on Dec 18, 2019 13:00:05 GMT -5
Soon after Ian and Sylvia released the song, I offered to Steve and Tom to write the "bullet through the brain" lyric out of it. Haven't heard back yet.
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Post by Village Idiot on Dec 18, 2019 15:49:21 GMT -5
No, no, no. Steve Gilette wrote that. I knew that back in the 60's. (and forgot it in the 80's) And it is still true. I looked that up before I posted. |
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Post by aquaduct on Dec 18, 2019 16:04:37 GMT -5
I've worked in ERs and have worked on a number of folks that have put bullets through their brains (although technically it's usually a bullet ricocheting around their brains since actual exit is kind of tough).
Seems pretty appropriate to me in terms of sadness and the depths of despair combined with an odd peacefulness and elegance.
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