[Closed] Who's the best-ever lyricist/songwriter?

Got to throw Ian Curtis into the mix.

“How I wish, how I wish you were here / We're just two lost souls / Swimming in a fish bowl / Year after year.”

Ooooh, Guy Clarke.
Man's a genius:

Joanna Newsom
Aidan Moffat & Malcolm Middleton aka Arab Strap
Bill Callahan
Howe Gelb with or without Giant Sand
Ryan Adams
Stephen Malkmus
Sufjan Stevens
Will Oldham

Another vote for Shane Macgowan here with Warren Zevon close behind.

Always found this song about the murder of Martin Luther king moving, very raw and honest.
God Rest His Soul - The Allman Brothers Band

Dappy.

Shane Mcgowan
- How anybody so ugly & wasted could create such beauty is beyond belief...

Agreed.

Nigel Blackwell.

She stayed with me until she moved to Notting Hill
She said it was the place she needs to be
Where the cocaine is fair trade, and frequently displayed
Is the Buena Vista Social Club CD
I thought she’d be back in three weeks and we’d go wandering the Peaks
Sojourn in my Uncle Joe’s ashram
For when you’re in Matlock Bath you don’t need Sylvia Plath
Not while they’ve got Mrs. Gibson’s Jam
Alas I’m brooding alone by the runnel
While she’s in Capri with her swain
And the light at the end of the tunnel
Is the light of an oncoming train

😀

"Best" is tricky, but a few I admire who've not been mentioned:

Nick Drake
Carole King
Buck 65

Got to agree with Cohen, Bragg and McGowan.

Also really like Alex Turner as a lyricist.

And (probably going to get shot down for this) have a soft spot for Lou Reed's word too.

Other thread just reminded me, whoever writes Goldie Lookin Chains lyrics should be on this list!

My candidates, in no order other than how they sprung to mind:

Stuart Murdoch, Lennon, Morrisey, John Bramwell, Damon Albarn, Kirsty Macoll, Joni Mitchell, Nigel Blackwell, Ray Davies, Mick Jagger (mainly for sympathy for the devil)

kylie..

Tom Waits
Cross My Wooden Heart and Swear On My Glass Eye.

youknowsit!

Morrrissey or billy bragg for me

but these chaps aren't bad....

Thom Yorke.

Paul McCartney (not frog chorus mind)

Ooh Murdoch. Good call.

In no particular order:

John Cooper Clarke

Vivian Stanshall

Sir John Betjeman

Tori Amos, if only for [i]Me And A Gun[/i]:

TORI AMOS
"Me And A Gun"

5am
Friday morning
Thursday night
Far from sleep
I'm still up and driving
Can't go home
obviously
So I'll just change direction
Cause they'll soon konw where I live
And I wanna live

Got a full tank and some chips
It was me and a gun
And a man on my back
And I sang "holy holy" as he buttoned down his pants
You can laugh
It's kind of funny things you think
at times like these
Like I haven't seen Barbados
So I must get out of this

Yes I wore a slinky red thing
Does that mean I should spread
For you, your friends your father, Mr. Ed

Me and a gun
and a man
On my back
But I haven't seen Barbados
So I must get out of this
Yes I wore a slinky red thing
Does that mean I should spread
For you, your friends your father, Mr. Ed
And I know what this means
Me and Jesus a few years back
Used to hang and he said
"It's your choice babe just remember
I don't think you'll be back in 3 days time
So you choose well"
Tell me what's right
Is it my right to be on my stomach
of Fred's Seville

Me and a gun
and a man
On my back
But I haven't seen Barbados
So I must get out of this

And do you know Carolina
Where the biscuits are soft and sweet
These things go through you head
When there's a man on your back
And you're pushed flat on your stomach
It's not a classic cadillac

Me and a gun
and a man
On my back
But I haven't seen Barbados
So I must get out of this

TORI AMOS lyrics are property and copyright of their owners.

Joni, Guy Garvey, Emmylou Harris, Kris Delmhorst, Elvis Costello.
To name a few.

wundred

Ha! Nice to see Neil Young and Ryan Adams get a mention but, funnily enough, nobody seconded my suggestion. 😉

+1 for Tori Amos, she is the only artist that has held my interest since I was a teenager.

The answer is Bob Dylan.

But Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Morrissey, Neil Young, Roger Waters and Jarvis Cocker are also good 🙂

+1 for Mark Everet, cant wait to see him in march.

and cant believe Mark Knopfler havent got a mention yet.

billyblackheart - Member
Bruce Dickinson.
POSTED 6 HOURS AGO # REPORT-POST

Anyway, surely Steve Harris writes most of the stuff?

Sorry, Bob Dylan again.

"The pump don't work 'cause the vandals took the handle"

That's enough for me.

Matt Johnson - the The
Nick Cave
Aiden Moffat
Tom Waits

I am just a poor boy, but my story's seldom told. I have squandered my resistance for a pocketful of mumbles, such are promises. All lies and jest, still the man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.

Paul Simon.

No need to look any further.

But in case you do.......

But all my words come back to me in shades of mediocrity, like emptiness in harmony I need someone to comfort me. Homeward bound, I wish I was.

Incomparable.

John Frusciante

Although I can't argue with Paul Simon.

Best lyrics writer......has to be Nigel Blackwell.

Justin Sullivan, and Steve Hogarth.

I love this song by Kris Delmhorst, beautiful tune that goes with it, too:

Well a train blows a whistle before it pulls away,
But no word or warning do you say.
One minute right beside me, another you're a thousand miles away.

Well I felt such a shaking and I heard such a whirr
And I swore we were moving fast enough to blur.
Then I opened up my eyes and found that we're right back where we were.

Baby you're no train, you're the track.
Always running away, always running back.
Baby you're no train, you're the steam blowing by.

How I longed for the journey, and those far distant lands,
I believed all your promises and plans.
Now I'm standing at the station with a lonely ticket in my hand.

Baby you're no train, you're the track.
Always running away and running back.
Baby you're no train, you're the silence behind.
So roll on.

More lyrics: http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/k/kris_delmhorst/
She has a wonderful, warm voice, too. Sadly, it's been a long time since she came over here, and she was very heavily pregnant then, as well!
A youngster makes travelling across the Atlantic tricky.

Some great songwriters mentioned already but I'm going to put in a late, possibly left field vote for Shane Macgowan. Seriously underrated as a lyricist in my opinion....apart from Fairytale of New York you've got these beautifully simple lines from Rainy Night in Soho...

I'm not singing for the future
I'm not dreaming of the past
I'm not talking of the first time
I never think about the last

Edit: just realised a few other folk beat me to it!!!

best opening line of a song

'inflammation of the foreskin reminds me of your smile...'

Shane knows how to put lyrics together, for sure.
Having just posted Kris's lyrics up, I've just had to listen to the album, not heard it for a while. Anyone who's a sucker for a woman with a warm, tuneful voice, who can turn out a really good song, and play most of the instruments and produce her own albums, I recommend Kris very highly, a very talented songwriter and singer. She has also made an album with her husband, Jeffrey Foucault, and another singer/songwriter, Peter Mulvey, under the name Redbird.

Paul Simon ain't bad but

Incomparable

LOL.

Nope. Good try all. The answer you've been looking for is Sir Paul Weller

Impeccable lyricist consistently from his teenage days until today.

The answer cant be Bo Dylan because Woody Guthrie's better. The right answer is still Townes Van Zandt though.

[i]Burt Bacharach[/i]

...wrote the tunes, Hal David wrote the words (mostly).

anagallis_arvensis - I spent the commute home last night listening to 'Townes', Steve Earle's tribute/covers album. Never really listened to it much before, I think I'll be investigating further.

Have you got Live At The Bluebird? Van Zandt, Earle and Clarke all together, it's excellent.

Anyway, as we're posting lyrics, this is my favourite Earle song

[i]Everyone in Nacadoches knew Tom Ames would come to some bad end
Well the sheriff had caught him stealin' chickens and such
by the time that he was ten
And one day his daddy took a ten dollar bill
and he tucked it in his hand
He said I can tell you're headed for trouble son
and your momma wouldn't understand

So he took that money and his brothers old bay
and he left without a word of thanks
Fell in with a crowd in some border town
and took to robbin' banks

Outside the law your luck will run out fast
and a few years came and went
'Till he's trapped in an alley in Abilene
with all but four shells spent

And he realized prayin' was the only thing
that he hadn't ever tried
Well he wasn't sure he knew quite how
but he looked up to the sky

Said you don't owe me nothin' and as far as I know
Lord don't owe nothin' to you
And I ain't askin' for a miracle Lord
just a little bit of luck will do

And you know I ain't never prayed before
but it always seemed to me
If prayin' is the same as beggin' Lord
I don't take no charity

Yeah but right now Lord with my back to the wall
Can't help but recall
How they nearly hung me for stealin' a horse
in Fort Smith Arkansas

Judge Parker said guilty and the gavel came down
just like a cannon shot
And I went away quietly
and I began to file and plot

Well they sent the preacher down to my cell
He said the Lord is your only hope
He's the only friend that you gonna have
When you hit the end of Parker's rope

Well I guess he coulda' kept on preachin' 'till Christmas
but he turned his back on me
I put a home made blade to that golden throat
and asked the deputy for the key

Well it ain't the first close call I ever had
I'm sure you already know
I had some help from you Lord and the devil himself
It's been strictly touch and go

Yeah but who in the hell am I talkin' to
there ain't no one here but me
Then he cocked both his pistols and he spit in the dirt
and he walked out in the street
[/i]

The answer cant be Bo Dylan because [s]Woody Guthrie's[/s] just about every other songwriter jedward included is better.

Phil Lynott

Got to agree with OP Morrisey was the man - unfortunatley he is now a twunt

Still love the Smiths tho

Have you got Live At The Bluebird? Van Zandt, Earle and Clarke all together, it's excellent.

yeah its a great little recording, however it was quite late in Townes life and his voice was shot by then and his guitar playing not brilliant the story about the tooth is bloody funny though. You should try to get hold of Townes Live at the Old Quarter Houston. Its just Townes and a guitar from about 1973 and is quite frankly the best thing I've ever heard.

Nick Cave

swamp_boy - Member

Ian Dury

next question?

Top shout. 8)

I wouldn't piss on Billy Bragg if he was on fire.
Unless I wanted to set fire to him a second time.
I will admit some of his songs at least have some comedic value, when listened to from the setting of his cliff top mansion. 😉

I wouldn't piss on Billy Bragg if he was on fire.
Unless I wanted to set fire to him a second time.
I will admit some of his songs at least have some comedic value, when listened to from the setting of his cliff top mansion.

Stay on my arm, you little charmer.......

What about Thom Yorke - I dont care if it hurts, I wanna have control, I want a perfect body, I want a perfect soul, I want you to notice when I not around. youre so ****ing special, i wish i was special, but im a creep im a weirdo, what the hell im doing here.......
Up there with the Dylans of the world?

Agree with lots, but I don't think anyone has mentioned Jarvis Cocker of Pulp!