HAVE you ever listened to a song popular in the 1960s, 70s and 80s and it’s as if you’re hearing the lyrics for the first time?
I was a teenager in the 1980s and like many my age, I’ve forgotten what I did two years ago but remember the lyrics to songs released decades ago.
This week’s column isn’t about remembering lyrics, it’s about re-remembering lyrics.
These are songs we sang out loud, danced to and were played non-stop on the radio.
Case in point, ‘Every Breath You Take’ by The Police in 1983 with:
‘Every breath you take, and every move you make, every bond you break, every step you take I’ll be watching you, oh can’t you see, you belong to me’.
Yeah, nah that just hits differently nowadays.
One Night in Bangkok by Chess in 1984, I only figured out the meaning behind these lyrics in the late 1990s.
‘I don’t see you guys rating the kind of mate I’m contemplating, I’d let you watch, I would invite you but the queens we use would not excite you’.
Then there’s this charmer from Gary Puckett in 1968 titled ‘Young Girl’.
‘Young girl get out of my mind, my love for you is way out of line, you’d better run girl … you’re much too young girl’.
I was raised by religious parents who monitored what my siblings and I listened to on the radio or watched on television.
‘Grease’ the movie was on the forbidden list and songs from the movie were turned down if we were in the car and one played on the radio.
They had issues with the song ‘Summer Nights’ sung by the late Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta, it was released along with the movie in 1978.
‘Tell me more, tell me more did you get very far’.
‘Tell me more, tell me more like does he have a car’.
That inferred boys were after one thing and girls preferred a guy who had his own transport, not far from the truth but then there’s this; ‘he got friendly, holding my hand. Well, she got friendly down in the sand. He was sweet, just turned eighteen. Well, she was good, you know what I mean’.
I’m well aware there are many raunchy pop songs played on the radio and in public spaces today.
There’s colourful language that’s crept into everyday life so much so that a swear word said on the radio has no shock value.
Today’s lyrics get straight to the point rather than the coy, ‘did you get very far’.
I’ve heard today’s singer songwriters lambasted for their meaningless, pointless or silly lyrics.
People harp on about how much meaning there was in songs from the 60s, 70s and 80s.
Oh, do you mean like, ‘Da Da Da’ by Trio in 1981?
It was a massive hit and pretty much was just ‘ah-ha, ah-ha, ah-ha, da da da’ over and over again.
What about 1963s hit ‘Wipe Out’ by The Surfaris? Those lyrics are, ‘ah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, wipe out’.
Sure, some songs hit differently now but over time we’ve all gone through similar comings of age.
Then there’s misheard lyrics, I thought the Fleetwood Mac song ‘Edge of Seventeen’s’ chorus was ‘just like the lone ranger’ then duh, it’s ‘like a wild angel’.
Yes, I know now it’s ‘just like the white-winged dove’ but I only learned that last year.
Songs like people, move through time with fluidity.
There are changes in society and what is and isn’t acceptable in one generation changes in the next.
The only real constant is choice. We can decide what we want to listen to or watch and how we react.
