The committee is seeking nominations for the 2008 Bon Jovi award for poor imagery in music and poetry.

We are looking for examples of the sort of imagery that makes you go "Eh? What would that even look like?" We are looking for phrases that make you say "What??? Have you even listened to yourself?" We want adverbs that can't possibly describe the verbs they are applied to. And we want examples of equivalent absurdity to last year's winner from Robbie Williams's song "Angels":

> When I'm feeling weak
> and my pain WALKS down a one-way street

Nominations are open to all, but the committee strongly recommends that anyone with a knowledge of Ronnie James Dio's career will have a distinct advantage.

Staple it together and call it bad weather

Jack Johnson

one that was pointed out to me a few months ago (in a poem that I had read, but (with it being wordsworth) not paid much attention to):

I measured it from side to side
'Twas three feet long, and two feet wide

About a child's grave up in a remote place.

As if you'd whip out your measuring tape and do that!

If you've got the feeling
jump up to the ceiling
are we getting down tonight?

(by Five)

This one shows that whoever wrote it was just a production line operative sticking words in the hopper, turning the articulation crank and churning out phrases with no quality control:

"Kiss me
beneath the milky twilight"

(Sixpence none the richer)

The sad thing is that had she said murky, it would have reasonably described the slightly occluded optical effect that you get at twilight. But, milky - no chance!

"My my!
At Waterloo, Napoleon did surrender
and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way"

(ABBA)

To be fair, I probably couldn't point to the threshold of quite similar if you gave me a map, but I'm damned sure it's not there.

"Hey Mister Tambourine man, play a song for me"

(Bob Dylan)

What the bloody hell would that sound like?

"Something's gotten hold of my heart"

(Gene Pitney)

In the context of the song, the above phrase has no interpretation, and if he means it in the literal sense then that's really quite gruesome.

REO Speedwagon:

"I'm gonna write a classic,
I'm gonna write in an attic..."

Thin Lizzy

'Tonight there's going to be a jailbreak
Somewhere in this town'

Hmmm. Where might that be? Perhaps this is a really big town with loads of penal establishments?

Can I join in with the rock based comments....

"Heat me up with your bowl of fire, so easy to please"

From Dirty girl by Y&T

I have not yet managed to find this mythical bowl of fire or indeed descover how it works, despite an exhaustive search.

Re - Ronnie James Dio (The Power Pixie himself) I have seen him several times including this year and yet his back catalogue of absurdity is still too dark and deep to enter.

Winston

"There's a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin' like a toad"
Jim Morrison from the Doors was called a poet and the above lines prove it

"Purple rain, purple rain"

Yeah... What and how? And why am I supposed to feel sad about it?

Chasing Pavements from ....well..... 'Chasing Pavements' by Adele -

- not that hard to catch, surely?

Cx

"I'm as serious as cancer
when I say rhythm is a dancer"

by Snap, 1992.

Er? No you're not!

"When the sleigh-bells bring the snow..."

Er, no they don't, actually...

I spoke to the comittee and they have disallowed that one Steven, because it's actually "When the snowman brings the snow", which of course he does.

However they liked the seasonal theme and have suggested:
"Children singing christian rhyme"

What? You mean carols?

Or, sticking with Sir Cliff, this nonsense:

"Many have come from the valleys, many of come from the hills... to be with someone on the saviour's day!

Who, I ask you? Dwarven gold miners?

"Got myself a crying, talking, sleeping, walking, living doll"

OK. I'm scared.

I suppose it explains why Cliff is still a virgin....

It's a few years old, but how about:

'I'm blue dab a de dab a di'

"Look to the future it's only just begun"

Ah the philosophy of Noddy...

Honorable mention:
The quotation below does not qualify as imagery, but it is a ludicrous proposition:

"Only the crumbliest, milkiest chocolate
tastes like chocolate never tasted before."

From Bon Jovi himself:

"A schoolboy's dream, you act so shy,
Your very first kiss was your first kiss goodbye."

What kind of a relationship would they have had if they only kissed once, right at the end?

Mr Waling

I think "I'm gonna write a classic / Gonna write it in an attic" was actually Adrian Gurvitz.

Is it sad that one should know this?

"cracked eggs - dead birds
scream as they fight for life"
- Radiohead

Not bad for things that are already dead

The most recent naff one that gets on my bits is from the generally redoubtable Noah and the Whale's most recent offering. It is a sad 'break-up' album and, at one point, in an otherwise rather lovely song, our hero sings...

'But like a cut down tree, I will rise again
And I'll be bigger and stronger than ever before'

Not generally the behaviour of trees round here, I'll be bound.

Jx

"What you gonna do when the lightening strikes and hits you?"

Err, as if you'd have much choice! Yes The Ladder.

bon jovi's shit!

Thank you for sharing Tommy, but I don't think you've quite got the hang of this thread.

"... it's hard to hold a candle
in the cold november rain"
Guns 'n' Roses

Why is this? Surely, if the November rain is cold enough, it's more likely that it's hard to prise your hands off from the candle your holding, if anything.

He's right though!

: )

Jx

Quote:You
Your sex is on fire
You
Your sex is on fire
And so
Were the words to transpire
And You
Your sex is on fire
And so
Were the words to transpire; Unquote

Kings of Leon
=============
I've seen worse on poems here, much worse....and I've seen this band twice live and they were awesome...but somehow, the words 'sex 'and 'fire' always make me reach for the Caneston.

: )

Jx

Hearing something then actually reading the words - so different. I've always loved Carol Kings song Tapestry, but suddenly in the middle the chap she's singing about "sat down on a river rock and turned into a toad". That bit's always spoilt it for me. I like toads but in the right place!

These two songs are the devil's symphonys.

1. I ain't no "holloback" girl.
2.You can stand under my umberella...ella....ella....eh....eh....eh

whoever wrote these songs better have been on drugs because if they weren't then they should see a doctor because there is something wrong with them.

I love to love,but my baby just loves to dance-Tina Charles?
how convenient! i,ve just sent 'me cloghoppers to the cobblers
-on the MOON!

i dream of wires-Gary Numan
woke up with his pork sword in a socket

don,t want to hog it,so finally,and with wires in mind
'i,m wired for sound'-Sir Cliff
best place for the speaker?
same as all of his crap

And what on earth would Sir Cliff have done with a Devil Woman? Tried to convert her I suppose!

BEST words ever - Alan's Pshychodelic Breakfast! "Marmalade, I like marmalade" - I've just run out of maramlade myself!

Some of the best ill-conceived imagery is to be found in the carol: The Holly and the Ivy...

The holly bears a berry as red as any blood/
and Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ to do sinners good.

All that's missing from the above is the linking phrase "however, I digress".

This goes on throughout the carol with attributes of either holly or Ivy veering irrelevantly to Jesusy stuff. However, this is all interspersed with:

O, the rising of the sun and the running of the deer.
The playing of the merry organ; sweet singing of the choir.

Again no link whatsoever. And, assonance aside, the stuff about natural phenomena doesn't even set up a rhyme with the organ/choir bit.

I'm sure whoever wrote it was either on drugs or had got to that stage where carol writing had become just a work-a-day job that he/she no longer had enthusiasm for.

"He called the greatest archers to a tavern on the green
Vowed to help the people of the King
He handled all the troubles on the English country scene
And still had plenty of time to sing.
Robin Hood, Robin Hood" etc

On second thoughts, I think the country would be a better place all round if our politicians could only find time to sing.

Now your talking, but never mind Robin Hood what about...

Ivanhoe, Ivanhoe,
Side by side
We’re proud to ride
With Ivanhoe.
At his call we spring
To help him ride along,
The song we sing
Is free and joyous song.

'at his call we spring to help him ride along????

I can see you are an entrenched atheist Dermot. I happen to like that Holly and the Ivy song and sing it beautifully with my sisters.

I don't think there is anything wrong with comparing the holly berry to the bearing of Christ. The link is in the blood red. Don't know if you have ever been present at the birth of a child Dermot - but believe me, there is a lot of blood shed - all mothers should be revered - not just Mary. Christ's blood (if you believe it) was spilt for the good of mankind - the second link.

The rest of the imagery just relates to winter and Christmasy scenes. I'm not prepared to argue about any of it though - it is primarily a song and when sung well, is incredibly uplifting.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph!

I don't know about imagery but do these words make sense to anyone?

The whispers in the morning
of lovers sleeping tight
are rolling by like thunder now
as i look in your eye.

OK. so i might have mis guided you all by including that last line, in the possibility that it leads to the next image of

I hold on to your body and feel each move you make

but can lovers sleeping tight really whisper?
In the morning or any other time for that matter?

I'll credit this one to Jennifer Rush though it may well have been recorded by others.

Now this discussion is really getting somewhere!

Don't want to start a secondary thread here but:-

"Top cat!
The most effectual Top Cat
Whose intellectual close friends
Get to call him "TC"
Bo bi bing is wip ti ti ty "

(or something equally unintelligible)

Whaddaya mean 'unintelligible'?

Top Cat!
The most effectual Top Cat!
Who's intellectual close friends get to call him T.C.
Providing it's with dignity.

Top Cat!
The indisputable leader of the gang.
He's the boss, he's a pip, he's the championship.
He's the most tip top,
Top Cat.

Yes he's a chief, he's a king,
But above everything,
He's the most tip top,
Top Cat.

Top Cat!

: )

Jx

I'm indebted to the clarification but I just managed to see on a Top Cat website a version challenging.
It said "Providing it's whipped cream for tea".

Then,

"£$%^&(%"£$%^&!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CRASH

If you should peek, you'll regret for weeks
I've roused from malevolent stupor
Three Trojans, a Greek, a worm and two Geeks
Who tried to infect my computer.

Seriously, much as I am loathe to discourage further research into this pressing debate, be warned about an infectious Top Cat website!!!!!!!!

Much as I loved, and still do love, the work of 1980s socialist heroes The Style Council, there is one line which always makes me cringe in the anthem "Walls Come Tumbling Down".

Citizen Weller has just tunefully castigated those who threaten "unity" and then he goes on the growl...
"Those who are with and those who are without,
And dangle jobs like a donkey's carrot."

The said symbolic vegetable is pronounced carROT!" by Weller. Arrgh, that's so horrible.

In many ways Weller is a National Poet, but I just can't stand those lines. They ruin a good song.

Wow this a dusty fusty old discussion thread. Just popped in to say I was listening to Lady Eleanor by Lyndisfarne and it has always worried me that he says she "Kissed the neck below my head." Sounds daaaft! Always loved that song though.

Dire Straits, Money for nothing:
"We've got to install microwave ovens"

What? Plug them in at the wall socket? Oh poor you!

'Nobody knows where my Johnny has gone...'

This has long been a favourite in Wigan, where the teenage unmarried birth rate is through the roof.

'You would cry too, if it happened to you!'

'Carve my name in my face, such a pheromone kick....' Slipknot. Okay if you have a shortish panhandle but a proper whopper of a nomenclature means you'll need to stray onto your ears and down your neck. And what font do you use?

Hi Hatta - with a little name like that you could have it carved between your eyebrows! Carving doesn't sound very nice. So paint it on with woad. And then maybe I'll have a foxglove tatooed on my nose! Only then a bee might fly up my nostrils! Lots of foxgloves in my garden at the moment! xx PS (I think the fox was innocent!)

"This romeo is bleeding
But you can't see his blood"

In that case, how do you know he's bleeding?

"It's nothing but some feelings
That this old dog kicked up"

You what?

"It's been raining since you left me
Now I'm drowning in the flood
You see I've always been a fighter
But without you I give up"

I could write an entire essay on what's wrong with the imagery in the above, but suffice it to say that he's clearly not been that much of a fighter if he gives up without the person to whom the song's addressed.

"I can't sing a love song
Like the way it's meant to be
Well, I guess I'm not that good anymore
But baby, that's just me "

Jon, you're really not endearing yourself to me with the baby, that's just me bit, and given that singing a love song like the way it's meant to be is your job, all you're really saying here is "don't buy my records, they're rubbish".

Maybe it's internal bleeding - in which case you could tell when he fainted from the drop in his blood pressure :)
Cx

more from Mr Bon Jovi (misunderstood is the title of this one) -

Should I? Could I?
Have said the wrong things right a thousand times
If I could just rewind, I see it in my mind
If I could turn back time, you'd still be mine

You cried, I died
I should have shut my mouth, things headed south
As the words slipped off my tongue, they sounded dumb
If this old heart could talk, it'd say you're the one
I'm wasting time when I think about it

Could I? Should I?
Apologize for sleeping on the couch that night
Staying out too late with all my friends
You found me passed out in the yard again

You cried, I tried
To stretch the truth, but didn't lie
It's not so bad when you think about it

Bob Marley: "Iron like a lion in Zion."

I remember my mother singing that of a Sunday evening, trying to get three school uniforms and a load of football kit ready for the morning.

Gawd bless'er

: )

Jxxx

John, you must be a mere pup! xx

And then there's this nonsense from Russ Ballard:
"Your poison letter, your telegram;
just goes to show you don't give a damn."

Now, clearly, someone who has taken the trouble to write a letter is someone who gives a damn. Someone who has taken the trouble to go down to their local telegraph office and dictate it to be sent as an actual telegram REALLY gives a damn. And, is maybe just a little too formal and possibly borderline obsessive.

Comme toi peut-être ? ; )

Did you mean comme toi or are you back into filthy haiku mode?

Dermot - that sounds to me like a bit of filthy forced rhyme - you get it everywhere nowadays.

Incroyable que j'ai fait cette erreur ! Je l'ai corrigée maintenant.
I guess I am just overly ECSTATIC about something! ; )

You shouldn't have - it was funnier before and probably the best offer DG has had all year!
Francine has just passed all her exams folks - is now a master of something or other - no rude comments please!

'Pogo pogo pogo pogo pogo pogo pogo pogo' as sung by System of a Down. Well, button me up in an inverse universe but 'pogo' is an activity that involves systematically going up as well as systematically coming down.

Can't imagine what it said before you changed it to comme toi, but I'm now intrigued.

Congratulations on the Masters Degree

Well, I never thought I would see SOAD mentioned on this site! Interestingly and alegedly their System of a Down took its name from a poem that Malakian had written titled “Victims of the Down."The word "victims" was changed to "system" because Odadjian believed that the alteration would appeal to a much wider audience and also because the group wanted to be shelved closer to their musical heroes, Slayer (Wiki)

My fav track of theirs "toxicity" can be heard/seen here

http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/newsgroupview.php?NewsThreadsID=688&NewsGroupsID=21

it has some great lyrics actually

they are planning a reunion tour for 2011. Get some. Win x

My kids loved them...but have moved on themselves. It's very disconcerting to enjoy something your kids are playing and then, when you say 'I like this' they say...err..keep up with the plan dad...they are so 'yesterday'.

I still like them....but not as much as this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btjhdHX8pMo

My middle boy, Patrick, introduced me to this lot.

Fab.

xxx

Stay intrigued then... ; )

Merci beaucoup DG !

Ah, Mr A -- tell your boys we at WOL create the trends. We do not simply follow them -- that is the prerogative of your sons and their peers. Besides, to continue to enjoy something even though it may be culturally superseded is the sign of constancy of heart and valour of spirit. When the revival comes they will salute us!

Besides, we're just panning nonsensical lyrics from any era we want to. We can take a pop at our whole musical heritage. My goodness, some of Thomas Tallis's lyrics in Spem in Alium are totally loopy! x

Yes, and the title's a bit weird too! ;-) Is it about masturbating into an onion?

"Have you seen the old man in the closed down market...?"

No, it's closed down, I can't have.

'Dirt in his hair and his home in 2 carrier bags' - he obviously shops at Wigan's Asda.

Every breath you take and every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take, I'll be watching you
Every single day and every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay, I'll be watching you

always thought this creepy and completely unachievable...every breath you take indeed.

Indeed - he wrote it to sound like a love song but to actually be about stalking - lines like oh can't you see, you belong to me... etc are all quite dark in context.

yeh he also did the 'dont stand so close to me' about his pupils at school...flirting with teachers? not in my school..

"Time goes on day after day"

Gerry and the Pacemakers.

Time goes on, period. There is not point stating your units in which time goes on. They are not discreet packages that tick over in digital fashion without centi-days, milli-days, femto-days or other in-between subunit, and the subunits themselves appear to be infintesimally divisible, so that opening statement in that song makes no sense at all.

If it were up to me, the entire lyric would read: Time goes on in continuous variation... so ferry across the mersey cos this land's the place I love and here I'll stay.

Cause baby you're a firework
Come on show 'em what you're worth
Make 'em go "Oh, oh, oh!
"As you shoot across the sky-y-y

Katy Perry

(Naff song, naff lyrics - and what a waste of dynamite..)

Freddie Mercury has got to:
1. Be Cool
2. Relax
3. Get in
4. Get on his tracks
5. Take a back seat
6. Hitchhike
7. Take a long ride on a motor bike.

Hell of a to do list. And that's just til he's ready.

Me, I just stick a bit of lippy on, bit of eyeshadow, and I'm good to go.

The whispers in the morning of lovers sleeping tight are rolling by like thunder now as i look in your eyes.

Jennifer Rush and a few others.

ok so i might have pushed it a bit with adding the last five words but it sounds that way when you listen to it ;-)
Do those whispers sound like snores by any chance? :-)

"Lonely as I am, together we cry"
Red Hot chilli peppers

Maybe it's me, but I don't really see how that works.

Perhaps it was written by a split personality. Speaking of which, is that what your mug shots are supposed to reflect?

I was getting a new driving licence photo done and it said not to smile, and when I saw that come out of the slot at the photo booth I just couldn't stop laughing at it so i put it on here.

Yes - you do look like a convict. Mind you, I look like a prozzie on mine. There is something very hard about a mature face that isn't smiling.

Not exactly an image... but ironic?
"we don't need no education"..... Pink Floyd.

"Me... I'm just a lawn mower... you can tell me by the way I walk"... Good old Peter Gabriel.

&

"Faith, hope and charity.... love is the best of the three". Can't remember the song.

The list is endless. It's called poetic licence.... only with twelve points.