The L Word

Ambivalence Avenue by Bibio (Lovers' Carvings)

Okie dokie people. Here we go with the most predictable word of the whole lot: ‘Love’.

To quote Ross from Friends (as I often do…):

“Ah, love. L-O-V-E love. ‘L’ is for life. I mean what is life without love? ‘O’ is for OH WOW! …” And so on.

Although it is the most talked/sung about sentiment/emotion/whatever-you-want-to-call-it, I actually only have eight songs that begin with ‘Love’, though that doesn’t include the two L.O.V.E songs I mentioned here. But, there are clearly about a million more that I don’t own.

I just looked some up, and there are indeed too many to mention, but I did notice these two which were next to each other in a list and their presence pleased me:

Love Will Keep Us Together - The Captain and Tennille

Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division

This seems to sum up our use of the word ‘Love’ in songs – it’s either the most amazing thing in the world, or the cause of a lot of misery etc etc. Well… I suppose that’s not completely true, some songwriters get more complex about the concept, but it is usually the case that ‘Love’ songs can fall into one of two camps.

Anyway, enough with the waffle, here are my ‘Love’ songs:

Love In an Elevator - Aerosmith

Love Is a Stranger - Eurythmics

Love Is Better Than a Warm Trombone - Gomez (interesting title…)

Love Me Do  - The Beatles

Love Me Girl - Yeasayer

The Lovecats - The Cure

Lovers’ Carvings - Bibio (used on a Kindle advert. Haven’t got any other songs by Bibio, but based on this one I would think I’d like more of his/their work, I just haven’t bothered to spend the time listening to any other tracks yet.)

Lovesong - The Cure

I think I would have had Love Is the Drug on here from the Radio Est 1967 album (actually a Kylie Minogue cover of the Roxy Music classic, but a fairly good cover) but for some reason I took it off my iPod – maybe I took the whole album off at one point… I fail to remember.

Well, I think that should be it for now. I thought it would take me a while to tackle the whole ‘Love’ schtick, but actually I didn’t have that many songs. I suppose there are also loads of songs that contain ‘Love’ in the title, just not at the start, and millions that mention ‘Love’ within the song, but just don’t include it in the title.

OK, I’ll bow out now, and see you at M. Mmmhmm?

L x

Bibio’s Lovers’ Carvings (at around 1.30 it turns into a whole new song. So good):

Long Lost Loves

Lost! by Coldplay (Don't worry, I'm not really a fan...)

Today I will mostly be talking about… the words ‘Long’ and ‘Lost/Losing’. Thrilling, I know.

Shall I bother with any preamble? I think I’ll just talk about stuff afters… If I have the energy. Perseverance, Louise, perseverance.

So, the long songs I have are:

The Long and Winding Road - The Beatles (I think my least favourite Beatles song, that I know anyway. Obviously still good. It actually reminds me of my Pragmatics lectures from uni because we used the lyrics as an example of entailment and implication – don’t ask me to explain, I can’t remember.)

A Long December - Counting Crows (a bit dreary, but when you’re in the right mood it’s good)

Long Distance Lullaby - Stornoway (it’s Stornoway, so it’s lovely)

That be it for ‘Long’. What is there to say about ‘Long’? Not much really, it’s just an adjective pertaining to measurement/quantity etc etc. I suppose it makes you think of ‘longing’ which is sad and mopey. If something’s long it’s usually boring too. OK, so there was a bit to say about it.

 

Anyway, now ‘Lost/Losing’;

Losing Keys - Jack Johnson (meh. Why do his songs ALWAYS come up??)

Lost in the Post - The Wombats (also meh.)

Lost! - Coldplay (oh Coldplay… what a conundrum. Yes they are bland, overplayed, humdrum, clichéd…whatever. But whenever they release new stuff, I try to resist them, but actually I sometimes do quite like their songs. Then, as per usual, I am exposed to them so much that then their songs do become bland, clichéd and just boring. So basically, a few of their songs that I did quite like originally and I managed to end up not completely hating, have found their way onto my iPod. Hence this one here.)

There are lots of connotations with ‘Lost/Losing’. There is plain ‘loss’, which is rather sad. Then there is the depression and humiliation of the verb to ‘lose’ (in terms of win/lose), and finally you can be ‘lost’ which is rather mysterious and scary. So a lot to be going on with for a songwriter.

OK. I want to go to bed now so I’m off. Do suggest more ‘Long’ and ‘Lost’ songs if you have/know them…. please?!

Goodnight,

L x

(Sorry no video this time, didn’t feel any of the songs really deserved it that much)

Little Lions

The Lion Sleeps Tonight by The Tokens

Eeek! I have not written a post in a looong time. Woops. Being busy takes up a lot of time, apparently.

And now I have about ten minutes to write this one. So let’s get to it.

I’m talking about ‘Little’ and ‘Lion’ today, though there will be NO mention of that Mumford and Sons song. No offence to them, their music would usually be to my taste, but their songs have been totally whored out by radio, TV, and just generally EVERYWHERE, so I am completely turned off them. Bleurgh.

Anyway… starting with ‘Lion’:

The Lion King – I Just Can’t Wait to be King - Jason Weaver/Laura Williams/Rowan Atkinson (A slight cheat here as technically the title of the song is just the I Just… part, but it’s listed as this on my iPod I think because I downloaded it from some random album. It is here because, of course, The Lion King is probably my favourite childhood film… ever, and Disney songs are just damned good)

The Lion Sleeps Tonight - The Tokens (Also in The Lion King, but a generally great song anyway, even if it hadn’t been used in such a good film. Sing it with me now: ‘A-weeeeeeeeeeeeee……’)

Lion’s Den (Live) - Dry the River (somehow discovered this band on the internet, can’t remember how, but they offered three free mp3 downloads on their website which I loved, and so when I found a six-set live EP of theirs from the iTunes festival I downloaded it also. The singer has a really lovely, high voice, a bit Bon Iver-ish and the songs are folky enough for my liking. Now they just need to release a full album)

Lions are one of the most dramatic and commanding (?) animals around, so I suppose it’s not that surprising there are songs talking ’bout ‘em. It may be interesting to look at other animal-themed songs at some point, but I don’t have the time right now…. one day.

Now ‘Little’:

Little Deuce Coup - The Beach Boys

Little Dreams - Ellie Goulding

Little Honda - The Beach Boys

Little Miss Pipedream - The Wombats (not overly keen on their album, but this song is my favourite, just a small, funny, sweet song. Has some great lyrics too. May put a video below so you can hear them)

So a few ‘Little’s. Don’t know why really, are there a similar amount of songs that have ‘Big’, ‘Large’ or some other quantifying word?? I suppose it’s quite a common adjective, that’s fairly straightforward.

Right, that’s it for now. No time to diddle-daddle, I’ve done enough of that already.

Bye!

L x

Little Miss Pipedream by The Wombats:

Let’s Be Ladies

Let's Go Surfing by The Drums

Damn it, over a week again. I think I will have to just try to do at least once a week…

I’m continuing with ‘L’ and ce soir I have ‘Lady’ and ‘Let’s’.

I’m slightly surprised by ‘Lady’ – it’s fairly formal and not really a common word… There’s obviously the classic The Lady is a Tramp but there aren’t many other songs with ‘Lady’ in are there?! Well, apparently there are a few, and they are:

Lady Jesus - The Asteroids Galaxy Tour

Lady Lynda - The Beach Boys (one of the few Beach Boys songs I don’t really like)

Lady Madonna - The Beatles

I’ve just looked into it a bit more, and there’s also that song Lady (Hear Me Tonight) released in the early noughties, but not a lot else that I’ve heard of. It’s also quite interesting that there are artists that choose to use it – Lady Gaga, Lady Antebellum etc, there aren’t that many artists or songs with ‘Lord’ in are there (excluding religious stuff)??

Anyway… I’m not really going to find out an answer, so it’s onto the next word: ‘Let’ (and ‘Let’s')

There’s not that much to say about ‘Let’; it’s an imperative verb, but a rather passive one… unless you’re demanding something, like ‘Let me go!’, but that’s about as interesting as it gets.

‘Let’s', on the other hand, provides a bit more of a talking point. It’s the contracted form of ‘Let us’ and so the ‘us’ means it incorporates the singer, the listener, and everyone in between. It’s very involved with the listener, whether it is someone in particular, or all-encompassing and talking to a whole audience. A bit like what I discussed with ‘you’ in the ‘Do You’ songs.

So my ‘Let’ and ‘Let’s’ songs are:

Let It Be - The Beatles

Let the Cool Goddess Rust Away - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Let Your Love Flow - Bellamy Brothers (Barclays slide advert)

Let’s All Die - Jack Peñate (nice song, but slightly uncomfortable with its rather relaxed, and positive, attitude to death…)

Let’s Dance to Joy Division - The Wombats

Let’s Go Surfing - The Drums (love this song)

Let’s Go To Bed - The Cure (another meh Cure song I wasn’t familiar with before I bought the best-of)

I think I will leave you with Let’s Go Surfing because it’s très bon.

‘Til next time,

L x

L-a L-a L-a

L-O-V-E by Nat King Cole

Ah scheiße. It happened again. Maybe I should tell myself I just need to post once a week, but then it’d probably end up being once a month.

Never mind. It’s ‘L’ time and we better get going because we have a lot to get through.

I am beginning with spelled-out ‘L’ words, which I have a couple of, randomly, and I don’t seem to have come across with any other letter yet. Odd.

I have:

L-O-V-E - Joss Stone (I will explain below…)

L-O-V-E - Nat King Cole (In the beginning of ‘The Parent Trap’ so, of course, an awesome song. Then there was that Chanel advert with annoying Keira Knightley and annoying Joss Stone doing a cover of this song, but, much against my will, I really liked her version too so had to download it.)

L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N. - Noah and the Whale (Another victim of overplay – I liked this a lot when I first heard it and soon downloaded it, but didn’t realise at the time that it would get played so much. Hopefully in about a year I’ll be able to listen to it again and it will have regained some of its original loveliness)

What other songs are spelly-outy songs are there? I’ve looked in the rest of my collection and can find: S.O.S., O.N.E. by Yeasayer, and U.R.A Fever by The Kills. There’s also R-E-S-P-E-C-T, though it may just be called Respect (kudos to Anna), D-I-S-C-O, D.I.V.O.R.C.E, S-H-O-P-P-I-N-G by The Pet Shop Boys  and GLORIA by The Doors (kudos to the internet) – any more??

Anyway, next is ‘La’. Not actually an English word, but either a French/Spanish word or a kind of ‘singing’ word, par exemple:

La Bamba  - Los Lobos (FUN!)

La La La  - The Bird and the Bee (Nice ‘twinkly’ sort of song. Also fun)

There must be many more foreign-language songs with ‘La’, and there must be more with ‘La’ as in the singing kind-of-word. But none are coming to mind…There’s Ooh La La by The Faces but that falls under ‘O’. I’m pretty sure there are lots because it’s a useful word for lazy songwriters, but I can’t be bothered to try to find more at the moment – maybe you can do it yourself for once…

OK, that be all. BYE.

L x

Another glorious clip from a magnificent film: