Best lines in a song


There has been a long-running thread here of 'Best quotes' but maybe it would be interesting to find out folks' favorite lines from songs. To keep it on some sort of track, let's have a few ground rules.

- Attribution is required, who sang it (or wrote it) and where can we hear it?
- Shorter is better, four lines maximum, a verse. These should be words of wisdom that can be summoned for inspiration in social emergencies.
- If you're an opera fan, you're welcome to post in Italian, just don't expect many high fives from the monolingual among us.

I'll throw out a couple for starters:

When you're rockin' and a rollin' you can't hear your momma call.
Little Richard - Good Golly, Miss Molly

All I want in this life of mine is some good clean fun.
All I want in this life and time is some hit and run.
Little Feat - Fat Man in the Bathtub
128x128sfar
This may seem a bit corny, but the Star Spangled Banner, by Francis Scott Key, will give me the biggest rush when performed right, at any major event.
Fewest words used to create the most vivid scene.

"It was a small town bank, it was a mess. Well I had a gun, you know the rest."

Highway 29- Da Boss
"Ain't no use in talkin' t' me, it's just the same as talkin' t' you- Robert Zimmerman
"mediocrity is the manta of our times" - West Coast Punkers Guttermouth. I used this quote in an Organisational Behaviour exam during my MBA...
I was drunk
the day my Mom
got outta prison.
And I went
to pick her up
in the rain.
But, before I
could get to the station
in my pickup truck
She got runned over
by a damned old train.

-- David Allen Coe

I saw teenage girls like gaudy moths a classroom's shabby butterflies
Flirt in the glow of stranded telephone boxes
Planning white lace weddings from smeared hearts
And token proclamations, rolled from stolen lipsticks
Across the razored webs of glass
Sharing cigarettes with experience with her giggling
Jealous confidantes, she faithfully traces his name
With quick bitten fingers
Through the tears of condensation that'll cry through the night
As the glancing headlights of the last bus kiss adolescence goodbye

Marillion, Warm Wet Circles, Album: Clutching AT Straws
I need to put my two cents in...

"I'll be with him on that midnight train to Georgia
I'd rather live in his world than live without him in mine"

Jim Weatherly/Gladys Knight and the Pips

Such love is so rare these days.
Lots of people talk and few of them know, Soul of a woman was created below. Dazed and Confused-Led Zeppelin
"Sometimes I find pride holds me back. Its not the way I want to be. I just couldnt help myself"

The Sweetest Ache - Tell Me How It Feels

Found on the Glass Arcade compilation released by Sarah Records release in 1992.

"Little darlin, come with me
Wont you help me share my load
From the dark end of the street
To the bright side of the road"

Van Morrison - The Bright Side of the Road
This is only temporary. These songs are my worst habits - Brendan Benson. " I don't know if you've been loving some-body, I only know it isn't mine" Elvis Costello.
Anything by the Beatles for that matter! I've listened to just about every genre regardless of what country/nation the music is derived...don't really have a favorite but the Beatles were really thought provoking..ahead of their time by a long shot.
won't it be dull,
when we rid ourselves
of all these demons
haunting us,
to keep us company.
won't it be odd,
when we're happy
like we always thought
we're suppose to feel,
but never seem to be.

War on Drugs
by The Barenaked Ladies
The only thing I'll ever ask of you,
you've got to promise not to stop when I say, when.

Everlong
by the Foo Fighters
"Dinah-Moe watched from the edge of the bed
With her lips just a-twitchin' an' her face gone red
Some drool rollin' down
From the edge of her chin
As she spied the condition
Her sister was in"...

Frank Zappa, "Dinah-Moe Hum"
"It's not the side effects of the cocaine,
I'm thinking that it must be love"

David Bowie
This from Bjork, one of Natalie Portman's favorite and mine too:

Possibly maybe probably love

How can you offer me love like that?
my heart's burned
how can you offer me love like that?
I'm exhausted - leave me alone!

Possibly maybe probably love

Since we broke up
I'm using lipstick again
I'll suck my tongue
in remembrance of you

I love this girl, she is so crazy and creative it makes me believe she's beautiful.

death and decay cadaverous smell
for us there is neither heaven nor is there a hell
and only the stigmata could be able to betray the sombre existence of the former days
after the dead lovers kiss, you fall into a dream,
and with your second birth, your a prince in our mournful realm
a day when a million suns are killing with their shine
the cold dark crypts are saving me and myne. me and myne. me and myne

Artist-Sopor Aeternus:
Track- Dead Souls
CD - "Es Reiten Die Toten So Schnell"
(or: The Vampyre sucking at his own Vein)
Well, John the Baptist after torturing a thief
Looks up at his hero the Commander-in-Chief
Saying, "Tell me great hero, but please make it brief
Is there a hole for me to get sick in ?"

The Commander-in-Chief answers him while chasing a fly
Saying, "Death to all those who would whimper and cry"
And dropping a bar bell he points to the sky
Saying, "The sun's not yellow it's chicken."

- Bob Dylan, "Tombstone Blues"
"My head is my only house when it rains." Captain Beefheart. Could very well have got that twisted up but that's how it works for me in memory. Actually not sure if it's a lyric or a song title. Either way - words to live by.

Jsonic - I second your choice of that lyric from Dylan's "Tangled Up in Blue".
"When it's cold outside I like to sleep
With a blanket on my ass
Don't want to feel the wind blow
I don't want my face to chap"

"Rangers at Midnight"--Crack The Sky
I'm cheating a little by using an album title:

"You Broke My Heart So I Busted Your Jaw" by Spooky Tooth
"I can't quit you baby
But I'm gonna have to put you down for a while"

"I Can't Quit You Baby" by Willie Dixon (and performed by probably every blues singer in the universe, including Willie himself, Otis Rush, John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers and Led Zep
"Well I called the TV doctor
He came over right away
He said to see what he could do he'd have to haul my tube away
I said 'No that will never do
If you don't get the picture
I'm gonna do some work on you!'"

TV Mama--Johnny Winter
"But ev'ry time Pandora comes my way
I get high, can't explain the sensation
To get it on I've got to watch what I say
Or I'll catch hell from womens' liberation"

"Pandora's Box" (continued)--Aerosmith
"Now I ain't what
You call a city slicker
My claim to fame's
To be a slitty licker"

"Pandora's Box"--Aerosmith
Oh, and of course let's not forget:

"All You Need is Love"

by Mr. Lennon

Is there any other philosophical lyric in a song more concise and to the point than this? I'd like to know if so.

I think when John Lennon wrote this song and title, his destiny as a musical and cultural icon was sealed......
"Never Blame the Rainbow for the Rain"

From "Never Blame the Rainbow for the Rain" by the Moody Blues
"They'd like to make it
With my big black dog,
But they just
Don't know how to ask"

Baby Ice Dog--Blue Oyster Cult
"Where do you come from, young man?"
"I come from The Bronx, your honor."
"I sentence you to 15 years!"

The Judge Sure is Funky--J. Geils Band

(And I'm originally from there, too....)
She's a tongue twisting storm she will come to the show tonight praying to the light machine she wants my honey not my money she's a funky thigh collector layin on 'lectric dreams
"Last time I was sober, man I felt bad
Worst hangover that I ever had"

Dire Straits-Heavy Fuel
Johnny Cash, from American Recordings.

I went up to Memphis And I met Delia there Found her in her parlor And I tied to her chair Delia's gone, one more round Delia's gone

She was low down and trifling And she was cold and mean Kind of evil make me want to Grab my sub machine Delia's gone, one more round Delia's gone

First time I shot her I shot her in the side Hard to watch her suffer But with the second shot she died Delia's gone, one more round Delia's gone
A friend in needs a friend indeed,
A friend with weed is better,
A friend with breasts and all the rest,
A friend who's dressed in leather,

PLACEBO, "Pure Morning"

And the devil in black dress watches over
My guardian angel walks away
Life is short and love is always over in the morning
Black wind come carry me far away

SISTERS OF MERCY, "Temple of Love"

Sunday morning when we go down to church
See the menfolk standin' in line
Dont say they come to pray to the Lord
When my little girl, looks so fine
In the evening when the sun is sinkin' low
Everybody's with the one they love
I walk the town, Keep a-searchin' all around
Lookin' for my street corner girl

LED ZEPPELIN, "Hey Hey What Can I Do"
"Running into to you like this without warning...
Is like catching a sniff of tequila in the morning."

Group: Crash Test Dummies
Album: God Shuffled His Feet