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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
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martykl
3,578 posts
 
In these intolerant times, Dar Williams "The Christians and the Pagans" has special resonance for me. While I find the entire lyric quite moving, there is one line I particularly like. About mid-song, Williams describes a kitchen crisis during the holiday time reunion dinner between the Christian and Pagan branches of the same family.

"The magic's in the learning,
'cause now when Christians dine with Pagans,
only pumpkin pies are burning."

Would that it were.
martykl
3,578 posts
 
I suppose there's a bunch out of John Hiatt to share, including:

"I've seen my own ass in a double whiskey glass"

"Still you argue for your options and you angle for your case,
You wouldn't know a burning bush if it blew up in your face"

"One thing's true, you're gonna die for sure,
You can learn to live with love or without it,
But there ain't no cure,
There's just a slow turning - from the inside out".
oregon
828 posts
 
Newwwlllleee we-ed-ed-eds, 2 years ago, and they're still checking each other out...Family Affair, by Sly.
"Your mind is on vacation and your mouth is working overtime", Mose Allison
"Nobody loves me but my momma, and she might be jiving too" B.B. King
"My father sold chicken medicine that farmers would buy" Nashville soundtrack
jebe1
75 posts
 
"But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed"

Elvis Costello - "Radio Radio"
ausjoe
98 posts
 
"Bulletholes in the mailbox, keyholes in my mind." James Mcmurtry
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