Best "abstract" lyricists?

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I'm looking along the lines of Robert Pollard and Captain Beefheart here...

Favorites?

― Michael Copeland, Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:00 (twenty years ago)

Bernard Sumner. With a couple of all-too-obvious exceptions, it's impossible to glean incidents, stories, or even details in his lyrics. More power to him.

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:03 (twenty years ago)

thom yorke.

― cutty (mcutt), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:14 (twenty years ago)

Trugoy the dove!

― sympathizer (sympathizer), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:17 (twenty years ago)

not even close.. ghostface.

― cutty (mcutt), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:18 (twenty years ago)

Jon Anderson
Marc Bolan
The Residents
Elizabeth Fraser
Wire

― Telegram Sam, Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:57 (twenty years ago)

David Berman obv.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 00:58 (twenty years ago)

Whoever rights for At the Drive-In and The Mars Volta.

I can never figure out who writes the lyrics because it says the band writes them (which is probably for royalty reasons).

The most abstract lyrics ready.

― Michael Costello (MichaelCostello1), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 02:38 (twenty years ago)

Robyn Hitchcock although his are really just deranged.

― Cunga (Cunga), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 04:02 (twenty years ago)

Wire for me.

― Michael F Gill (Michael F Gill), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 05:17 (twenty years ago)

q-tip. lock thread.

― Sym Sym (sym), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 07:16 (twenty years ago)

Love Tractor's are pretty impressive.

― Hillary Brown (Hillary Brown), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 11:58 (twenty years ago)

jose luis catillejo.

maybe arrigo lora-totino?

― ebenoit, Wednesday, 20 July 2005 12:07 (twenty years ago)

Karl Hyde

― Brian Miller (Brian Miller), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 12:10 (twenty years ago)

Dylan in 1965-66, Stephen Malkmus

― kornrulez6969 (TCBeing), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 13:35 (twenty years ago)

Jeff Mangum. A while ago I read something that described his lyrics as "American Surreal," which I thought was an interesting way of putting it.

― PB, Wednesday, 20 July 2005 13:52 (twenty years ago)

John Lennon, in his Lucy in the Sky/I Am the Walrus mode.

― Dominique (dleone), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 16:19 (twenty years ago)

Kandinsky has a good beat and he's easy to dance to.

― The Mad Puffin (The Mad Puffin), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 16:44 (twenty years ago)

Definitely Stephen Malkmus

― dog latin (dog latin), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 16:52 (twenty years ago)

Beck circa 1993-1996

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 16:54 (twenty years ago)

Wait, no, holy fucking shit...SYD BARRETT.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 16:55 (twenty years ago)

Edward Ka-Spel

― Brian Miller (Brian Miller), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 17:00 (twenty years ago)

Stipe, when he subtly hints at a narrative ("Sad Professor," "E-Bow The Letter," "Bittersweet Me"). NB: When he's actually trying to tell a story (more and more often these days), he's godawful. He's one of the best *phonetic* writers around, however (you know - "Secanol / Spanish fly / Cherry-flavored neck and collar" type stuff - the sounds and the syncopes dictating their own meanings).

― joseph cotten (joseph cotten), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 17:07 (twenty years ago)

"What's the frequency, Kenneth?"
-- William Tager

― Rob Uptight (Rob Uptight), Wednesday, 20 July 2005 17:53 (twenty years ago)

Wire:
"Reviewed, it seemed
As if someone were watching over it
Before it was
As if response were based on fact

Providing, deciding, it was soon there
Squared to it, faced to it, it was not there

Renewed, it fought
As if it had a cause to live for
Denied, it learned
As if it had sooner been destroyed"

Bolan:
I was dancing when I was eight,
Is it strange to dance so late?
I danced myself into the tomb,
Is it strange to dance so soon?

Residents:
"Yes, shake and shout and cause a spout to be a mockery!
Exist inside a lemon drop and cause no word to be.
If after all this oleo a speck of dust exists,
We'll set aside a common tide 'twixt friend and who he's kissed"

"What hoe you rake, you fake a taking and a mating moo;
Confuse to lose and quake to break are simple rules to you.
Why send a curly head to bed and know her secrets too? "

"Glue it down you dripping clown, and be not busy, too;
If a needy, if a seedy lets him come on through.
Keys are not thrust open spores, and neither is a broken store!
There are clothes that haven't been worn,
Feet that haven't been shorn,
There's causes that haven't been given a principle.
Need I say more? "

Beefheart:
Bulbs shoot from its snoot
And vanish into darkness
It whistles like a root snatched from dry earth
Sodbustin’ rakes with grey dust claws
Announces its coming in the morning
This train with grey tubes
That houses people’s very thoughts and belongings.

Jon Anderson:
State of life, may I live, may I love;
Coming out the sky, I name me a name;

Coming out, silver word, for what it is;
It is the very nature of the sound the game

― Telegram Sam, Friday, 22 July 2005 00:12 (twenty years ago)

Gibby Haynes

― Si.C@rter (SiC@rter), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:15 (twenty years ago)

scott walker circa Tilt.

Gastr del sol.

― jed_ (jed), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:18 (twenty years ago)

http://www.imagemakersart.com/images/dylan-01.jpg

― Sexy MFA (Hexy M.F.), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:24 (twenty years ago)

Syd Barrett OTM.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:27 (twenty years ago)

(Good painter, too.)

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:27 (twenty years ago)

Mark E. Smith

― Sasha (sgh), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:27 (twenty years ago)

Lawrence.

― oni0n_kid, Friday, 22 July 2005 00:32 (twenty years ago)

David Byrne

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Friday, 22 July 2005 00:38 (twenty years ago)

mr. kirkwood from the meat puppets is up there.

― m0stly clean (m0stly clean), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:43 (twenty years ago)

Mission of Burma
Dave Thomas from Pere Ubu

― Sasha (sgh), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:47 (twenty years ago)

Definitely NOT Kurt Wagner. Ugh.

― Truckdrivin' Buddha (Rock Hardy), Friday, 22 July 2005 00:55 (twenty years ago)

Green Gartside, particularly in pre-1980 Scritti Politti.

― Kitten, the body needs it, the body cries out for Ian Riese-Moraine! (Eastern Ma, Friday, 22 July 2005 01:14 (twenty years ago)

Gadji beri bimba clandridi
Lauli lonni cadori gadjam
A bim beri glassala glandride
E glassala tuffm I zimbra

Bim blassa galassasa zimbrabim
Blassa glallassasa zimbrabim

A bim beri glassala grandrid
E glassala tuffm I zimbra

Gadji beri bimba glandridi
Lauli lonni cadora gadjam
A bim beri glassasa glandrid
E glassala tuffm I zimbra

― Austin Still (Austin, Still), Friday, 22 July 2005 03:00 (twenty years ago)

ghostface is otm

― burna (burna), Friday, 22 July 2005 03:04 (twenty years ago)

iron monkey (not 'best' maybe , but pretty good, in a certain vein)

― cd, Friday, 22 July 2005 09:56 (twenty years ago)

Faust - early albums. Plus most of Falk-U Rogner's lyrics for Amon Duul II. The Incredible String Band - not "abstract" but very very bizarre on occasion (esp. Robin Williamson)

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 22 July 2005 10:10 (twenty years ago)

Wire
Syd Barrett
David Bowie (Scary Monsters in particular)

― Deluxe (Damian), Friday, 22 July 2005 10:44 (twenty years ago)

John Cale

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 22 July 2005 10:52 (twenty years ago)

Mark Stewart was pretty damn abstract on Y.

― Kitten, the body needs it, the body cries out for Ian Riese-Moraine! (Eastern Ma, Friday, 22 July 2005 20:03 (twenty years ago)

Richard Meltzer (esp. stuff on the Stalk-Forrest Group album)

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Friday, 22 July 2005 22:09 (twenty years ago)

Van Dyke Parks

― Disco Nihilist (mjt), Saturday, 23 July 2005 17:09 (twenty years ago)

Eno, especially with Taking Tiger Mountain

― bill neil (inabillity), Saturday, 23 July 2005 17:19 (twenty years ago)

another vote for wire, especially lewis's stuff ("a serious of snakes" being the absolute pinnacle. i mean, it's about the nativity! gotta love that.)

― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Saturday, 23 July 2005 20:32 (twenty years ago)

Dan Bejar

― derrick (derrick), Saturday, 23 July 2005 20:34 (twenty years ago)

daft punk

― pete d, Saturday, 23 July 2005 23:18 (twenty years ago)

Chris Goss of Masters of Reality

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Saturday, 23 July 2005 23:59 (twenty years ago)

If this counts, "You Got It (Release It)" by Pearl Harbour and the Explosions contains no concrete nouns. Almost no nouns, but she does say "right as rain" once. That's a real good song.

― dr. phil (josh langhoff), Sunday, 24 July 2005 00:47 (twenty years ago)

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