Lyrics that strike you as odd or disgust you — Page 4

The line "Anything you want to, do it" in "Pure Imagination" bothers me because when it's sung, the comma kind of disappears and then its just a weird phrase.

---

So sad but true about Hal Prince's Showboat lyric. Yep, the first words sung onstage are:

"Colored folk work on the Mississippi,
Colored folk work while the white folk play..."

It took me awhile to track down the evidence 'cause all I have is a cassette of the show (REALLY tough to find cd's of Hal prince's revival), and who has cassette players in their homes anymore, right? Finally realized my car (a 2004 model) still has a tape player so checked on the opening track just now. My heart sank to discover awesomedanny is right.

Two from Flower Drum Song: first, from "I Enjoy Being a Girl":

When I hear the compliment'ry whistle
That greets my bikini by the sea,
I turn and I glower and I bristle,
But I'm happy to know the whistle's meant for me!

Change "I'm happy to" to "at least I" and have that last line sung in a cringing, embarrassed, slightly off-key manner and it works. It does not quite work the way Pat Suzuki sings it on the cast album. But the whole song's a bit, shall we say, self-conscious, which is why Phyllis Diller destroyed -- er, recorded it. And I do like the melody.

Second, two lines from that dummy lyric nonpareil "Chop Suey":

Harry Truman, Truman Ca-POAT and Deweeeeeeeey....

Hear that lovely "La Paloma"
Lullaby by Perry COMAAAAAAAAAAA....

No one can doubt Juanita Hall was one of the greats but this is exactly how they came out; maybe "Ockie" overlooked a bit too much. I wonder how (or if) he instructed her to sing them. And we can't excuse them because Hammerstein was ill during the show's creation. Oh well, as the other posts demonstrate, there are worse lyrics -- half of them from one show.

Updated On: 6/24/11 at 08:22 PM

The entirety of "Birthday, B****" from Bare: a Pop Opera I find disgusting, and this is coming from someone who loves the Book of Mormon score.

The whole of 'Contact'. I love RENT but this song just seems so out of place. Angel's just died and then they all start singing about sex. I know it's a metaphor but it kills the mood set by 'Without You'.

"It's the butcher's dear darling retarded wife, Fruma Sarah, Fruma Sarah!"

at least that's the way I always heard it as a kid listening to the OCR

The one about killing the dog in Rent truly disgusts me

"it's what we used to dream about, think twice before you poo-poo it" from Rent. that lyric just stands out like a sore thumb to me..

"it's what we used to dream about, think twice before you poo-poo it" from Rent. that lyric just stands out like a sore thumb to me.."

I SO agree with this one, and I love Rent. Eery time I thread like this pops up, that has been my answer!

chewy- I'd categorize it as odd.

The whole of 'Contact'. I love RENT but this song just seems so out of place. Angel's just died and then they all start singing about sex. I know it's a metaphor but it kills the mood set by 'Without You'.

No, he hasn't. Angel dies at the end of "Contact," hence Collins saying, "It's over." The Broadway staging made this very clear. I'm guessing you've only seen the movie and heard the cast recording?

They discuss in the book how difficult it was for the actor to portray an orgasm and a death scene simultaneously.

---

The lyric from "Defying Gravity" that really bothers me is right at the beginning of the body of the song:

Something has changed within me;
Something is not the same.

Duh. Redundancy Department of Redundancy on line one.

---