Axis, Bold as Love

[quasimodo1]

Jimi Hendrix as a guitarist and musician is unparalled but his lyrics are pure poetry...ANGER!
************************************************** ********
He smiles, towering in shiny metallic purple armor.
Green jealousy, envy waits behind him, her fiery Green gown
snares at the grassy ground.

Blue are the life giving waters, taken for granted,
they quietly understand.

A once happy Turquoise army lay opposite and ready
but wonder why the fight is on.

But they're are all bold as love
they're all bold as love
Yeah, they're all bold as love
Just ask the axis

My Red is so confident, that he flashes tokens of war
and ribbons of euphoria
orange is young and full of daring
but very unsteady for the first go around.

My Yellow in this case is not so mellow in fact I'm trying to say,
it's frightened like me, and all these emotions of mine
keep tolling me from giving my life to a Rainbow like you,

But I'm A...yeah
I'm Bold as Love, yeah, yeah
Well I'm Bold, Bold as Love
Hear me talking
I'm Bold as love,
Just ask the axis, he knows everything.

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah

[littlewing53]

...thanks qm1...he's my absolute favorite...his music and lyrics are quite incredible...:thumbs_up...

[quasimodo1]

Down the street you can hear her scream "you're a disgrace"
As she slams the door in his drunken face,
And now he stands outside and all the neighbours start to gossip and drool.

He cries "Oh girl, you must be mad,
What happened to the sweet love you and me had?"
Against the door he leans and starts a scene,
And his tears fall and burn the garden green.

And so castles made of sand, fall in the sea, eventually.

A little Indian brave who before he was ten, played war games in
the woods with his Indian friends, and he built a dream that when he
grew up, he would be a fearless warrior Indian Chief.

Many moons passed and more the dream grew strong, until tomorrow
He would sing his first war song,
And fight his first battle, but something went wrong,
Suprise attack killed him in his sleep that night

And so castles made of sand, melts into the sea eventually.

There was a young girl, whose heart was a frown,
Because she was crippled for life, and couldn't speak a sound
And she wished and prayed she would stop living, so she decided to die.
She drove her wheel chair to the edge of the shore, and to her legs she smiled

"You won't hurt me no more."
But then a sight she'd never seen made her JUMP AND SAY
"Look, a golden winged ship is passing my way"
And it really didn't have to stop...it just kept on going.
And so castles made of sand slips into the sea,
Eventually

lyrics by Jimi Hendrix

[quasimodo1]

After all the jacks are in their boxes
and the clowns have all gone to bed
You can hear happiness staggering on down the street
footsteps dressed in red
And the wind whispers Mary
A broom is drearily sweeping
up the broken pieces of yesterdays life
Somewhere a queen is weeping
Somewhere a king has no wife
And the wind, it cries Mary
The traffic lights, they turn, uh, blue tomorrow
and shine their emptiness down on my bed
The tiny island sags down stream
'cause the life that lived is,
is dead
And the wind screams Mary
Uh-will the wind ever remember
the names it has blow in the past?
And with this crutch, its old age, and its wisdom
it whispers no, this will be the last
And the wind cries Mary

lyrics by Jimi Hendrix

[quasimodo1]

After all the jacks are in their boxes
and the clowns have all gone to bed
You can hear happiness staggering on down the street
footsteps dressed in red
And the wind whispers Mary
A broom is drearily sweeping
up the broken pieces of yesterdays life
Somewhere a queen is weeping
Somewhere a king has no wife
And the wind, it cries Mary
The traffic lights, they turn, uh, blue tomorrow
and shine their emptiness down on my bed
The tiny island sags down stream
'cause the life that lived is,
is dead
And the wind screams Mary
Uh-will the wind ever remember
the names it has blow in the past?
And with this crutch, its old age, and its wisdom
it whispers no, this will be the last
And the wind cries Mary
Lyrics by Jimi Hendrix

[NikolaiI]

I had "just ask the axis" under my name for a while...the album is one of my all time favourites; closely linked with "Disraeli Gears" by Cream...either of those albums just puts me in a state of bliss triggered by memory..

[Il Penseroso]

Seriously Jimi creates the absolute most beautiful music on the face of the planet....or a reasonable facsimile.

[quasimodo1]

This thread, after some input from members, is a bit off the general literature topic, and must have a short lifespan. quasimodo1

[vili]

This thread, after some input from members, is a bit off the general literature topic
Which, I think, raises the question why song lyrics aren't really considered literature, or at least literature "worth studying"?

(An exception, of course, seems to be lyrics older than, say, a hundred years whose accompanying music has been lost.)

[NikolaiI]

Okay, well, then, what does the axis mean in "just ask the axis"?

[quasimodo1]

Deceptively simple question. In this case, I think it would mean "just ask the establishment and/or alliance". By obvious extension, this would be a rhetorical question like.........ask the center around which all things turn...you won't get an answer. If you directed a question to the government or society in general, you won't get an answer. It is asking those purporting to have all the answers but anyone dealing with any large population establishment knows the answers are not supplied or put off or you are sent to another judge as in Franz Kafka's "The Trial". You know that in this case J. Hendrix worked this rhetorical question only knowing the futility of the querry. quasimodo1

[Virgil]

Yeah Hendrix is the greatest rock guitarist. Catch Purple Haze on you Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF0o4xCqPgU

And the studio version of Crosstown Traffic: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5TczkLw2H0

[bluevictim]

Which, I think, raises the question why song lyrics aren't really considered literature, or at least literature "worth studying"?

(An exception, of course, seems to be lyrics older than, say, a hundred years whose accompanying music has been lost.)I think this is a good question, and of course I don't know the answer. I thought at first that maybe it's because the barrier to entry is too low or it's too accessible, but then that should apply to film as well, which does seem to be considered "worth studying". Do you have any thoughts?

Back on topic, I've always wondered what was going on in these lines:

There was a young girl, whose heart was a frown,
Because she was crippled for life, and couldn't speak a sound
And she wished and prayed she would stop living, so she decided to die.
She drove her wheel chair to the edge of the shore, and to her legs she smiled

"You won't hurt me no more."
But then a sight she'd never seen made her JUMP AND SAY
"Look, a golden winged ship is passing my way"
And it really didn't have to stop...it just kept on going.
And so castles made of sand slips into the sea,
Eventually

Anyone care to explain?

[quasimodo1]

To Bluevictim: The words mostly say what they mean, on the surface level, that's clear for starters. Deeper meanings are a judgement call and my judgement is that the girl in the lyric finds a bright thought in the midst of a bout of depression. Then again, Hendrix was fond of certain mind-expanding chemicals but since these agents can actually change your DNA, it wouldn't be advisable to search for the meaning in that way. Besides, whether you can find the deeper or meaning or not, you can still just enjoy the beauty of words and music. quasimodo1

[Virgil]

Which, I think, raises the question why song lyrics aren't really considered literature, or at least literature "worth studying"?

(An exception, of course, seems to be lyrics older than, say, a hundred years whose accompanying music has been lost.)


I think this is a good question, and of course I don't know the answer. I thought at first that maybe it's because the barrier to entry is too low or it's too accessible, but then that should apply to film as well, which does seem to be considered "worth studying". Do you have any thoughts?


Traditionally when words are put to music, it is usually catagorized as music. Opera does not fall into drama, but music. Words put to music will almost always require the music to give full meaning. The art form of song writing focuses on the arrangement of words within the framework of music. Without the music, lyrics don't amount to much really. I know people are going to disagree with me (we've had this discussion before, so I know how passionate some get about thier song lyrics) I fail to find more than a hand full of songs that really rise to poetry. Sure there may be a line or two, but song lyrics aren't poems.

[bluevictim]

To Bluevictim: The words mostly say what they mean, on the surface level, that's clear for starters. Deeper meanings are a judgement call and my judgement is that the girl in the lyric finds a bright thought in the midst of a bout of depression.Thanks, quasimodo1. I guess I get the impression (based on the previous verses) that what should happen is that the girl realizes that there is something she wants to live for just as it's too late and she goes into the water (and dies), so that her hope that suicide would be a solution turns out to be a castle made of sand. However, I have no idea what Hendrix had in mind with the vision of the golden winged ship.

Besides, whether you can find the deeper or meaning or not, you can still just enjoy the beauty of words and music.Agreed.

[bluevictim]

The art form of song writing focuses on the arrangement of words within the framework of music. Without the music, lyrics don't amount to much really.
...
I fail to find more than a hand full of songs that really rise to poetry. Sure there may be a line or two, but song lyrics aren't poems.In fact, as vili pointed out, there is a lot of scholarly work on song lyrics whose accompanying music has been lost, like just about all ancient Greek poetry up to the fifth century BC.

[Virgil]

In fact, as vili pointed out, there is a lot of scholarly work on song lyrics whose accompanying music has been lost, like just about all ancient Greek poetry up to the fifth century BC.

Good point, but ancient works are so scarce that they are a world onto themselves. Even with the middle ages, hymns are studied as music, not poetry.

[vili]

I don't think that there is any simple or straightforward answer to why song lyrics are so often overlooked when "literature" is studied. This, probably, doesn't come as a surprise to anyone.

Yet, I think that the argument is not going to be valid that song lyrics shouldn't be studied simply because (at least) 99% of them lack of anything even remotely interesting in terms of ("high"?) literary qualities. I have been to enough discussion forums and read enough magazines to know that exactly the same argument can easily be made about poetry. And the section of "uninteresting" novels, or movies, or short stories is also very high -- certainly more than 75% of literary texts produced would not be considered worthy of serious study by the majority of literary theorists?

Although the field has become more relaxed in the past decades, there is still a healthy doze of snobbery and ivory-tower-sitting noticeable within the field. Note, however, that I don't want to say that this is necessarily a bad thing -- you, after all, only have a limited amount of time and resources to study something, and if for example I have to choose, I choose Chaucer over Harry Potter any time. But I wouldn't necessarily want to stop anyone else from studying Harry Potter, or think that those who do are somehow wasting their time or devaluing literary theory.

Virgil's point about song lyrics often being categorised with music is, I think, an important one. I personally think that the field of literary criticism has some categorisation problems -- for, what in the end constitutes "literature"? Does it have to be printed, and must it be exclusively language-based?

We perhaps hold on to our categories too tightly. Note, for example, that comic books (graphic novels) still aren't "real literature" for most critics. This is at least partly because they come with drawings (but then again so do most of Blake's poems), and perhaps more importantly because again more than 99% of comics are "uninteresting" (or "less interesting") in literary terms. Yet, in my opinion the few works that actually are interesting shouldn't be cast out of the ivory towers without at least first giving them a fair look.

I also think that when they are considered at all, song lyrics are approached too much as if they were poetry. Lyrics won't necessarily conform to poetic rules, as they also have to deal with to the music with which they are accompanied. Lyrics are, therefore, not really poetry, but certainly that doesn't automatically disqualify them from being "literature"? In some ways I suppose that we still lack the tools and the right approach with which to study a song lyric.

Most literary critics also don't have the background to meaningfully discuss music theory, and therefore venturing into the field of song lyrics is probably a bigger step than many are willing to take. Yet, many literary critics seem to be more than willing to work on film criticism, even if they don't have much concrete knowledge of film theory, either.

That's my two cents for now. There are probably many other reasons why song lyrics are generally not part of the literary canon.

[bluevictim]

vili, thanks for your thoughts. I guess this is quite off-topic, and I'd be surprised if there weren't already a thread somewhere about whether or not song lyrics are poetry, so I'll just briefly give some of my reactions.


Yet, I think that the argument is not going to be valid that song lyrics shouldn't be studied simply because (at least) 99% of them lack of anything even remotely interesting in terms of ("high"?) literary qualities.I agree that this argument is unconvincing. To me, it seems to beg the question -- it amounts to saying, "song lyrics aren't worth studying because they aren't worth studying".


But I wouldn't necessarily want to stop anyone else from studying Harry Potter, or think that those who do are somehow wasting their time or devaluing literary theory.Perhaps the more important issue is whether or not you would pay someone to study Harry Potter (or song lyrics).


I personally think that the field of literary criticism has some categorisation problems -- for, what in the end constitutes "literature"?Where is Socrates when you need him? :)


I also think that when they are considered at all, song lyrics are approached too much as if they were poetry. Lyrics won't necessarily conform to poetic rules, as they also have to deal with to the music with which they are accompanied. Lyrics are, therefore, not really poetry, but certainly that doesn't automatically disqualify them from being "literature"? In some ways I suppose that we still lack the tools and the right approach with which to study a song lyric.My impression is that poetic rules originated in the practice of fitting words to music, so I find it ironic that things have now come to a point where something like "1(a" by E.E. Cummings is considered poetry, but song lyrics are not. I can't help but feel some amusement at the fact that the poetry "worth studying" is largely irrelevant -- few people are really touched by it, compared to the great mass of humanity that every day finds inspiration in song lyrics, which, in my opinion, is a much more vital body of verse today. Maybe that ivory tower, with its corpus of poetry "worth studying", is something of a castle made of sand?

[vili]

Perhaps the more important issue is whether or not you would pay someone to study Harry Potter (or song lyrics).
From my own pocket, no. :) But I'd certainly read a piece of Potter criticism if it was written by someone I consider a good critic. It would probably be much more difficult to get me interested in something written by someone I don't know anything about, on a topic I am not all that interested in.


I can't help but feel some amusement at the fact that the poetry "worth studying" is largely irrelevant -- few people are really touched by it, compared to the great mass of humanity that every day finds inspiration in song lyrics, which, in my opinion, is a much more vital body of verse today.
On the other hand, it is perhaps understandable that those who actually study these things don't really want to spend their time on something that they are not all that interested in. And anyway, especially after the 1960s the main issue has not really been what you study, but how you do it and what your conclusions are. For many, the source text is not all that relevant, as long as it can be exploited to further one's intellectual adventures. Since most intellectuals are more familiar with Shakespeare than Justin Timberlake, it is not all that surprising that they get more inspiration from the former for their studies.


Maybe that ivory tower, with its corpus of poetry "worth studying", is something of a castle made of sand?
Quite cunningly you brought the discussion back to Jimi Hendrix there. ;)

[stlukesguild]

I have no problem coming out and saying that the lyrics to most music is not studied as literature because it is essentially not all that brilliant as literature. There are always exceptions as noted: some Greek lyrics, certain medieval ballds, Thomas Campion, maybe a few more. This is even true of most classical music. Earlier classical music largely followed various religious ritual texts (Requiems, Stabat Maters, etc...) often in Latin (which the composers themselves were frequently unfamiliar. Lieder or "art songs" were usually poems by established poets set to music by the composer: Wolf and Schubert setting Goethe, Debussy and Faure setting Verlaine. A few exceptions might be Wagner's librettos and those of Da Ponte (Mozart's librettist) whose works have been seriously studied as literature... but most opera libretto's are nothing without the music... and a good deal of it is actually quite bad if taken on it's own. Puccini, for example, was notorious for his preferences for cheap, tawdry novels as his operatic source material. Most popular music lyrics has been penned by musicians who are rather limited in their skills as word-smiths... a majority of that by 20-30 year-olds. How many writers (outside of Rimbaud and Keats) have reached maturity at that age? To my mind the best popular/folk songs work as a unity of music and words (and in many cases, performance). The rhythm, the emphasis, the various emotional or dramatic nuances are only revealed when taken as a whole. This is no less true of most opera, masses, oratorios, or even some lieder. Schubert, for example, composed his masterpiece, Die Winterreise to a collection of second-rate romantic poems. Heard in their musical setting, however, they take on a power equal to that of some of the greatest poets. In a way I think that the essential unity of word/music/performance is not unlike another art form like painting. The suggestion that we might want to study the narratives of Breughel or Rubens outside of the imagery would seem rather absurd.

And anyway, especially after the 1960s the main issue has not really been what you study, but how you do it and what your conclusions are. For many, the source text is not all that relevant, as long as it can be exploited to further one's intellectual adventures. Since most intellectuals are more familiar with Shakespeare than Justin Timberlake, it is not all that surprising that they get more inspiration from the former for their studies.

Yes, this cultural relativism... the notion that all art is equally worthy of study... is something that I could do without... nor am I too keen on the idea of "using" art for the "scholar's" personal political/social agendas. As artistic scholarship I find this rather deceptive... and as "Art" ... well would anybody really read such crap for enjoyment?

[stlukesguild]

I find it ironic that things have now come to a point where something like "1(a" by E.E. Cummings is considered poetry, but song lyrics are not. I can't help but feel some amusement at the fact that the poetry "worth studying" is largely irrelevant -- few people are really touched by it, compared to the great mass of humanity that every day finds inspiration in song lyrics, which, in my opinion, is a much more vital body of verse today.

When was poetry or "serious" literature ever "relevant in the terms you suggest: touching the lives of the masses? Do you imagine that Dante, Virgil, Goethe, or Baudelaire had some great populist audience? Was Michelangelo painting for the uneducated peasant? Was Mozart writing for the man on the street? Thomas Kinkade and Michael Jackson "touch" a much larger audience than Rembrandt or Beethoven even had. Does that make it great art? Sports "touch" a far larger audience than literature ever has. Should we be making scholarly analysis of the structures of "classic" dramatic sporting events? Artists create with something of an assumption that their audience is not unlike them... that their audience has a similar grounding in their discipline. James Joyce was certainly not expecting that the average working guy would "get" what he was about. Joyce, it would seem, expected an audience as well versed in literature as he was (and unfortunately for him, few have ever been so well versed). When Jackson Pollack painted his abstractions or Giorgio Morandi made an entire career of painting simple still lifes of bottles neither would have imagined that they were attempting to communicate to the masses. Both assumed that their audience would have had a similar workable knowledge of art history and of the developments of modern art. It is easy to dismiss this notion as "elitist" or representing the artist who is irrelevant to society and living in the proverbial "ivory tower"... but what is the alternative...? Dumbing down ones work to reach the largest possible audience? Should all art debase itself to the level of TV sitcoms? This very question was at the center of Hermann Hesse's Glass Bead Game. Like Hesse, I don't think either direction is entirely satisfactory... nor do I imagine a possible middle ground. Perhaps the best one might hope for is that rather than assuming that if we wish to reach a larger audience we should dumb down the work... we might instead seek to enlighten more of an audience... we might do more by way of the arts and education. The elitism of art is not an elitism of culture, social status, or formal education... it is an elitism by choice. Many of the greatest artists, poets, composers came from poverty and remained poor for much of their lives... but they made the choice that great art was important to them. Do we simply give that up because the polls suggest that more people would rather read Harry Potter and Jackie Collins than Cormac McCarthy and Charles Wright?

[quasimodo1]

Although I think this point is well taken, Virgil's point about lyrics for songs don't fit into the parameters of poetry but rather have no existence without the music, that point has equal validity. Personally, I think that if the lyrics can stand by themselves as very good or great poetry, then they can be percieved as such. In any case, with most song lyrics, only a small percentage of these lyrics are poetry in the classical sense. If nothing else, the various pro and con arguments make it a must that whoever posts song lyrics as poetry must be selective to the extreme.

[bluevictim]

On the other hand, it is perhaps understandable that those who actually study these things don't really want to spend their time on something that they are not all that interested in. And anyway, especially after the 1960s the main issue has not really been what you study, but how you do it and what your conclusions are. For many, the source text is not all that relevant, as long as it can be exploited to further one's intellectual adventures. Since most intellectuals are more familiar with Shakespeare than Justin Timberlake, it is not all that surprising that they get more inspiration from the former for their studies.Which kind of makes it all the more amusing. :)


Quite cunningly you brought the discussion back to Jimi Hendrix there. ;)Thank you! Unfortunately, it seems the can of worms is now wide open and the thread drift is now irreversible (sorry quasimodo1!).


I have no problem coming out and saying that the lyrics to most music is not studied as literature because it is essentially not all that brilliant as literature. There are always exceptions as noted: some Greek lyrics, certain medieval ballds, Thomas Campion, maybe a few more.
...I agree that most lyrics are not brilliant literature, but then, most poetry is not brilliant literature, either, as vili already ably pointed out.


In a way I think that the essential unity of word/music/performance is not unlike another art form like painting. The suggestion that we might want to study the narratives of Breughel or Rubens outside of the imagery would seem rather absurd.This seems to be painting all songs with a broad brush (so to speak!). I'm sure there are many songs whose lyrics are completely uninteresting apart from the music / performance, but some examples of bad lyrics doesn't seem like a convincing argument for dismissing them all from the get-go. Besides, we don't object to studying Shakespeare's plays as literature even though some knowledge of stagecraft is necessary to appreciate them, nor do we object to studying Orwell's 1984 as literature even though some knowledge of the history of the U.S.S.R. is necessary, so I don't see why song lyrics shouldn't be studied as literature just because some knowledge of music is required. After all, it seems to be agreed on all sides that this endeavor has been very fruitful in the case of ancient Greek lyrics, which brings me back to the irony that we find song lyrics beneath poetry when so many of our poetic conventions have roots in Greek songcraft.


When was poetry or "serious" literature ever "relevant in the terms you suggest: touching the lives of the masses? Since the time of Homer, at least.


...
Many of the greatest artists, poets, composers came from poverty and remained poor for much of their lives... but they made the choice that great art was important to them. Do we simply give that up because the polls suggest that more people would rather read Harry Potter and Jackie Collins than Cormac McCarthy and Charles Wright?No, of course not.

[quasimodo1]

Personally, I have no problem having song lyrics analyzed, hyped, enjoyed or dismissed as poetry. It is hard to imagine the lyric standing alone but many can. The "Vevet Underground" or "Steppenwolf" might supply some grist for this mill. Besides anyone who has been to any of the great sixties festivals is grandfathered in. It's amazing to me the thread has taken on a life of it's own. If I must take a position here, I'm with Stlukesguild and Virgil (is that an oxymoron?). quasi

[Clouder]

This is almost one of my favorite Jimi Hendrix albums. Especially, for me, it is hard to Read the lyrics other than bringing the music/lyrics both in at the same time. I always feel there is an "abandoned child" psychology in his musi, especially this album. The hopeless sadness is not an Adult kind.

It might be a bit off-topic.
Personally, I don't count them as Literature, although what it conveys might be more than Literature. Certainly, I don't think serious/classical literature is more superior or advanced than any other Expressing form, either. Same thing goes with lots of 60'-70' US/UK music (Rock and Roll, Blues, Psychedelic Rock, etc. Bob Dylan, Leonardo Cohen...) I think if we have to divide like lyrics AND music, it is analysis or communication. It is just how beautifully amazing that certain type of music can amplify/transform original text/poem/lyrics, and vice versa. Maybe for some cases, music is the vehicle to carry on lyrics. Meanwhile, how different it is for the music can make bland words so powerful and deeply reaching to people's heart and soul.
:thumbs_up for 60'-70' era, I enjoy classical too, which is not tightly connected to literature though.