[somecleric]

Rewriting this post:

Favorite Songwriters can be taken three ways, you mean lyricists, composers or some combination of the two. I'm going with the combination option:


Martin Gore (Depeche Mode)

Wrote some brilliant pop masterpieces like But Not Tonight, Blasphemous Rumours (with the great line 'I think that God's got a sick sense of humour, and when I die I expect to find him laughing'), In Your Room, Somebody (which is one of the alltime great love songs) and Policy Of Truth. Not only are the lyrics great, but musically, they're near perfect, whether they're the earlier piano/drum machine composistions, or the later distorted industrial works.


Phil Elvrum (The Microphones)

At some point The Glow is going to be recognized as a landmark single in music. Whether it's for Mirah's breathy vocals overtop the human heartbeak approximated with a distant tape machine echo, the slightly offset drum distortion paired with the distorted and drawn out guitar tones that slowly slip further and further into murky echoes, the bizaare layers of feedback, the tape reel playback that sounds like waves lapping at shore or just the fact that it's possible the best pop song ever recorded, it will be remembered and reverred. Phil Elvrum is a studio genius, creating sounds never heard on record, and pairing them with some of the most beautiful pop songs since Brian Wilson went crazy.


Kevin Shields (My Bloody Valentine)

Kevin Shields reinvented music in 1991 with Loveless. He took the wall of sound approach and took it way past what it was intended to be. There's so many layers of guitar and vocal on this record, you'd expect it to just sound messy and crowded, but Kevin Shields carves beautiful melody and infectious hooks out of the mass of sound. Loomer, the first track on the album, has one of the best hooks ever heard. To Here Knows When sounds like 17 different bands all rehearsing, all heard through thin walls, muffling their individual sounds, but instead of a mess, you get one of the greatest songs ever recorded. Can't speak to the lyrics though, because for Kevin Shields, they were just another instrument. What lyrics appear on Loveless are mumbled and whispered, almost indistinguishable from the mix.


Modest Mouse

Isaac Brock deserves most of the credit for the lyrics, but it seems unfair to leave out the rest of the band, as they're all responsible for the Pixies meet The Beach Boys harmonies. Bizaare, literate lyrics like 'the universe is shaped exactly like the earth, if you go straight long enough you'll end up where you were', 'outside naked shivering looking blue, in the cold sunlight that's reflected off the moon', 'broken hearts want broken necks, I've done some things that I want to forget but I can't', 'oh my god, I've gotta gotta gotta move on, where do you move, when what you're moving from, is yourself?' and 'short love with a long divorce, and a couple of kids of course, they don't mean anything'.


Lou Reed (The Velvet Underground)

Stephanie says, that she wants to know, why she's giving half her life, to people she hates now. Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground were brilliant.


The Walkmen

Again, the band deserves all the credit here, regardless of who wrote the lyrics. Everyone Who Pretended To Like Me Is Gone is the spiritual successor to Love Will Tear Us Apart with it's dark organ sounds, pulsuating drums and complex guitar interplay. And Hamilton Leithauser sounds every bit as desperate and driven as Ian Curtis. Rue The Day is stripped down Velvet Underground done perfectly. A delicate melody interrupted and distorted by aggression and anger, personified by drums and guitar. I'm Never Bored sounds like updated Television with it's driving drums and twisted guitar arrangments. Revenge Wears No Wristwatch sounds like a worn down, weary Strokes recording with Martin Hannett. And that's all before we consider incredible lyrics like 'when we were introduced, we both laughed cause we'd been friends since years before', 'I had never planned on, thinking of you since, I'd be lying if I said your name, never came up as, I'd be thinking of just how I'd like to cash my days in now', 'I've heard it all before, I've had it up to here, such a mess' and 'your jokes miss, your hands grow to fists, and your lips purse, expecting the worst, with every word, that's how it started, that's the problem'.


Tom Waits

Fractured, tortured, twisted lyrics. Somehow, they always end up insanely beautiful. Tom Waits is everything Nick Cave wishes he could be.


Tiger Trap

Not for everyone, but Tiger Trap are like the female version of The Ramones. They don't want to be The Ramones, they're uniquely female, writing from a uniquely female viewpoint, and they don't sound all that much like The Ramones, other than possessing the same intuitive grasp of melody and harmony, and the same love of guitars. Most of their songs are about relationships, but their lyrics are scarily intense, cynical and perceptive. 'the first time's the hardest is what I've been told, but I wouldn't know, all it feels like to me is the end of my world, the end of the heart, that I said would never be broken by you', 'I whisper I love you into your ear, I don't know if you even hear, you're sleeping, I hope you're dreaming of me', 'do you remember when I used to wake you each morning with kisses, you'd kiss me too, that was so long ago, now I just slip away, quietly so as not to disturb you' and 'I won't pretend to like her, cause I won't lie to you, that's more than I can say for her, and I know that's nothing new'.


Ian Curtis (Joy Division)

And then there's Joy Division. Whether writing about a life spinning out of control (Disorder, She's Lost Control, Transmission), the feeling of being an outsider (Isolation, Colony, Decades, Ice Age) or Ian Curtis' favorite, the destructive nature of relationships (Candidate, Shadowplay, I Remember Nothing, Atmosphere, Glass and the finest song ever written Love Will Tear Us Apart), Ian Curtis was raw emotion, his lyrics hitting hard and clawing deep into you. 'Why is our bedroom so cold? Turned away on your side. Is my timing that flawed? Our respect run so dry? Yet still there's this appeal, that we've kept through our lives, love, love will tear us apart. You cry in your sleep, all my failing's exposed. Get a taste in my mouth, as desperation takes hold. Is it something so good, just can't function no more? Love, love will tear us apart again'.