Line #127 Main/PhraseSaladLyrics


1	Sometimes songwriters write lyrics that are completely incomprehensible, stringing together a bunch of words that have just the right rhythm for the song, but in context make no sense whatsoever. This is known as WordSaladLyrics. However, sometimes the same effect is done [[DownplayedTrope in a slightly less extreme way]]. Introducing the Phrase Salad Lyrics, where, unlike the more extreme Word Salad Lyrics, each line or sentence in a song actually completes a thought-- but string several sentences together, and no meaning is clear. It may be symbolic, or it may not be. Sometimes each sentence sounds fitting to the mood of the song; but together the meaning of the sentences is still difficult, if not possible, to comprehend.
2
3	While it's true that Word Salad Lyrics and Phrase Salad Lyrics often overlap, Phrase Salad Lyrics are found so much more often than Word Salad Lyrics that the existence of the corresponding trope in songs with Phrase Salad Lyrics is often completely over-looked. It's even possible that songs with Phrase Salad Lyrics are just as common as songs with a clear meaning.
4
5	This is extremely common in HipHop. Due to the genre's origins as party entertainment, many rappers and listeners pay more attention to wordplay, musicianship, presence and the creativity of individual lyrics than to the overall meaning of the song, which may carry only a vestigial theme like [[BoastfulRap braggadocio]], [[TakeThatCritics insulting haters]] or ThisIsASong. Storytelling skills are admired in the genre too, however.
6
7	----
8	!!Examples:
9	[[foldercontrol]]
10	[[folder:National Anthems]]
11	* There is an English version and French version of "O Canada," and often the singer will switch between the two if singing at a public event. Problem: the two versions mean very different things, so it's this trope if you speak both languages--and WordPureeLyrics if you don't.
12	[[/folder]]
13
14	[[folder:Pop]]
15	* Until You Leave by Music/PermanentMe
16	-->See my friends\
17	Run in circles\
18	Watching cars pass on the street\
19	\
20	Missing daylight\
21	Oh the night light\
22	Casting shadows of defeat\
23	\
24	You got me looking out the shades\
25	Waiting up for you\
26	How much longer should I wait?\
27	\
28	So...\
29	Until you leave\
30	My eyes will turn red for a minute\
31	And I can't breathe when she goes\
32	\
33	She kills me nightly\
34	On my way home\
35	I see the moon begin to fall\
36	The world it turns now\
37	Leaves me breathless\
38	Sing the saddest song of all
39	* A lot of Music/BackstreetBoys' stuff is this.
40	-->Life goes on 'cause it never ends\
41	Eyes of stone observe the trends\
42	They never say forever gaze if only\
43	Guilty roads to an endless love\
44	There's no control\
45	Are you with me now?\
46	Your every wish will be done
47	* "Everything You Want" from Music/VerticalHorizon does this. The chorus makes perfect sense within the context of itself, but the lines in the verses neither have anything to do with each other, or with the chorus.
48	** Sometimes the pop song sounds like it's becoming Jamaican, both in tone and use of words.
49	* Music/{{KMFDM}} tends to string together idioms in their songs sometimes.
50	* The song "Afternoons in Utopia" by {{Music/Alphaville}} features the most abstract lyrics on an album full of songs pretty abstract to begin with.
51	-->Mighty Mamoondog drifts across the grass\
52	Healing lullabies for Easter time on Mars\
53	Paint your hats and shoes with flowers and with stars\
54	Singing in metropolitan operas.
55	* "The Arrangement" by Music/{{Oliver}} can easily be regarded as this.
56	-->You can go down and visit the bus stop\
57	If you can find the right change or box top\
58	And you know you'll have a good time\
59	Won't it be fine?\
60	\
61	I will be glad to give you these fine clothes\
62	If you can show me how fast your fortune grows\
63	You'll be smart and wear a smile\
64	You'll be in style\
65	\
66	I'll look around and find you a nice bowl\
67	If you won't miss a small piece of your soul\
68	In a crowd you'll be at ease\
69	You'll never sneeze
70	* WebVideo/BillWurtz does this in just about every song. He has a fondness for [[SillyLoveSongs love]] and [[TheresNoPlaceLikeHome a feeling of going back home and/or where you belong]], but as per [[SurrealHumor his sense of humor]], his songs never really build on a specific theme or narrative despite individual phrases being perfectly coherent. An example from "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0HCZ4YGqbw La de da de da de da de day oh]]":
71	-->''I went down to the mall, then they closed down the mall''\
72	''Guess they don't want me goin' to the mall, cause I'm just too small (too small for the mall!)''\
73	''Then I built some trains, and I'm travelin' somewhere new''\
74	''It's a wonderful world, but still no you''\
75	''It's a wonderful world for two''
76	* "January" by Disclosure falls into this:
77	-->I might as well fix up and play your game\
78	Make the memory the reason\
79	Remembering the time when you and I fell behind\
80	But found a way to justify
81	* By dance song standards, the lyrics to "Walk Like An Egyptian" by Music/TheBangles make sense for the most part, but only the first couple verses actually relate to Egyptians. After the first chorus finishes up, the lyrics eventually switch to out-of-nowhere phrases about blonde waitresses, school kids hanging out at metal and punk concerts, Japanese with yen, and [[DonutMessWithACop cops in donuts shops]].
82	[[/folder]]
83
84	[[folder:Rock]]
85	* The third-person-view story in the lyrics to American Girl by Music/TomPettyAndTheHeartbreakers is suddenly interrupted by a first-person-view chorus of the singer having sex with someone. Isn't it rude to sing about some other girl while you're having sex with the one in front of you?
86	-->Oh yeah! All right!
87	-->Take it easy baby!
88	-->Make it last all night!
89	-->She was... an American girl!
90	* Music/JohnLennon wrote "I Am The Walrus" to deliberately make no sense to baffle music experts and critics trying to find the meanings of Music/TheBeatles' songs.
91	* Many heavy metal lyrics have cool/threatening phrases stringed together, even if they don't make much sense. For instance, the chorus of "Two Minutes to Midnight" by Music/IronMaiden is a metaphorical description of the DoomsdayClock. The verses, just random WarIsHell sentences.
92	-->Kill for gain or shoot to maim\
93	But we don't need a reason\
94	The golden goose is on the loose\
95	And never out of season\
96	Blackened pride still burns inside\
97	This shell of bloody treason\
98	Here's my gun for a barrel of fun\
99	For the love of living death
100	* Music/RedHotChiliPeppers vocalist Anthony Kiedis does this a lot. The crowner is probably the epic long poem at the end of "Death of a Martian" off of ''Music/StadiumArcadium'', where each line individually makes sense, but strong together sounds like gibberish:
101	--> ''She's got a sword in case\
102	No, this is not her lord in case\
103	The one who can't afford to face\
104	Her image is restored to grace''
105	* With the exception of the chorus, the lyrics to Music/PoetsOfTheFall's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biZpPNzt3II Choice Millionaire]]" range from [[WordSaladLyrics nonsensical]] to flirting with coherence from line to line as the listener attempts to parse them.
106	-->Subliminal love for the ones you hate\
107	LOL as I abbreviate\
108	Alleviate if you can relate to the pink slip\
109	Of love unzipped
110	* "Take Me to Church" by Music/{{Hozier}} can fall into this. WordOfGod is that it's a metaphor about the Catholic Church and its stance on homosexuality, although if you don't know this, the lyrics sound somewhat nonsensical.
111	-->Drain the whole sea\
112	Get something shiny\
113	Something meaty for the main course\
114	That's a fine-looking high horse\
115	What you got in the stable?\
116	We've a lot of starving faithful
117	* The Polish rockman Kazik Staszewski's song "Mars napada" (Mars Attacks) is ostensibly about an AlienInvasion... but half of the lyrics are random musings or out-of-context inside jokes that have nothing to do with the alien invasion story.
118	* Speaking of Polish rock (and pop) men, Music/KubaSienkiewicz, he of the song about paintings of Creator/SalvadorDali. Among others.
119	* [[Music/{{Crises}} "Moonlight Shadow"]] by Music/MikeOldfield (with vocals by Creator/MaggieReilly) otherwise tells a fairly clear story of a woman whose lover is shot, but it uses a trick of having every second line in every stanza be the same, and only some of those lines fit between the ones telling the story.
120	* The portions of Music/{{Beck\|Musician}}'s catalogue that don't fall into outright WordSaladLyrics tend to rest here. In general his approach to songwriting is one that favors describing thematically related snippets of imagery rather than telling a traditional narrative.
121	* Music/ElectricSix songs often indulge in this, such as in "Psychic Visions"
122	-->And she's the queen of the queen bees\
123	She's coming on the next jet from Belize\
124	I see her dancing in the Latin quarter\
125	Abbreviations make everything shorter
126	* "Do You Like Me" by Music/{{Fugazi}} is said to be the result of Guy Picciotto fusing two unfinished songs together, one being a song about a crush and the other being a ProtestSong about war - hence why the song starts with him describing someone who "should pay rent in my mind", but ends with a chant of "Lockheed, Lockheed Martin Marietta", as in [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin the arms corporation]].
127	[[/folder]]
128
129	!!Non-music examples:
130	[[folder:Film -- Live Action]]
131	* The ''Series/StrangersWithCandy'' movie ends with a Phrasebook Salad song composed entirely of random Spanish sentences.
132	-->No lo sé pero creo que sí / ''I dunno but I think so''\
133	Qué quiere? díselo / ''What do you want? tell him''\
134	Dónde está la panadería? / ''Where is the bakery?''\
135	Eeeeeeeeh...\
136	A la derecha tener cuidado / ''To the right take care''\
137	Ahora mismo, otra vez / ''Right now, once again''\
138	El gusto es mío / ''The pleasure's mine''\
139	Muchas gracias. / ''Many thanks.''
140	[[/folder]]
141
142	[[folder:Video Games]]
143	* Many songs from the ''Franchise/SonicTheHedgehog'' series that have lyrics qualify. Some more notable examples are listed below.
144	** ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure'': "Unknown from M.E." (Knuckles the Echidna's theme):
145	--->The new [[SomewhereAMammalogistIsCrying porcupine]] on the block with the buff chest\
146	Out the wilderness with the ruggedness\
147	Knock knock, it's Knuckles, the bloat thrower\
148	Independent flow-er, magical emerald holder\
149	Give you the coldest shoulder\
150	My spike goes through boulders\
151	That's why I stay a loner
152	** ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure'': "Lazy Days ~Livin' in Paradise~" (Big the Cat's theme):
153	--->Everyday's a new beginning, yeah! (We don't know who we're gonna meet today!) \
154	The more I want, the less that I can get (Keep working for a new tomorrow!)\
155	But I guess that I'm so happy now, gonna set my heart free!
156	** ''VideoGame/SonicAndTheSecretRings'': "Seven Rings in Hand", the main theme of the game (overlapping with WordSaladLyrics):
157	--->No such thing as fate for those who speed\
158	A path out of time instead of just livin' it\
159	So many things erased before they begin\
160	Hopes un-dream instead of what could have been
161	[[/folder]]

Context Main / PhraseSaladLyrics