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She’s a killing machine
The Telegraph has a fluff piece on the worst rock lyrics of all time. Dunno about the worst, but there are some awful stuff in there. Amongst it all, the two tracks are on topic for us. It is Highway Star, and Rainbow’s Man on the Silver Mountain.
Anyone who loves the Ronnie James Dio-era Rainbow will know that the former singer from American rock band Elf (and future replacement for Ozzy in Black Sabbath) can make any old guff sound profound.
And he starts as he means to go on with the opening lines of track one, side one, of debut album Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, the band’s first single. “I’m a wheel, I’m a wheel/ I can roll, I can feel/ And you can’t stop me turning”, he bellows. Never intended to, Ronnie, but hey, roll on, man. Eat your heart out, Tufnel and St Hubbins.
Read more in The Telegraph.
FWIW, of all lyrics presented there, U2’s Get On Your Boots is winning the popular vote as the worst of the time of this writing: 229:14.
Thanks to Georgius Novicianus for the heads-up.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
I was expecting ‘Uwe know who’ to be the heads up name. Here we go here we here we go again, and again and again………………..repeat infinitely. A pity the link is with a loathed tabloid…….never subscribed to them…………
September 14th, 2025 at 06:21What!!
‘Highway Star’ is amusing and very ambiguous!
Sorry but the person digging up that awfulness can’t read without moving his lips according to every word he has to spell!
I am appalled ☹️
I love Highway Star!
Even ‘Black Night’ that was made during a hangover I read somewhere, is significantly better than that nonsense in ‘the Telegraph’!
September 14th, 2025 at 06:37As far as I’m concerned Dio can sing LaLaLaLa and still be the best rock singer of his era. Has the Telegraph listened to some of the utter crap being peddled today. Lyrically and musically.
September 14th, 2025 at 08:41By the end of the first paragraph of the actual list of songs you know the author has no idea what he’s talking about. He appears to think Sabbath’s Fairies Wear Boots was about the little people.
September 14th, 2025 at 09:49The lyric in the DP family that makes me wince is Ian’s “Keep you hands …”. Not his finest moment! But as he wrote “Rocks and stones …” he can be forgiven anything.
@4
“you know the author has no idea what he’s talking about”
– hear hear Ted!
I think I will start to read the Telegraph just so I can stop again!
September 14th, 2025 at 10:26Hello!
They just simply have nothing to write about nowadays ! Fools.
(Is someone paying them ?!)
Andrew (#3) was already spot on.
There´s couple of singers (both sadly late) that can sing whatever on earth and that´s
still awesome. RJD is the one and Marc Bolan is the other.
…Gillan´s lyrics are often more intellectual – so that´s why I don´t understand them at all… : )
In my opinion – for over these decades – RJD could sing the the phone book and still sound number 1 and be credible. (…and you youngsters out there – phone book or telephone directory, if you like, was the book where you had all the phone numbers in alphabethical order – whatever your own area was.)
Best Wishes,
“…but Life`s not a Wheel…”
September 14th, 2025 at 12:53😱 What’s with these people? I have a good friend in Fantasmania who tells me that succinct intellectual outbursts like “rollin’ and feelin’ wheels” + “suns that can run” make perfect sense, touch one deeply and are really only disliked by people with small minds. Or English as a second language.
https://youtu.be/mfrZ022mMJQ
September 14th, 2025 at 14:07To me, Roger’s lyrics to All Night Long are the absolute nadir in Purple Family lyrics. They are not funny, not even on Coverdale’s juvenile double entendre level (which nevertheless always shows how he actually adores wimmin and is charmed by them, a vomit sentence like “>i>don’t know about your brain, but you look alright” would have never crossed DC’s lips). They sure as hell aren’t sexy or sultry either. And they have nothing to do with love, because Roger meant “fuck” where he wrote “love” to get the darn thing played on the radio. The lyrics are misogynistic inane crap in ill taste – he was in his mid 30s when he wrote them, I don’t know what possessed him, it was out of character for him too.
You’re walking up with your eyes on me
It’s looking good but I just don’t know
I need a girl who can keep her head
All night long
You didn’t come just to see the show
I guess you know what you wanna see
The way you smile let’s me know I can’t go wrong
Wanna touch you, wanna feel you
I wanna make you mine
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
I saw you standing down by the stage
Your black stockings and your see-through dress
Your mouth is open but I don’t wannna hear you
Say good night
You’re sorta young but you’re over age
I don’t care ’cause I like your style
Don’t know about your brain but you look alright
I wanna touch you, wanna feel you
Wanna make you mine
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
Your mind is dirty but your hands are clean
You’re short of class but your legs are long
I know I can’t stand another night
On my own
Hey girl, would you like some wine?
What’s your name? Are you by yourself?
Are you the one, what’s your sign, can I take you home?
Wanna touch you, wanna feel you
Wanna make you mine
I wanna love you all night long
September 14th, 2025 at 14:35I wanna be with you all night long
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
I wanna love you all night long
I wanna be with you all night long
I wanna love you all night long…
Who cares about the lyrics when the tunes musically are so enjoyable.
September 14th, 2025 at 17:39If they are going to make fun of Dio’s lyrics I would remind them of the greatest lyrics of all time ‘The world is filled with Kings and Queens who blinds your eyes and steel your dreams’ from Heaven and Hell.
And how about the Lyrics of ‘Perfect Strangers’ it’s Ian’s Gillan’s greatest.
Peace 🤞
Uwe, of course All Night Long is just what you say… but don’t you see the slightest chance it is an ironic take on rock’n’roll lyrics supplied by the likes of KISS and many others? As you point out it is by no means in the vein of anything we ever heard from Roger…not in his often introvert lyrics, not in his statements or about his lifestyle. Alice Cooper as in Vincent Furnier doesn’t really love the dead either. I guess it’s just the words of a stage persona.
September 14th, 2025 at 19:02When it comes to Highway Star I mentioned just a couple of days ago I can’t believe the irony is lost on a native English speaker… especially when you bother to read other lyrics by Ian Gillan.
So Karin came to best pissibolity here: start reading that lousy Telegraph – so you can stop to digest that ignorant scam.asap.
Gillan’s written a ton of clever lyrics, such as “Makes me forget the things I never said.” That’s probably a nice way of saying he’s been misquoted many times.
September 14th, 2025 at 19:02–“Oh, Mr. Grover, Mr. Gillion you must’ve made a million.”
–“She was a cunning linguist, a master of many tongues”
–“carriage of misjustice”
–She said, “A hard man is good to find”
–I said what is this queen of the ping pong business
–“She smiled what do you think
It has no connection with China
I said oow have another drink”
–“With emptiness, eagles and snow
Unfriendliness chilling my body
And whispering pictures of home”
–“No dark conspiracies, I stand on my own two feet
I’m coming through just like Jack Ruby”
“Who cares about the lyrics …”
Uhum, I do! And if they are nonsensical, then at least be honest about it .,,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7z-GwNavp1Q
September 14th, 2025 at 21:33@10
Max, I do need to point out that between the Rainbow song, penned by Roger, and the Purple ditto ‘Rat Bat Blue’, there are similarities in the lyrics.
But of course, Roger is the co-writer of both 😊
And YEAH! Both are ironic in the lyrics!
I don’t know the gentlemen personally, but really don’t find either of them to be degrading towards women. On the contrary to be honest.
In Ian’s autobiography he mentions school girls making passes at him and the rest of the band, and how none of them took advantage of the situation!
James G mentions some of Ian’s beautiful lyrics, tongue-in-cheek and everything! I find it genuinely fascinating to read Ian’s poems ☺️
September 14th, 2025 at 22:52You mean irony like that, Max? 😂
https://youtu.be/52kToozmfCE
I have never heard that All Night Long was supposed to be ironic. I’ll eat my words if it is. What I did read though was that Roger is embarrassed about the lyrics today and puts their quality down to being still a comparatively young man back then. But for crap like this, youth is a lame excuse. When I was 35 or so my view of wimmin had already progressed somewhat, in fact there was never a time in my life where I would have subscribed to the observations made in All Night Long.
I don’t mind sexist lyrics if they are either sexy or humorous or charming or show some passion.
https://youtu.be/AqPBfbLoF_M
https://youtu.be/rjlSiASsUIs
All Night Long is none of those and the subject woman is eyed and treated like a commodity – yuck! It doesn’t even tell a good story like this German coming-of-age classic does …
https://youtu.be/-khXx1Y0WeU
Ian Gillan immortalized Mitzi Dupree, leaving her all her dignity, writing how a chance meeting turns into a little crush for someone else for the duration of an airplane flight. That lyric is lovely. I hear none of that empathy in All Night Long where the female subject is denigrated to the level of a disposable handkerchief.
September 14th, 2025 at 23:18Singers like Dio and Steve Perry could sing lyrics like “na na na”, “ooooo”, “on and on and on and on”, made them sounds mega, majestic to hear
Just listen to Heaven and Hell and Lovin, Touchin’ Squeezin by Journey. The world is blessed with soaring and soulful vocalists like them.
To me the lyrics on Whoosh! are the pinnacle of Gillan and Glover abilities to write intelligent, meaningful lyrics in Deep Purple catalogue. The songs are poets with melodies but also reflected the current theme of the world at the time. Nothing at All is a beautiful treasure to listen.
In contrast, along with the topic of the post, “Razzle Dazzle” and “Doing it Tonight” are when Gillan had all the fun in the world with his pen. Far from being silly lyrics, some smart words, but man he might write the lyrics while laughing his a* off. I remember years ago he said “Razzle Dazzle” is his favorite Purple track (take it with a grain of salt of course).
Gillan sung “Razzle Dazzle” around 10 times with Don Airey and Simon McBride (along with “Rapture of the Deep” and “Hell to Pay”). Maybe he would want to do it at least once with Deep Purple.
September 15th, 2025 at 02:44@14 There’s a fine line between clever and stupid, between writing some fine double entendre lyrics and exposing horny teenagers fantasies. Let’s cut the lyricists some slack and not judge them too hard. Let’s remember that in many cases their intended audience was the teenagers and early tweens.
September 15th, 2025 at 07:16Don’t know if RG regretted writing All Night Long, never read that, but DO know he tends to be ironic big time. Plus they were heading for the charts, trying to sex things up a bit out of Dio’s dungeons …but what do I know. I ain’t no Uwe after all. It was just a suggestion.
September 15th, 2025 at 07:50As the great David Coverdale once said: ‘There is a humour in songs like Slide it in – but I can’t force people to see it!’
But the more ladies we’re lucky to welcome here the more feminist we get of course. So I am embarrassed too. No doubt. Big time. It’s plain disgusting.
Nobody gonna take my car
I’m gonna race it to the ground
Nobody gonna beat my car
It’s gonna break the speed of sound
Ooooo, it’s a killing machine…………
Is there anything better to start the day for a DP fan ?
September 15th, 2025 at 09:38All Night Long is NOT a bad song. The only problem with it is it was written in 1979 and is being judged by today’s standards.
September 15th, 2025 at 13:15It sounds like an observational song from Roger’s stand point. The “groupie” who stands at the front of the stage hoping to get with the band. I’ve seen it at many shows. I saw it at a DIO show in the early eighties. Ronny was pointing at certain ladies out front of the stage.,My buddies all said,”He’s picking out women for Bain and Campbell.”
Grand Funk even describes it in “We’re An American Band.” “Now these fine ladies they had a plan they was out to meet the boys in the band.”
It was a common thing back then and today. Ever hear Gillan sing about the “Michelin Girls?” I saw them at a show in NJ. Right at the front of the stage.
It’s sad really but it’s a truth.
I don’t judge people by whom they want to sleep with and I especially don’t judge women any harsher – if men could sleep their way to success, we’d all be queuing up as volunteers. But no one and especially not a young woman looking for some excitement at a rock gig deserves to have “don’t know about your brain, but you look alright” sung about her, that is just despicable. I don’t have issues with casual sex though it is not my personal preference, but taking part in or advantage of it and then denigrating your sex partner like that is manosphere-cheap.
As for the music to All Night Long, that is one of the most calculated Rainbow pieces ever written: A typical minor key Blackmore riff from the dust bin played in tried and trusted fashion with fourths on the D and G strings of Ritchie’s Strat (like eg SOTW, Burn, MOTSM or Kill The King before) to then immediately change into a relative major key romp for the verse using tonic, subdominant and dominant (courtesy of the Rolling Stones’ Out Of Time as Blackmore has himself admitted), I wonder why Status Quo didn’t sue as it was their recipe (and Francis Rossi unsurprisingly liked the track at the time). All Night Long (and not just the lyrics either) is from the bricklayers’ school of banal songwriting.
September 15th, 2025 at 16:39@17
“There is a humour in songs like Slide it in – but I can’t force people to see it!’
– especially the first line Max: ‘You talk too much’
I’ve been told that women talking a lot can be a nuisance 😼😄😄
Which of course can be a problem if one has a lot of thoughts….
Never need to be neither embarrassed nor feeling disgusted, because as I always tell myself (and especially after I joined you lot in here):
September 15th, 2025 at 17:00– alle Dinge sind rein für den Reinen 😇
Uwe @8
You are absolutely right about how unpleasant “All Night Long” is. But I’m not sure about you absolving Coverdale in the way you suggest. Remember his “adaptation” of the Big Fat Tyres line from Highway Star? I’m not even going to type it, just another example of Coverdale and Hughes utterly disrespecting the Mk2 material, and singing it dreadfully, whilst singing their own Mk3+4 stuff brilliantly?
September 15th, 2025 at 18:18Coverdale has a one track mind, but he essentially adores women and puts them on pedestals to marvel at and desire, they are temptresses to him, not utility commodities. I’ve never heard him sing anything really nasty about women: They trigger his gargantuan lust and passion, break his heart, mistreat him or are the object of his romantic longing and passion.
Coverdale is a romantic macho and sexist with a weakness for Saltburn-by-the-Sea working men’s clubs crude terminology (“slide it in”, “spit it out”, “G string tuned to A”), all that yes, but not a misogynist. His lyrics have me rolling my eyes, but don’t rub me the wrong way like All Night Long always does.
To me there’s a world of a difference between the oogling Rainbow track and something like this here:
https://youtu.be/qF1px6EgLiU
I can’t imagine Rod Stewart singing about one of the many women he likely slept with (and they liked doing so with him!) “you’re short of class, but your legs are long”. Nor would Ronnie Dio or Joe Lynn Turner have written such a lyric. I don’t know what possessed Roger to do so, but it wasn’t one of his great moments no matter how many people here now try to summon all their tribalist loyalty to defend the indefensible. 😈
September 15th, 2025 at 19:19Never pay attention to these clowns!
September 15th, 2025 at 20:15Highway Star – best driving song ever!
@ 20 – I thought Uwe was going to say the ‘ACDC school of banal songwriting’ there for a moment.
September 15th, 2025 at 21:51Yeah, the big fat knockers weren’t great, but he was ad libbing and in his early to mid 20s at the time.
DC has written shelves of dumb and mono-themed lyrics of course, but he doesn’t denigrate women.
HS is a song about getting kicks both out of driving fast cars and having (fast?) sexual intercourse, it’s about the rush of feelings, adrenaline and endorphin cocktails, not so much real people or real cars. I don’t have issues with it.
All Night Long, however, describes over several verses a typified person, in this case what Roger obviously thought was your archetypical, barely legal age, scantily dressed “groupie” (I don’t like the word) or female fan. So Roger basically had fun character-assassinating and ridiculing someone he longed to have sex with – if that isn’t unhealthy misogyny I don’t know what is. That wasn’t ok back then and it’s not ok today, much less is it a message you would want to send to horny male teenagers and young twens. “Don’t know about your brain, but you look alright” is not a recommended pick-up line according to my limited experience at least.
And it wasn’t even good poetry – listen to the Rolling Stones’ Star Fucker if you want to hear that.
September 16th, 2025 at 02:28Gillian is one of the cleverest lyricists in rock. This segment from Castle Full of Rascals is some of the best ever written in my occasionally humble opinion.
A glistening of questioners
Prepared the inquisition
While jackals in the shadows
Maneuver for position
A fundament of righteous men
A barrow of ideals
The Carriage of misjustice
Crushes all beneath it’s wheels
Conspiracies of silence
Within the temple walls
Graveyards full of promises
That no one can recall
A castle full of rascals
A fortress full of thieves
A parliament of silver tongues
The latter to deceive
My 2 cents
September 16th, 2025 at 05:32Well you’re 23 of age, a working class lad from England with glasses and a bit overweight, all of a sudden standing on a stage in Tokyo, adore by screaming folks, driven around in limos and treated as royalty, mass of ego and testosterone …and come up with the line ‘bit fat knockers’ …see I even wrote it! … who am I to throw the first stone?
September 16th, 2025 at 06:14Oh but we’re so pc now of course and nothing like that would have escaped our lips or even come to our mind…beware. The return of the Victorian age.
@28
If I silently may add this to your brilliant comment:
I prefer the Viking age!
Or maybe even the gypsy age ☺️
September 16th, 2025 at 07:35@23 Well, here’s some ole Cov’s lyrics from the time when he was the young Cov:
Baby, I would do anything that you want me to
But would I lie to, would I lie to, should I lie to you?
Just to get in your pants
I think so
Classy? I will leave it up to you to decide. To me, sounds like the typical teenage boy’s stuff: just give it to me and then after I do you I never knew you.
But then… Let’s face it. Hard rock is the genre that may be based on fine music, but lyrically it was never supposed to be classy. It just wasn’t part of its creative code. It was supposed to convey primal carnal desires. Over the time, musicians grew older and wiser (some of them) and started writing more refined and profound lyrics (some of them).
Otherwise, and let me quote the ultimate hard rock lyricist of all time, it’s:
Handles on her hips
September 16th, 2025 at 07:55Sugar on her lips
I need a woman
Ohh, and why this sudden neo-purism?
Some of you have praised Frank Zappa highly, and as far as I know, he is no better than RG, DC and others!
If one wants to, everything can be dirty, even this:
https://youtu.be/eHBP1SitZSw?si=I6iSnYUHPFkWx3vH
September 16th, 2025 at 08:36😂😂😂
@26 and @19 “Don’t know about your brain, but you look alright” That was commented on back in 79 as not PC. Sorry Rog.
September 16th, 2025 at 09:56I hope no one thinks of me as a prude given how I am generally unafraid to raise matters of sexual nature with even the most tenuous connection to the subject matters here. I’m also often enough un-pc and wouldn’t describe myself as woke either (I just don’t believe in insulting minorities for the heck of it).
But the scorn- and disdainful undertone in All Night Long already rubbed me the wrong way in 1979 when I was only 18. I thought what kind of a lyric from Roger of all people is that for chrissakes? Around the same time, WS released their chest-beating macho anthem Lie Down (A Modern Love Song)
https://youtu.be/JFS-91Qhwdw
but that is just pleasantly loudmouth & dumb, not denigrating and vitriolic – and the I think in the chorus shows some tongue in cheek self irony.
Anyway, I ‘m sure that Roger, otherwise a thoughtful and empathetic man, has long atoned for his sins of (comparative, harrumph …) youth. 🤗
September 16th, 2025 at 11:10@ 20, All night long would never work today because it is so deeming to woman, plus it is very sexist and racist.
September 16th, 2025 at 11:53I don’t believe it, Ronnie James Dio was actually complimented by Uwe for lyrics. Well, it sort of was a compliment, in an almost irrelevant way. Still, we will take it and remember it too. Talking about corny lyrics, what about John Entwistle’s lyrics for The Who song Trick of the Light. Especially as we know this is how The Ox departed his earthly life. And he also wrote a song for his solo album Too Late the Hero from 1981, ‘Love is a Heart Attack. That guy really did have a crystal ball. Although the heart attack song was written about that scene in general and someone else. A bit prophetic though, don’t we think. Both rather good songs, all things considered and much better songs than All Night Long.
‘Trick of the Light’
Wide awake in the middle of the night
I wonder how she’s feelin’
Is it just a trick of the light
Or is her ceiling peeling?
She’s sitting up in bed, shakin’ her head
At a copy of “True Confessions”
Ooh, it must seem like a fairy tale
To a woman of her profession
Chorus:
But was I all right? (Was I all right?)
Did I take you to the height of ecstasy?
Was I all right? (Was I all right?)
Did a shadow of emotion cross your face
Or was it just another trick of the light?
Come on, tell me
What’s a nice girl like you doin’ in a place like this?
They don’t make girls like you no more
And I’d like to get to know you
On closer terms than this
But I guess you’ve heard it all before
Lady of the night
Won’t you steal away with me?
Lady of the night
Won’t you steal away with me?
The money’s lyin’ on the floor, she looks at me
Shakes her head and sighs
Out of time, out the door
Red light shinin’ in my eyes
Chorus repeat etc.
“Love is a Heart Attack” 1981
Love is a pain
Love is a heart attack
It’s so easy to take
But so hard to give back
The doctor told me this is a showdown
You’re living too fast
You’ve got to slow down
You’re heart can’t take it
You’re gonna break it
You’re not gonna make it.
The doctor told me, you’ve got to choose
Between living or dying
And sex, drugs, and booze
Drugs I can handle
Booze I can quit
But giving up love, I can’t take it.
Death is nature’s way of telling you to stop
Love, is a heart attack
Sex is just the icing on the top
Underneath, everything is jet black.
I’ve got one more night to live
Maybe two, if we can take it slow
One more night of love
With you, such a nice way to go
Love is a pain
Love is a heart attack.
Love is a pain
September 16th, 2025 at 12:12Love is a heart attack.
@Chris 27, I believe it’s “that flatter to deceive.”
September 16th, 2025 at 13:27@34
Hi Karen,
Racist!? This I didn’t catch in the song 😄
September 16th, 2025 at 15:46@34
September 16th, 2025 at 16:13All Night Long is racist? Well you live and learn. How about homophobic? Harmful to the enviroment? Downright toxic?
And there’s more! We can do better than that. Suggestions please…
Karen, why is it racist (sexist, demeaning and ugly alright …)? I never thought the girl in All Night Long non-Caucasian, are you mistaking it with The Stones’ Brown Sugar? 😂
Someone mentioned AC/DC, their lyrics are often crude when they deal with sex, but I don’t find them demeaning, wasn’t Whole Lotta Rosie an appreciative ode to big girls, the bigger the cushion, the better the pushin’ as Brooklyn & Queens boys Chaim Witz & Stanley Eisen agree upon here …
https://youtu.be/AdkdJ8B3aXc
(Musically a testament how KISS were always more Zep- than DP-influenced.)
Speaking of old lecherous Gene: He was obsessed with the subject and his lyrics were often porn-mag lewd to the point of coarse, let me put my log into your fireplace 🙄, but he still handled his odes to casual sex with more grace and less contempt than Roger on ANL.
https://youtu.be/yiSB7G732Eg
I think it is the contempt thing that shines thru in Roger’s lyrics that bugs me the most. Attesting someone to be dumb and unclassy because she went to bed with you is real poor style.
September 16th, 2025 at 17:09The ‘smutty’ lyric issue must be a bass guitarist thing by the look of it. I cannot imagine what some of Gene Simmons lyrics would be like or Lemmy’s. They do get bored, waiting for the rest of the band to kick in and let’s face it, they would have to have an active mind, wouldn’t they? Cheers.
September 16th, 2025 at 21:47Sometimes Dio and Gillan may have gotten it wrong, but I prefer to enjoy it when they get it right. I always loved that one from Dio, which may sound as a reply to this article:
September 16th, 2025 at 23:22“The lover of life’s not a sinner
The ending is just a beginnin’
The closer you get to the meaning
The sooner you’ll know that you’re dreaming.”
@ George M 36….. That makes sense… I listened again and again but couldn’t distinguish the words.
THS lyrics show this… “That latter to deceive”
AZ Lyrics Agrees with you… “that flatter to deceive”
Musixmatch… “Latter to deceive”
I’ve been singing along “the latter to deceive”
Anyone else want to chime in? Fun stuff, but either way, brilliant lyrics
On another related/unrelated question from Fireball, No One Came, Ian (and Roger?), sang…
I wrote on yellow paper from a man who was the king
He said my boy we’ll have some crazy scenes
There weren’t any scenes at all like he was talkin’ about
He must’ve been the king of queens
Who is being referred to? I have never heard anyone speak to that.
Curious minds etc…
Blessings, Chris
September 16th, 2025 at 23:40@38
“Suggestions please…”
– 🤣 well I have one:
It is very bad for my diet and exercise rutine 🤭
And now I need some coffee, a hotdog (Danish style) and a big chunk of chocolate while I read on in here!
September 17th, 2025 at 06:54(See: bad for my diet and exercise rutine..)
@39
“I think it is the contempt thing that shines thru in Roger’s lyrics that bugs me the most. Attesting someone to be dumb and unclassy because she went to bed with you is real poor style.”
– Uwe, he was a young-ish man when he co-wrote this.
Aren’t there things you regret doing when you were young-ish? (Not that I’m suggesting you’re not young-ish still 😄) (I will confide in you and admit my list is very long🫢)
Please people! It is music! If you don’t like it don’t listen to it – just like I do with the bt!
And I can tell this very big secret: most girls like to be the center of men’s attention. And if they say otherwise in public, I can certainly tell you that the private talk among girls are completely different!
Of course we need to be respected but COME ON!
September 17th, 2025 at 07:04The banter among the sexes are very fun indeed and shouldn’t be turned down due to excessive political correctness 😆
It’s quite remarkable how this discussion went in a certain direction and Uwe gets the credit for it. It takes some assertiveness and persuasion to manage the conversations this way. Maybe the barristers experience has something to do with it. Let’s track it. He enters the discussion at @7, then at @8 he brings up ATL, his usual punching bag, and that’s it. We all are going off the rails on a crazy train. And let me recall it, that the song was NOT mentioned in the article we were supposed to discuss.
September 17th, 2025 at 07:50@ 27
I haven’t checked but surely the line is “That flatter to deceive”, not “The latter to deceive”?
September 17th, 2025 at 10:41“King of queens” is generally an anti-gay slur. There were quite a few people with that background in the business side of the 60s (and further) music scene such as Joe Meek, Brian Epstein, John Reid etc because the arts & music were one of the few safe and accepted refuges for a semi-openly gay man.
No idea though if that is what Ian meant. He could be scathing and not always entirely just in his comments on other people though —> Money Lender on CAT.
September 17th, 2025 at 10:42“The lover of life’s not a sinner
The ending is just a beginnin’
The closer you get to the meaning
The sooner you’ll know that you’re dreaming.”
Frederic, one man’s meat … What a bunch of utterly pretentious, semi-philosophical, yet trite waffle straight from a juvenile’s autograph book! 😂
Ok, let me try one too:
God made the river, created the lakes
Let even Ronnie write lyrics …
But doesn’t everyone make mistakes?
Sorry, I’ve listened to too many smart and cutting lyrics by the other Ronald (Mael) to be more gentle in my judgement …
https://youtu.be/FSia5n54pQ0
https://youtu.be/oC0rzv1j8Zc
https://youtu.be/cR_IEjo61Ds
Now Herr MacGregor from Fantasmania can unleash his druid wrath on me!
September 17th, 2025 at 11:19Princess Karin wrote:
“– Uwe, he was a young-ish man when he co-wrote this.
Aren’t there things you regret doing when you were young-ish? (Not that I’m suggesting you’re not young-ish still 😄) (I will confide in you and admit my list is very long🫢)“
Something must be wrong with me, but, no, I have never questioned a woman’s brains I’ve had sex with – not before and not after (not a sexual reference, Max, it is the English word I used!). And the last time I treated a woman real crap I was 15 (and it haunts me to this day because she had psychological issues which I didn’t realize at the time) not 35, that’s a 20 year difference.
Karin added:
“And I can tell this very big secret: most girls like to be the center of men’s attention. And if they say otherwise in public, I can certainly tell you that the private talk among girls are completely different!”
Oh I’m sure of that. And they all regard You’re dumb as hell and a slut, but I’d still like to fuck you and then throw you away. as a covet compliment. Thanks for clearing that up.
But I understand that in this day and age people make all kinds of allowances for “locker room talk”, it does seem to trump more measured takes on wimmin.
September 17th, 2025 at 13:42The dazzling analytic Georgivs @35: You know me too well, I have to be more careful! 🤣
September 17th, 2025 at 13:46I still don’t get it, Karen, what’s racist if a white rock musician (Roger was last I looked) is demeaning to a (thus viewed) potentially white “groupie”? I’ve been to a lot of Rainbow gigs, and the amount of black girls there – in my recollection: zero – could not hold a stiff candle to the amount of white (or black!) girls I’ve seen at Kool & The Gang gigs!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxBZ6rNC_Q0
I fear that during his tenure with Rainbow, a band I would rank rather low on the danceability meter and with little cross-racial appeal in general, poor Roger never once laid eyes upon a black female fan “standing down by the stage in black stockings and a see-through dress with … (her) mouth wide open”. He wasn’t exactly Prince you know.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfHsF6FKgb4
September 17th, 2025 at 15:40@50
“Oh I’m sure of that. And they all regard You’re dumb as hell and a slut, but I’d still like to fuck you and then throw you away. as a covet compliment. Thanks for clearing that up.”
– I did NOT say that, and you know it!
Stop lawyering so much around me ☺️
But please! It’s a mediocre song.
September 17th, 2025 at 17:35Why not concentrate on all the other beautiful songs they made?
@44 It is music! If you don’t like it don’t listen to it – just like I do with the bt! …….AGREE 100%
September 17th, 2025 at 19:50@ 45 – Georgivs, yes it is the same old person with a chip (the size of planet Jupiter) on his shoulder in regard to very small details in his life. Poor Uwe, maybe we should start up a ‘go fund me’ account or something for him. To rescue him from the depths of his despair. Second thoughts, no we will leave him to his demons. Cheers.
September 17th, 2025 at 22:28@8 – Uwe – didn’t care much for “Down To Earth” to begin with, so never noticed the lyrics. A letdown after Rainbow’s Dio years. But you’re right to insist on the point that the words to “All Night Long” are truly appalling.
RJD’s fantasy-style lyrics on the other hand never bothered me, they seemed to fit with the music.
@31 Karin – are you also a Zappa non-fan? Could never understand why some folks thought he was funny.
@40 – MacGregor – Lemmy was a pretty literate guy and, I would say, one of the better rock lyricists. Not consistently great, but as they say, “an artist should be judged by his best work”.
Such as his life-as-card-game classic “Ace Of Spades”… Clever titles such as “Killed By Death”… His ability to add a bit of poetry to smutty numbers like “Jailbait”(“Don’t care about our different ages / I’m an open book with well-thumbed pages”).
And the genuinely moving songs he would occasionally come up with, such as “1916”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_jU0EkhlAQ
September 18th, 2025 at 00:01‘All Night Long’ is bad but Coverdale’ ‘The Bitch is in heat so you’d better run’ is equally grim. Moreover, David’s ‘She was born to succeed’ was a pun too far!
September 18th, 2025 at 03:34Before someone starts to complain about missing comments in this thread; one of our commenters started debating themselves with different nicknames. That is just trolling and very unnecessary.
Yes, it now means some comments above are referenced wrong and looks confusing but I couldn’t be bothered to clean up that much. 🙂
(“Karen Ballsnatcher” and “timmi bottoms” is the same person.)
September 18th, 2025 at 07:00@57
🤣🤣🤣
Well Svante I was wondering about that quite extraordinary last name 😄
September 18th, 2025 at 07:17@55
Re Frank Zappa
Well Skippy, I actually like his music, the instrumental part of it, and I have been singing along to some of his songs, but his lyrics are way too colourful for me to stop blushing when I read them 😄😄
This may be a surprise, but I do prefer Ian’s pen. He is intelligent, interesting, so much fun, ironic and downright brilliant, Frank Zappa isn’t!
September 18th, 2025 at 07:23But Zappa has a lot of fans, and I can see the fun in his lyrics, but Ian is more my kind of guy.
@ 55- Skippy, I didn’t necessarily mean anything negative to Lemmy or Gene Simmons. I was taking the piss about bass guitarists who wrote lyrics and also enjoyed the lustful side of life. I enjoy Lemmy interviews, always have and a humorous and insightful guy he was. He wasn’t too bad a vocalist on a few Hawkwind songs and also that one you posted. When I briefly met him after a cancelled Motorhead show in 1984, I was hoping to get into a chat about everything and anything, except Hawkind of course. Alas he was so pissed off about the PA not working that he was in no mood for talk. I definitely knew to NOT mention Hawkwind at all as at that stage he most probably was still a bit miffed about being dumped by them. He let go of all that as the years passed, I was playing it safe that night, he he he. Gene Simmons is a clever guy and no fool either and I also enjoy some of his comments at times. I was trying to get Uwe to ‘take the bait’ regarding bass guitarists and their penchant for ‘debauchery’. Of course drummers NEVER do anything like that at all, ever. Cheers.
September 18th, 2025 at 08:21I never liked All Night Longs lyrics either, for all the reasons Uwe already displayed. But I feel almost the same about some of D.C.s lyrics.
September 18th, 2025 at 09:27But yes @52, let’s concentrate on all the other beautiful songs made. For example: The other day I was wondering if anyone ever figured out what Ian Gillan is mumbling during the Cascades intro of I’m Not Your Lover…
@54 I think a chip is supposed to be flat or thin and Jupiter is neither. The astronomic object that appears to be flat based on the height/diameter ratio is the Solar System.
September 18th, 2025 at 11:39I did think “Ballsnatcher” was a bit overt and not exactly springing from a female mind! 😂 But it’s ok for Timmi to identify as a Karen too – it’s the spirit of the age …
Oh man, RB, I never got that until now, you were born to succeed, yummy, LMAO THAT IS funny. Also utterly juvenile and Pennälerhumor par excellence, but I’m guilty of that all too often myself.
Karin is right, ANL (don’t insert another A!) is a throwaway calculated song, at least Roger didn’t waste good lyrics on it.
And Skippy, I do agree that Dio was good at painting an atmosphere with his words that fitted the music. As long as you didn’t dig too deep about the meaning …
Can’t get over this … Born to succeed after sliding it in to then spit it out? OMFG, the boy from Saltburn-by-the-Sea is even more stunted in humorous development than I thought or are we already in dad joke territory? 🤣
September 18th, 2025 at 12:52“The ‘smutty’ lyric issue must be a bass guitarist thing by the look of it.”
Sure thing, Tassie Boy, we’re good (but not as nervous as guitarists) with our fingers, keep up, but never overdo the pressure, and have that reassuringly continuous throb. Uwe macht die Frauen nass, denn er spielt Elektrobass. Nuff said with a weary tongue.
Drummers, so I’ve heard, have this awful reputation of doing drum rolls on women’s breasts at the most inappropriate times. But that is a percussive myth, right?
September 18th, 2025 at 14:10Well DC comes from the blues… his words are clearly taken from the big ol’ blues books of lyrics. The apple an the snake, yer ol’ back door man and medicine man …all that.. Just as Uwe I think it is a bit more tongue in cheek and not misogyne. His adoration for all things female is so obvious – plus he attracted women big time because of it. Who was it that told the story of David calling his mom “darling”… 😀
IG on the other hand has writen up to 3 love songs at most in a carreer spanning 7 decades so either women aren’t that improtant to him or he just prefers to not wear his heart (or whatever DC wears there) on his sleeve. Fair enough. His lyrics are a whole different art form. Blues metaphoers vs literature if you ask me. They appeal to my Jekyll and Hyde. If only I knew who was who there.
September 18th, 2025 at 15:48@ 62 – ha ha ha, you mean something like this image depicts. I get it, much more realistic. Cheers.
https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-color-enhancement-of-atlas-supports-the-heavens-on-his-shoulders-by-104017864.html?imageid=917BD31A-3DD3-4D15-8DF2-A771CA0B4F38&pn=1&searchId=b3d543c04e66641a81d82e5e3bfbbf93&searchtype=0
September 19th, 2025 at 01:11I really don’t care about the lyrics. It’s the least important part of rock music to me. The sound of the voice and the power & emotion is what I hear. I usually get too caught up in the riffs and rhythm to remember to pay attention to what the singer is saying.
September 19th, 2025 at 06:48That always baffles me, how you native speakers ignore the lyrics. I once asked an American friend whether Klaus Meine’s heaffy Tshörmen äkzent and terrible lyrics didn’t bother him and he said: But we never notice. I didn’t even know they were German!
Yet you will be hard-pressed to find a German rock fan with some savvy and a reasonable command of English who doesn’t think that Klaus Meine’s accent and his lyrics are cringeworthy.
September 19th, 2025 at 11:29@68 Not a native speaker here (I’m increasingly bad with all languages including my own). Still have to concede it, once Uwe is asking for it: the Scorpions’ lyrics are cringeworthy and so are all other lyrics. There’s only Homer, Dante and Shakespeare. The rest is waste.
September 19th, 2025 at 14:41Always made me wonder how anyone could mistake Born in the USA for a patriotic MAGA kinda song. Even back then I realised it was rather critical and introspective. And there’s a lot of examples. I don’t Like Mondays … being played on monday mornings on the radio cos it is mistaken for a song about having to hit the desk again … Scorpions: I always felt they got swing like a sack of wet foil. Plus the lyrics … I can’t even stand them rotten drunk. Never could.
In fact I found great pleasure reading the lyrics of many song – I remember pre-internet when I prayed the new album of one of my heros would contain a lyriuc sheet. I learned from them, I enjoyed them, they made me feel home and less alone as a youngster and that ist what art sometimes is about. Hey, there is someone out there who feels the way I do and is way better with words than me. (Like, say, in “Lie down – I think I love you baby”) And the moment I began listening to the words of the songs I liked my Engllish at school got a ot better. Sadly I was never in chansons … with the exception of the obvious Je t’aime.
September 19th, 2025 at 15:34@68 Uwe – many of us English-speaking kids got a kick out of Scorpions’ occasional lyrical quirks.
The music was so good, lines such as ‘In search of the peace of mind”, or “I take too much in the Saturday night” didn’t bother us. If anything, the words and Klaus’ accent made the band seem a little more exotic. But we barely paid attention.
Not convinced that Scorps’ early lyrics are that much dumber than those of some of their native English-speaking contemporaries. And once fluent-in-English drummer Herman Rarebell joined, the error-ridden lyrics ended.
The thing that stunned us was not those early lyrical gaffes, but Uli’s resignation. The band still sounded great afterwards, but without his distinctive playing, compositions and “singing”… VERY different.
September 20th, 2025 at 02:35@70
“how anyone could mistake Born in the USA for a patriotic MAGA kinda song.”
I too saw that song for what it was the first time I heard it. Unfortunately those type of people only hear what they wanna hear and are absolutely myopic in in the way they see themselves and the world around them. Living amongst so many of them since I relocated to Nevada has taught me that they are perfectly content to be blissfully ignorant and would rather die than be enlightened.
September 20th, 2025 at 07:16@70
“Scorpions: I always felt they got swing like a sack of wet foil. Plus the lyrics … I can’t even stand them rotten drunk. Never could.”
– ohh I agree! The vocalist sounds like a throat infection gone really wrong!
“Hey, there is someone out there who feels the way I do and is way better with words than me.”
September 20th, 2025 at 07:32– and this also goes for the women, even though so many very good tunes are made by men. But that is actually quite interesting, because we are all human beings, aren’t we?
It’s said that men aren’t that good at expressing feelings, but I don’t agree.
A lot of lyrics made by, well for arguments sake let’s take Ian Gillan, are so in tune with how I think and feel. It is very nice!