Worst. Lyricist. Ever.

By Michael J.W. Stickings

If you like lists, like I do, and you like rock music, like I do, and you want something really funny to read, check out Blender's new list of the 40 worst lyricists in rock (and check out that fine magazine's other lists while you're at it, especially if you're at work, bored, or have a paper to write, or are otherwise looking to procrastinate).

I won't give away who's #1 -- until the end of the post. Suffice it to say that I don't agree. He's not that bad and in fact has been quite good throughout a long and distinguished career. (And I love his older stuff.)

Otherwise, some comments:

-- Paul McCartney (#38) has written some great lyrics and some pretty awful ones. The Beatles-era McCartney was brilliant -- especially on Sgt. Pepper's and the White album, and also Abbey Road. But the post-Beatles-era McCartney descended into the pits of pop crap. They're right to single out "Ebony and Ivory," one of the more horrendous songs of all time. And "Say, Say, Say" isn't much better.

-- A fellow Canadian, Bryan Adams, deserves to be higher on the list than #37. Have you ever heard "Heaven"? ("I'm findin' it hard to believe... he's had such a long and successful career.")

-- Diddy at #33? How does his "music" qualify as rock? How does it qualify as anything other than self-absorbed cacophony?

-- #31: Carly Simon. Yeah, but that's one song, and it's about Warren Beatty. C'mon! (Okay, a lot of her songs suck. "Let the River Run" works at the end of Working Girl, but, well, as a song...)

-- Simon Le Bon (i.e., Duran Duran) at #26. You know, I loved Duran Duran when I was, er, an adolescent. Who didn't like the unrated version of "Girls on Film"? And I loved "The Reflex" and "Rio" and the rest of that drivel. Even now, there's a certain warm nostalgia. I even saw them at Radio City Music Hall during their comeback of the early-'90s. Thankfully, however, one outgrows one's adolescence. Usually.

-- Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant comes in at #23. And rightfully so. Although I've come to like "Stairway to Heaven" more and more, believe it or not, as well as a few of their other classics, they remain an appallingly overrated band. And, yes, too much Tolkien is not a good thing.

-- Jon Bon Jovi's lucky to be only at #22. Sheer and utter shit.

-- Another fellow Canadian, Alanis, at #21. Such potential she once had. Jagged Little Pill is a pretty good album. Seriously. But then: poof! So much for potential. I once saw her in concert at Jones Beach in New York. Way back when, and everyone was excited to be there, just for her, and everyone knew the lyrics to "Ironic". I liked her, but the opening act, which I didn't know, was awfully impressive, much more so, and I ran into them backstage (waiting for Alanis, who never showed, much to our chagrin). The name of that opening act? -- Radiohead. Awesome.

-- #15: Bernie Taupin. Which means, Elton John. Enough said. Catchy tunes, but, overall, crap. I saw him at Shea Stadium in New York in... oh, back when I was in college. '93, maybe. I liked the guy who came on before him: Eric Clapton. Now that was impressive.

-- The Genesis crew come in at #13. Really? Were they that bad? Like, worse than Elton John, Duran Duran, and Bon Jovi? I don't think so. Sure, the prog-rock routine was tiresome, and Phil Collins has gone on, after a decent start to his solo career, to do some of the more repellent soft pop of our time, but Invisible Touch remains a classic album. "Tonight, tonight, tonight... we're gonna make it right..." Fine, that's... that's terrible.

-- Jim "Lizard King" Morrison deserves a high spot on the list, but... #10? If pretension is the key factor, then, yes, absolutely, fine. But, again, were his drug-induced visions worse than the banal, unintentionally hilarious excrescence of, say, the '80s?

-- #7: Paul Stanley. I'll say it here: KISS sucks. Sorry, Peter Griffin.

-- #4: Noel Gallagher. It must be tough to rip off The Beatles while doing lines, stroking your inflated ego, and engaging in some serious sibling rivalry with your far-less-talented brother. And what the hell's a "champagne supernova"? Still, when they're good -- and they've been very good -- they're not bad. Oasis, I mean.

-- Rush's Neil Peart, yet another fellow Canadian, is the next-to-worst at #2. Again: really? I don't much care for early Rush, the prog-rock Rush, the Rush of concept-album inanity, but Peart outgrew his adolescent infatuation with Ayn Rand and became a pretty good lyricist -- solid words to accompany the undeniable musical genius of the band. Songs like "Subdivisions" captured, without being trite, the alienation of suburban existence. And Roll the Bones, one of their best albums, obliterated for good whatever lingering attachments they may have had to Ayn Rand, although she was long gone well before then. And, overall, the lyrics, from about 1980 on, explored social, political, and philosophical issues maturely and intelligently. #2? -- I think not. Not even close.

And, okay, here's #1, the worst lyricist ever:

-- Sting. He'd be high on the list if, again, the key factor were pretension, but how can this be justified? I'm hardly a fan of the lute-wielding Sting of today, nor even of some of his "world music" explorations of recent albums, but he wrote some amazing songs for The Police and his first four solo albums were excellent. He is criticized here for name-dropping Nabokov, but "Don't Stand So Close to Me" is a brilliant song. So, too, pretty much everything on Synchronicity. And who doesn't like "Roxanne" and "Message in a Bottle"? Sure, much of his solo work is preachy, if not politically infantile, but most political rock is far, far worse. Sting isn't nearly as annoying as, say, Bono. And from his solo work, there are some amazing songs: "Fortress Around Your Heart," "They Dance Alone," "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You," among others. Sorry, he's a big name and all, and he has done some dreck, I admit, but there's no way he belongs anywhere near the top of this list, let alone at the very top.

On a more pleasurable note, it's good not to see Roger Waters on the list. He and Pink Floyd have so many (misguided) detractors, after all, many of whom simply can't stand his lyrics, perhaps because they don't get them. But I'll make the argument that he is the best lyricist in rock, and, if you require evidence, I'll direct you to everything they ever did -- but especially, just to name a few, "Time," "Us and Them," "Brain Damage," "Shine On You Crazy Diamond," "Wish You Were Here," "Mother," "Hey You," and "The Final Cut".