Great songs with not so great lyrics

[Cagliostro]

I'd have to put Jethro Tull in this category. I like a lot of their songs, but the lyrics are typically pretty meaningless to me.

[Endymion9]

Hmmmm....i'll have to check out their lyrics. Other than the stories of Aqualung and Crossed Eyed Mary, I realized I don't really know the other songs lyrics. I guess they are of the level of Bungle In The Jungle (which the title sounds inane but I still don't even know what the lyrics are).

[Vraith]

David Bowie has to be in here..some great lyrics, some stupid (yet hysterical sometimes) lyrics--did anyone ever hear "The laughing gnome?" (see below), and some WTF does THAT mean lyrics, but TONS of great music.
[from memory, some gaps and mistake probably]
I was walking down the high street
and I heard a strange noise behind me
there sat a little old man in scarlet and gray
chuckling away.

{then something about bumming a smoke, I think} then

the next morning when I woke up
he was sitting on the edge of my bed
with another one who's name was fred
He brought him along
to sing me a song
[hear a ticking sound] Bowie: what's that ticking noise?
Gnome: that's Fred, he's a metrognome.
[chorus] Hah hah hah, hee hee hee
I'm the laughing gnome and you can't catch me

{another verse or two, I think} then a bunch of this kind of stuff:
Bowie: Haven't you got a home to go to?
Gnome: No, we're gnome-ads
Bowie: Were'd you go to school
Gnome: The London School of ecognome-ics...
ETC.

[Endymion9]

I loved Bowie's 70s stuff..nonsense lyrics not withstanding, but somewhere in the mid 80s he seemed to just start mailing it in..at least that's how it seemed to me. Decided to check out his album Earthling cause I found it in a used CD store...and found it so unrecognizeable to the Bowie stuff I liked, that haven't tried any other of his 90s and later stuff.

[Vader]

I loved Bowie's 70s stuff..nonsense lyrics not withstanding, but somewhere in the mid 80s he seemed to just start mailing it in..at least that's how it seemed to me. Decided to check out his album Earthling cause I found it in a used CD store...and found it so unrecognizeable to the Bowie stuff I liked, that haven't tried any other of his 90s and later stuff.

Cygnet Committee (Man of Words, Man of Music/Space Oddity) still is the Ulysses of song lyrics.

[danlo]

I've said it elsewhere but VH1 just picked Come on Ilene by Drexy's Midnight Runners as their #1 one hit wonder of the '80s, granted the tune's catchy, but I don't understand a single thing they're saying...

I'd have to put Jethro Tull in this category. I like a lot of their songs, but the lyrics are typically pretty meaningless to me.

Then you need to pay more attention-Aqualung, for one, is spelled out for you, man! Listen to Thick as a Brick-it's a concept album, in fact the cover even let's you know what's going on. He's not the kind (of God) you have to wind up on Sunday, what's not to understand?