1538: Lyrics

2015-06-15T23:41:15Z

EricF: Song lyric guesses.

{{comic
| number = 1538
| date = June 15, 2015
| title = Lyrics
| image = lyrics.png
| titletext = To me, trying to understand song lyrics feels like when I see text in a dream but it𝔰 hอᵣd t₀ ᵣeₐd aกd 𝒾 canٖt fཱྀcu༧༦࿐༄
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|This is a stub. There is probably a more thorough explanation. Maybe add possible song titles/lyrics if this is a real song?}}

For some modern songs, the vocalist chooses to perform the track in a way that emphasizes emotion, accent or style over clear pronunciation of the lyrics. Some forms of music, for example the Jazz style Scat, use purely nonsensical lyrics while some styles of dance music use a single line of lyrics repeated throughout the track.

The comic is illustrating (in text form) how listening to such a song feels before you have learned what the actual lyrics are. The lyrics are represented in an indecipherable way, with a few mildly recognizable words. This represents the auditory experience of being able to hear and understand some words (perhaps incorrectly), but not all of them.

Another example of this experience can be seen in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxELSzay2lc this video] of a British TV commercial from the 1980s, showing someone who has misheard Desmond Decker's The Israelites as "My Ears Are Alight".

This experience is similar to that shown by the character [http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Havelock_Vetinari Havelock Vetinari] in Terry Pratchett's Discworld book [http://www.ealasaid.com/fan/vetinari/vl-soulmusic.html Soul Music]. Rather than listening to music, he preferred to read the printed sheet music.

''In fact the kind of music he really liked was the kind that never got played. It ruined music, in his opinion, to torment it by involving it on dried skins, bits of dead cat and lumps of metal hammered into wires and tubes. It ought to stay written down, on the page, in rows of little dots and crotchets, all neatly caught between lines. Only there was it pure. It was when people started doing things with it that the rot set in. Much better to sit quietly in a room and read the sheets, with nothing between yourself and the mind of the composer but a scribble of ink. Having it played by sweaty fat men and people with hair in their ears and spit dribbling out of the end of their oboe...well, the idea made him shudder.''

For a related experience see {{w|Mondegreen}}.

The title text elaborates on the fact that [[Randall]] has the same experience when trying to understand song lyrics as when he sees text in his dreams. The last part of the title text is written in strange scripts to illustrate how he feels when seeing text in his dreams. Translated it says: ''it's hard to read and I can't focus.''

Note that it looks like the song lyrics were written by drawing in a tool like MS Paint and then cutting out pieces and shifting them slightly.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball sits in a chair holding something. A speaker on a counter behind him is transmitting music. Four lines of wavy undecipherable lyrics emanate from the speaker. The lyrics are surrounded by musical notes. Below is the best attempt to write this down in text, also using capitals when they are clearly there in the comic.]
:I CANTFVEN +ELe THER
:ANDT⊕NG fHE WCAN NAp.
:HADBE AūτlfA!NNNG∩RKILL...
:FOR♡ITiNnaAGL♡OOO!VEEE ?-

best guess at meaningful words:
I can't even tell her
Anything she wanna
Had beautiful sang or I'll
Forgotten glove.

:[Caption below the frame:]
:'''Sometimes I wonder what it would'''
:'''be like to be able to understand'''
:'''song lyrics without looking them up.'''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Songs]]
[[Category:Dreams]]

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1538: Lyrics