It used to be said that the perfect pop song lasted just under three minutes. Now all that matters is the first 30 seconds. Songwriters desperate to catch the ear of fickle modern listeners are loading introductions with catchy hooks, samples and recognisable vocals. Experts say the shift is driven by streaming services such as Spotify, which are said to pay royalties only if a track is played for more than half a minute.
Most 45 rpm singles in the 1950s and early 1960s were around 3 minutes in length, the majority less than 180 seconds. This was both a historical hangover, but it was also down to the fact that AM radio liked their records to be short as well as a technological necessity in that this allowed the records to be as loud as possible; putting more grooves on a 45 to pack in more music meant that they played quieter.
The issue for me. reading Spotify and similar online lists, was that they were filled with anything and everything under three minutes duration. For me, the pre-requisite would have to be ten seconds either side, to give a more accurate evaluation of a three-minute recording.
Look at this compilation. Released in 1992 it proved very popular but you’d be hard-pressed to find anything much that stuck to the three minute hashtag.
Even Magazine’s “Shot By Both Sides”, the song that spawned my username is closer to four minutes!
So, songs exactamundo three minutes or slightly less. To that end, I’ve narrowed down my ten personal favourites, each with the story behind the song.
10: Public Image Limited – “Public Image” (02:59)
Something that’s only come to my cognisance in doing this article is that Public Image starts with ‘hello’ and ends with ‘goodbye’ – however as well as being such a great tune, it’s the reference to Monopoly that I like.
The song reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart. Public Image was written when Lydon was in the Sex Pistols. The song addresses John Lydon’s feelings of being exploited in the Sex Pistols by Malcolm McLaren and the press. Along with being released as a single, it appeared on PiL’s 1978 debut album Public Image: First Issue.
On the song, PiL leader John Lydon has said:
‘Public Image’, despite what most of the press seemed to misinterpret it to be, is not about the fans at all, it’s a slagging of the group I used to be in. It’s what I went through from my own group. They never bothered to listen to what I was fucking singing, they don’t even know the words to my songs. They never bothered to listen, it was like, ‘Here’s a tune, write some words to it.’ So I did. They never questioned it. I found that offensive, it meant I was literally wasting my time, ’cause if you ain’t working with people that are on the same level then you ain’t doing anything. The rest of the band and Malcolm never bothered to find out if I could sing, they just took me as an image. It was as basic as that, they really were as dull as that. After a year of it they were going ‘Why don’t you have your hair this colour this year?’ And I was going ‘Oh God, a brick wall, I’m fighting a brick wall!’ They don’t understand even now.
Hello, hello
Hello, hello
Hello, hello
You never listened to a word that I said
You only seen me from the clothes that I wear
Or did the interest go so much deeper
It must have been to the color of my hair
(The) Public image
Oh what you wanted was never made clear
Behind the image was ignorance and fear
You hide behind this public machine
You still follow same old scheme
(The) Public image
Two sides to every story
Somebody had to stop me
I’m not the same as when I began
I will not be treated as property
(The) Public image
Two sides to every story
Somebody had to stop me
I’m not the same as when I began
It’s not a game of monopoly
(The) Public image
Public image you got what you wanted
The public image belongs to me
It’s my entrance my own creation
My grand finale, my goodbye
Public image
Public image
Goodbye
09: The Smiths – Shoplifters Of The World Unite (02:59)
Very few songs in The Smiths catalogue go that close to the three-minute mark but while choice is limited, I reckon this little gem will go down a treat with fans of Manchester’s own fab four.
Released in January 1987, it reached No. 12 in the UK Singles Chart. As with most of the Smiths’ singles, it was not included on a studio album. It is featured on the compilation albums The World Won’t Listen, Louder Than Bombs, Singles and The Sound of The Smiths.
The title alludes to the slogan “Workers of the world, unite!“, and the 1966 David and Jonathan hit “Lovers of the World Unite”.
During a 1987 interview with Shaun Duggan, Morrissey said of the song: “It does not literally mean picking up a loaf of bread or a watch and sticking it in your coat pocket. It’s more or less spiritual shoplifting, cultural shoplifting, taking things and using them to your own advantage”.
Learn to love me
Assemble the ways
Now, today, tomorrow and always
My only weakness is a list of crime
My only weakness is well, never mind, never mindOh, shoplifters of the world
Unite and take over
Shoplifters of the world
Hand it over
Hand it over
Hand it overLearn to love me
And assemble the ways
Now, today, tomorrow, and always
My only weakness is a listed crime
But last night the plans of a future war
Was all I saw on Channel FourShoplifters of the world
Unite and take over
Shoplifters of the world
Hand it over
Hand it over
Hand it overA heartless hand on my shoulder
A push and it’s over
Alabaster crashes down
(Six months is a long time)
Tried living in the real world
Instead of a shell
But before I began
I was bored before I even beganShoplifters of the world
Unite and take over
Shoplifters of the world
Unite and take over
Shoplifters of the world
Unite and take over
Shoplifters of the world
Take over
08: Blondie – “Picture This” (02:57)
“Picture This” was written by Chris Stein, Debbie Harry and Jimmy Destri. Debbie Harry wrote the lyrics while Destri and Stein each wrote portions of the music. The B-side of the single, “Fade Away And Radiate”, featured Robert Fripp on guitar and was also included on the Parallel Lines album. “Picture This” was included on the international version of the band’s first ‘greatest hits’ compilation The Best of Blondie, released in October 1981.
It was originally released in the UK in 1978 as the lead single from their third album Parallel Lines. It reached number 12 in the UK, giving Blondie their third UK Top 20 hit. It also charted in various other countries but was not issued as a single in the US.
All I want is a room with a view
a sight worth seeing
a vision of you
All I want is a room with a view
I will give you my finest hour
the one I spent
watching you shower
I will give you my finest hour
All I want is a photo in my wallet
a small rememberance
of something more solid
all I want is a picture of you
Picture this – a day in December
Picture this – feezing cold weather
You got clouds on your lids and you’d be on the skids if it
weren’t for your job at the garage
if you could only,
Picture this – a sky full of thunder
Picture this – my telephone number
One and One is what I’m telling you
All I want is 20-20 vision
a total portrait
with no omissions
All I want is a vision of you
If you can…
Picture this – a day in December
Picture this – feezing cold weather
You got clouds on your lids and you’d be on the skids if it
weren’t for your job at the garage
if you could only,
Picture this – a sky full of thunder
Picture this – my telephone number
One and One is what I’m telling you
get a pocket computer
try to do what ya used to do
07: The (English) Beat – “Best Friend” (03:04)
A recent thread on Twitter asked for folk to mention their favourite ‘happy’ songs. Along with The Happening by Diana Ross and The Supremes, this number from Dave Wakelin’s boys is so upbeat, it deserves a place here even though it’s slightly over three minutes.
If I Just Can’t Stop It was the living embodiment of Pete Townshend’s maxim that “Rock ‘n’ Roll won’t eliminate your problems, but it will sort of let you dance all over them,” then “Best Friend” just might be the epitome of that embodiment.
With Andy Cox’s 12-string Rickenbacker playing high-and-seek with Dave Wakeling’s six-string and Saxa providing commentary throughout, “Best Friend” soars like the greatest power pop songs of the era.
Naturally, the soaring music is contrasted with Dave Wakeling’s scathing lyrics:
I just found out the name of your best friend,
you been talkin’ about yourself again,
and no one seems to share your views.
why doesn’t everybody listen to you kid?
how come you never really seem to get through, is it you?
talk about yourself again, you.
talk about yourself,
always you, you, you.
talk about yourself again.
she’s on a holiday,
she’s got her summer frock on.
suck on an ice cream,
it’s meltin’ in the hot sun.
first date’s made you pray for more.
i wanted you, wanted.
everybody knows the score,
i wanted you, wanted.
what are we pretendin’ for?
let’s talk about ourselves on the floor.
let’s talk about yourselves, nothing more I promise.
talk about ourselves again.
06: The Jam – “Smithers-Jones” (03:00)
That final verse, in fact the whole final sixty seconds of this song that’s high in my all time top ten songs by The Jam is just sublime!
Back in the sixties and seventies, when you left school those who weren’t massively educated either followed in the family business or took a job with a big industry company; gas, water, transport etc and were generally guaranteed a job for life. That almost certainly does not happen anymore and now looking less likely than ever as the big corporates talk about employing robots to do your everyday jobs. The city gent image of that long-forgotten era, with the men in their pin-stripe suits, bowler hats and umbrellas inspired a song which ended up as a B side, but its sentiment is probably more poignant now than it was back then.
The song is Smithers-Jones, a track recorded by The Jam which ended up on the B-side of their 1979, number 17 hit, When You’re Young. Like the Beatles whose almost entire hit singles catalogue were written by Lennon & McCartney, except From Something which was written by George Harrison, 16 of the the Jam’s 18 hits were written by lead singer and guitarist Paul Weller. David Watts, written by Ray Davies, and News of the World written by the band’s bass player, Bruce Foxton, were the only exceptions.
Bruce also wrote Smithers-Jones and said of it in an interview with Pennyblack Music, “Yeah, Smithers Jones was, and is, especially heartfelt. You still do get loads of people who give their lives to the job and then once they are past their sell-by date loyalty doesn’t matter. That is what happened to my Dad and hence that is how Smithers Jones came about. There is a lot of anger there in that song.”
It’s a shame there weren’t more Foxton-penned songs, he’d written two tracks that appeared on the 1977 album This Is The Modern World and one track on The Gift from 1982, Vic Coppersmith-Heaven, the Jam’s producer gave this explanation in an interview with Richard Buskin, “There were some Bruce songs that [manager and Paul’s father] John Weller was trying to convince me to include, but it was less about whose song than it was about the concept of the album. We were all very involved with the production at that stage, and we worked together pretty much as a four-piece in terms of choosing the songs. Smithers-Jones worked because it was fresh, it was new and it was interesting to have a different kind of arrangement.” The version that appeared as the flip side to When You’re Young was a band arrangement and, in my opinion the better version, but for the 1979 album Setting Sons it was a re-worked as a much more orchestral version. Vic continued, “We transposed rhythms from the original band arrangement to the violin score. It was a very good song. Paul’s music virtually conceptualised the Jam at that point.”
Here we go again, it’s Monday at last,
He’s heading for the Waterloo line,
To catch the 8 a.m. fast, its usually dead on time,
Hope it isn’t late, got to be there by nine.
Pin stripe suit, clean shirt and tie,
Stops off at the corner shop, to buy The Times
‘Good Morning Smithers-Jones’
‘How’s the wife and home?’
‘Did you get the car you’ve been looking for?’
Let me get inside you, let me take control of you,
We could have some good times,
All this worry will get you down,
I’ll give you a new meaning to life – I don’t think so.
Sitting on the train, you’re nearly there
You’re a part of the production line,
You’re the same as him, you’re like tinned-sardines,
Get out of the pack, before they peel you back.
Arrive at the office, spot on time,
The clock on the wall hasn’t yet struck nine,
‘Good Morning Smithers Jones’
‘The boss wants to see you alone’
‘I hope its the promotion you’ve been looking for’
Let me get inside you, let me take control of you,
We could have some good times,
All this worry will get you down,
I’ll give you a new meaning to life – I don’t think so.
‘Come in Smithers old boy’
‘Take a seat, take the weight off your feet’
‘I’ve some news to tell you’
‘There’s no longer a position for you’ –
‘Sorry Smithers-Jones’.
Put on the kettle and make some tea
It’s all a part of feeling groovy
Put on your slippers turn on the TV
It’s all a part of feeling groovy
It’s time to relax, now you’ve worked your arse off
‘cos the only one smilin’ is the sun-tanned boss
Work and work and work and work till you die
‘cos there’s plenty more fish in the sea to fry
05: REM – “Fall On Me” (02:59)
Though R.E.M. singer Michael Stipe once described the song as “pretty much a song about oppression,” the subject of the song was initially about acid rain and its effects on the environment, hence the first line of the chorus, “Don’t fall on me.”
When it first appeared during live concerts in 1985, the song had a different melody which had been entirely rewritten by the time of its recording for Lifes Rich Pageant. The counter-melody in the second verse is actually the song’s original tune and features the original acid rain inspired lyrics.
In an interview with David Fricke, singer Michael Stipe commented that the finished version of the song “is not about acid rain. It’s a general oppression song about the fact that there are a lot of causes out there that need a song that says, ‘Don’t smash us.’ And specifically, there are references to the Leaning Tower of Pisa and the guy dropping weights and feathers.”
In audience patter prior to a performance of the song on VH1 Storytellers in 1998, Stipe again mentioned the apocryphal tale of Galileo Galilei dropping feathers and lead weights off the Leaning Tower of Pisa (to test the laws of gravity) as partial inspiration for the first verse:
“I was reading an article in Boston when I was on tour with the Golden Palominos, and Chris Stamey showed me this article about this guy that did an experiment from the Leaning Tower of Pisa, whereby he dropped a pound of feathers and a pound of iron to prove that there was… a difference in the… density? What did he prove? I don’t even know. [A man shouts out from the audience] What? [“They fall just as fast,” repeated the disembodied voice] They fall just as fast. Thank you very much.”
The song is something of a duet between Stipe and Mike Mills, with the two of them sharing vocals prominently during the bridge and chorus. Mills takes lead vocals for the bridge. Later in the song, the pair are joined by Bill Berry’s vocals in the chorus with the words “it’s gonna fall”.
Stipe filmed and directed the video for this song, in which the lyrics are seen superimposed over upside-down, black-and-white footage of a quarry. Towards the end of the second verse, he misspelled the word ‘Foresight’.
There’s a problem, feathers, iron
Bargain buildings, weights and pulleys
Feathers hit the ground before the weight can leave the air
Buy the sky and sell the sky and tell the sky and tell the skyDon’t fall on me (what is it up in the air for?) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (if it’s there for long) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (it’s over, it’s over me) (it’s gonna fall)There’s the progress we have found (when the rain)
A way to talk around the problem (when the children reign)
Building towered foresight (keep your conscience in the dark)
Isn’t anything at all (melt the statues in the park)
Buy the sky and sell the sky and bleed the sky and tell the skyDon’t fall on me (what is it up in the air for?) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (if it’s there for long) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (it’s over, it’s over me) (it’s gonna fall)Don’t fall on me
Well, I could keep it above
But then it wouldn’t be sky anymore
So if I send it to you, you’ve got to promise to keep it wholeBuy the sky and sell the sky and lift your arms up to the sky
And ask the sky and ask the skyDon’t fall on me (what is it up in the air for?) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (if it’s there for long) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (it’s over, it’s over me) (it’s gonna fall)Don’t fall on me (what is it up in the air for?) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (if it’s there for long) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (it’s over, it’s over me) (it’s gonna fall)Fall on me, don’t fall on me (what is it up in the air for?) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (if it’s there for long) (it’s gonna fall)
Fall on me (it’s over, it’s over me) (it’s gonna fall)Fall on me, don’t fall on me
04: Roxy Music – “Virginia Plain” (02:59)
It was the song that gave Roxy Music their big breakthrough, and the summer of 1972 one of its defining chart moments. Yet it was a hit single that didn’t so much ignore the rules as simply get them arse-backwards: no chorus, a faded-in intro and a sudden ending – the opposite of ‘normal’ singles. The song’s title wasn’t even mentioned until the final, dead-stop moment, when singer Bryan Ferry suddenly blurts: ‘What’s her name? Virginia Plain!’
“This day and age when you think of singles, they have the formula perfected,” says Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera. “Straight into the chorus for the beginning, play the hook, quick verse, back to chorus, repeat until fade. There was none of that with Virginia Plain.”
A guileful subversion of existing tastes? An arrogant art-rock mission statement, signalling the arrival of a new way of being?
“No, none of that,” Manzanera insists. “We just hadn’t a clue how to make a single. We’d never done one before.”
In typically back-to-front fashion, Roxy had released their debut album two months earlier, in June 1972. Ripe with songs that had no chorus or didn’t even reference their titles, and often stopped without warning, it nonetheless managed to clip the edge of the Top 10.
Recording and releasing their very first single in August 1972 was almost an afterthought. “We were told: ‘The album’s done reasonably well. You should do a single,’” says Manzanera. “We all sort of went, ‘Oh, all right…’”
When the band entered London’s Command Studios in July, they hadn’t even rehearsed the song. “We just turned up at the studio, Bryan played us these three incredibly simple chords on the piano, and we just started messing around with it there and then,” says Manzanera.
‘We’ was the classic early Roxy line-up, also featuring sax and oboe player Andy Mackay, drummer Paul Thompson and the cryptically-named Eno (no one yet knew his first name was Brian) on VCS3 synthesizer and ‘treatments’, whatever they were. The messing around proved to be extensive. As well as the stream-of-consciousness _joie de vivre of the lyrics (‘Flavours of the mountain streamline, midnight-blue casino floors/Dance the cha-cha thru till sunrise, opens up exclusive doors, oh wow!’_), there were unique sounds: Ferry’s vibrato-heavy voice; the sound of a motorbike roaring off into the distance; Eno’s Tonka-toy synths; most absurd and beautiful of all, a parping oboe.
“Was there ever a hit single with an oboe in it?” muses Manzanera. “I don’t know. But I think the feeling was there should be. No other band at the time seemed to have one.”
But then Virginia Plain had a lot of things going for it that other bands could barely dream of – not least the sense that someone, somewhere, was having a giant laugh at the rest of the world’s expense.
“There were certainly some odd things in it that you couldn’t hope for other people to get,” allows Manzanera. “For instance, the opening verse…” To wit: ‘Make me a deal, and make it straight, all signed and sealed, I’ll take it/To Robert E. Lee I’ll show it, I hope and pray he don’t blow it ’cos/We’ve been around a long time/Tryin’, just tryin’, just tryin’, to make the big time!’ Most people, understandably, assumed Ferry was referring to the Confederate general in the American Civil War. Not so, says Manzanera. The verse had virtually no symbolism at all.
“Robert E. Lee was – and still is, actually – the name of the band’s lawyer. So when Bryan sang of taking a deal to Robert E. Lee and hoping he doesn’t blow it etc, he was being very literal. As that’s exactly what happened when we were offered the deal by Island Records to sign for them.”
Even then, Roxy Music had a reputation as musical futurists ushering in a new age. But what’s striking about the recording of Virginia Plain is just how old-school it was.
Manzanera: “Apart from Brian’s synths and various tape machines, which he had pretty much assembled randomly from whatever weird toys came his way, everything else was very much done as-live in the studio. For the sound of the motorcycle we actually had to borrow someone’s bike. Then wait till the middle of the night and take it out onto Piccadilly Circus, which is where the studio was, because in those days Piccadilly Circus was fairly deserted at night. Hard to believe now, but true. Then we got someone to start the bike up and rev the engines and finally speed off while we stood there recording it with this big reel-to-reel tape-recorder.”
There’s just one question left hanging: who or what was Virginia Plain? Some far-out, beautiful fox like the ones that used to feature on all Roxy’s album covers?
“Sadly, no,” replies Manzanera. “Bryan had been an art student and done a number of paintings, one of which was a sort of Warhol-type pop-art painting of a cigarette packet, which he’d called Virginia Plain.”
So Virginia Plain was a cigarette?
Manzanera laughs. “Well, it was a cigarette packet.”
How very Roxy Music.
Make me a deal and make it straight
All signed and sealed, I’ll take it
To Robert E. Lee I’ll show it
I hope and pray he don’t blow it ’cause
We’ve been around a long time just try try try tryin’ to
Make the big time…
Take me on a roller coaster
Take me for an airplane ride
Take me for a six days wonder but don’t you
Don’t you throw my pride aside besides
What’s real and make believe
Baby Jane’s in Acapulco We are flyin’ down to Rio
Throw me a line I’m sinking fast
Clutching at straws can’t make it
Havana sound we’re trying hard edge the hipster jiving
Last picture shows down the drive-in
You’re so sheer you’re so chic
Teenage rebel of the week
Flavours of the mountain steamline
Midnight blue casino floors
Dance the cha-cha through till sunrise
Open up exclusive doors oh wow!
Just like flamingos look the same
So me and you, just we two got to search for something new
Far beyond the pale horizon
Some place near the desert strand
Where my Studebaker takes me
That’s where I’ll make my stand but wait
Can’t you see that Holzer mane’
What’s her name? Virginia Plain
03: Elvis Costello & The Attractions – “Oliver’s Army” (03:00)
Oliver’s Army is Elvis Costello’s most successful single. Though its lyrics are quite dated, I think there is still an energy about it that keeps it sounding fresh.
The title of this song is a reference to the leader of the Parliamentary Army in the English Civil War against the Royalist Army of King Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, albeit the song has nothing to do with Cromwell really.
Elvis Costello wrote this song in 1978 as he was flying home to England from Belfast. He was disturbed by the sight of so many very young British soldiers walking around with machine guns. It was a time when unemployment figures were at an all-time high and the only option that many young men had in their quest for work was to join the army. Large numbers of squaddies were recruited straight from school, often from poor families and with poor exam results.
The line: with the boys from the Mersey and the Thames and the Tyne refers to the rivers which run through, Liverpool, London and Newcastle, three of the English cities that were suffering severe economic depression during the seventies: hence they were ideal areas for the army to find new recruits.
The song mentions the end of the British Empire and it describes the life of soldiers in the trouble hot-spots of the world, mentioning Northern Ireland, South Africa, Palestine and Cyprus.
Despite the strong political content of this song, many people: myself included bought this record just because it had a great pop melody.
In 2008, Costello told Q Magazine “I don’t think its success was because of the lyrics. I always liked the idea of a bright pop tune that you could be singing along to for ages before you realize what it is you’re actually singing. Of course, the downside of that is some people only hear the tune and never listen to the words. After a while, I got frustrated at that.”
The song lyrics contain the words “white nigger:” a phrase that is almost never censored by radio stations. However, in 2013, BBC Radio 6 Music did play the record with the potentially offensive word removed despite having been played by BBC radio stations for over 30 years uncensored. It was an unpopular move with the public, given the intended anti-racist and anti-war theme of the single.
At the Glastonbury Festival in 2013, Elvis Costello performed the song with its original lyrics.
Oliver’s Army features on the album Armed Forces. It was released as a single in February 1979 and peaked at No.2 in the UK singles chart.
Don’t start me talking
I could talk all night
My mind goes sleepwalking
While I’m putting the world to right
Called careers information
Have you got yourself an occupation?
Oliver’s army is here to stay
Oliver’s army are on their way
And I would rather be anywhere else
But here today
There was a checkpoint Charlie
He didn’t crack a smile
But it’s no laughing party
When you’ve been on the murder mile
Only takes one itchy trigger
One more widow, one less white nigger
Oliver’s army is here to stay
Oliver’s army are on their way
And I would rather be anywhere else
But here today
Hong Kong is up for grabs
London is full of Arabs
We could be in Palestine
Overrun by a Chinese line
With the boys from the Mersey and the Thames and the Tyne
But there’s no danger
It’s a professional career
Though it could be arranged
With just a word in Mr. Churchill’s ear
If you’re out of luck or out of work
We could send you to Johannesburg
Oliver’s army is here to stay
Oliver’s army are on their way
And I would rather be anywhere else
But here today
And I would rather be anywhere else
But here today
And I would rather be anywhere else
But here today, oh oh oh oh oh, oh oh oh oh
Oh oh oh oh oh, oh oh oh
02: The Beach Boys – “God Only Knows” (02:54)
God Only Knows is one of those shimmeringly perfect love songs. It worked especially well in that scene in the Wonder Years, because it summed up, too, the uncertainty of adolescence, that first step from the familiar security of childhood Kevin and Winnie were leaving behind and the great unknown of adulthood: “I knew then that the girl next door was gone,” Kevin recalled. “And my life would never be the same again.”
Composed by Brian Wilson, sung by his brother Carl, its lyrics dreamed up by Tony Asher, it appeared on the band’s 1966 masterpiece, Pet Sounds. It opens in a haze of french horns and harpsichord, it marries baroque and West Coast pop, combines multitracked, layered vocals, and some 16 musicians – a cellist, a flautist, and an accordionist among them. Brian Wilson once described the song as “a vision … It’s like being blind, but in being blind, you can see more. You close your eyes; you’re able to see a place or something that’s happening.” The idea of God Only Knows, he added, “summarised everything I was trying to express in a single song.”
Considering the fact that this is a song about devotion, its opening line has always been unsettling: “I may not always love you,” Wilson sings, a sudden cloud of uncertainty in the music’s clear blue sky. Yet it is of course this very line that makes God Only Knows truly extraordinary. This isn’t just a love song. It isn’t just about the billing and cooing, the early doveish days of courtship; it’s a song that recognises the fact that falling in love is somehow terrifying, that you go into that love blindly, as Wilson put it, but that in that blindness you can see that you are who you are because of someone else.
One of the controversies at the time of the song’s release was the fact that it had the word God in its title; it was so unprecedented that for a time the band was fearful that the record would not be granted airplay, while simultaneously fretting that to younger listeners the overtly religious title might seem, in the words of Wilson’s ex-wife, “too square”.
But “God” has its place in this song – not only does the jump into the unknown required to fall in love echo the leap of faith necessary to believe in God, the rest of the song’s lyrics proceed to dismantle the uncertainty of the first line while simultaneously citing godly creations: the stars above and the world that turns and the life that goes on. It first gives us doubt, then finds us reasons to believe.
I may not always love you
But long as there are stars above you
You never need to doubt it
I’ll make you so sure about it
God only knows what I’d be without you
If you should ever leave me
Though life would still go on believe me
The world could show nothing to me
So what good would living do me
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
If you should ever leave me
Well life would still go on believe me
The world could show nothing to me
So what good would living do me
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows what I’d be without you
God only knows
God only knows what I’d be without you
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