The 10 Best Popular Song Lyrics
Not as Belles-lettres, But for Beneficent Persuasion
Millions upon millions of songs have been written, so it’s impossible to truly select the “best” lyrics, as many of the very best were probably never heard by more than a handful of people, or even just one or two.
That having been said, of the popular songs (those that were played on the radio or at least appeared on recordings you might find in a record store), the following are my selections (and so are limited to songs I was exposed to, meaning they skew rockward and ‘60s and ‘70s-ward). Feel free to add your rebuttals, replacements, suggestions, etc. in the comments section.
NOTE: In this article I’m not talking about lyrics for the sake of “art,” necessarily. If I were choosing those, among my top picks would be Jim Croce’s Operator (“You can keep the dime”), Guy Clark's L.A. Freeway and Bruce Springsteen’s Thunder Road (“The screen door slams, Mary’s dress sways…), but this list is about the goodwill behind the lyrics — words that can change people’s minds and hearts if they allow them to.In most cases, the artists represented here released songs that I like better than these as far as the music goes (such as CCR, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Black Sabbath), but these are the creations of theirs that stand out to me the most as far as the impact of the lyrics.
The entries appear in alphabetical order
Eve of Destruction by Barry McGuire (written by P.F. Sloan)
Fortunate Son by CCR (Creedence Clearwater Revival)
From a Distance by Bette Midler; also covered by The Byrds (written by Julie Gold)
Lean On Me by Bill Withers
Saturday Night Special by Lynyrd Skynyrd
Share the Land by The Guess Who (written and sung by the best rock singer ever, Burton Cummings)
War by Edwin Starr (written by Norman Whitfield & Barrett Strong; covered by several other artists, such as Bruce Springsteen)
War Pigs by Black Sabbath
What’s Going On? by Marvin Gaye
Where Have All the Flowers Gone? by Pete Seeger