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September 30, 2011 3:20 PM

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History of made-up lyrics: 26 songs over 49 years

By: Will Goodman
Topics: Viral Video

(CBS) - How many major songs over the decades have had a series of nonsensical words in the lyrics? Tons! Check out the video above to watch 26 songs with made up words in them over the course of almost five decades.

Nicely done! This video gets a huge "gabba gabba goo" with extra "malalalala" from all of us here at The Feed for being just way too cool for school!

The YouTube video was directed by Joe Sabia and features Jane Lui on vocals, Michael T. on bass and Jonathan Batiste on piano. If you'd like to check out more work by them, feel free to click on any of their names to go to their respective pages.

9 Comments +


by illcountryboy October 6, 2011 1:50 PM EDT: It is called scat and is a classic vocal jazz component. And since Rock and Blues are derived from jazz - it makes sense that good musicians use it.

In vocal jazz, scat singing is vocal improvisation with wordless vocables, nonsense syllables or without words at all. Scat singing gives singers the ability to sing improvised melodies and rhythms, to create the equivalent of an instrumental solo using their voice.; Reply to this comment


by mecury69 October 3, 2011 9:43 AM EDT: This was disappointing CBS. The video is great but your write up is way off the mark and does the video an injustice.

These are not non-nonsensical words but vocalizations and who the heck interpreted that way?

'Alligator Lizards in the Sky', "Mojo Sideboard', etc. are nonsensical lyrics.

You ruined the first viewing of this excellent video with your misrepresentation.; Reply to this comment


by rtyurty October 2, 2011 10:48 AM EDT: Duh. You forgot fa la lala la la lala la la...

This is the stupidest subject, approached most stupidly, that I've encountered in quite some time...; Reply to this comment


by snorkyturtle October 2, 2011 2:31 AM EDT: To me these aren't really words either, and how many times can "na" be considered a different word, if it's used to different rhythms?; Reply to this comment


by rwsmith29456 October 1, 2011 10:54 PM EDT: I think it would have been better with nonsense phrases that consist of real words.; Reply to this comment


by realtimecoffee October 1, 2011 7:03 PM EDT: sus-sussudio; Reply to this comment


by Billygage October 1, 2011 3:48 PM EDT: Agree with previous post. Also to be considered as a professional vocalist one should be in the habit of warming up the voice. As for "Lie, lie, lie, lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie." that is what the "Boxer" experienced with his every turn. Clever lyrical turn by Mr. Simon. Good premise, not thought through or executed well. Sophomores will be sophomores.; Reply to this comment

by jmcnelis October 1, 2011 3:12 PM EDT

You do realize that these are not made up words, right? Maybe one or two of the examples, sure, but the majority are just vocalizations, like "lalala" and the like. You may want to classify them as nonsensical, but really, they don't fit that bill.

I was expecting things like Steve Miller's The Joker, with that famous made up word, "pompatus".

Reply to this comment


by jaykay3141 October 1, 2011 7:39 PM EDT: Or Kurt Cobain's concatenative "nevermind" which a lot (NOT "alot") of people now think is a real word ...

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