Oh, go on then. A lyrics quiz based on the first twenty tracks that a randomised playlist turns up. This is an old-school quiz: no poll, no screening, just argue it out in the comments.

Oh, and it’s bloody hard: I think that, if I were to look at it next week, I wouldn’t get half of it. To help, though, three-and-a-half bands or artists turned up twice. Or three came up twice and one came up one-and-a-half times, you might say.

Edit: Bonus point details and hint added for number 17.


1. I’d like to dream my troubles all away

2. She wears the clothes of an emperor/But her paintings are a sham

3. They couldn’t tell Lou Reed from Doug Yule

4. I’ve got a heavy coat, it’s filled with rocks and sand

5. Having no future, it’s a terrible thing

6. I do not want your pearly gates, don’t want your streets of gold

7. Punished for speaking and praise for the silence

8. She stumbled in sometime last loneliness

9. It shows/While that bastard is in, unemployment grows

10. I’ve met these fractured thoughts before/They grin and wander round this place

11. House is on fire, vipers in the grass

12. Woods full of crazies where the alligators chomp on you (chomp! chomp!)
OR: Got blues, and jazz, and country and western too

13. Cash is gonna flow down by the old mainstream.

14. Take your time and take a bow/This place is gonna blow

15. A purple dog that wears spats

16. The flower looks good in your hair

17. They, they always try to blame it on the blacks/But it’s really those in power who’ll stab you in the back (Bonus point if you can name the original artist and what the song was called when they did it; hint: the lyrics and title are totally different between the two)

18. Louie, Louie, Louie, Louie, Lou

19. Black is a cast/Two is a crowd

20. It feels like we just got started