I’d like your band more if I understood any of the lyrics

It happens to me all of the time. I run across a song I really like, so I dig around and decide to buy the album. I listen a few times and think “dang, this is good.” But after another few plays, I end up shelving it. Why? Because although the album sounds good, there’s nothing else there, or, perhaps more accurately, there’s nothing else I can get from it. Why? Because I can’t understand any of the lyrics. Sure, if the album is really good I might get online and try to figure out if anyone else knows what the guy is singing, but even that won’t extend their likability much; just knowing the lyrics are out there isn’t the same as really following along.

Here’s a good example. Once you listen to this song a few times, the little extra bleeps become an important – and wonderful – part of the song. But the lack of intelligible lyrics, at least to me, gets old fast.

Lead Sin Fang Bous lead singer Sindri Mar Sigfusson is Icelandic, but according to NPR, “Luckily for an American audience, Sigfusson’s imagery-rich lyrics are easier to discern than the name of his new outfit, since he sings in English, rather than his native tongue.” Yeah, right.