OT - Song lyrics puzzle
 

Okay, back in the day, song lryics made for great puzzling. If you're conversant in pop culture, then it's fun to contemplate what well-known song includes "Neil Young" in its lyrics.*

Regrettably, the internet has largely spoiled this once fertile ground for puzzling. So, it now takes some creativity to come up with a suitable puzzle based on song lyrics.

Recently, I think I came up with one. We'll see how it does... indeed, this is one where you can give yourself a "score" rather than simply answering the question correctly or incorrectly.

- - -

Find a well-known song, with one word that fits the following description:

-the word must not be an article, pronoun, preposition, or other trivial word

-the word cannot appear in the song title

-the word cannot appear back-to-back more than once in the song

-the word must not appaer as part of a particular phrase in more than half of its appearances



Your score for the puzzle is the number of times that the word is used in the song's lyrics.


I have a qualifying song/word which I believe scores a 25. See how well you can do.








* - That would be Sweet Home Alabama, by Lynyrd Skynyrd, and shame on you for resorting to the footnote.

Quik,

As Bart once asked Homer--

"Do you even have a job anymore?"

Is there a generally accepted lyrics database somewhere that could of "official" for this puzzle?

Fair question - I don't know the answer, but that would certainly help in resolving potential differences. I don't think there's anything too official, as most lyrics are copyrighted and their reproduction in official form is a bit shaky.

I am ashamed to admit that, as a former professional writer, I do not know whether the word "here" is technically a pronoun or not.

I do know of a song that uses the contraction "here's" 28 times, by my count.

I guess that rules out "Oh" and "Baby". :)

There are several lyrics sites that I look up frequently. One of my favorites is http://lyrics.astraweb.com/

Re: OT - Song lyrics puzzle
 

Darn, but for that rule, I had a 28 point Who song.

I think I've got a 25 point song as well.

Edit: 25 points by official lyrics, though you could argue for more if you listen to the song.

Again, not necessarily in the spirit of the puzzle, but the U2 song "Numb" uses the word "don't" about 90 times (I lost count).

Since this puzzle has been around for a few hours, I'm going to post my solution.

Talking Heads' "Once In A Lifetime" officially uses "water" 25 times, only 12 of which occur in the phrase "water flowing underground", so it just squeaks in as being official.

Edit: The astraweb link doesn't work, so it's been taken out.

That was my entry also.