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Sometimes spoken word can be a little jarring in the middle of a song.
You’re singing along and then all of the sudden, someone starts talking? And you definitely don’t have all those words memorized. So, you just have to sit there and wait until the chorus picks back up.
But everyone now and then, spoken word can really add to the message of the song. Here are five spoken-word songs that tell a really great story:
1. Tom Waits — “9th & Hennepin”
Waits’ words describe in harrowing imagery a street corner in New York City. “And the girl behind the counter has a tattooed tear. One for every year he’s away she said,” Waits writes. In the last few lines, you discover that the person speaking is just observing the corner from a passing train.
2. Kanye West — “Who Will Survive in America”
The song on West’s album “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” is built on a sample of the poem “Comment No. 1” by famed jazz poet Gil Scott-Heron. West performed the song at Scott-Heron’s funeral in 2011.
3. Metallica — “Enter Sandman”
The song plays on every person’s fear of the dark. By using the classic sandman poem they step up the creepiness by a factor of 10. The spoken word starts at about 3:45.
