Lyrics to
The Word Before Last

This version of The Word Before Last was released by The Human League in 1979.

Our About The Human League page at Decade Lyrics includes the lyrics for The Word Before Last from 1979 as well as all of the other lyrics from The Human League that we have in our lyrics database.

Here's more interesting things in songs and lyrics tied to The Human League or about the 1970s in general.

You will notice that very appropriately I’m left-handed

This man I saw
Was happy then
And then loved
And on TV well
But now he cried
And he cried
And of course he had to want to die
But he watched him
Which made it worse
Of course, of course, of course, of course

You understand
He didn’t know
That it was someone else
Who looked the same
A similar voice taken
The clothes changed
But the face retained

Surrounded by
Old imagery
His brain bypassed
The eternal moment laid bare
No time to heal
Continual pain, continual pain, continual pain, continual pain

I spent a bad day yesterday
With a man and a picture of himself
The tape was running and the TV turned

…and described Mrs Thatcher’s first three months in power as disastrous

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The Human League has released many songs over the years besides The Word Before Last. The Human League released songs from 1979 to 2001 spanning across albums like Reproduction, Travelogue, Dare, Fascination!, Hysteria, Crash, Romantic?, Octopus, and Secrets. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by The Human League.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1979 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and The Word Before Last by The Human League

The lyrics to The Word Before Last are the words, verses and chorus for the song released by The Human League in 1979. Elements of the lyrics to The Word Before Last are both direct in meaning and also metaphorical with the real meanings of the song only known by The Human League and any collaborating writers working on the lyrics for The Word Before Last back when it was created.

Some people have an interest in the etymology behind words and phrases. You can take apart the lyrics to The Word Before Last by The Human League in a number of ways. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to The Word Before Last" means the words set to the music of The Word Before Last, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by The Human League. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to The Word Before Last and the lyrics to The Word Before Last are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of The Human League who came here looking just for the lyrics to The Word Before Last, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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