In honor of the 11th anniversary of this site, here’s a very important post speculating about the usage of a folksy cliche.
Today is the 11th anniversary of 11 Points. I published my first article on June 11th, 2008 and now, more than 1,100 posts later, here we are on the milestone birthday of all milestone birthdays. And how will we honor this momentous occasion?
Ha, great material.
No, to honor my 11th anniversary I decided to write up the dumbest idea I could find on my list of hundreds of possible 11 Points ideas. And that idea is this.
There’s an old cliche that goes “measure twice, cut once.” The literal meaning related to building or craft work — measure your board or, I guess, felt?, twice before you cut. The metaphorical meaning is that slow, careful, extra preparation is of paramount importance before taking a one-time, irreversible shot.
So, to extend the metaphor, I feel like the cliche could apply to relationships too. But using it that way is *super* hacky.
Therefore, if a musical act were to write lyrics that used “measure twice, cut once” as a metaphor for love, it would take a perfect storm of factors:
- A musical act that’s cool with being cheesy and/or sappy as hell
- A musical act that’s cool with making folksy-ish, vaguely or overtly blue collar, references
- A musical act that’s cool with using cliches
- A musical act that tries to be deep but struggles to get actually deep
Based on those criteria, these are the 11 musical acts that I believe would write lyrics that feature “measure twice, cut once” as a metaphor for love. Also, I’m not going to include Nickelback, because in a list mocking a cliche, I can’t go for the lowest hanging cliche fruit of all.
11 | The Georgia Satellites
10 | Shakira
9 | Sugarland
8 | Semisonic
7 | Indigo Girls
6 | Barenaked Ladies
5 | Rascall Flatts
4 | One Republic
3 | Florida Georgia Line
2 | The Fray
1 | Train
It’s been a hell of an 11 years! Here’s to another 11.
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