When you really look closely at the career of the Bee Gees, and by that we mean the entirety of their career, well, impressive doesn’t quite cover it. Anybody who concentrates only on the disco-era hits is giving them short shrift, because they were also baroque pop masters before that.
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One of the prime tracks from that era of their career was “Words,” which was a hit all over the world when released in 1968. This ballad, so beautiful, ironically emanated from the band members’ frustrations with some arguments they were enduring.
The Other Side of the Bee Gees
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s claim about no second acts in American lives certainly didn’t apply to the Bee Gees, perhaps because of their origins in Australia and Great Britain. Most people know about their massive success with disco-oriented, falsetto-fueled hits in the era of Saturday Night Fever. But if you listen to enough oldies radio, you’ll know these guys were churning out smashes long before that.
In the late ’60s, the group was one of the most dependable hitmakers of the era, concentrating on lush, dramatic balladry. By that time, brothers Barry, Robin, and Maurice had developed estimable songwriting chops to go along with their incredible vocal harmonies.
To give you an example about their prolific nature, they churned out seven Top-20 hits in the U.S. in 1967 and 1968. All of those songs were written by the band themselves, which was equally impressive considering their youth (twins Maurice and Robin hadn’t yet turned 20, while Barry was only three years older.) “Words” was released smack-dab in the middle of this period as a stand-alone single.
“Words” of Love
In the book The Ultimate Biography of the Bee Gees – Tales of the Brothers Gibb, Robin Gibb explained the not-so-rosy atmosphere that helped to inspire this sweet song of love and dedication:
“Words reflects a mood. It was written after an argument. Barry had been arguing with someone, I had been arguing with someone, and happened to be in the same mood. [The arguments were] about absolutely nothing. They were just words. That is what the song is all about; words can make you happy or words can make you sad.”
Unlike so many of the Bee Gees hits of that time, “Words” contains no harmonies. Barry Gibb sang the song solo, and one of the most memorable parts of the track is when he took care of the final refrain with all the instrumentation falling away. That threw a spotlight on the incredible control he had over the tremolo effect of his voice.
Behind the Meaning of “Words”
Like so many of those early pop hits by the Bee Gees, the lyrics deal in extremes and high drama. It’s not just a simple smile the narrator asks of his love, but rather an everlasting smile. These two innocents find themselves in a fraught environment: This world has lost its glory / Let’s start a brand new story now, my love.
Talk in everlasting words, Barry sings. And dedicate them all to me. This is by no means a halfway proposition. “Words” snaps itself out of its flowery language when the narrator directly addresses why he needs to make such proclamations: You think that I don’t even mean a single word I say / It’s only words, and words are all I have to take your heart away.
Put those lyrics together with a typically engaging Bee Gees melody and those silky vocals from Barry Gibb, and it’s no wonder “Words” remains not just one of the group’s high points, but also a standard from that era when orchestrated pop was all the rage. A few arguments might have started “Words,” but the Bee Gees delivered an undeniable message of love and unity in the wake of all that.
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