Ghostwriters for famous artists

[Lowdz]

Marillion had an outside lyric writer after the split with Fish I believe.

[Architeuthis]

Prince wrote songs for other bands. The first one that comes to mind is Manic Monday by the Bengals. ( I think )

[Kotowboy]

Bangles.

[Stadler]

A LOT of famous songs are written by outside writers. And its sad. Why must a musician, to be known, have to get weighted
And written songs made for them to be well known. Damn this dictated society.

I don't understand this point of view.  Well, I understand it, but I don't understand the statement "damn this dictated society"?  What does that mean?   So you can't be good at ONE thing, you have to be the total package?   I've had this conversation before; I think Elvis wrote something like three songs in his catalogue.    Frank Sinatra.   

Art is about expression; express how you see fit.  Are you really telling me that Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan are somehow "better" because they croak out their own lyrics, than, say, Pavarotti? 

[Stadler]

Oh, and John Helmer wrote lyrics for Marillion post-Fish, and Prince did in fact write for the Bangles.

[bosk1]

Interestingly, Prince falls into that category, having written The Bangles' "Manic Monday", Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing compares 2 U", and several others.

Yeah, I was coming in here to mention him.  Good call. 

Tom Petty wrote Stop Draggin' My Heart Around for Stevie Nicks.

And my memory may be a bit fuzzy, but I seem to recall that, for awhile, either Paul Simon or Art Garfunkel (or maybe both of them) were doing a lot of writing for others.  I did a quick Google search, but couldn't find anything.  Can anyone confirm or deny?

[KevShmev]

Prince wrote songs for other bands. The first one that comes to mind is Manic Monday by the Bengals. ( I think )

That and Nothing Compares 2 U (covered by Sinéad O'Connor) are the two I usually think of.

[Kwyjibo]

A LOT of famous songs are written by outside writers. And its sad. Why must a musician, to be known, have to get weighted
And written songs made for them to be well known. Damn this dictated society.

I don't understand this point of view.  Well, I understand it, but I don't understand the statement "damn this dictated society"?  What does that mean?   So you can't be good at ONE thing, you have to be the total package?   I've had this conversation before; I think Elvis wrote something like three songs in his catalogue.    Frank Sinatra.   

Art is about expression; express how you see fit.  Are you really telling me that Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan are somehow "better" because they croak out their own lyrics, than, say, Pavarotti?

Totally agree with this.

And I think that there are artists out there that would be much better if they would just play/sing the songs others have written.

For instance I really like Steve Morse's guitar playing, but his solo records are almost always very mediocre, because I don't think he's a good song writer. In a band situation where he's only contributing some parts and not writing whole songs he's much much better.

I would say this "dictated society" works more the other way round. If you can't write your own songs you aren't a "real musician" is the feeling I often get from people. If someone relys on outside writers, he's got no credibility, especially in the prog scene.