love songs about things and NOT people

Specifically a certain part of himself.

In the same vein The Beach Boys' "Take A Load Off Your Feet"

 

x2

 

I see your John Lennon reference and raise you Jimi Hendrix The Stars That Play With Laughing Sam's Dice

 

I hear you. However, one might argue that this Hendrix song is much more explicitly about the effects of speed and LSD, to the point that the title is a more direct reference rather than an attempt to be coy and slip something in.

FWIW, here is Snopes' take on the "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" controversy. I think this covers it pretty thoroughly:

http://www.snopes.com/music/hidden/lucysky.asp

 

NRBQ- Little Floater

..."I'm in love with an automobile and I know it's in love with me. When I get behind the wheel, I know what it is to be free."

 

Carl Wilson's dog.

 

Another car - Red Barchetta (Rush)

 

Vegetables - Beach Boys

 

Jimmy Buffett - Cheesburger In Paradise

Never such a song of such intense devotion towards a 1/4 of ground beef either before or since.

 

I believe Fats Waller recorded a ditty called "I Love to Whistle." Others that come to me off the top of my head are the old hymn "I Love to Hear the Story" and Tom Paxton's "The Marvelous Toy," recorded by any number of artists (the one I grew up with is by the Chad Mitchell Trio, but Mr. Paxton himself also recorded quite a charming version). For that matter, doesn't little what's-his-name "love that dragon Puff" in "Puff the Magic Dragon"?

 

Oh, bother: that should be, of course, "I Love to *Tell* the Story"--the ol' brain is half asleep today for some reason.

By way of atonement, here's another one: "Misalliance," by Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, which is a (most amusing) metaphorical account of the ill-fated love between a bindweed and a honeysuckle. Although it doesn't include the word "love," their "Slow Train" is effectively also a love song, a tribute to the picturesque names of rural rail stops fading into oblivion.

 

Awesome.

 

I read an interview with Bryan Adams where he revealed that Run To You was not about a mistress but actually about his guitar.

 

I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass - Nick Lowe

 

I'll throw one in:

I Love L.A. - Randy Newman

 

Ben-Michael Jackson

 

The Sunrays - "I Live For The Sun"
The Fastastic Baggys - "Big Gun Board"
Arlo Guthrie - "The Motorcycle Song"
Dennis Wilson - "River Song"
Charles Manson - "My Garbage Dump"

 

MY BLUE HEAVEN - Fats Domino. I take it to be home. "Just Molly and me, and Baby makes three, in our Blue Heaven"

And Roy Orbison sure loved BLUE BAYOU !

 

Chestnut Mare

 

"The Minstrel"-- Dan Fogelberg

Great story song about his sailboat, "The Minstrel"