hear hear bassnation. from a board that waffles on about grime as much as this one does, this has to be about the daftest question i've ever heard. words add texture, tell stories, put messages across, document peoples lives and help to set music in a historical context. think about grime a second. what makes it so of its time and place, so absolutely contemporary and real. is it the music? no. so i'd say there's plenty of point if only for these reasons. however, less of the highfalutin stuff, they just sound good and give people a way of interacting with music i.e. singing along as marc mentioned. personally i don't like much stuff *without* lyrics, and, yes, i do listen to them, like about 95 per cent of the rest of people. seriously, i'm totally dumbfounded by some of the responses here, because they make me think people are missing about 75 per cent of the point of what they're listening to.