Beginning today, song lyrics for hundreds of thousands of songs from major publishers will be incorporated into Yahoo! Music through Gracenote’s growing database, thanks to a new licensing deal between the companies. Through the agreement, consumers can search for song lyrics from the Yahoo! Music Search bar, simply by entering even a partial lyric from the song.

“You mean Bob Dylan isn’t actually saying ‘The ants, my friend, are in a bowling pin?’” asks Ian Rogers, general manager of Yahoo! Music. “Finally, a free, legal and definitive way to settle a bet with the guy sitting next to you at the bar who is certain the Ramones’ most famous anthem declares, ‘I wanna piece of bacon.’”

All is not beer and skittles with the new lyrics service, however, as the database is far from complete. Yahoo! says it has lyrics for over 400,000 songs, and a quick test reveals that it contains lyrics for only four songs from The Doors, while Justin Timberlake has 15, and Jessica Simpson has 40 songs.

Even having officially licensed lyrics does not guarantee accuracy. Harry McCracken posted on his PC World blog that there are still common errors, for instance, Yahoo's version of The Ronettes' You, Baby has Ronnie Spector singing “Baby, baby now you're gonna know/All the ways I've had to throw you so,” when she really says, “All the ways I plan to thrill you so.”

One other interesting thing to note is that the licensed lyrics come with its own version of DRM – you are not allowed to casually cut-and-paste any of the lyrics text.