| Jackson Browne – The Pretender Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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It is interesting to hear such different views of this song. I don’t get some comments about yuppies (JB born in 1948), herds, lousy kids, military engagements, expectations etc. Over the years I have constructed a different take on this song. Great album. Listen to the upwelling at the beginning. This is a tenuously hopeful song. There is some urgency. This is a guy who doesn’t count himself among the junk man, the veteran and others who have watched their dreams sail out of sight, but he realizes he will be soon if he doesn’t snap out of it. He is aware of the time going by. This guy has chosen a living over a dream of being a fireman or an astronaut or a rock star. This is not some poor shlub that worked his way to asst manager at Taco bell at the age of 47. This is you. Are you doing what you dreamed of all your life? The Pretender feels the urgency of time going by. He’s not a kid anymore and the dream is eating at him. He has to choose to abdicate what is left of his dream and be able to rest OR run down the dream. I get the feeling he’s not sleeping much so he strolls “Out into the cool of the evening…He knows that all his hopes and dreams Begin and end there.” In these restless evening walks he is building to a decision. It would probably be easier if he just fell in love like those laughing lovers as they run through the night. Fall desperately and madly in true love (contender) and he won’t have to choose off and toil with the decision between a meaningless existence and possible failure chasing a fading dream. It would be easier to just fall in love. (Holy crap, isn’t that every mid-life crisis you have ever heard of?) Are you prepared for the Pretender? If it’s not you now, it will be. This is a very human song but it is not depressing to me. I am pulling for this guy. I’ll say a prayer for the Pretender. Come on man, it ain’t over. (By this post, you would think I have a bunch of time on my hands.) |
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