| Radiohead – No Surprises Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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It could be applied to aging baby boomers who used to protest the government (You were so tired, happy, bring down the government, they don't, they don't speak for us) who have resignated themselves to high-stress jobs where they are subjected to heart disease or exposed to dangerous chemicals that are killing them (a job that slowly kills you), eating foods that clog their arteries and smoke and drink so that their body is full of poisons (A heart that's full up like a landfill), and they are slowly coming down with cancer, strokes, and heart attacks (some cancers have symptoms of bruises that don't go away and heart attacks and strokes can be brought on by blood clots blocking blood vessels and don't move), so they deal with businesses that poison the air (I'll take the quiet life, a handshake of carbon monoxide) such as the automobile industry. No longer arguing or protesting (Silent, silent). They may be on their death bed with a terminal disease caused by their lifestyle of the aforementioned or it could be their last time mentioning their dissent before taking in a life of pure acquiescence (This is my final fit, my final bellyache). They trade in the thrill and flavor of their life for the security of assimilation and in exchange for acceptance they get their house in the suburbs complete with a yard and 2.5 children (Such a pretty house, such a pretty garden). And they don't want any stirring up of their past excitement (No alarms and no surprises, please). |
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| Radiohead – Paranoid Android Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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I think in tying the lyrics together to mean one thing creates a violent allegory where the victim finally exacts revenge on his tormentors while mocking their beliefs and their traits. One interpretation I get from it is the outsider who watches the upper-class born-again jocks with disgust and mocks them until the outsider decides to make them pay for their hypocrisy. The person fears for his safety daily, but still refuses to assimilate and therefore will remain an outsider (I am paranoid, but not an android)... So this person comes in with a gun and comes after this tormentor and everyone does what he says because he's got a gun (When I am king, you will be first against the wall). The jock-type tells him, "I do really like you." but his opinion is no longer of any consequence. So then the jock-type begs for his life, a kicking, squealing gucci little piggie. Perhaps this jock-type has called the singer names and never called him by his rightful name, and this angers the singer (You don't remember, you don't remember, why don't you remember my name Off with his head man, off with his head man Why don't you remember my name?), but now that the tormentor has a gun pointed at him he is using his name (I guess he does). The rain down part would be where you would see in slow motion the victim pulling the trigger or making that final decision to go beyond the point of no return and the second time you hear this is when the victim is actually shooting the person and maybe these are the things that are playing in his head or it could be all of those memories of being tormented flooding back into his mind while he is making that brutal decision: (That's it sir, you're leaving) the decision to through with it and take this person's life (the crackle of pig skin) pigskin a reference to football, maybe deflating a football (player)? (the dust and the screaming) the bullet passing through the person and hitting the wall behind making some plaster fall and the screaming people when they see the murder (The yuppies networking) the rest of the people fleeing (the panic, the vomit) People panicking, maybe getting sick from seeing the gore or the jock-type's body losing its muscle control or the panic of the shot person causing him to become physically ill (God loves his children) mocking this person's religion by saying "How will your beliefs save you now?" or mocking his belief that he is a religious person and therefore one of God's children and now look at him -OR- This shooter believes he is doing God's work by eliminating this person -OR- In God's creation he also created ugly things like panic and vomit and so it mocks just how much God loves His children to give them such awful things. Of course, I could be wrong. |
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| David Byrne – Like Humans Do Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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I thought it said, "TV's in repair" which would make this song very similar to my growing up with a working mom. It was hard for her to keep up with the housework so there were dishes in the sink and the floor might not have been vacuumed and the rooms upstairs not cleaned and our TV broke many times. And I am almost positive that it's wiggle while you work. Maybe it's a song about a dysfunctional family...the radio edit (I guess it comes standard with all Windows Media Player XP's?) changed the lyric watching TV while stoned to "We're eating off plates and kiss with our tongues"...boy if that ain't dysfunctional.... |
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| Zebda – Motivé Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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I love Zebda, but these lyrics seemed eerie after 9/11. It's all about revenge on those countries that are holding their brothers hostage ("Ce soir ennemi connaîtra le prix du sang et des larmes" means "Tonight the enemy will know the price of blood and tears") and breaking down those bars and for those brothers who fall a friend will come from the shadows to replace them. Very creepy. |
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| Zebda – Tomber La Chemise Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| This song was very popular when I was studying in Tours my sophomore year of college. I loved the video and would stay up late to watch it on La Cinquiéme. | |
| David Bowie – John, I'm Only Dancing Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| I always thought this was about a gay couple at a club or maybe at home and they are arguing about a girl that one was seen dancing with. There's some hints of allegation, but the one is trying convince John that he didn't do anything with her and that they were only dancing. So the accuser is pretty cynical ("You're everyone that ever cared"). | |
| David Bowie – As the World Falls Down Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| The whole movie seems like a sexual allusion. Here's this girl on the brink of adulthood who resents her little brother (childhood) and is tempted by a man to enter his world of the dark and unknown. He woos her by granting her every wish and dream as long as it serves within his purpose. In order to reach the man she has to endure a treacherous maze (puberty?) and can only do so with the aid of her friends. But yet when she finally does reach it, she chooses to hold onto childhood a little bit longer and turn away from the man although the invitation back is always open to her. When Jareth sings in Underground "It's only forever" he might mean that once you become an adult you are an adult for the rest of your life. Sarah chooses that instead of quickly going to adulthood that she will take small steps to get there and passes her childhood onto Toby while still retaining her part of it too (Hoggle et al). | |
| David Bowie – Magic Dance Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| gJstar are you kidding? The tight pants and the big hair is why it holds appeal with girls when they finally get old enough to realize why they liked it so much. What other fairy tale features a sexy Brit rock star wearing tight pants and makeup? Okay, "Tommy" doesn't count. That's where I started my true infatuation with David Bowie. I never got into idols (and I was a preteen during the New Kids on the Block/Vanilla Ice era too), but while my friends plastered Donny, Danny, and Jordan on their walls, I had David Bowie looking down on me from my ceiling. Damn, I am beginning to fall for him all over again while I play a 5-hour mp3 block of David Bowie songs that I ripped from my CD collection on my computer... | |
| David Bowie – Young Americans Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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The 20/50 years is about working, right? Most people then started their careers when they were 20 and their lives were pretty carefree until then and then they worked until retirement. This song, or at least the first part of it makes me think of an immigrant girl who falls for an American thinking that she will get great things for it and has the American dream in her head, but then their relationship becomes sour and the stories that she might have heard from her father about America are not turning out like he said (Papa's heroes). It only took him minutes to ruin her life (I guess he's not a 60-minute man?) by making her pregnant so that she had to marry him (took his ring, took his babies). |
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| Ben Folds Five – One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| This is a song about someone (I don't want to assume it's Ben) that shows that he still doesn't accept himself as being worthy because he is still dwelling on the past and using his external fortune (fame, money, celebrity) to prove that he is now worthy when it shouldn't really matter...but then again, as a poor kid who grew up around middle-class racists who did horrible things to me, my things, my house, and my family now with a BA and living abroad while those same losers work as grocery store cashiers and fast food restaurant managers and some of them already divorced by the time they were 22 with kids to boot, I can totally see where Ben is coming from (and plus I was little for my age growing up). No matter how down I get, I know that it would take a whole lot more crap to sink to the level of my former bullies. I am one angry 5'7" geek :-) | |
| Ben Folds Five – Selfless, Cold, and Composed Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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This is the song about a girl who has dumped her boyfriend and while he is still emotionally attached to her, she is cool, probably playing the "Let's Be Friends" card. So the person who is saying these words is telling her that the way she has detached herself from all of the things that their relationship used to mean disgusts him. He's still worked up about it and she's calm. This is a beautiful song, one of the best Ben Folds Five songs on this album. |
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| Ben Folds Five – Steven's Last Night In Town Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| And of course the telephone ringing in the middle of the song. The first few times I heard that part of the song, I thought it was my phone, but it was actually the phone ringing while they were recording the song. I like this one because of the klezmer flavor. | |
| Ben Folds Five – The Last Polka Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| My favorite lines are in the verse at the end. The whole thing where his girlfriend thinks that he's nothing without her and he reminds her that he managed to get through the previous 25 years without her. And the piano when Ben sings "You've been pushing me like a sore tooth". This is also my favorite Ben Folds Five song. | |
| Ben Folds Five – Cigarette Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| It's a song about a man whose wife has mental and substance problems. Maybe she takes tranquilizers but it doesn't help their relationship or solve her problems. And of all of the drugs that she uses, the one that puts them all at risk are those damn cigarettes. | |
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