The song lyrics were written by the band Van Halen, as they were asked to write a song for the 1979 movie "Over the Edge" starring Matt Dillon. The movie (and the lyrics, although more obliquely) are about bored, rebellious youth with nothing better to do than get into trouble. If you see the movie, these lyrics will make more sense. It's a great movie if you grew up in the 70s/80s you'll definitely remember some of these characters from your own life. Fun fact, after writing the song, Van Halen decided not to let the movie use it.
You know what you know so you go break the terror of the urban spell
This alliance you say 'I'm on the threshold of greatness girl' so you burn
Your pagoda through the congo till there's a broken bond
On the birth of the search white trash
My native son
It will all find its way in time
Blossom riot poof
You know what you know so you go chain her to your flow
She bites through your lean dried meatas she's
Going to the movie show
In a bath of gliter and a tiny shiver
She crawls through your lava sea
Black sahara
I'm stepping into your space oddity
It will all find its way in time
Blossom riot poof
The sun is warming
My man is moistening
On the bomb
On the bond
On the bomb
This alliance you say 'I'm on the threshold of greatness girl' so you burn
Your pagoda through the congo till there's a broken bond
On the birth of the search white trash
My native son
It will all find its way in time
Blossom riot poof
You know what you know so you go chain her to your flow
She bites through your lean dried meatas she's
Going to the movie show
In a bath of gliter and a tiny shiver
She crawls through your lava sea
Black sahara
I'm stepping into your space oddity
It will all find its way in time
Blossom riot poof
The sun is warming
My man is moistening
On the bomb
On the bond
On the bomb
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Light Up The Sky
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Little Feat
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Overall about difficult moments of disappointment and vulnerability. Having hope and longing, while remaining optimistic for the future. Encourages the belief that with each new morning there is a chance for things to improve.
The chorus offers a glimmer of optimism and a chance at a resolution and redemption in the future.
Captures the rollercoaster of emotions of feeling lost while loving someone who is not there for you, feeling let down and abandoned while waiting for a lover. Lost with no direction, "Now I'm up in the air with the rain in my hair, Nowhere to go, I can go anywhere"
The bridge shows signs of longing and a plea for companionship. The Lyrics express a desire for authentic connection and the importance of Loving someone just as they are. "Just in passing, I'm not asking. That you be anyone but you”
Mountain Song
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto "Mountain Song", which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988.
"'Mountain Song' was actually about... I hate to say it but... drugs. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain," reveals Farrell. "What it feels to descend from the mountain top... not easy at all. The ascension is tough but exhilarating. Getting down is... it's a real bummer. Drugs is not for everybody obviously. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it."
"There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother; our last name was Smith. Cashing in when she cashed in her life. So... she decided that, to her... at that time, she was desperate. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets."
Mountain Song
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto "Mountain Song", which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988.
"'Mountain Song' was actually about... I hate to say it but... drugs. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain," reveals Farrell. "What it feels to descend from the mountain top... not easy at all. The ascension is tough but exhilarating. Getting down is... it's a real bummer. Drugs is not for everybody obviously. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it."
"There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother; our last name was Smith. Cashing in when she cashed in her life. So... she decided that, to her... at that time, she was desperate. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets."
Magical
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
How would you describe the feeling of being in love? For Ed Sheeran, the word is “Magical.” in HIS three-minute album opener, he makes an attempt to capture the beauty and delicacy of true love with words. He describes the magic of it all over a bright Pop song produced by Aaron Dessner.
"To me Riot Poof is about one part of my family that is the conqueror and the other part who where being conquered. They fought at both sides. And you have to find out who you are. Many people don't want to see that they're partly victim and partly the executioner. Every evening I get letters. Hundreds of letters. A great part of them are letters from young women (and men) who where sexually abused by adults they trusted. They hate themselves because they think they made the adults do this. They are all wearing a little victim sign. Like they belong like some elite group. They're drown in a lake called victimhood. Instead of saying: 'No! I have the pride of a lioness. I will hunt. I will escape from this all.' I found this place when I lost my baby. Then I understood the life force you can get from it. So I could go to Venus, to make passionate records there. I can't define my new record yet. I only see this picture in front of me, like it is filmed from a camera that is circling round the heart of Venus. So I can look at her in all her darkness." [Tori; OOR Magazine, Sept. 18, 1999]
"This record talks a lot about the shadows and the shadow world," says Amos. "`Riot Poof' is for all the jocks out there who need to deal with their secret sexuality." [Tori; Tower Records' Pulse Magazine, NOV99]
"I'm surprised when I see, for instance, gay men being racist or women colluding with that patriarchal thing, when women are sexist against women. So men don't surprise me. Being a lioness, I know the teeth and claws of women. But, of course, women have always been blamed. We see it down the centuries - 'if she didn't have a wet pussy then we wouldn't have been with her'. Urgh! And they have a woody sitting at the fuckin' table but they see it as this sanctified, insatiable body part. And women aren't allowed that - if they do, they become bad. That's what the song Riot Poof is about. It's like I'm the tooth fairy, the homo fairy and this is my present to all the homophobes. I'm leaving it under all their pillows. [She pauses] Blossom riot poof."
"Well, that being a poof doesn't mean you're not a hunter, that you're not masculine, or a man. And also being feminine doesn't mean that you're not a hunter either. There are all these concepts around but now the paradoxes are starting to live." [Tori; Attitude Magazine, Nov99]
"Yeah... Because I was brought up in such a Christian household it is about the father. It's a father God and a son saviour so when I say "The sun is warming / My man is moistening" in Riot Poof, which is really about a guy who finds his feminine after he burns everything to ground and decides maybe, head, face down to the earth, 'Maybe I need to think about this for ten seconds'." [Tori; Much More Music's Speakeasy, Jan 2000]
[Julie]: So who wrote a song about you? [Darren]: Because I was cooking for Tori Amos when I came out,she wrote a song about me. It was called Drama Queen which when translated into Dutch and back into English becomes Riot Poof, so that's what she called it. [Darren Staats, Tori's chef during the 1998 Plugged Tour; Gay.com Interview, Early 2001]
Thank you for all those quotes - it does help verify some of what I suspected the song is about. I think the themes are clear but it's still hard to decipher Tori's language.
I'd always thought the song was partly about self-hatred brought on by prejudice against a person's sexual orientation. The verse:
you know what you know so you go chain her to your flow she bites through your lean dried meatas she's going to the movie show in a bath of gliter and a tiny shiver she crawls through your lava sea black sahara i'm stepping into your space oddity
This, I cannot help but think it's about trivializing martyrdom - turning it into a sort of fashion statement. "She bites through your dry lean meat as she's going to the movie show - in a bath of glitter and a tiny shiver" - it all conjures images of a social scene, a world of superficiality, sharp tongues and bitchiness. I think this is Tori's assessment of the gay scene or maybe just the idea that it's suddenly cool to embrace sexual diversity but it also works as a smokescreen to cover the fact that there's a whole lot of anger and hatred underneath it all. The scene, in fact, perpetuates this sort of behaviour but makes it out to be something cheap, fun and harmless.
I could be completely wrong but still. I do recall reading something about the gay scene and its superficiality.
This song is totally underrated. One of the best on Venus for sure.