This song is written as the perspective of the boys in the street, as a whole, and what path they are going to choose as they get older and grow into men. (This is why the music video takes place in an orphanage.) The seen, and unseen collective suffering is imbedded in the boys’ mind, consciously or subconsciously, and is haunting them. Which path will the boys choose? Issac Hayes is the voice of reason, maybe God, the angel on his shoulder, or the voice of his forefathers from beyond the grave who can see the big picture and are pleading with the boys not to continue the violence and pattern of killing their brothers, but to rise above. The most beautiful song and has so many levels. Racism towards African Americans in America would not exist if everyone sat down and listened to this song and understood the history behind the words. The power, fear, pleading in RZA and Ghostface voices are genuine and powerful. Issac Hayes’ strong voice makes the perfect strong father figure, who is possibly from beyond the grave.
Tonight will be
The night that we
Begin to ease
The plugs out of the dam.
And we will stand
Knee deep in the flow,
The undertow
Will grab our heels and won't let go.
And while we hold,
Our legs quivering,
The water rises now
To our teeth
When we just let go
And sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping our backs.
To breath in the air will be
The only thing that we have
And all the wasted nights
And empty moments
In our lives flushed away
As we sway with the rhythm
Of the waves bobbing us up.
Crests fall to troughs we feel our gills open up.
And sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping our backs.
To breath in the air will be
The only thing that we have
And if the hook sets in
The bottom of our lungs,
We'll rip it out and lick the blood off with our tongues.
The despair can ravage you
If you turn your head around to look down the path
That's led you here,
Because what can you change?
You're a vessel now
Floating down the waterways.
You can take your rudder
And aim your ship,
Just don't bother with the things left in your wake.
Just sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping your back.
To breathe in the air will be
The only thing that you have
And your love will be warm nights
With pockets of moonlight
Spotlighting you as you drift,
The actor in this play.
And you walk across the stage,
Take a bow, hear the applause,
And as the curtain falls,
Just know you did it all
The best that you knew how
And you can hear them cheering now.
So let a smile out and show your teeth
Because you know you lived it well.
The night that we
Begin to ease
The plugs out of the dam.
And we will stand
Knee deep in the flow,
The undertow
Will grab our heels and won't let go.
And while we hold,
Our legs quivering,
The water rises now
To our teeth
When we just let go
And sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping our backs.
To breath in the air will be
The only thing that we have
And all the wasted nights
And empty moments
In our lives flushed away
As we sway with the rhythm
Of the waves bobbing us up.
Crests fall to troughs we feel our gills open up.
And sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping our backs.
To breath in the air will be
The only thing that we have
And if the hook sets in
The bottom of our lungs,
We'll rip it out and lick the blood off with our tongues.
The despair can ravage you
If you turn your head around to look down the path
That's led you here,
Because what can you change?
You're a vessel now
Floating down the waterways.
You can take your rudder
And aim your ship,
Just don't bother with the things left in your wake.
Just sail belly up to the clouds,
The rocks scraping your back.
To breathe in the air will be
The only thing that you have
And your love will be warm nights
With pockets of moonlight
Spotlighting you as you drift,
The actor in this play.
And you walk across the stage,
Take a bow, hear the applause,
And as the curtain falls,
Just know you did it all
The best that you knew how
And you can hear them cheering now.
So let a smile out and show your teeth
Because you know you lived it well.
Lyrics submitted by wimplucy, edited by Mellow_Harsher
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
I Can't Go To Sleep
Wu-Tang Clan
Wu-Tang Clan
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.
Amazing
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran tells a story of unsuccessfully trying to feel “Amazing.” This track is about the being weighed down by emotional stress despite valiant attempts to find some positivity in the situation. This track was written by Ed Sheeran from the perspective of his friend. From the track, we see this person fall deeper into the negative thoughts and slide further down the path of mental torment with every lyric.
Page
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
There aren’t many things that’ll hurt more than giving love a chance against your better judgement only to have your heart crushed yet again. Ed Sheeran tells such a story on “Page.” On this track, he is devastated to have lost his lover and even more saddened by the feeling that he may never move on from this.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
To me this is the best lyric ever written and only CC knows what his song is really about. What’s so cool about music is that it speaks to people in different ways. The listener could interpret it totally different than the writer intended it to be.
So here is what this song means to me: I see the "Flow" as life and the "Rocks that scrape our backs" as the bad things that happen is life, the "Crests fall to troughs we feel our gills open up", there are ups and downs in life but somehow we adapt to the changes. And the best line is the song "and if the hook sets in the bottom of our lungs we’ll rip it out and lick the blood off with our tongues". No matter what happens there is always a way out, it might be painful but nothing is as bad as we make it. "If you turn your head around to look down the path That’s led you here, Cause what can you change?" don't drag your past with you into the future.
The one thing I don’t quite get is the title of the song. Maybe CC was thinking about suicide, maybe life was giving him more than he could handle, but then these words came to him and “he ripped it out and licked the blood off with his tongue”.
If this is not what CC mean by this song that’s ok, but this is how it speaks to me. I want this song to play at my funeral.