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.
Unstoppable force and immovable object
Repel one another when by chance colliding
The Brownian-Motion within this love potion
Ensures our opinions are always dividing
I am from Mars my dear
You hail from Venus
A meeting star-crossed
Like the Sun and the Moon
Destined to let this cruel world
Come between us
Our last kiss eclipsed by a shadow at noon
A rose that is built
Out of music by moonlight
Petals stained ruby with nightingale blood
Cast down in disgust
To be crushed by a cart-wheel
Because of mere trivia misunderstood
We quest for a grail of illusive perfection
Each hoping we'll find it some glorious day
Yet gaze with remorse at our jaded reflection
That looks like The Picture Of Dorian Gray
[Chorus:]
Siamese Twins who were joined at the heart
Love's an affliction without a known remedy
Blunt-bladed fate
Deemed to cleave us apart
Emotional surgery pays no indemnity
Some seek release with effete anesthesia
Others adapt to the role of sworn enemy
You found nepenthe in cheap, sweet amnesia
It was far easier losing my memory
And the nightingale sang
"Sing love's lament
With a thorn at your breast
Impaled by her barb
Cruel and unforgiving
A million dead poets would gladly attest
Heartache's a keepsake
To remind us we're living."
[Chorus]
Repel one another when by chance colliding
The Brownian-Motion within this love potion
Ensures our opinions are always dividing
I am from Mars my dear
You hail from Venus
A meeting star-crossed
Like the Sun and the Moon
Destined to let this cruel world
Come between us
Our last kiss eclipsed by a shadow at noon
A rose that is built
Out of music by moonlight
Petals stained ruby with nightingale blood
Cast down in disgust
To be crushed by a cart-wheel
Because of mere trivia misunderstood
We quest for a grail of illusive perfection
Each hoping we'll find it some glorious day
Yet gaze with remorse at our jaded reflection
That looks like The Picture Of Dorian Gray
[Chorus:]
Siamese Twins who were joined at the heart
Love's an affliction without a known remedy
Blunt-bladed fate
Deemed to cleave us apart
Emotional surgery pays no indemnity
Some seek release with effete anesthesia
Others adapt to the role of sworn enemy
You found nepenthe in cheap, sweet amnesia
It was far easier losing my memory
And the nightingale sang
"Sing love's lament
With a thorn at your breast
Impaled by her barb
Cruel and unforgiving
A million dead poets would gladly attest
Heartache's a keepsake
To remind us we're living."
[Chorus]
Lyrics submitted by SongMeanings
You Lost My Memory Lyrics as written by Graeme English Walkyier
Lyrics © CONEXION MEDIA GROUP, INC., Royalty Network, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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
Light Up The Sky
Van Halen
Van Halen
Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
"Fast car" is kind of a continuation of Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." It has all the clawing your way to a better life, but in this case the protagonist never makes it with her love; in fact she is dragged back down by him.
There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
Lord Huron
This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Gentle Hour
Yo La Tengo
Yo La Tengo
This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
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.