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"
Oh, sweet thing
Zion doesn't love you
And Babylon don't love you
But you love everything
Oh, you saint
America don't love you
So I could never love you
In spite of everything
In the dark of this place
There's the glow of your face
There's the dust on the screen
Of this broken machine
And I can't help but feel
That I've made some mistake
But I let it go
Ya Hey
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am that I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Oh, the motherland don't love you
The fatherland don't love you
So why love anything?
Oh, good God
The faithless they don't love you
The zealous hearts don't love you
And that's not gonna change
All the cameras and files
All the paranoid styles
All the tension and fear
Of a secret career
And I can't help but think
That you've seen the mistake
But you let it go
Ya Hey
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
You say "I am what I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Outside the tents, on the festival grounds
As the air began to cool, and the sun went down
My soul swooned, as I faintly heard the sound
Of you spinning "Israelites"
Into "19th Nervous Breakdown"
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am what I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am that I am"
But who could ever live that way?
(Ya Hey)
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Zion doesn't love you
And Babylon don't love you
But you love everything
Oh, you saint
America don't love you
So I could never love you
In spite of everything
In the dark of this place
There's the glow of your face
There's the dust on the screen
Of this broken machine
And I can't help but feel
That I've made some mistake
But I let it go
Ya Hey
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am that I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Oh, the motherland don't love you
The fatherland don't love you
So why love anything?
Oh, good God
The faithless they don't love you
The zealous hearts don't love you
And that's not gonna change
All the cameras and files
All the paranoid styles
All the tension and fear
Of a secret career
And I can't help but think
That you've seen the mistake
But you let it go
Ya Hey
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
You say "I am what I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Outside the tents, on the festival grounds
As the air began to cool, and the sun went down
My soul swooned, as I faintly heard the sound
Of you spinning "Israelites"
Into "19th Nervous Breakdown"
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am what I am"
But who could ever live that way?
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Through the fire and through the flames
You won't even say your name
Only "I am that I am"
But who could ever live that way?
(Ya Hey)
Ut Deo, Ya Hey
Ut Deo, Deo
Lyrics submitted by SongMeanings, edited by bobduck, sulra, Mellow_Harsher, Folaeli, DjDabs, akjsdbshbd, lindstyl
Ya Hey Lyrics as written by Ezra Koenig Rostam Batmanglij
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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This song is in reference to Yahweh, or our God. However the name of the song is a play on words due to the fact that in order to prevent themselves (the Jews) from ever using the Lords personal name in vain they decided not to say it all together (hence the name Ya Hey). The "through the fire and through the flames" portion is in reference to Exodus 3:2 where God calls to Moses from within a bush on fire. The main point of Exodus 3 is that God has seen the suffering of his children in Egypt and has come to rescue them; through sending Moses to bring them out of Egypt and into the promise land. In Exodus 3:13,14 (NIV) Moses said to God “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.". Therefore I think that Ezra is saying to God, how can you love them (Israelites/Jerusalem/Zion) and rescue them when they do not love you Lord? He is showing sympathy for God by saying how can you love so much and not get any credit? This song is showing Ezra's adoration for God's unfailing and unconditional love for his children.
He's openly mocking God in the song.<br /> <br /> "But you love everything...<br /> Oh, you saint"
To be honest, I'm not sure how anyone could read this as "Ezra's adoration for God's unfailing ... love". On this song and elsewhere on the album, his doubts are everywhere. I look at the album as an expression of his inner conflict of believe vs. non-belief, and it certainly seems by the end of the album that he has landed on the side of non-belief.<br />