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"
As a kid, my hands were red
When you asked me I denied it
I've told lies that never came true
And I have stolen and so have you
If we can make it through another day
With you believing in my innocence
And we can make it through another year
'Cause we both need it to forget this fear
If it's all the same to you
Then it's just a little white lie
Then it's all the same to me
And it's just a little white lie
If I was to blame would you?
Would you still believe?
I don't want you to forget
Just pretend that it never happened
And it's just a little white lie
And it's just a little white lie
If it's all the same to you
Then it's just a little white lie
Then it's all the same to me
And it's just a little white lie
If I was to blame would you?
Would you still believe?
If I was a thief?
When you asked me I denied it
I've told lies that never came true
And I have stolen and so have you
If we can make it through another day
With you believing in my innocence
And we can make it through another year
'Cause we both need it to forget this fear
If it's all the same to you
Then it's just a little white lie
Then it's all the same to me
And it's just a little white lie
If I was to blame would you?
Would you still believe?
I don't want you to forget
Just pretend that it never happened
And it's just a little white lie
And it's just a little white lie
If it's all the same to you
Then it's just a little white lie
Then it's all the same to me
And it's just a little white lie
If I was to blame would you?
Would you still believe?
If I was a thief?
Lyrics submitted by MuuCowOfDeath
White Lie Lyrics as written by Jeremiah Fraites Wesley Schultz
Lyrics © 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
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
Lord Huron
Bron-Y-Aur Stomp
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
This is about bronies. They communicate by stomping.
Cajun Girl
Little Feat
Little Feat
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”
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
Head > Heels
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Head > Heels” is a track that aims to capture what it feels like to experience romance that exceeds expectations. Ed Sheeran dedicates his album outro to a lover who has blessed him with a unique experience that he seeks to describe through the song’s nuanced lyrics.
To me this song is about a guy that has been telling little lies since he was a kid with "red hands" (being caught red-handed by his parents and friends). Now he's in a relationship, still used to telling little little white lies, but they have a huge affect on the girl he's with. She wants to leave him because he's a liar, he wants her to stay and get through it with him. After all "it's just a little white lie" and if it's "all the same to you, and it's all the same to me" he says it shouldn't bother either of them but she completely disagrees and wants to leave.
I think she was the offender here and she was trying to ease her conscious by saying its "just a little white lie". She tells a lie to conceal her wrong doing, and gets off with its "just a little white lie". I think he is slightly sarcastic when he says "It's just a little white lie",implying if it was "just" a white lie to her he can also fuck up and rub it off as a little white lie,hence the line "then it's all the same to me". Tit for tat situation. The opening lines is his attempt to generalize we all tell fibs at some stage in our lives, so his issue is not that she lied, his issue is that she rubs it off/console herself with "It's just a little white lie". She is thus not taking responsibility, hence him saying "I don't want you to forget" (fourth verse). In the last verse he is asking what would happen if the tables were turned, "If I was to blame would you still believe?" He probably knows the answer to that as she probably gave him shit about a minor wrong doing in the past. He concludes by saying and "if I was a thief?", which he knows she feels is wrong. So he is trying to erase any discrepancies between offenses, implying they are the same, all equally wrong. Anyway just my little white take on the song! Love it!
@All your insides fall to pieces very good point of view and I agree with you.