| Cursive – Tall Tales, Telltales Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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...it also strongly reminds me of Joseph Conrad's short story titled, "Youth." Something that it has in common with both "Youth" and "The Odyssey" is that the opening line let's you know that the song is being sung by a narrator, who is telling a story of something that occurred in the past. The song is very interpretive, as are all good literary works. Thus it is not explicitly about "heroin addiction" as vivisect suggests, but you can certainly interpret it that way. |
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| Jawbreaker – Shield Your Eyes Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Of course it's about the Allegory of the Cave. HOW COULD YOU FOOLS DOUBT BLAKE SCHWARZENBACH?! He's an academic, after all--an English Professor. I remember reading on his MySpace page that his favorite novel was the Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky. So his music introduced me to Kerouac when I was nice and young and angry, and he follows it up with my introduction to Dostoevsky when I was (only very slightly) older. So good. Sorry for ramblin' :P but anyways YEAH RESPONSE TO THE ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE WOO |
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| Cursive – Butcher the Song Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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The phallus is a certainly motif in this album, and it's not a joke. This song in particular has to do with castration, self loathing, etc., all due to his infidelity. In fact, it seems like *a lot* of Tim Kasher's music has to do with his infidelity destroying his relationships (Domestica, this album, Album of the Year by the Good Life, etc.) |
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| Cursive – The Great Decay Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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Very existential, as somebody else said. But it is a little bit immature, in that it's a pessimistic existentialism. I believe that existentialism comes full circle, from (A) There are no absolutes, everything is random and inherently meaningless, to (B) Therefore, any meaning derived is created by your own device, thus (C) Your life, values, and experience are what you make of it. It's up to you. This is a much more optimistic outlook. But I guess that wouldn't fit in too well with popular emo attitude. Haha. This song is also very strongly suggestive of vices - especially alcoholism and drug addiction. It is especially evocative of heroin addiction. |
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| Cursive – Tall Tales, Telltales Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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This song reminds me very much of the scene of Odysseus's shipwreck in Book 5 of the Odyssey, when Poseidon creates a tempest that destroys Odysseus's raft. He tries to hold steady, and he pleads to the gods, but they send him no sign (although one does help after he is tossed into the water). The same optimism is there, too. Although his raft is destroyed, he eventually swims ashore, barely alive, and he accomplishes his journey home by the end of the poem. |
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| Elliott Smith – Needle in the Hay Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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This song is clearly about heroin addiction. Drug addiction is a motif in the album, serving as a metaphor for the larger themes of dependence, hopelessness, etc. If you've ever used heroin, been addicted, or had friends addicted to the stuff, it's all very easy to relate to. |
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| Jawbreaker – Peel It The Fuck Down Lyrics | 19 years ago |
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Literally, it's through the eyes of a baby what it's really about is being helpless or being dependent, and the anger that comes from being in that state. there's a desire to be independent, but there's also a fear that goes along with that. it's about growing up. |
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| Jawbreaker – Friendly Fire Lyrics | 19 years ago |
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this song makes me think a lot about the common fighting that goes on between rebellious, independence-seeking teens and their smothering parents, particularly mothers. 'Walked beyond the fence, played outside our yard. You took it hard.' - metaphor for leaving the nest 'I like my clothes. Don't want to grow. I'll wait around 'til you say go.' - this to me is somewhat of a recollection of childhood, when one's relationship with their parents tend to be good or at least better 'The lights were off when I got home. Black room, blue phone. Don't I know your name? Weren't we almost friends? Guess that depends.' - this just really reminds me of how lots of teens stay out of the house as much as possible to stay away from their parents and come home late at night once they're asleep 'Take some benefit with all your doubt. If this is principle, I'm dropping out.' - this makes me think of fights between parents and their kids. 'take some benefit with your doubt' to me is a kid addressing their parent and telling them to stop assuming the worst, and acting on it, and instead let things go to see that the kid really isn't doing all that bad. It's the kid telling their parents to get off their back. "if this is principle, i'm dropping out" seems like a sort of thing a teen would say to their parents in a fight--a sort of 'cutting your nose off to spite your face' type of thing--threatening to drop out of school "My back is warm with your friendly fire. I know you're trying. Could you please aim it higher?" - this, to me, is the kid realizing that even though they feel like their parents are dragging them down, they realize that it is indeed contradictory "friendly fire"--something intended to be friendly, to help, but it ends up hurting or antagonizing. "So alone I wrote, I wrote this will. I will decline." declining what their parents perceive as "friendly" help, but is "fire" to the kid "This fish ain't big. This pond is small. So small of mind." - Means that the kid believes all the fighting and problems are their parents' fault. it's not that they're too big of a fish for the pond, the pond is just too small and constricting just an interpretation reflecting my experiences and the point in life that i'm at |
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| Jawbreaker – Better Half Lyrics | 19 years ago |
| It's about losing yourself to rage, kicking the living shit out of someone, and then feeling like crap afterwards. violence gets nobody anywhere | |
| Jawbreaker – Oyster Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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I think that 'oyster' is vagina... "you like the taste of it can't take the smell" and the rest of the song is mostly about wanting a girl and not wanting her at the same time, so it fits. |
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| Jawbreaker – Basilica Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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Basilica: An early Christian church designed like a Roman basilica; or a Roman Catholic church or cathedral accorded certain privileges goes along with the death/funeral/church things in the song. |
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| Jawbreaker – Jet Black Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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Here's the quote from Annie Hall i tell you this because, as an artist, i think you'll understand. sometimes when i'm driving, on the road at night, i see two headlights coming toward me. fast. i have this sudden impulse to turn the wheel quickly, head-on into the oncoming car. i can anticipate the explosion. the sound of shattering glass. the flames, rising out of the flowing gasoline. |
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| Jawbreaker – Chesterfield King Lyrics | 20 years ago |
| what's a chesterfield king? a cigarette? | |
| Pink Floyd – Learning to Fly Lyrics | 20 years ago |
| This song is beautiful. There's no underlying meaning about drugs or sex or whatever. It's about flying. Anybody who has experienced flying a small aircraft knows what this song is about. His words truly capture the experience of flying. | |
| Bob Marley and the Wailers – Exodus Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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yes, now that i look back on it, i realize it's obviously about the back to africa movement advocated by Marcus Garvey and the Rastafarian religion. I believe babylon isn't quite america though--it's the white powers that keep blacks on the lower rungs of society, previously through slavery, and now economically (but it is most likely most prevalent in America). "Jah people" are the people of Jah, the Rastafarians. |
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| Billie Holiday – Strange Fruit Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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According to my history teacher... She absolutely hated this song--probably because of its subject matter. She never wanted to sing it, but because of pressure she always ended up doing just that, and cried afterwards. |
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| The Postal Service – This Place Is a Prison Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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Makes me think of drug addiction. It's like you're in a prison--trapped. Inhaling thrills through $20 bills is snorting a drug, probably meth or coke. Also, you're inhaling the $20 bills, as in using it up really fast--drugs cost a lot of money. "I know that it's not a party if it happens every night": this, to me, is the dividing line between drug use and abuse or addiction. |
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| David Bowie – Ziggy Stardust Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| anybody else notice one of the riffs in this song that kinda sounds like the end of "stairway to heaven" during "So where were the spiders while the fly tried to..."? | |
| Bob Marley and the Wailers – Buffalo Soldier Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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If you know your history, Then you would know where you coming from, i laughed when i heard that. Adding onto the comments of the historical background of this song: the native american's dubbed the term "buffalo soldier," because they thought that the African Americans' hair resembled the hair on the neck of a buffalo. It is important to note that this was a term coined out of respect. |
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| Bob Marley and the Wailers – Exodus Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| I think this might be about the exodus of 1879, in which African Americans move westward in response to the Jim Crow laws, which effectively made the African Americans second class legal and social citizens. | |
| Social Distortion – Drug Train Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| Reminds me of a few of my friends. They've gotten on board the train... and now they can't get off. | |
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