| The Smashing Pumpkins – Ava Adore Lyrics | 1 year ago |
| @[spliphstar:50814] Because Courtney Love is a perfect counterpart to Lindsay Lohan: she is a slow motion train wreck that never actually grinds to a halt and lays there inert, but like the Energizer Bunny just keeps going and going. | |
| Beck – Girl Lyrics | 1 year ago |
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"black tongue tied Round the roses" This is a fundamentally Goth fashion reference. It's obscure/archaic (as Goth itself can often be), but "tongue" can refer to a broad strip of fabric used to wrap around and bind. ["Her hair pulled back in a ponytail held by a tongue of blue ribbon" for instance.] If it has laces/cord as a double outer binding over the ribbon of fabric, this even more resembles how a shoe tongue looks and works, so drawing the analogy by functionality works. "Toy diamond ring stuck on her finger" can also refer to the quirky and inventive devices (necessarily cheap because of low discretionary income) Goth girls might use to fancy up their look. "With a noose she can hang from the sun" sort of sounds like the fascination with death and suicide taken to extremes, with extremes of looking for fresh and quirky was to express an overly dramatic image. Very Goth. I'm just going to say there is so much Goth imagery and reference probabilities (if you're familiar enough with these kinds of girls) and even Goth styled expression that I think one's mind should be looking for that flavor of interpretation throughout the song. |
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| Garbage – Push It Lyrics | 2 years ago |
| @[loveisnodoubt:49140] Excellent offering. It is biographically supported, and her own statement about the song appearing in another comment speaks of desires in conflict with demons, a fine fit for a self-harmer. | |
| Garbage – Push It Lyrics | 2 years ago |
| @[interpol2221:49139] Sometimes having a boyfriend for a long time is the gateway drug to lesbian life. In this case she's at most casual towards bi/dyke girl hookups and is not known to be a lesbian. | |
| Tom Petty – Mary Jane's Last Dance Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| @[fnnkybutt:45118] Small towns don't have hotels tall enough to kill yourself by jumping. | |
| Stevie Nicks – Edge of Seventeen Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| @[tuchesuavae:42383] "only she and her boyfriend were in the room when he passed" - uhm.no. The man was her cousin, and this happened in Arizona, not Alabama, so he wasn't her boyfriend. | |
| ABBA – Fernando Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| By the time Fernando was written, and altered by Bjorn for greater dramatic impact, the American "western" had become so detached from factual history and sense, in the interest of story telling and greater emotion, that really it doesn\'t much matter what historical events the song refers to anymore than what historical truths might be involved in a TV western. \n\nIn short, both US TV Westerns and Fernando are just spinning a web of emotions without regard to history. | |
| Eagles – Hotel California Lyrics | 6 years ago |
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@[Screech:32974] "Founded by Allister Crowley in 1969" Mr. Crowley died in 1947, so I don't think he founded any church in the USA more than two decades later. |
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| Selena Gomez – Bad Liar Lyrics | 7 years ago |
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On an overt level, these lyrics talk about the giddiness and blend of both desire and aversion, hope and fear, young females feel when entering into a bad case of love fever, perhaps regarding a person she already knows is a bad idea to become obsessed about. On a more subtle level, references to a war, references to the fact that an outcome of a struggle like a war has a victor and a subjugated party often, and references to a negative self-assessment of prospects in such a struggle - destined to "give in to you" or submit rather than simply manage to avoid contact and avoid this, all talk euphemistically about some primal emotions young females have about someone they are "falling" for. On a primal level, perhaps Genesis said it best: You shall desire to guide him, but he shall govern you and dominate your feelings. This is a usual source of giddiness, a desire or craving for someone while simultaneously feeling anxiety about this. The usual course is to wind up "giving in", adopting the subordinate or submissive role in the relationship, and this is not always a safe thing to lunge headlong into. It's all about the frequent refrain, "Not to give in to you", despite feeling it is desirable to: - passively allow herself to be rented and be an amenity to be enjoyed, - admit self defeat as her strong feelings overpower her deliberate intention to not let them show and not let them govern her, - blame herself as a "liar" and a bad one, a blameworthy trait of someone who perhaps deserves to be defeated and subjugated, rather than more neutrally or positively stated assessment of herself as a person whose nature is governed by feelings - what the heart wants, and - even such a potent this as HER kiss is what the victor, cast as the artist, will exercise control over, the weilder of the brush that is her. Maybe the way is which the singer is most of all a "bad liar" is in choosing to portray herself as destined to be conquered in love rather than be someone with open options to choose at each point. The latter is the truth, but the former which is emphasized throughout the lyrics is a badly constructed lie being used to deny she can choose as she decides to at all points in the relationship. |
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| Hole – Softer, Softest Lyrics | 8 years ago |
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Notice that each verse in this starts out with what is often called a "confessional" approach - Anne Sexton was a great exemplar of this type of lyrical form, and there is a resemblance in style. The very next portion after that is invariably a reference of harsh corporal punishment - get the belt - which results in a distressed and disturbed girl - "pee-girl". Then the milk recitation comes. "Milk" is commonly understood as the essential nutrient for healthy life. Her constant reference of this deals with her fundamental needs, how they were met in a peculiar way, inadequately and not satisfactorily at all as to results. "Sour"? Unsatisfying and inadequate. etc. "Milk" having a "dick"? She met her needs through prostitution at one point in her teen years, until her dad kicked her out of the house for it. "Dye" - hiding herself behind the punk hair and make up she used in teen years. I suspect "old milk" could refer to genuinely mature parental figures, people who worked with her to change her behavior for the better or "mind", she encountered when she was in Oregon girl's reform school (which was actually, in the era she was resident there, a therapuetically oriented place, not like the nasty reform school girl prison exploitation movies would suggest). Ultimately, this song is about self-realization of what she herself needs to acknowledge about herself - both emotionally and in self-image. "I tell you everything" is referring to private thoughts and allowing them back into her conscious awareness, allowing herself to feel what she is seeing clearly in the privacy of her thoughts - her heart touching things. People who have suffered from abuse might not be able to do this, to trust themselves to know what they really feel even, for a long time, until very late in life sometimes. People who become teen prostitutes have a lot of very thick internal walls to be overcome at some point in life. She was doing this here, I think, and the song meaning is obscure to people who haven't been subject to extremely abusive and disturbing life events when young, as someone who becomes a "teenage whore" has, because they have not the experience of overcoming extreme internal cellularization or "walling off" of what they feel and how they view themselves. That's why it sounds so strange to many. |
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| X – Los Angeles Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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In the era this lyric was penned, punk and other forms of metal rock where in a backlash against the turmoil of the 60-70s counterculture. The generation coming of age then experienced the counterculture from a younger perspective: as if listening to one's parents argue and wondering if they are going to both be alive in the morning. People who were young children, but aware of events going on, during the counterculture, naturally built up an insulating wall to protect themselves, particularly on topics such as race, gender identity, class, etc., which the counterculture struggle had been about. The generation originally listening to X in live performances were very atuned to the release and pleasure to be experienced from raw and candid expressions of what was bugging them. Thus the very raw racial epithets in this lyric have an authenicity for them. Notice that in some singing of the lyrics (live or recorded) you can almost hear "cross the date line" as both or either "cross the Orange County line" and "cross the color line". Both had resonance as it relates the racial angst a mostly white punk set in Los Angeles. In many ways the protagonist of this lyric is dealing with her feelings of distress and confusion about race that were very typical for the generation coming of age immediately after the death of the counterculture, and what was envigorating about these lyrics in part is the very fact of candidly using epithets that expressed the sense of unease this generation felt about all topics of race, etc, that reminded them of the counterculture struggle going on that they were old enought to witness with horror but too young to actually be part of. |
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| X – Los Angeles Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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Notice the time references: date line, clock. This seems most related to both confusion and things wearing out (expiring - as a day does when the sun comes up at the international dateline, which is an arbitrary distinction, and toys and boys losing their appeal, which are expirations of arbitrary or idiosyncratic choices). Other arbitrary distinctions (potentially) appear in the song: ethnic or racial classifications which might be founded in fact but reflect arbitrary conventions also. This, too, is a source of confusion to the lyric's protagonist. Purchasing a clock is a method of finding something factual and objective to sort out something confusing. If there is nothing objective to sort things out, then you are left with coping with the arbitrary conventions, idiosyncratic features, and other tidbits as they are. If you can't do this, you have to get out. In short, if you can't sort out the ethnic/racial scene in LA, your will be hopelessly lost and there's no clock you can buy to help you - you have to get out. |
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| Courtney Love – Mono Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| Having listened to this song over and over, I think it is probably the best work, musically and lyrically, that she's ever done. | |
| Courtney Love – Mono Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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Yeah Drive a million miles down the PCH/ The PCH is a well known acronym for The Pacific Coast Highway. The PCH is the main road into and out of Malibu, which is another Love lyric which probably ties in with this use here. Technically, the PCH is the same highway that extends all the way up the Pacific Coast into Washington and you can drive it up to Seattle. A number of grunge works make reference to this highway for various lyrical purposes. And now he's gone / I slashed his tires, I bled his brakes / "Malibu" opens with the lyric "Crash and burn", interestingly enough. It had to be done / Their hand-job lives were just too cruel / I would understand this largely to refer to the enormously phony or nongenuine ("hand job") cultural mileau that is the Hollywood movie and music business - whose main colony is often considered to be Malibu. (But) mercy was done / We drowned them all in their swimming pools / Run away, run away, run away yeah Leave the phony Hollywood ethos behind, and run away. This again is reminiscent of the ethos of punk, which the song elsewhere references with its "three chords in your pocket tonight ... bring my punk rock back" - three chords being a staple musical device of punk. Punk in LA was centered in Hollywood, ironically, because that's where the run down venues and seedy atmospheres that would host these acts in their formative days could manage to play given their lack of financial clout and limited audiences. |
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| The Smashing Pumpkins – 1979 Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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"shakedown 1979, cool kids never have the time/on a live wire right up off the street/you and i should meet" A bird on a wire fits this positioning. They perch on live wires all the time. "A bird on a wire" is possibly a lyrical allusion. Dylan: "Like a bird upon a wire/like a thief in a midnight choir/I have tried in my way to be free". There are other "bird on a wire" references that could also be suitable as allusions. |
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| Courtney Love – Mono Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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"Oh God you owe me one more song So I can prove to you that I'm so much better than him Oh god please listen fast Here comes the crash We're gonna rise above We gotta smash it up You won't abandon us again hey" Actually the "him" in this is probably neither Cobain nor any form of deity. Rather it is more likely famous poser and mediocre musician "Marilyn Manson" who she wants people to see she is better than, among others who may have been involved in the "Rock is Dead Tour". ("Well they say that Rock is Dead"). Love's experience on that tour is that few parents are going to let their little daughters, her core audience, go to a testosterone drenched adolescent puke-fest featuring goth posers, and you could get at most "99 girls in the pit". |
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| Courtney Love – Mono Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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"Well they say that rock is dead And they're probably right 99 girls in the pit Did it have to come to this?" And they said "God" was "dead" one time too (as a predominant cultural anchor, not in any theological sense). But along came Carter, the whole Born Again she-bang, and it seems "God" is not "dead". Maybe this kind of thing could happen for rock too, despite failing attendence - a mere 99 girls. Of course this can also be interpreted in a certain "the world revolves about me" sense, and she may be referring only to riot grrrl rock, of which I suppose she means mostly herself. There's something about Courtney Love's estimate of her importance which can be matched only by Yoko Ono's overblown opinion of herself, so maybe this meaning does apply throughout the song. |
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| X – Your Phone's Off the Hook, But You're Not Lyrics | 21 years ago |
| The "all of New York is a tow-away zone" is known to be what a tow truck driver said while towing away the band's van on a trip to New York (I think to play at CBGBs). | |
| The Smashing Pumpkins – 1979 Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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I suspect that many of the references in 1979 may be to the punk rock movement, which pre-dated 79 in origins but was coming into the mainstream in that year. By the time of writing this song, punk was abandoned: "as you see there's no one else around". Indeed X's "The Unheard Music" has allusions in these lyrics that I can pick up on, particularly the fastness and lack of hope in the music. X often wrote about the "urgency of sound" as a punk ideal, though not in that exact phrase, being locked out of the public eye, and perhaps related to inspiration while stopped at a traffic light: "no hard cords, on the car radio/ some stupor on the car radio". I think Smashing Pumpkins musical treatment of this song would count as "some stupor", ironically. In 79 a proto-goth would be described as hanging out with the freaks and ghouls, as Justine is here. They were, as goths are now, tremendous posers. "Zipper blues" does have a sexual frustration connotation, and is also slang of limited circulation for "ups and downs" and being despondent because it seems like things are going well and then they crash. (Would describe punk pretty well. Nirvana et al were POSTpunk, not really punk.) I would think "shakedown" of 1979 would refer more to an act of aggression, which was what punk was about in trying to kill off the insipid "music" all around it. In many ways the anti-suburban, despondent youth, don't give a shit attitude of punk is all over this lyric, but I don't want to go on too long. |
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| Courtney Love – Mono Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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"Hey hey hey yeah we had everything Vinyl in mono And we looked the other way Man we were so dumb " Monophone recordings in vinyl are a very old medium, probably last produced for the mass market in the 60s and abandoned before the end of the 60s. Truly great founders or precursors of rock and roll cut mono in vinyl. But someone figured something new was better than the original rock and roll inspiration, and this increasingly was the trend until punk came along trying to reestablish the roots of rock and roll. "Is this the part in the book that you wrote Where I gotta come and save the day Did you miss me Did you miss me Yeah yeah yeah yeah " Who is "you"? From the rest of the lyrics, it would seem to refer to God, or some kind of god that cares in the least about the fate of rock and roll music, impliedly in a positive way. An odd attitude to attribute to the Judeo-Christian conception of God, in the least, but maybe that isn't the exclusive conception of God being talked about here. After all, those 12-steppers can as a matter of necessity come up with a "higher power" suited to their idiosyncrasies. Apparently Ms. Love's higher power referenced in this work would want something about rock and roll salvaged and would like her to do it, or maybe was ignoring her thinking she wasn't able to anyhow? She seems ambivalent about just how much her higher power is willing to be supportive of her throughout the song. |
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| Hole – Violet Lyrics | 21 years ago |
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Sky like amethyst: - amethyst is a shade of violet, and the name of a gemstone of that color . - this is what it looks like around dawn and twilight in terms of color, both times are often quiet and may provide a restful contemplative moment. - amethyst is also hard and usually cut with sharp corners as a gemstone, which is a particuarly inanimate form of beauty also. I interpret the purpose of this line as being to create a feeling of detached and somewhat restful contemplation of a big overall picture (sky), perhaps concerning artificial beauty (pop art and such), compared to a normal hectic paying attention to it that isn't reflective. Stars look just like little fish: - obviously there could be a word play here "stars" are just like "little fish in a big pond" despite their egos. - for stars to look just like little fish, the most probable setting would be from a high place looking into water that held a great deal of little fish, or like in a fish pond. This echos a somewhat quiet and contemplative air, as such ponds are frequent in meditative settings, restulf landscapes, and places one might vanish to for a bit of a quiet break, like a pier perhaps. Also, viewing little fish is from a perspective of being a large person, and implies a sense of superiority and control. These two lines together have a commonality that is in contrast to the following lines: learn how to go, learn how to say no. These imply a lack of control, a felt lack of superiority and power, being placed in a hectic and demanding situation perhaps. They also propose a solution, perhaps, to a problem posed by the first part. "might last a day yeah mine is forever might last a day, yeah well mine is forever " I've also seen this rendered "minus forever". The only eternal decision or state one will ever encounter is the state of being dead. There are no other "forever"s in human life, except in overly idealized aspirations such as eternal love, etc. Life might last a day, forever if one is a believer in transpersonal realities (survival of consciousness after death e.g.), or through a mechanism such as fame or glory, as the Greeks held. Perhaps this attitude suggested by this stanza poses another "solution" in the form of knowing when to go, when to say no. From these basics I think a basic theme of the song is establshed. Despite a tie in with an old maxim that once men have sex with you without marrying you they never want you again, I think the thing that once you get you never want again is more likely, in this text, death. |
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