submissions
| The Mountain Goats – Genesis 30:3 Lyrics
| 10 years ago
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As has been already mentioned this song to be about a couple who have lost their child. Perhaps the child was born prematurely. We don't know but it certainly seems he didn't live long. The lyrics that suggest this have already been sited so read the other comments if you want to know more.
What interests me is the refrain "I will do what you ask me to do because of how I feel about you". Earlier in the song we're let know that she's the stronger one of the two (power, rough touch, keeping care, keeping watch). Perhaps she wants to try again for another child and he he's not sure he can risk that suffering again. His love and his trust of her brings him to agree. I'm close to a couple who's first child lived just two hours. It was devastating for them but they now have three healthy children. For me this song is for them. |
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| The Mountain Goats – Quito Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I think this song is darkly humorous. It sounds like a person out of their minds on drink or drugs (or both) deciding to give up drink/drugs and declaring how their life will at long last be problem free from then on. You get the feeling that they're deluding themselves and that their substance abuse is as much a symptom as a cause of the problems in their life. If they do sober up the reality will set in and they'll want to get loaded again so that they can escape back to the reasuring delusion that they're one move away from being happy ever after. Like others have said, the song is ironic. It is a heavily drug induced mind's idea of what it might be like being sober. Their Children dancing around them like gypsies?! If they WERE just drinking water they wouldn't be talking like this. |
submissions
| Bob Dylan – As I Went Out One Morning Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Above Danielss brought up Dylan's controversial acceptance speech for the Tom Paine award. The award was from the Emergency Civil Liberties Commitee which was originally founded to protect black-listed Communist Party members. I believe this is the root of the meaning of the song. I think the damsel in the song may represent the Communist Party, a romantic and enticing figure that is ideologically close to the writings of Tom Paine (equality, fairer distribution of wealth and resources etc.). This is why, in the song, he finds her "around Tom Paine's". In the Russia of the time, however, this ideology had become corrupted into a repressive, controlling regime. This is why the damsel takes the narrator (Dylan) by the arm (presumable forcibly) when he offers her his hand. She's trying to control him. He ultimately becomes seduced by the damsel (the communist party) until Tom Paine appears. Individual freedom is at the core of Paine's philosophy which is why I think he's seen to rescue Dylan at the end of the song and apologizes for the damsel's actions, because she is a corrupted version of his ideology.
In Dylan's acceptance for the Tom Paine award he apparently complained about being used by political organisations because of his fame and after this he distanced himself from overt political issues. The song may, therefore, be more generally about how involvement in political organisations can suppress individual freedom. I'd like to stress this is just an opinion on the meaning of the song and all other opinions are just as valid. |
submissions
| Blur – The Universal Lyrics
| 14 years ago
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I think Tonyk hit on something with the mention of the National Lottery as that is what the song has always put me in mind of. The lottery is an illusion that makes ordinary working class life more bearable. People are convinced that "it really really really could happen". Each week they're dissapointed but it doesn't shake their optimism. "As the days they seem to fall through" people just let the days go, rolling on their optimism to the next week. It's a symbol of the inertia in modern life where instead of working to improve their lives people are just resigned to their dissatisfaction with the world and get through it by pinning their hopes on near impossible dreams that require the minimal ammount of effort on their part such as winning the lottery. |
submissions
| R.E.M. – Drive Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I always thought the song was about young joy-riders. Sort of disaffected, pseudo-rebellious youths risking their lives and other people's lives for no substantial reason. I especially think this with the line "maybe you tried to get off", i.e. someone got scared and wanted to get out of the car. Also later the line "maybe I drive to get off". This always makes me think of joy-riders where I live in Dublin (where it's quite a big problem) always talking about the "buzz" they get off it. I think that lines like "hey, kids, rock and roll. Nobody tells you where to go" is more supposed to be sarcasticly mocking these kids. "Tick-tock Tick-tock", it's only a matter of time before the inevitable happens and they kill themselves or someone else. |
submissions
| Paul Simon – Kodachrome Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I have to say i always thought that Kodachrome was a euphemism for weed. I see now that it probably isn't but I'm pretty let down by that. Without thinking of it as a euphemism it sounds like a cheesy TV ad. |
submissions
| Paul Simon – Mother and Child Reunion Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I once heard that the song was a warning against the use of hard drugs. Their was a rumour that The Beatle's "Let It Be" was really about heroine and I was told that the line "I know they say "let it be"/But it just don't work out that way" was a reference to this. I don't buy it though. |
submissions
| Bob Dylan – Girl from the North Country Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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The melody for scarborough fair is taken from an ancient english melody called canticle but i'm pretty sure that Paul Simon wrote the lyrics himself and based them on Girl from the North Country rather than the other way round. |
submissions
| Pearl Jam – Animal Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I have some recollection of seeing a clip of Pearl Jam live where Eddie introduced the song by saying "this song's about my mother, it's called animal".
I hate to think of it being about a gang rape. The topic is a world too dark for such a energetic song. |
submissions
| Pearl Jam – Brain of J. Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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i think the use of the word "relieved" is meant to be sarcastic. It's about the American government becoming more totalitarian and gestapo like in its methods. It justifies this by saying it's establishing "order". People are supposedly being relieved of the burden of thinking and acting for themselves. |
submissions
| The Clash – Spanish Bombs Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Quoting Tsk8rKFF: ""Back home the buses went up in flashes
The Irish tomb was drenched in blood" the Clash are from the UK. this is relating to the incidents of the IRA (something having to do with pissed-relgious-irish folk)."
Bit of an ignorant (not to mention offensive) summary of the Northern Irish problem of the 70's. It wasn't religious it was political. It began in the late 60's when Irish Catholics (more an ethnic than a religious term) started a peaceful campaign to secure equal civil rights to the protestant population. Previously a catholic vote was worth only half a protestant one and catholics weren't allowed seats in the Northern Irish parliament. The protests led to a violent reaction from the working class loyalist areas. The British army, sent in to control the situation, and understanding little about Irish affairs, were seen to take the side of the loyalists. the population became radicalised and the bloody IRA (a paramillitary organisation that sought a united Irish republic and which had long been dormant before the start of the troubles) swelled with new angry young members. A horrible bombing campaign followed which frequently stretched to London.
I think the clash's reference to it here is more a call to watch the situation carefully. Up to now the British Army had handled it disastroulsy exacerbating the problem more than helping it (Bloody Sunday). I also think that ETA is implicitly present within the song. Perhaps Strummer saw some relevance in the that period in Spanish history and the contemporary issue of violent paramilitarianism that was growing in different areas of Europe. "Can I hear the echo from the days of 39". |
submissions
| Pixies – Gigantic Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I always thought she was saying "a big big log", which would add credance to the bbc theory. Guess it is kinda racist. |
submissions
| The Pogues – Fairytale Of New York Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It also makes me think of the lonely misery the many Irish immigrants of the 80's must have gone through around Christmas time. These two cling to each other for happiness amid the drunken despair, but it all turns to shit in the end. |
submissions
| The Pogues – A Pair of Brown Eyes Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Isn't it that the first narrator walks into a pub after a fight with his girl, hoping to drink himself into oblivion when this war veteran starts burning his ear off with his war stories, parts of which are recollected in the song. the man just wants the veteran to piss off, but the old mans words come back and haunt him on his way home. I don't have the booklet to "the rest of the best" but i think i heard that somewhere |
submissions
| Pavement – Perfume-V Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I love this song. It has a darker undercurrent then most pavement songs. Parts of it seem to be about some sense of guilt someone might feel after being with a nervous prostitute ("can a one trick night feed 40 days", the singer, I assume, being that nights trick). The image of her shivering like "a vein slashed bright and new" is particularly harrowing. I also get the sense of a bad acid trip, the vials metioned might contain LSD. Whatever it's about it sounds sinister and I love that. And your right devastator, it's also a good one to hammer out while your hammered. |
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