St. Vincent – Cheerleader Lyrics | 12 years ago |
Moreover, to refer back to what I was saying earlier, if you're GOING to make any valid attempt at analyzing lyrics, you can't speak text-extrinsically. She mentions "bad guys" all of once at the beginning of the song–the bulk of the lyrical content is musing on her dubious intentions and beguiling behavior. So why is it that every interpretation you're going to read about on here is going to be something to the effect of: "zomg! this ttly reminds me of wehn my relationship with my one ex sucked and blahblahblah"? The song is clearly not primarily about gender relations–why is it that every other poster is going to read it that way? I maintain that it has less to do with what Annie is saying and more to do with what self-absorbed people are hearing. |
St. Vincent – Cheerleader Lyrics | 12 years ago |
Swooping, what you're saying is fine–when an artist is discussing their own work. They're allowed to have that degree of control over their artifice as it is THEIR artifice, first and foremost, and normally, I'd agree with you–the more interpretations there are of a work, the richer and fuller an understanding of it can be had by all. But, personally, I'm sick of nine out of ten women feeling the need to frame all of Annie's songs in the "woman-empowers-herself-by-being-a-bitch-whilst-still-living-a-life-that-is-centered-around-pursuit-of-men-'cause-god-forbid-she-should-have-to-exist-without-a-man" manner (she's not Madonna, for Christ's sake!) and thinking that this somehow makes them revolutionary and feminist–it doesn't; it's a demeaning stereotype, and I'm not even female. Annie's art is way too nuanced to be reduced to something so crude. If people want to interpret her songs that way while they're screaming along to her songs in their cars, that's fine. But if you want to have an honest, critical discussion in attempts to analyze her music and lyrics, you're going to have to stretch your brain a little more than that–it's all about context. Unfortunately, if you want to dispense with contentious interpretation and critical analysis, you're essentially advocating that we discard with this website entirely because that's what songmeanings is pretty much all about–analyzing lyrics and music. |
St. Vincent – Cheerleader Lyrics | 12 years ago |
It's also a disservice to her sex to say that women behave these ways solely in pursuit of a man. A lot of the behaviors she's describing are predatory, and in the refrain she's disavowing the sycophantic veneer she assumes as a convoluted chore and, ultimately, a frivolity. It's reminiscent Lady MacBeth's line, "Look the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't", only Annie is saying that she'd rather discard the flower-act and let others know she's a damn serpent, and she's not a picky eater. She's expressing a weariness with the subtlety society expects of her (or subtlety she's simply learned as the path of least resistance) used in pursuit of dubious ambitions. Like most of her songs, the lyrics contain a degree of ambivalence; does she want to live an honest life and throw away her devious tendencies with her exhausting assumed persona, or does she have every intention to be just as perverse a person as she's been up until now with the exception that she will no longer hide it from those around her? Can a person discard guile whilst still being fundamentally twisted, or will society's pressures ultimately force a person who adulterates themselves to resort to artifice in order to survive? |
St. Vincent – Cheerleader Lyrics | 12 years ago |
Where does she mention all these men that people keep finding in her songs? ANALYZE THE TEXT AND ONLY THE TEXT–basic critical technique these days, people. Text-extrinsic interpretations are indefensible as, quite literally, no element of the text can be used to defend the interpretation if you're extrapolating beyond the presented information. Just because you "identify" with her lyrics and you've made a fool of yourself in pursuit of a man doesn't mean that's what Annie Clark is talking about here. I play dumb sometimes not when I want people to like me but when I want people to UNDERESTIMATE me. Not everyone lies, cheats, steals, and otherwise misrepresents their intentions exclusively in pursuit of a relationship with a man. Expand your minds. |
St. Vincent – Cruel Lyrics | 12 years ago |
I don't know that I feel this has to do with societal pressures on women (but then again, I'm not female, so Annie Clark may have more to say about that) so much as it has to do with the anxiety of being seen as the means to an end and the nature of objectification that is essential in treating another person as something sub-human–that is, cruelty. Cruelty, at its core, is defined as indifference to or pleasure in the suffering of another person. "They could take or leave you / So they took you / And they left you" is an exceptionally demonstrative verse–the person at the core of the lyrical narrative is being treated by others more so as a set of options or preferences than as a living, breathing individual with emotions and desires. Not only that, they are being callously "taken" and "left" …Â like a bit of used up crayon that someone has discarded after they wore it down to a wax nub. The narrative voice is defined by what "… everybody wants from [her]"; taken and left–she's denied intrinsic value and expected to derive worth solely from what she's provides others, from what utility she serves to those around her. I'd say we don't need to pigeonhole the gender of the narrative voice–the song's about our society's casual dehumanization/objectification of its constituents and the resulting turmoil and distress this causes to the individual. Brilliant music and lyrics always …Â god, Annie has a knack for formulating a phrase, lyrically and musically. |
Sufjan Stevens – Impossible Soul Lyrics | 12 years ago |
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/aug/28/magazine/tm-soft35/5 Vallam, I think you should be very careful not to assume that your brand, idea, or denomination of Christianity is the same as Sufjan's. Also, being spiritual is not necessarily the same as being religious. |
St. Vincent – Oh My God Lyrics | 12 years ago |
So true …Â this song never stops hurting no matter how many times you let it loop. |
Sufjan Stevens – Impossible Soul Lyrics | 13 years ago |
Actually, nemov, there apparently IS no source concerning who worked on "Impossible Soul" with Sufjan. So there are no reliable sources who can verify whether it's Shara Worden, Annie Clark, Nedelle Torrisi, or even Lady GaGa. Basically, a bunch of fans have decided: "It's her!" or "No, it's not her, it's HER.", and a few unaccredited critics have posted reviews online ASSUMING it's Worden without any confirmation whatsoever of what musicians were involved in the recording of The Age of Adz. Moreover, apparently Sufjan worked with a LOT of people on this album, across a vast swath of time and in numerous locations. Just because a majority insists upon something does not make it fact. |
Ani DiFranco – Red Letter Year Lyrics | 13 years ago |
I would say that the first half has less to do with drug addiction (Ani's a smoker and, if you've heard "Evolve", you know her position on marijuana) and more to do with exactly what the first verses directly state: "New Year's Eve we dropped mushrooms and danced 'round the house". All subsequent lyrics leading up to the obvious Katrina references are pretty accurately and simplistically describing the experience of tripping. "First you go under, then coming up gives you the bends": 'going under' signifies the act of 'dropping', or eating, the mushrooms. 'Coming up' is blatant psychonaut parlance for the feeling of whatever substance you're tripping or rolling on (MDMA, LSD, psilocybin, et cetera) beginning to affect you. It's usually accompanied with a feeling of expansiveness and magnanimity. When you're coming up on mushrooms, they oftentimes can make you nauseous or give you stomach cramps–hence, 'the bends'. "When you break the surface, all you can see is your friends": There comes a point in a trip or roll when you feel what most people with any experience with these substances will call a 'wave'. It's the first peak that you hit along the trip's trajectory, and it can be intense–in both good and bad ways. It's oftentimes a wise decision to trip with other people (hopefully at least one of them is not under the influence if you're inexperienced), as not only will they tend to prevent you from acting on some of your crazier ideas, but they'll also help to ground you to a sense of reality and comfort–which is crucial to preventing a bad trip, the psychological turmoil of which cannot be overestimated. "So you grab your purple crayon": Obvious Harold reference here, but as an aside, tripping can give you some intense visuals, which inspires a lot of people to express themselves artistically whilst tripping. "And finally the whole world is made of one unbroken line": At some point during a trip, you will experience a sense of "ego death"–you are not alone, you are not an isolated agent, you are a part of much larger machinery, and it's an astounding feeling. I sometimes describe it as "being able to see past the fourth wall of reality", as that's the best approximation for what I've experienced. And lastly, "Just remember you are there, you are always, always there": One of the other things that tends to occur to people while they are tripping is what Nietzsche would call "eternal recurrence". You begin to ask yourself how such a tiny amount of a weird chemical could so drastically alter your perception of reality. You come to realize that the world around you is always as beautiful, as complex, as terrifying, and as awe-inspiring every day as when you are tripping–the only difference is that you've used a chemical to force your brain to interpret information differently than it normally would. Ideas akin to: "This is always this beautiful. It's always here, I just need to look for it" abbreviate into mantras ("incantation replaced resolution") of "This is always here. It's always here. It's always here". Also, mushrooms are not addictive (most hallucinogens aren't), so the idea of this song addressing addiction is … flimsy. I think this song has more to do with perceptions of truth and reality, and how something that's so demonized (a "drug"!) can help a person create a more positive reality for themselves and others, whereas something that's so commonplace and accepted as television is detrimental in that it encourages a sense of complacency, entitlement, and detachment from the world around you. |
Sufjan Stevens – Impossible Soul Lyrics | 13 years ago |
Remove Shara Worden until someone with the booklet posts, I say. It sounds INCREDIBLY like Annie Clark to me, and I'm a huge St. Vincent fan. It's in the cadence of "Don't be distracted", specifically the timbre in the vowel of "don't". Obviously, I could be wrong, but until we've got confirmation from someone with the artifact itself, it's inaccurate to propagate rumors of it being Shara, Annie, or Nedelle. |
Sufjan Stevens – The Transfiguration Lyrics | 13 years ago |
Listen to "Sleeping Bear, Sault Sainte-Marie" off of Greetings From Michigan: The Great Lake State. It has a similar harmonic progression. Sufjan seems to repeat a lot of lyrical and musical motifs between and across his Å“uvre, and it's very interesting to hold them in dialogue with one another. |
Frankmusik – 3 Little Words Lyrics | 13 years ago |
The narrative voice does allow for some ambiguity as to what the lie is that the subject of the song is telling him- or herself: Are they lying in believing that he could fall in love with the subject, or lying in believing that they are indeed in love with him? These possibilities are also not mutually exclusive; there are many ways in which a person might lie to oneself. Is he resistant to saying the three words because he truly isn't in love with the subject or because he fears that the subject is insincere or fickle? In stating that all he wants is a "kiss or two" would seem to indicate the former. However, it is not inconceivable that a person could: 1) be attracted to another enough to desire a physical relationship with another; 2) feel deeper emotions and romantic attachment to said other; and, 3) not trust the other's perception/intention/self-representation enough to feel safe in acting upon the aforementioned emotions in order to seek a committed relationship whilst still pursuing the physical aspect of a relationship. Will he or she not hear the "I love you" because he refuses to speak it (and moreover, does he resist this action out of integrity and honesty to his own emotions, or is he refusing to speak a truth in an act of self-preservation against a person he sees as untrustworthy?), or will he or she be unable to "hear" it in a sense of listening to his words, understanding and truly valuing his position, and allowing his or her natural defense of self-deception down long enough for another's voice to penetrate this egocentric fantasy? |
Frankmusik – 3 Little Words Lyrics | 13 years ago |
Hate to break it to you, Fanjita, but I've known and personally seen an awful lot of gay guys kiss or make out with women–even a few who screwed a girl out of curiosity, the key distinction oftentimes being that they aren't usually attracted to and don't want a relationship with a woman. I (being a bisexual man) have also danced raunchily with, kissed, made out with, and had my ass unsolicitedly grabbed by lesbians. These things happen; sexuality's a lot more fluid than most people will acknowledge. Gay-guy-talking-to-straight-girl interpretation stands as plausible. |
St. Vincent – Paris Is Burning Lyrics | 14 years ago |
Historically, I'd think this song has more to do with the Franco-Prussian War and the policies of Otto von Bismarck (wretched man–sorry, I'm of Polish descent through my father) than World War II. As noted, Paris was markedly left veritably untouched by WWII, both when the city fell to Nazi Germany in 1940 and when it was finally liberated in August of 1944 by the Allied Forces. However, in the Franco-Prussian War, the French were subjected to a defeat at the hands of the Northern German Federation and Prussians which culminated in the Siege of Paris. Bismarck advocated a bombardment of the city to bring about a quick end to the siege, which was only prevented by the opposition of General Blumenthal due to the massive civilian casualties it would incur. Moreover, the entirety of the war was fomented by Bismarck's notorious foreign policy and diplomatic manÅ“uvring, which would be where the "slip[ing] poison in your ear" verse could find some basis. |
Peaches – Fuck the Pain Away Lyrics | 15 years ago |
Abbreviations are right, but Peaches herself (Merrill Nisker) was a teacher (yes, I know, it calls to mind insane mental images) before she became, well, Peaches. My thoughts are that she's offering advice to "students": If you're going to fuck, at least use contraceptives and continue to educate yourself. "Fuck The Pain Away" as a PSA? Heh. |
Lady GaGa – Beautiful, Dirty, Rich Lyrics | 15 years ago |
Lady GaGa is pretty open about her influences (Bowie, Queen, et cetera), and, if nothing else, her revival of the aesthetic of the over-the-top androgynous glam rock of the seventies should be a huge tip-off that, yeah, she's done some drugs. Most of her songs (this one being a sterling example) make some pretty transparent references to a life of excess with some explicit allusions to drugs (what do you think "shit-wrecked" means, honestly? It can't really be done without, at the very least, alcohol–which, I'll remind you, is indeed a drug). It's not like she's been hiding this fact or lying to her fans, but it seems to me as if you'd prefer her to lie about these things … |
Ani DiFranco – Sorry I Am Lyrics | 15 years ago |
The beauty of this song, I think, is in the juxtaposition between the specificity of the imagery and voice and the sense of emotional broadness; I feel as though everyone who's ever been in love can relate to this song on some level, whether they would place themselves on the end of Ani's voice in the narrative, delivering the apology, or on the anonymous, unrequited addressee of her apology. And I'll reiterate the previously expressed opinion that attempting to reduce Ani to a sexual label or gender stereotype is narrow and misses the point of her art entirely. |
Rent – Finale B Lyrics | 15 years ago |
Well, Liztomaz, in La bohème, the Puccini opera upon which Rent was loosely based, Mimì does die—and the character than Angel is based on, Schaunard, lives. Amazing song, though. Larson went far too soon. |
Björk – Hope Lyrics | 16 years ago |
This song is unbelievably understated in its execution, and yet its intensity of imagery is mind-blowing. In it, Björk discards entirely with this mentality of equivocation: "Is it worse for this person to kill this person, or that person to kill that person? Did he start it, or did she start it?" She forces her audience to address atrocity for what it truly is—a denial and a rejection of our universal and unequivocal humanity. When you deny a person's right to hope for a better future, she seems to intimate, you've left them with no choice but to try and create a world in which such hope can again exist, and you've placed yourself between the individual and their ability to conceive of a life of contentment. Violence of ideology begets physical violence, and over time, violence on all levels becomes entrenched within a culture. The only way to break this cycle is to allow for hope in a better future to take root and flourish. |
Ani DiFranco – Dilate Lyrics | 16 years ago |
What I don't get is why so many people responding to this song take it to be angry. To me, it speaks more to an introspection. The lyrics that, if read straight from a page without Ani's guitar or voice to color them, could seem resentful, are delivered, if anything, indifferently when she actually sings them: "You've left me with nothing, but I've worked with less", exempli gratia. All the times I've seen her perform live, all the recordings I've heard of this song, her tone doesn't convey anger or hatred when she sings this verse. If anything, she seems to be trivializing the fact that the person she's singing to has either literally or figuratively desolated her. This song speaks more to a sense of loneliness to me. It may have a bitter, ironic edge, but the core of the emotion itself seems a barrenness in my opinion. Confer: "Not A Pretty Girl": "I am not an angry girl, but it seems like I've got everyone fooled, Every time I say something they find hard to hear, they chalk it up to my anger, never to their own fear." I don't think Ani would ever identify a single song of hers as coming solely from one, broad, ambiguous emotion. Her narrative voice is usually quite intimate and nuanced. Also, I think this song has less to do with the "man" everyone likes to identify (Ani's bisexual: yes, much of the album Dilate was purportedly inspired by a relationship she had with a man, but you CANNOT whitewash or pigeon-hole an artist like Ani) and more to do with Ani's own internal turmoil: "And I just want to you to live up to the image of you I create, I see you and I'm so unsatisfied, I see you and I dilate." This line speaks more to Ani's awareness of the fact that she's created an ideal of what a romantic partner "should" be. She's recognizing a disconnect of her inner narrative and external reality. I see this song more as her coming to terms with the fact that reality is never going to live up to her expectations; she concludes that she's "… better off alone." Not that she's better off with another "man", or with a woman, or with anyone else, or with someone who can fulfill her romantic ideal, or with the ideal itself: alone. |
Peaches – Fuck the Pain Away Lyrics | 16 years ago |
People who think this song sucks obviously don't get the entire point of Electroclash, which isn't to produce music that is laden with intricate meaning, tightly-wrought lyrics, and elegantly-written music—it's to take the vapid nature of contemporary mainstream music to its logical conclusion. It's the whole studio-produced, bigger-faster-better mentality that arose within the consciousness of music culture (along with the rise of the "music industry" itself) during the late seventies/early eighties, and has dominated popular music since. It's post-modern commentary on music, it's not meant to "sound pretty" or having "meaningful lyrics". It's essentially satire in the form of music. In short, if you don't like Peaches—you're not INTELLIGENT enough to like Peaches. There, I said it. |
Joni Mitchell – The Boho Dance Lyrics | 16 years ago |
I'd have to say that I agree with what Orange has found, although I came to that conclusion intuitively while listening to the song. It took me a while to really internalize what she was saying, but it seemed to be a kind of equivocation playing itself out in her head … she'd associated with the "bohemian" crowd, the artists who go on about doing what they do sheerly for love of the purity of art and disdain the acceptance of their artwork by a larger audience as "selling out"—and perhaps this is what Joni thought some people were saying about her; she'd expanded beyond her range of hippie-folk and thus "betrayed" her fellow artists and first loyal audience, so she must be a "sell-out". Also, she seems to be commenting on the fact that regardless of their posturing, many supposedly-"deep", "intellectual" artists are simply affecting airs—in essence, they are no better than what they claim to despise (superficiality)—"bohemian" or "bourgeois", they're both just masks that a person wears to efficiently navigate their social predicament. Furthermore, reflecting upon it, she seems to have never felt as though she belonged to either group—she's neither one of the "bohemians" nor one of the "bourgeois" patrons, so what does that make her? It seems a very unresolved song, and there's beauty in that ambivalence. She seems to implore the listener to appreciate artists on an intensely individualistic and internal basis rather than on basis of their image and affectations. |
Ani DiFranco – Napoleon Lyrics | 17 years ago |
this song is actually (allegedly) about Suzanne Vega after she got signed to a label. whether or not that's the truth behind the situation is probably to remain a mystery considering i doubt Ani would ever actually confirm it if it were true. |
Imogen Heap – Closing In Lyrics | 17 years ago |
i'm probably letting a personal experience color my interpretation of this song, but . . . to me, it seems like the lyrics are the thoughts of a person who is deeply, obsessively in love with someone else, someone who might not be aware of their infatuation, but at the very least doesn't likely feel the same intensity of emotions. she hasn't seen the person she's in love with in a long time, and is trying to find them so that she can finally make her intentions apparent. and, regardless of how this person feels about her, she means to love them. |
Björk – Who Is It? Lyrics | 18 years ago |
to me, the actual meaning of the lyrics is rather irrelevant. i think it's an amazing song particularly because it never fails to make me inexplicably and exceedingly happy. just listening to "who is it" makes me want to get up and laugh and dance. |
Björk – All Is Full of Love Lyrics | 18 years ago |
To me, this song illustrates the principle in Dao De Jing known as "wu wei" or "empty action", "nonaction". between the extremely simplistic chord progressions and the seemingly straightforward lyrics, "All Is Full Of Love" should be nothing special. But it IS—it is because everyone who listens to it is able to internalize the meaning of the song and see themselves reflected in it. To some, that means that, quite literally, love is everywhere and the world is a beautiful place. To others, it seems, that this is a juxtaposition of incongruities: "If love is everywhere, why aren't we feeling it?" To them, this song is delicately cynical. If that were not enough, the one thing that actually does seem to color this song—the increasing passion in Björk's own voice as the song reaches its crescendo—evokes pure passion itself, but refrains from imposing specific imagery or past experiences of the artist herself upon the mind of the listener. The result: we feel passion, and we are allowed to make it our own. That's the true beauty of "All Is Full Of Love" . . . Björk managed to capture the entire range of human experience through subtle and fragile minimalism. |
Björk – Mouth's Cradle Lyrics | 18 years ago |
Actually (and I know how weird this sounds), if I remember correctly, Björk discussed this song on the making-of-Medúlla DVD (The Inner Part Of A Plant Or Animal Structure) and she said that this song had to do with breast-feeding. |
* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.