| The New Pornographers – Entering White Cecilia Lyrics | 18 years ago |
| This song strangely, maybe, reminds me of the Virgin Suicides (novel by Eugenides and the film by Sofia Coppola). The youngest daughter and first suicide is the very young and relatively innocent 13 year old Cecilia. Maybe it's just that due to this connotation, anything regarding Cecilia conjures the Virgin Suicides, but this seems exceptionally fitting. | |
| The New Pornographers – The Body Says No Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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It's a travesty that there are no comments on this song! It's my favorite off of Mass Romantic and in my top five overall. I could listen to it over and over and over and over and often do. It's just do damn catchy. And I think it's one of Newman's songs with a little more bite to it than his usual beautiful, yet often nonsensical, lyrics. I think this, like Centre for Holy Wars, is a fairly preceptive and almost precongnitive, take on International Relations. The great thing about it, though, is that it works on a couple different levels as it could also just be a personal relationship. The same themes are resonant in either situation--the breakdown of a relationship based on one party's unilateral decision that they don't need the other. Also, the theme of history repeating itself and an unending cycle of violence seems to be pretty prevalent as well. I think the "she" is the U.S. and the "body" is the UN/other nations. Also: "what could be worse than the wheel of history? Rolling up over the rooms you've prayed in" --the theme that history repeats itself. Also, it evoke the image of a tank rolling around holy sites in the Middle East. "Am I repeating myself to tell you dreaming it's what's left of psychedelia" --i take this as--the hipppie 60s peace movement failed, because we're right back where we started. |
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| Arcade Fire – Intervention Lyrics | 19 years ago |
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To deny that this song has nothing to do with Bush and U.S. foreign policy in general is foolish. However, it is equally irresponsible not to acknowledge the central role that religion plays in adding layers of meaning to the song (and obviously the album). The entire album is essentially a condemnation of the interconnected aspects of "popular," really "modern" culture as we experience it. Religion, media, politics, materialism etc.--they're all mixing to create an insidious society in which we are content and even eager to watch 20 minutes of daily news coverage about the death of Anna Nicole Smith, but the daily news of hundreds of deaths of Iraqis, non-Westerners, or the great majority of humanity unfortuante enough to be born in the Global South/Third World. Essentially, this song, and this album is condemning us for our shallow, and essentially meaningless existence in the virtual reality that we create with our technological savvy, surfeit of green bills, and insaitiable appetites. Meanwhile, an absurd percentage of humanity can't even achieve basic needs, such as not starving to death. We, the US, have/has created and nurtured this parasitic inequality. Moreover, we live in our sheltered reality while this status quo of inequity unneccessarily perpetuates. Look at the TITLE of the song: Intervention. No one has discussed the importance of nomeclature to the intended meaning of this song. Yes, it can readily be applied to the Iraqi clusterfuck in which we are now intrenched. But, it is intended to be a more universal and timeless indictment. What is wrong with Bush was virtually no different than what is wrong now...our leaders are shitty for a reason--we are. This song is an instance on the album that focuses on the interplay of religion and politics. If you think that the two are mutally exclusive, then you are a fool.."Workin’ for the church while my family dies"--Bush's relied on his main constituiency of the "religious right" to get re-elected. Rather than being speciifically about Iraq, this song captures what happens when the U.S. foreign policy intervenes in the Third World and eviscerates hope. These are problems surely not isolated to Iraq, for it is dangerous to not recognize that as well. That and the popular culture-laced denial in which we are trapped. The bottomless lies, bloodletting, the usurpation, the unbridled, the materialsim, and the religiously-infused brand of idealism--America is fundamentally fundamental. P.S. Sorry my thoughts are far too disorganized and quasi-self-righteous right now to formulate a more organized argument. Also, I too lazy to proofread. |
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