| Pansy Division – Negative Queen Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| "He thinks he's Oscar Wilde, but he's Paul Lynde" - Best. Opening. Line. Ever. | |
| Pansy Division – cocksucking faggot Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| It took me an embarassingly long time to find out that this was a rewrite of "Colored Spade" from the musical "Hair." All that time I was referencing "President of the United States of Love," I was making a reference to a musical I'd never even seen. I still like this version better. Partly because that dinner sounds so freaking delicious. | |
| Pansy Division – Sweet Insecurity Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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@terrible: You're joking, right? Do you even know who Pansy Division are? How did you even find out about this song? In case you need a clear-cut explanation for why your interpretation is unbelievably, hilariously wrong, look up the lyrics to "C.S.F." First off, this song is definitely NOT from the perspective of a girl. I think it's about a guy who's really shy and insecure, and he's been crushing on this boy from afar, wishing they could be together. And then a miracle happens - somehow, despite himself, he's actually managed to snag his dream boy! But now he's so nervous he doesn't know what to do next. He's afraid if he does anything, he'll mess it all up. But by the end of the song, he's trying to stop freaking out and take it one step at a time: "Hold you close/Close to my chest/Later on/We'll work out the rest." Despite being a straight girl, I can totally relate to this song. This is by far my favorite PD song; I'm too much of a pansy for most of Pansy Division's hard-rocking punk numbers, but this one (like most of "Absurd Pop Song Romance") is nice and poppy. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Baby Seat Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| My interpretation is actually completely opposite from Kwazy's. I think this song is, if anything, an attack on youthful idealism. The "40 days at sea..." part seems to be saying that this woman dreamed of wandering around like Jack Kerouac, but now that she's actually gotten herself lost, she's thinking she was kind of dumb. And if she survives the experience she once thought of as so romantic, she's going to become more of a grown-up and stop daydreaming about "leaving it all behind." | |
| Barenaked Ladies – Every Subway Car Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| The last refrain of the chorus, he doesn't sing "spray paint on my glove." He sings something else - I'm not quite sure what. It kind of sounds like "melted on my glove" or even "belted on my glove." Does anyone know what the correct line is? | |
| Barenaked Ladies – You Run Away Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| I think he was being sarcastic. It's definitely about Steven Page. Page himself admitted it by bitterly paraphrasing a few of the lyrics in a tweet. ("He did his best, but it wasn't enough.") | |
| Ben Kweller – Believer Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| In my opinion, this is the best song Ben's ever written. | |
| OK Go – The House Wins Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Am I the only one who heard "You don't have to have loved to be lost" rather than "You don't have to have lost to be lost"? I heard it as a clever play on the old saying, "'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all." | |
| Ben Kweller – Things I Like to Do Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| This is my favorite song off the new album right now. It's so cute and simple! It also kind of reminds me of "Beautiful World" by Colin Hay (another very good song). | |
| Ben Kweller – Homeward Bound Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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No, it's not a cover. It's from his new album, "Changing Horses." The song, I think, is about a teen runaway. He's from Colorado and now he's sleeping in some train station, somewhere. It's such a sad, beautiful song. |
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| Ben Folds – Dr. Yang (Album Version) Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I'm pretty sure it's "I need false teeth, I need plastic knees." That's what it sounds like to me, anyway. In any case, yeah, this song is definitely making fun of New Age quackery. Segues nicely into "The Frown Song," with the gossipy rich woman struggling to get to shiatsu. |
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| Weezer – Troublemaker Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Tearlock, you hit the nail on the head! And he continues that theme of making fun of rock stars' self-importance with the very next song, "The Greatest Man that Ever Lived." Seriously, people, the irony is not that subtle. Sure is funny, though. Especially the way he sings, "Who needs stupid books?" and "Don't let me play football." I think he's purposely trying to sound like a dumbass. I particularly love the use of worn-out Hollywood cliches in the chorus - "Doing things my own way and never giving up." For some reason, I always picture this song sung by Napoleon Dynamite. While simultaneously doing that dance. |
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| The Decemberists – July, July! Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| This song reminds me of R.E.M. for some reason. It just sounds like an R.E.M. song. | |
| The Decemberists – The Soldiering Life Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I'm kind of surprised to see so many people denying that this song is in any way gay or homoerotic. I actually read an interview with Colin Meloy where he gave a list of unusual things he wrote about in his songs, and one thing on that list was "homosexual doughboys in World War I trenches." If this isn't the song he was referring to, then what was it? | |
| The Decemberists – Leslie Ann Levine Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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The connection to "We Both Go Down Together" doesn't make much sense to me. If anything, this song reminds me of "The Bachelor and the Bride" - "There's a wrinkle in the water/Where we laid our first daughter..." Anyway, in my opinion, the absolute saddest part of this song is the part about the chimneysweep. So many children died exactly like that. Industrial Britain was an ungodly horrible time and place to live. |
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| Eisley – I Could Be There for You Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| My first association with sulfur is that, in the Judeo-Christian tradition, it's closely associated with demons. Demons supposedly smell like sulfur. So when I first heard this song, given the first few lines and the vaguely threatening sound of the music, I thought the sulfur reference was meant to indicate that the subject of this song is a bad or wicked person. But the rest of the song kind of contradicts that - I get the feeling that she's not bad, just depressed and withdrawn - so I'm not entirely sure what the sulfur reference is about. | |
| Eisley – Come Clean Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| t0rnX, I have a hard time imagining anyone in Eisley even *having* sex, much less referencing it so explicitly in a song. Get your head out of the gutter! | |
| Barenaked Ladies – In The Car Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| No, she didn't die. She just turned to her new husband and said, "I think that's me." :-P | |
| Guster – Barrel Of A Gun Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| Er... I thought it was kind of like "Straw Hat and Old Dirty Hank" by Barenaked Ladies. I thought it was about an obsessive fan who tries to assassinate the celebrity he's in love with. A song about masturbation just seems so juvenile. Seriously, this is Guster, not Green Day. | |
| Harvey Danger – Humility On Parade Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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This seems to be a communist or socialist's ideal vision of The Revolution. "A river red with rebel blood to sweep us off our feet" - guerrilla armies revolt against the government and manage to restore equality. "The remnants of the leisure class will crumble! Smug bastards will be humbled!" It starts out with the problem that needs to be fixed through an uprising. "This road leads to Rome, that road leads to ruin," and "the general's been screwing us around" (does this song take place in a military dictatorship?) so I'm guessing they're headed for ruin, and on top of that, "the land's no longer arable." "The welcome was overstayed" - I'm thinking in terms of ecology because of the line about farming earlier in the song, but given the rest of the lyrical context, it could also be that the upper class overstayed their welcome in terms of the lower class putting up with them. "I am the mustard on the wedding dress, the weevil in the watercress." That line is bursting with class warfare; anyone who's gotten married knows that wedding dresses are insanely expensive, though the mention of the wedding dress could also just represent the WASPish pomp and circumstance that the revolutionary wants to dispose of. ("Forcible miscegenation! No bow ties, Bo invitations! ") And, of course, watercress. Who eats watercress but rich people? "Beyond the false horizon lies the rising up." It may look bad now ("Here comes the inquisition!") but just you wait: The Revolution is coming. Hard to say if Sean is making fun of hipster radicals or if he actually believes this stuff, but whether the song is sarcastic or genuine, it's definitely about class warfare - actual, literal class warfare, like with guns and everything. |
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| Harvey Danger – Why I'm Lonely Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I know this song isn't political, but these two lines... "And with the right revolting piety of tone, the word 'freedom' can make you want to lock yourself in a deep dark dungeon." ...remind me of the Bush administration and the War on Terror. Especially after the political commentary in the first two songs on the album ("I had a lovely brunch with Jesus Christ..." "Family and Christian/Untenable position/Here comes the inquisition" etc. etc.) Vote Obama in '08! ;-) |
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| Ben Folds – There's Always Someone Cooler Than You Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| This whole song vividly reminds me of high school. Because of that, I interpret the line, "Now that I've got the disease" and the verse that comes after it as being about unpopularity. When all the cool kids already hate you for reasons you don't even understand, it really is like you have some kind of disease. No one wants to be around you. But that's actually kind of a blessing, because if you cared about what they thought, you'd have to spend all your time shopping for just the right expensive clothes and going to boring parties where everyone's wasted out of their minds and talking crap about other people. It's hard work, being popular, and more often than not, you just end up getting stabbed in the back. (Anyone read "Queen Bees and Wannabes"?) So when they hate you, it's actually kind of a blessing because it frees you to be yourself and wear whatever you want to wear (even acid-washed pants!). | |
| Ben Folds – Bitches Ain't Shit (Dr. Dre cover) Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I listened to him in his iTunes Originals thing talking about how, when he was a kid, he'd go to an electronics store and use their keyboards to perform these beautiful songs with outrageously vulgar lyrics and wait to see how people reacted. As soon as I heard that, I instantly thought of this song. I guess some things never change! Just out of curiosity, does anyone know if Dr. Dre knows about his cover, and what he thinks of it? |
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| They Might Be Giants – The Bells Are Ringing Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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Malkavian, I see no reason why the song wouldn't be about Nazi Germany. The Holocaust wasn't the only element of Nazi rule, or even the most important, especially in the party's initial rise to power. Actually, their big obsession was organization and discipline, and the line "They were disorganized and that was what was wrong" perfectly describes the Nazi attitude towards past German rule. "The girl with cotton in her ears" could be anyone who dissented - Sophie Scholl of the infamous White Rose, for example. That said, I don't think the song is specifically about Nazi Germany. It's vague enough to fit anything from a fascist dictatorship to religion to trend-worshiping. For me, the Christmas-y tone predisposes it towards being about consumerism, specifically advertisements. Everyone being told to buy, buy, buy and obeying without question. Although to be perfectly honest, I remember listening to this song the Christmas after 9/11 and thinking, "This is eerily appropriate." |
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| Ben Folds – Dog Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I like this song; it's cute, offbeat, strangely catchy... I agree with colum1225's interpretation: he was scared for a long time to grow old and settle down and live a quiet life, but as he said in the song, he got older anyway. And now he realizes that he shouldn't have been afraid, and that a quiet, boring, traditional life wouldn't be so bad if he were living it with her. BTW, what's a cumquat? |
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| Ben Folds Five – Uncle Walter Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| ...but he's NOT!!!!!! | |
| Barenaked Ladies – Maybe Katie Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| Her youth is fading, she's got a daughter, and she's still in high school? Who is she, Jerri Blank? | |
| Ben Folds – The Ascent Of Stan Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| So... the part where Ben sings, "And I watched it all go down..." does that remind anyone else of the song "Take it Outside" by Barenaked Ladies? Specifically, the first line? They're almost identical! Makes me wonder if Ed Robertson was listening to "Rockin' the Suburbs" when he and the other Ladies were writing "Everything for Everyone"... | |
| Ben Folds – Prison Food Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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There are two ways to interpret the line "We talked and never spoke a word" - one is that they were engaging in shallow chit-chat; the other is that they knew each other so well that they could communicate without actually talking. I prefer the second interpretation, but the rest of the lyrics seem to suggest the first. "She wonders who will be the first to go" - I immediately interpreted that line as being about death. She's wondering which of them will die first. She's feeling depressed, thinking about death; he's trying to distract her and cheer her up even though he's just as depressed as she is. You know, this song seems to be about a theme Ben briefly touched upon in "Brick" - how you can be with someone and still ultimately be alone. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Maybe Not Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| Oh, the lines "And then forever I'll be good as gold... If I may" should be "And then forever I'll be good as gold... lamé." | |
| Barenaked Ladies – Bank Job Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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"Maybe the phone part is reffering to the one call that people have a right to after they are arrested." That's what I immediately thought of. I don't think it's a metaphor for a relationship. BNL has proved to us over many, many years that they're far too creative a band to make every song about romantic relationships (however subtle). And the US foreign policy thing really is a stretch. It's a hilarious song about a bank robbery gone awry. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Great Provider Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I think I liked this song better when I didn't know that the line, "Who's the Holy Ghost" was a question - I thought it was "I'm your son, who's the Holy Ghost." Like, he's a ghost to his father, he's practically not even there. But the song's still beautiful, and woefully underappreciated. I think the song is about the son going off to college. Naturally, as a teenager, he probably distanced himself from his parents (including his dad) as much as possible, and now that he's beginning to mature enough to think about what he may have been missing, it's time to move away and become an adult. |
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| Harvey Danger – Pike St./Park Slope Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I don't know about the rest of you, but for me, the meaning of this song was hard for me to pin down. I'm still not sure I've got it, but here's my interpretation anyway: The song is an argument (or meltdown) between two people, a man and a woman. The man is the bohemian, "alternative" artsy type (as evidenced by the fact that he keeps suggesting that the woman run away with him to "start a little repertory moviehouse or something"). She is sort of his sugar momma, for lack of a better term: she's in a better position economically, so she finances his creative endeavors, but she's getting pissed that they never go anywhere and fed up with his mooching. As the song wears on, she becomes more and more angry with him. (In the first chorus, she warily offers him the money. In the second chorus, she suggests he find greener pastures in LA. Finally, she accuses him of blaming her for his lack of success). This is the final straw, as evidenced by the meltdown halfway through the song. ("Well when you like something, it’s an opinion / But when i like something, it’s a manifesto...") I get the feeling that he lives on Pike Street, or in the general vicinity, whereas she lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Placing this at the end of each chorus advances the plot (he keeps crossing the Manhattan Bridge, going from his place to hers to ask for money) and could also be interpreted as suggestive of their differing economic situations: he's down-and-out at the edge of Chinatown, whereas she's living well in Park Slope (probably in a gorgeous brownstone). The East River is not the only thing separating them. The song begins from her perspective. She's already getting tired of him making excuses and blaming others for why he hasn't found success in New York City. She suggests he "drive across the country" (a shadow of her later suggestion to go to LA), then sarcastically points out that "no one's keeping you captive in the town that let you down (so sorry)." He defends himself: "Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not greedy... Like everybody else, i wanna pay my dues..." Then follows up this insistence on his lack of greed with... a request for money. She's suspicious, but gives him the dough. (I'd like to take this opportunity to mention how much I love Harvey Danger for the "sorry, but I think you might be just projecting" pun. He's projecting the blame onto her like movies are projected onto a screen. Get it?) "A community of dabblers who are vain and fond of biting backs ('we hate it when our friends become successful') And a different school whose energies are spent evading income tax... And silicone enhancements by the breastful." I'm not sure what this verse is referring to. It might be him blaming his lack of success on the New York art scene. (They're all so catty, you see, they'll stab him in the back as soon as he starts to threaten their fame. And that's why the money she gives him never amounts to anything.) Again, he asks for money. She suggests going to LA. This is where things get ugly. I've always assumed that one of them says this line: "Well when you like something, it’s an opinion / But when i like something, it’s a manifesto." And the other says this line: "Pomposity is when you always think you’re right / Arrogance is when you know." Not sure which one says which, but either way, it's evidence of their relationship completely breaking down. Also, the second line ("Pomposity is when you always think you're right / Arrogance is when you know") is just pure genius. He asks for money again; she refuses even to be nice and suggest alternatives. The relationship is over. |
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| Ben Folds Five – Where's Summer B.? Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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This song is mad catchy. My favorite part is how in the first chorus, he's like, "There goes Joe Caparo with Darren's girlfriend, ho hum..." And then it takes him the entire rest of the song to figure out, "Hey, wait a minute... THAT'S DARREN'S GIRLFRIEND!!!" What I don't get is... if Summer B. is Darren's girlfriend, how is she asking Ben where she's been? And if he saw her walking around with Joe Caparo, he knows where she is: with Joe Caparo. Or is this Darren's NEW girlfriend (in which case, why would she want to know where his ex was)? I'm probably reading way too much into this... |
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| Ben Folds Five – Underground Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| I love the way the guy says, "Hand me my nosering!" Like he's talking to his harem of concubines while they're hand-feeding him grapes. Anybody know who that guy is, at the beginning? Is that just Ben talking in a funny voice? | |
| The Refreshments – European Swallow Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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Half the humor of this song is just the delivery, especially in the way he says "girlfriend," like iluvmybass pointed out. I can't even listen to it without cracking up. "Well, it doesn't change much, I still don't think that much of your GIRLFRIEND..." I especially love how the chorus starts out with a standard love song line ("I'd do anything for you") and then follows it up with, "It's just gonna take a little more money." The title appears to be a reference to blowjobs and Monty Python. (A running gag in Holy Grail is the comparative strength of African vs. European swallows. And, of course, since the woman's a hooker and will do anything for money, that brings up the question of "spit or swallow.") |
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| They Might Be Giants – Kiss Me, Son Of God Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| I like to imagine that this song is about Paul. But then again, I really don't like Paul. | |
| The Goo Goo Dolls – Without You Here Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| This song makes me sigh girlishly and go weak at the knees. | |
| Barenaked Ladies – Go Home Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| They totally said "fuck." Listen to it closely - it doesn't sound like anything else, except possibly "puck." And I know they're Canadian, but no one's THAT obsessed with hockey that they'd randomly insert the word "puck" into an exclamation. | |
| The Goo Goo Dolls – We'll Be Here (When You're Gone) Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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Okay, so maybe this song is definitely and definitively about Buffalo, but I'm going to post my interpretation anyway. :-P The first time I heard it, it immediately reminded me of Native Americans. And through the fence I see a ghost Of a place that used to breathe You know it choked away the sun But we still had food to eat This used to be our land, land that used to live, land that used to give us life... And now everyone is gone To a place that won't be home Can they keep their family strong? Will they make it on their own? ...but now we've been pushed far away from it, to a reservation. Can we keep our culture and families together, even though we've been forced from our home? And we'll be standing when you're gone And we'll be heard again We missed our chance but not for long I know somehow we will hold on we'll be here When you're gone When your unsustainable civilization finally collapses, we'll still be here to rebuild what you couldn't completely destroy, if we can only hold on until then. The following verses also fit this theme, but they're a little obvious, so I don't want to waste space by reprinting them here. Just scroll up and re-read the whole song with this interpretation in mind, and you'll see what I mean. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Told You So Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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I'm going to be the sole dissenter here and say that I think it's about a romantic relationship (possibly a gay relationship) that ended when one person died of AIDS from cheating on the other person (the narrator). Either that or the narrator finally left the relationship ("Now I can't believe / It took so long to leave") while his partner was still alive. I also think it's possible that the narrator contracted AIDS from his partner. From the bridge: A viral infection That can incubate for years Caused by affection Falling deep into arrears No medication to procure Makes me pure There's no cure I am sure This is obviously about AIDS, but check out the wording: "No medication to procure makes me pure." Makes ME pure. Not "makes YOU pure." This implies, to me, that not only does the ex-lover have AIDS, but actually gave the disease to the narrator. That may explain the cruelty of other parts of the song, like why the narrator seems so cold about the other person's death ("Perhaps someday I'll grieve / Or I never will"). The other reason I think the narrator got AIDS from his partner is these two lines: "I never mentioned how I’ve prayed for you / Now I've paid for you." That suggests that the damage done to the narrator is more than just the pain of watching from the sidelines as a friend ruins his/her life. His partner's mistakes destroyed both their lives. As the next two lines go, "I never said that I would wait for you / It's too late for you." But ultimately, he "has to let it go" - his grief over the end of the relationship and his anger at his partner. Whether my interpretation is right or not, it's a very powerful song. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Alternative Girlfriend Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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One of the most clever things about this song is the double meaning: she's his alternative girlfriend, in that she's really into the "alternative" scene. But the second verse reveals that he's already seeing another woman, but he's bored with her and is looking for all the excitement of youth with this other girl. So she is also his alternative girlfriend in that she's an alternative to the girlfriend he already has. Overall, this is a wonderfully spot-on parody of Generation X, circa 1994. |
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| Barenaked Ladies – Alternative Girlfriend Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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One of the most clever things about this song is the double meaning: she's his alternative girlfriend, in that she's really into the "alternative" scene. But the second verse reveals that he's already seeing another woman, but he's bored with her and is looking for all the excitement of youth with this other girl. So she is also his alternative girlfriend in that she's an alternative to the girlfriend he already has. Overall, this is a wonderfully spot-on parody of Generation X, circa 1994. |
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| The Wallflowers – God Don't Make Lonely Girls Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| First of all, I don't think this song is necessarily from Jakob Dylan's perspective. He's written a lot of songs about fictional characters. I think this is a story about a very lonely man falling in love with a stripper. If he really does "get the girl" at the end, then it's kind of a sweet song about a diamond in a rough, managing to love in a sleazy situation, the whole "Pretty Woman"-prostitute-with-a-heart-of-gold thing. But if he doesn't get the girl and he's just dreaming about what he'd do if she went home with him, the song becomes more of a sad story about how lonely he is and how these peep shows prey on his loneliness by dangling an illusion in front of his face. | |
| The Wallflowers – Josephine Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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This was my favorite song on BDTH until I listened more closely to the lyrics. Maybe it's just me, but does anyone else get kind of a creepy pedophile vibe from this song? He keeps emphasizing how young she is, her "schoolgirl style," and talks about how he's watched her walking home from school. (Does she know he's been doing that?) The main question for me is: how old is Josephine, and how old is the narrator? If the narrator is her age and they're both teenagers, then the song becomes sweet and beautiful again. But his offer to drive her into town raises the question of whether or not she can drive herself into town, and the line about making ribbons from a paper bag makes her seem very young. (Do grown women wear ribbons in their hair? No. Do teen girls wear ribbons in their hair? No. Who does? Very little girls.) I hope I didn't just crap all over the song for everyone here, because it really is a gorgeous song and I love it too. I'm just saying, there's something of a disturbing undercurrent in the lyrics... |
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