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Nightwish – Dark Chest Of Wonders Lyrics 17 years ago
Translations are always a problem. The big blue I think is generally a reference to the sea, but it could be the sky. Zeus features in the legend.

The imagery in symphonic metal picked for the songs is always going to be derivative, of fantasy, and of each other, and of the native surroundings of each band.

Nightwish has the strange "christianity transplant" which shows up in a lot of medieval european culture where christianity has been superimposed on the native culture by conquest, inquisition and missionaries.

The imagery here I can't be sure that this has that in it, except maybe the last line. I can see the God=Zeus parallel, the whole origin of our modern concept of god is very twisted (Latin Deus actually is Zeus)

Where fantasy legends come from is harder to pin down even than religious ones. The Greek legend of Anesidora's Urn is usually cited as the origin of Pandora's Box, but really, no one knows for sure, it could be just another permutation of an older legend.

Anyway, Pandora's box is the one picked here for the song. I agree with the Peter Pan image, but then again, consider the etymology of the name Peter Pan. Speaking of christian-fantasy hybrids. (Not in a Narnia way.)

And I don't think that Nightwish is subtly trying to sell us on Jesus through fantasy, but just a hand down of the collective past to the present. Like their language.

Where these images come from to me is not as important as what they are saying. Poet and the Pendulum, for instance, is not a song about Edgar Allan Poe.

Overall, I love the imagery. I love the music also. I'd like to hear it in the original Suomi. I just have a handful of tracks untranslated.

:)

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Nightwish – 7 Days to the Wolves Lyrics 17 years ago
I'm never sure if explained the poetry loses something, but the best riddles are the ones with an absolute meaning, and layered meanings withing, Not those which are simply all things to all people.

I can't ignore the whole Taiga angle. There's an element of Kitee to Nightwish that rest of us in these remote winterlands feel. Wolves are a big part of that. I think that "liking wolves" or not isn't the issue. If you spend time with wolves, you get it.

I think that the new set up in Dark Passion Play is maybe even a step up. I still think that they should re-draft Tarja for recordings, I think that would be a great contrast to Annette as well, and they would work well together, all personal issues aside.

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Nightwish – Bare Grace Misery Lyrics 18 years ago
Sure, there are a lot of christian refs in nightwish songs. vistigil christianity in a weird neo-heathen ultra-reactionary future vision.

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Nightwish – Dead Boy's Poem (feat. Sam Hardwick) Lyrics 18 years ago
I'm listening to it right now. I'm certain it's"Hasten to drown into beautiful lies"

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Nightwish – 10th Man Down (feat. Tapio Wilska) Lyrics 18 years ago
I had to laugh when I read this:
"But the video is awful, it's Japanese animation with a load of robots flying around with huge rocket launchers."

Um, these are fan videos, made by fans. There are very few nightwish videos out there, they all show the members of the band.

Anyway, I appreciate some externalism from nightwish.

Okay. My two cents: War(s)

First, WWII. Finland was an Axis defender like Iran. The band has clearly picked no bones about defending this position.

This only helps deliver their perspective on war:

"Today I killed, he was just a boy Eight before him, I knew them all In the fields a dying oath: I´d kill them all to save my own"

That's a defender's position on war. If you read or watch anime, you find this sort of position all the time in Japan, another Axis defender. The strongest proponent of this position in pop culture today is probably Hayao Miyazaki.

Once you have that perspective (If you don't, go watch Naussica, Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle, or anything else) Moving on. This is probably a comment on the current war:

"Deliver me from this war It´s not for me it´s because of you"

Okay, this is a war of someone else's making:

"I alone, the great white hunter"

Is a reference to british imperialism. This could be a reference to any of the recurring british imperialist conflicts that are ongoing at the moment. The Britain-US-Israel alliance has taken these up as "the great white hunter" and the obvious choice is Iraq, which probably inspired the song, but equally applies to the east african "ethiopian" wars, or Iran... etc.

I agree the 10th man down is the killer who finds he can't kill anymore. Normally, 8-10 is the maximum kill ratio for the best soldier, but the song writer is saying, and so at least hinting at this soldier falls not because of a failing in skill, but in will.

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Nightwish – Lappi (Part 1. Erämaajärvi) Lyrics 18 years ago
Kalevala?

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Nightwish – Dead Boy's Poem (feat. Sam Hardwick) Lyrics 18 years ago
Okay. I'm going out on a limb here, but it's 4:40 am and I actually queued up the song to listen to it to hear what I heard:
Which was not "Hasten to drown into beautyfull eyes"

This line has no meaning in context, and it's not what she says. IMHO. Maybe it's a slurring, but consider that this line makes more sense in context:

Hasten to drown into beautiful lies

Sing what you can't say
Forget what you can play
Hasten to drown into beautiful lies
Walk within my poetry, this dying music
My loveletter to nobody

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Nightwish – The Poet And The Pendulum Lyrics 18 years ago
Agreed. Tarja would be the shoulder to cry on, obviously this is more introspective and I wish he wasn't so suicidal when he gets so introspective. Obviously one person caught the Poe reference. Again 2005, death, nightwish, rebirth. He undoubtedly wrote a lot of these lyrics in the inter-regnum time.
Musically I think it's the best. It's up there with ghost love score. It needs tarja as backup in the verses as I said elsewhere. It has more to say. I think that it would be nice to hear some external content in this epic stuff like Epica's "Divine Conspiracy" etc. Tuomas' fans should understand "sing what you can't say"

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Nightwish – The Islander Lyrics 18 years ago
I tend to lead to the jack sparrow interpretation :)
Yeah, it's the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and the whole PotC thing is just taking the legend and using it as is nightwish.

"This is for long-forgotten Light at the end of the world"

Explanations anyone? esp/ from someone who's read the Rime...

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Nightwish – Eva Lyrics 18 years ago
Ignoring all the Tarja vs Anette nonsense...

This is song is about suicide. I think some of you got close. It's real obvious. There's not a lot of room for play. Eva gets pushed over the edge.

Eva, mocked at school, refuses to go:
6:30 winter morn

Nothing wrong with Eva

A kindest heart which always made
Me ashamed of my own

She probably is lovesick also.

Eva flies away Dreams the world far away

Escapist.

In this cruel children's game
There's no friend to call her name

Friendless, lonely

Eva sails away Dreams the world far away

kills self

The Good in her will be my sunflower field

is now dead

Mocked by man to depths of shame

again, driven over the edge

Little girl with life ahead

like any suicide

For a memory of one kind word
She would stay among the beasts

If she had anything to live for, she wouldn't have killed herself

Time for one more daring dream
Before her escape, edenbeam

Eva, dead, dying, is still fantasizing. Dying dream. See Mullholland Dr. et al.

We kill with her own loving heart

Eva, now dead, died because of a broken heart.

Simple, straightforward, to the point. This song really didn't take any interpretation. Now if people can shut up about which nightwish singer they want to sleep with the cold hard reality is that Tarja missed a concert, and her husband was trying to interfere in band affairs, and is probably responsible for her missing a concert, and a couple of tours. The band replaced her because they have to move on. This doesn't mean that she's a bad person, or a bad singer, it probably means her husband is somewhat manipulative and possibly jealous. If you've seen him you know that he's no looker, and at the rate things are going I think this is going to be a band with millions of fans. There's realistically no way for him to compete, even with all his money, in a future world in which tarja has money of her own and a million guys to choose from.

This Tarja story is really just Yoko Ono in reverse. I have nothing against either of them.

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Nightwish – End Of All Hope Lyrics 18 years ago
I had no idea what this song was about. I concede to the introspective crowd, that makes the most sense. It has a wonderful vampiric image to it. Tuomas loves these iredeemable femme fatale image characters. But, like his christian and faerie tale references, these are metaphors, sure. I wish they would work it out with tarja. I saw Anette in concert and she was amazing, but there are places where tarja as an additional voice on some records would really add something. I think the most amazing song ever is Poet and pendulum, but I'd love to hear tarja as backup in the verse sections (dark passion play et al)

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Nightwish – Dark Chest Of Wonders Lyrics 18 years ago
I'm afraid to comment. I like to call this "the most subversive song ever written." Obviously it's about Pandora's Box, and sure, uses peter pan imagery, faerie tale imagery is all over these lyrics... for a reason. What makes this subversive is the message of the song is actually advocating opening pandora's box, and that in itself is a reference to something else. I could tip it off, but I'm cruel :)

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Nightwish – Bare Grace Misery Lyrics 18 years ago
I actually heard them talk about this song, so a lot of you are very close, no one got it because it's not explicitly there to be gotten. This is an epilogue to "The Little Mermaid" by Hans Christian Andersen. "This dance will hurt like hell" is a reference to the walking on knives experience of being on land. In this tale, she can never go home, and so she lures young lads into he den, everything else is pretty much a fairy tale reference. Spoiled Lucrece is probably a roman reference. Little Match Girl is in caps to show you that it is a direct HCA ref. I love this song. I don't know if it's as catchy as "everything's grand here down in the sand here, under the sea" :)

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