| Massive Attack – Teardrop Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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Whoever said "fearless on my breath" makes no sense while "feathers on my breath" does is being a pure idiot. I am not trying to be rude. Just observe. "Love, love is a VERB, love is a doing WORD, fearless on my BREATH." As in, she's saying the word love without fear. Words on breath is a common idiom, for Pete's sake. "I love you" --- 'love' is the verb in that sentence. Cripes, people. Feathers? Really? Does anyone have a reliable source for that? My copy of Mezzanine does not have a lyrics booklet (which sucks; how long did it take me to cop on to the fact that it's 'all these half-floors' in the title track. A mezzanine IS a half-floor. Duh. That was my moment of pure idiocy). Also, if ONE MORE PERSON comes in here to say 'LOL! this is the theme to HOUSE!' . . . . seriously, people. We know. |
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| Tori Amos – Carbon Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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There are many different threads in this song, but ultimately I believe it is about bipolar disorder, as suggest by Tori herself (see below). Metaphors of chemistry, the different states and processes of carbon as an element, run throughout the verses, alongside imagery of winter and language of mental destabilization. All the wintery allusions throughout, from the names of the ski hills which sound so evocatively non-sequiter (bear claw, free fall, a gunner's view), through to what I assume is a reference to a skate (blade to ice), and the chorus which implies a person is at risk of being lost in a storm. After all, we are here to 'race the downhill' --- ski down a mountain and descend into madness. In "blade to ice," "ice" can also be slang for a diamond, which leads back to carbon: "it's double diamond time." Diamonds are pure carbon and the hardest most impenetrable material known, which makes "you must go in again," an extremely daunting task, when read as a challenge to once more enter Carbon's mind. It is a challenge to enter the impenetrable as it is on the verge of a system collapse. After all, Carbon-made was originally found "at the end of a chain" --- a phrase that suggests being both 'at the end of your rope' (limits of one's sanity) and also being like a pure diamond hanging on a necklace, beautiful but trapped and unchanging. "Little sis you must crack this" also appears to be both a challenge to figure the situation out and a reference to the process of cracking, a chemical process by which carbon-carbon bonds are broken. "Double diamond time" also brings back the alpine language --- when ranking the difficulty of ski hills, double-diamond are the most treacherous, difficult, and unpredictable. "It's double diamond time" also means a deadly challenge even as it suggests two carbon-made beings locked into a dangerous dyad (a carbon-to-carbon bond that must be broken, if 'you must crack this' is taken literally). I think "shred in ribbons of lithium / blow by blow / her mind cut in sheets / layers deep now unravelling" is evocative too, knowing that lithium is both a psychological medication for bipolar disorder and is also one of the most reactive elements in existence. Pure lithium bursts into flame upon contact with air or water. The lithium people take as psychological meds is actually a lithium salt; one common form is actually lithium carbonate. |
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