| Modest Mouse – 3rd Planet Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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There are definitely multiple themes running throughout this song. What struck me, though, were the sexual references. A third had just been made and we were swimming in the water Didn't know then, was it a son, was it a daughter? When it occurred to me that the animals are swimming Around in the water in the oceans in our bodies And another had been found, another ocean on the planet Given that our blood is just like the Atlantic" When Issac says a third had just been made, he is alluding to a girl in the song who has just becoming pregnant. The little animals swimming around are semen. They don't know whether it's a boy or girl because she has just been inseminated. Perhaps when he says that another ocean and planet had been found, the planet is supposed to represent a female ovum, which is spherical in shape. |
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| Thom Yorke – The Clock Lyrics | 18 years ago |
| I believe that the strongest songs/poems allow for multiple interpretations. Many songs/poems seek to present the listener with a definition or explanation. These definitions are closed doors; things once open and inviting but which the poet closed when exiting the room. However, there are a few songs/poems which open doors for the listener. They create a space in which the listener can go into. Furthermore, if the song/poem is truly powerful, this space replicates the place from which the poet originally conceived the poem. | |
| Menomena – Wet and Rusting Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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"Separated by skin ‘til we let ourselves in" I hear this song saying that humans remain foreign and distant from one another unless they choose to be intimate. However, that choice involves making oneself vulnerable. It requires having faith in the people you are letting in; trusting that they won't judge, hurt or scar you. When the lead singer comments, "it's hard to take risks with a pessimist," he is explaining that it is hard to achieve intimacy with his partner because she/(he, if gay) is too cynical to have complete faith in him. He may also be commenting on the fear he feels when trying to let her in. Knowing that she is a pessimist, he knows that she/he is quick to judge things negatively, including whatever parts of himself that he shows her/(him). |
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| Mason Proper – A Chance Encounter Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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I hear the writer of this song using his "chance encounter" to highlight the ways in which we intentionally hold onto dependencies. The girl described in the song has lost her contact lens, an object that allows her to see clearly. The singer's response to this is to pose the question of whether she saw incorrectly in the first place. "See? It doesn't blur that much," is him guiding her to believe that she can see on her own, with what she has. The girl then turns to him and says "oh, please don't leave." The singer explains that she has missed his point and means to say that she has turned him into a new dependency. She is afraid that he will leave because she feels like she is insufficient without help. This song makes me wonder what I would be able to see if I let go of all my habits, dependencies and addictions. As the song helps me to realize, I spend all of my time searching for things to correct what is "wrong with me", to fulfill me, to satisfy me. What would happen if I allowed myself to be sufficient, fine and well? I would have much energy to explore things beyond the small scope of what I know now. |
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| José González – Crosses Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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In the majority of Jose Gonzalez's songs, I hear pain and an underlying frustration. I believe the pain is caused by the things he bore witness to, whether literally or emotionally. To me, the frustration is from his inability to produce a concrete answer to the questions that the inner pain makes him ask. His voice always seems to carry a tone of despair. Disappointed in the world's ability to cause pain and it's inability to produce definite answers, he looks to interpersonal relationships as the only light. When he says "we'll cast some light and you'll be alright for now," I feel as if he is saying "the world may be a place devoid of light and love, but we can make our own. We are only temporary, and human in our capabilities. Still, we can generate our own light, for each other, if only for a while." |
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