| The Hold Steady – I Hope This Whole Thing Didn't Frighten You Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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yeah i think the narrator being gideon makes a lot of sense. there's always this sense that gideon was never a full cityscape skin, he just had the tattoos, or at least it was all in the past for him; same here where he's justifying it by saying they were just a crew to go to shows with. what i'm wondering is whether this establishes a link between the skins and the camps down by the banks of the river? except it's a bunker? red herring? i never read the two as especially connected before. mostly i like the awkwardness of the transition from the verses, which are totally standard craig finn half-talking-half-singing riffing on whatever and spitting nonsequiturs, to the choruses which are pretty full-on stadium rock. it's a pretty perfect combination and i'm now realizing the faux-stadium verses on (e.g.) parts of Heaven is Whenever are part of why i don't listen to that album much. |
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| The Hold Steady – Our Whole Lives Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| definitely -- the bit about taking off tavern jackets is in lftr pllr's "viceburgh" as well. | |
| The Low Anthem – Boeing 737 Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| there's this and there's "trains to brazil" by guillemots and both are full of racist bullshit but i think maybe they're all the better for being honest about it. | |
| Bruce Springsteen – Thunder Road Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| "waste yr summer praying in vain for a savior to rise from these streets." i swear craig finn wrote like two whole albums imagining the story behind this line. | |
| The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Come Saturday Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| "this is a song about ejaculation" -- kip berman, last night | |
| The Clash – This Is England Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| holy shit you're right. been wondering that half my life. cheers | |
| Baby Dee – Safe Inside the Day Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| thanks, fixed up as per | |
| Lets Wrestle – I Wish I Was In Husker Du Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| it's totally part chimp, not hot chip. | |
| The Clash – This Is England Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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so what actually is that line - "a (something) to the eye like a flare" - ? it sounds like i sound when i'm singing along to something but don't actually know the words. stunning song, mind. |
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| The Hold Steady – The Weekenders Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| i think this is the come-down to Chips Ahoy. and i think Craig is deliberately fucking with the heads of those of us who try and construct a linear narrative out of THS songs. i thought we dealt with the horses and then moved on to some kind of murder mystery, no? apparently not. i guess this kind of looking back over it post-breakup. i don't get it though. who's "they" in the second line? (i also briefly thought OTB was ODB, as in the late great Ol' Dirty Bastard.) | |
| The Hold Steady – The Sweet Part of the City Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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i'm finding lots of tracks on Heaven is Whenever have the same kind of nostalgia in the lyrics as in Stay Positive. in Multitude of Casualties it was "we spent a few years nodding off in matinees"; in Same Kooks it became "we slept it off in the matinees"; now it's "we used to nod off in the matinees". used to. it's like how "we had some massive nights" is so much worldwearier in Joke About Jamaica than in Massive Nights, although the words are exactly the same. elsewise: "some nights she looked gorgeous" reminds me of First Night; i make this the third THS song to mention the no-doubt great state of Tennessee; "St. Theresa showed up wearing see-through" reminds me of the antecedent of Stevie Nix turning up in a long black shawl; i don't know what it is about the St. Paul to Cheyenne journey but it turned in Yeah Sapphire too; and obviously "we were bored so we started a band" refers back to Positive Jam, though this time in the first-person plural rather than the singular. |
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| The Hold Steady – Our Whole Lives Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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should now be fixed up to match what's in the liner notes. some interesting changes from the live version i originally based this off: "sing sing singing the song we know" becomes "bang bang bang goes the quarter notes"; "kids are ripping in their sugar packets" (?) becomes "the townies taking off their tavern jackets"; "ring ring ring goes the telephone/tell my little lambs that i ain't coming home" sort of appears out of nowhere; and "now they're waving them around to treat some troubled hearts/ the band sounded stiff no one's even listening" sort of vanishes. |
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| Bob Dylan – Brownsville Girl Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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"Way down in Mexico you went out to find a doctor and you never came back." isn't this straight out of the ending of On the Road? i don't know about finding a doctor, but Dean leaves Sal in the hospital and never comes back |
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| The Hold Steady – We Can Get Together Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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soooo... i've never heard of any drug called heaven, but i have heard of Heavenly, who were indeed from Oxford. they released a whole bunch of singles though, so i don't know which one Craig's referring to here. Heaven Hill make whiskey, but i don't know why a girl from there would be talking about Husker Du, who did start in St. Paul MN but never really got particularly huge. songs called "Heaven" and containing the phrase "heaven is the whole of the heart" have been recorded by Face to Face and the Psychedlic Furs, but I don't know who covered who. "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" was by Meat Loaf and Ellen Foley and is also referred to in "Certain Songs". i'd never heard of it before, but Utopia did release a song called "Love is the Answer" in 1977. i'd agree that they were probably right. does anyone know the band whose drummer was the singer's little brother? none are coming to mind right now. finally, the last bit reminds me of a story called "Peter Shelley" by Patrick Marber from the collection "Speaking with the Angel", edited by Nick Hornby. it's about two kids who get together, sit down on the floor and listen to some records (then have sex). |
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| The Hold Steady – We Can Get Together Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| "Husker Du" means "do you remember" in Danish, so this makes sense. | |
| Adam Gnade – We Live Nowhere and Know No One Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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the hold steady also invoke the "born to run"/"born to lose" axis on "barfruit blues": half the crowd is calling out for "born to run" the other half is calling out for "born to lose" baby, we were born to choose we got those last call bar band really really big decision blues we were born to bruise i guess the main difference is that gnade tries to answer the question while craig finn kind of skirts around it. though there's obviously something to be said for recognising that the crowd will always be split 50/50 between the two. |
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| Jamie T – Sticks N' Stones Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| is it weird that the verses remind me of rancid? both the lyrics and vocals. while the chorus is like the jam (jam jam jam). | |
| Adam Gnade – Summer Suite Part 2 Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| also i like "serious and young and brave". sounds like a hold steady lyric or a ryan mcginley photo. | |
| Adam Gnade – Summer Suite Part 2 Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| so i got the title wrong. should be "suite". is there any way to fix it? | |
| Adam Gnade – Hymn California Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| isn't there an episode in 'Generation X' by Douglas Coupland where the main character throws a rock at a car and wakes up feeling guilty? or maybe i'm grasping at straws. i need to read that book again soon. | |
| Adam Gnade – We Live Nowhere and Know No One Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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adam sez: I think I’ve played this song at every show I’ve ever done. It’s an old one, and it’s been recorded about three times. This one’s my favorite, acoustic, me on guitar, Ryne from Ohioan playing harmonica. Right now I’m getting ready for a tour and I’ve been knocking around the songs I want in my set-list. From the get-go I was adamant against playing “We Live Nowhere” again. “Progress,” I told myself, “move forward, new songs, don’t look back.” But as soon as I ran through it I knew it was in there. It’s my theme, I guess, and you can’t ditch out on a theme if it’s still true to you. This song is true to me and I hope it is for you too. http://news.adamgnade.com/post/237175274/we-live-nowhere-and-know-no-one-by-adam-gnade-i |
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| The Hold Steady – Chicago Seemed Tired Last Night Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| my favourite, maybe. | |
| The Gaslight Anthem – Meet Me by the River's Edge Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| "our father's factories marked our cars while Eden burned against the stars." - i don't know what this means but i think i love it. | |
| Double Dagger – Vivre sans temps mort Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| oh this is one of the greatest things i've heard in a long time. fucked up and brilliant. | |
| Adam Gnade – Snake Lore Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| trippy. | |
| Adam Gnade – Robbie & Lauren & the Silver Sunrise Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| adam kind of mumbles a lot, doesn't he? there's lots i couldn't make out here, between that and the creepy backmasked shit. is robbie here the same as rob in "the old lover"? i guess so. then again, it's a common name... | |
| The Hold Steady – 40 Bucks Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| came here to add these and found them already here... i love it, for the record. it reminds of me of "certain songs", which i guess makes sense, but this is just one story, in full detail, rather than a few told kind of vaguely. i love the description of the dad's song - "a sad slow waltz about a pure and simple love" - sounds like "first night", right? | |
| The Hold Steady – Lord, I'm Discouraged Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| the version on 'a positive rage', recorded late 2007, has the penultimate line as "i don't know for sure if she's even alive" - it think it gives a more pessimistic sort of feeling to it. either way the narrator doesn't know what he wants to know, but the possibility that the girl (probably holly) is dead rather than just unobtainable makes it a much sadder story. | |
| Manic Street Preachers – Peeled Apples Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| thanks to the fine folks at the forever delayed forums for working these out. likewise, if anything's wrong, it isn't my fault :) | |
| The Hold Steady – Don't Let Me Explode Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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"now back home in new york lately i've had a couple of friends tell me i talk too much... well, when pressed, they admitted i talked too much about myself. so, what i'd like to do is tell you a story about someone else... so 300 years after christ lived, in a place called micronesia, lived a woman who's now known as saint barbara. back then she was just named barbara. now saint barbara was the daughter of an aristocrat, and there was a weird thing that happened back then, which is a lot different from what happens now, which was that rich people actually fought wars. so he was away fighting a war, and his daughter saint barbara decided to become a christian. and - being a christian was not 300 years after christ what being a christian is now. like, bible study and safe and youth groups and shit. (audience: it was awesome!) i don't know if it was awesome, because i think it was kinda at moments, not so awesome, i think you're gonna find that out. and so, i think - the one thing i keep saying is maybe back then it was maybe sort of, a modern equivalent would be if you got a facial tattoo. (laughs) you're kind of like, setting yourself apart. alright, so saint barbara's dad comes home from the war. and he finds out she's a christian and he gets pissed. and i bet everyone here has had a dad that's been pissed at them. but, saint barbara's dad was way more pissed than your dad. and here's how i know: cause he ordered her to be executed. and whoever's in charge of that kind of thing in micronesia said, "you know, that's cool, but do you think that's harsh enough? maybe saint barbara's dad, you should do the execution" and he was like "yeah, good idea, i didn't think of that one myself." so they were all there in the town square and saint barbara's dad beheaded his own daughter (crowd boos) boo, that's what i say. but the story doesn't end right there, cause he was walking home to, you know, have some sort of party, whatever you do after you execute your own daughter (audience: killer parties!) killer parties, it was a killer party, and uh, the thing is, a bolt of lightning came from the sky, and hit him, and struck him dead. so if you're ever thinking of executing your daughter, don't even. that said, saint barbara's now the patron saint of landmines... or, more specifically, not stepping on a landmine. and this song's called don't let me explode. they said what about los angeles..." - craig finn discussing the story of saint barbara, october 6, 2006, live at the earl, atlanta, GA. i thought it was pretty cool. |
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| Jay Jay Pistolet – Holly Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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i really love this song, one of my favourite things released recently in this genre. can i make a couple of corrections though?: 01. in the second verse, i think the third line is missing an 'it', as in 'while i never once condemned it i did not agree' (probably a typo). i also think in the final line, 'fell' should be 'failed' - 'fell' doesn't make any sense. 02. in the final verse, that last line as you've transcribed it feels awfully anticlimactic, though i can't really imagine what that last word could be. my best guess is a simple 'oh', though that's almost as out of place as 'odd'. aside from that, i think you've got the whole thing about right. i was thinking about adding these lyrics myself a while ago, but never got round to it. to repeat myself, this is a genuinely beautiful song, really one of the best things i've heard in a while. |
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| The Hold Steady – Joke About Jamaica Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| another thought - if we take it that the female protagonist of "both crosses" is sapphire, and we take it that sapphire can, somehow, see the future, then perhaps the reason for her and craig's difference here is that so far, at the time of writing, only one kid's been crucified, but another will be in the near future. and because "both crosses", though about sapphire, is still narrated by craig, if we take it that craig is a fictionalised version of the real-life craig, who interacts with holly, sapphire, etc., rather than having created them, he could've been misled by sapphire as to what had happened and what was going to happen when she told him about the boys that died. i don't know if any of that made any sense. what i'm trying to say is how the discrepancy between craig and sapphire's accounts could come from sapphire (deliberately or otherwise) blurring the line between what has happened and what has yet to happen. | |
| The Hold Steady – Joke About Jamaica Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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interesting to think how "we had some massive nights" is using the exact same tense and exact same words here as in "massive nights" itself, but here it sounds so much more nostalgic, so much more set in the past, whereas in "massive nights" even though the lyric's definitely in the past tense, it doesn't sound like they're going to stop having those massive nights any time soon. i guess that kind of present/past distinction is the main difference between 'boys and girls' and 'stay positive' as a whole. another cool thing i noticed was how the number of kids who got crucified seems to change between "both crosses" and this song. to begin with, "she's been with a couple of boys that died and two of them were crucified" ('she' being sapphire in my opinion, what with the psychic references in "both crosses"), but here "two kids died and one of them was crucified". i'm not quite sure what that means, though if we assume that that "crucified" isn't to be taken literally, more as a metaphor for murder or betrayal, or even execution, then the difference could come from the different characters' (sapphire on "both crosses" and craig on this one) interpretation of events - craig thinks that one kid was responsible for his own death, while sapphire sees it as murder. |
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