| Mr. Bungle – Sweet Charity Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Jimmehboi, that actually makes sense, since the entire album revolves around suicide in one way or another. All the songs on California has some aspect of killing one's self: None of Them Knew, inadvertently killing the mind, Retrovertigo, killing musical dignity for fame, Air-Conditioned, a person's perspective after committing suicide, Ars Morendi means "the art of dieing", Pink Cigarette, obviously suicide, Golem II and the Holy Filament...not really sure, Vanity Fair, becoming a eunuch (suicide of sexuality), and Goodbye Sober Day, seeing as another person committing suicide through drugs (maybe?). Although, to say that California is only about suicide is wayyyy oversimplifying the album. This album is way too complex. |
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| Mr. Bungle – Sweet Charity Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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This is one of my favorite songs and I got two interpretations of this song. Ah, the beauty of avant garde. Firstly, it seems like this is from the perspective of a person who doesn't understand the current fascination of technology and media. Instead, the narrator enjoys the natural things in life, like the Grand Canyon, sunsets, etc. The lyrics blend all of these conflicting ideologies together in such a way to symbolize the ambiguity of the narrator's identity. This ambiguity essentially makes the narrator go insane, not knowing what should be experienced in one's life because the mass media has skewed and distorted his perception of what it is to live and have a meaningful life. The whole song is an allegory of the Apocalypse as well, symbolizing the narrator's strive to leave on a sweet charity this hellish place filled with technologically obsessed people and enter a place, an insane asylum, full of people who are consumed with their own minds rather than others. This is a brutal, yet deserved attack on our current culture for no longer thinking for ourselves. The narrator would rather be with people completely consumed with their own thoughts than stay in a world where people are completely consumed with other people's thoughts. Thus, the asylum is his heaven away from technology's apocalypse/destruction of free thought. My second interpretation is that the lyrics essentially depict the Apocalypse happening and blending that with what our perception of God is now, which is Technicolor, photographs, and alcohol, but basically just man made self-indulgences. Symbolically it states that the majority of people worship mass media as the sole shaper of ideologies more than god himself. I know Bungle never has religious propaganda, but what this song is saying is that people, even the most religiously devout, have had their perception of god and godliness changed due to man made inventions. This is the reason the narrator seems to be talking to god, but is really talking to a being that has a Technicolor heartbeat, drinks alcohol, gives perfect gifts of postcards and photographs, and has sunset eyes. This personification of god being a fragmentation of man made and natural characteristics again shows how much our current culture worships new technologies as the savior from all of our troubles and hardships of everyday life. The duality of god described in the lyrics, and the duality of the song structure for that matter, reinforces this idea. Technology has taken (or is currently taking) the place of god in many people's minds. I think the asylum bit at the end is a direct message from Mr.Bungle stating how insane our culture has become and that technology will not solve everything. You must be crazy to think that technology will solve the solitude of a lonely heart! As Kurt Vonnegut writes: 'Goodbye Blue Monday!'. |
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