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Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven Lyrics 10 years ago
@[mattimal:2685] JRRT was abundantly clear the TLOR was not about WWII or Nuclear weapons. He stated so many many times.

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Creedence Clearwater Revival – Have You Ever Seen the Rain? Lyrics 11 years ago
Always thought it was... "It's been calmin' for sometime" as a play on words for "there's a calm before storm" indicating something has been building...

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Peter Bjorn and John – Big Black Coffin Lyrics 14 years ago
OFFICIAL LYRICS (according to the ones that come with the cd)


It's coming back the things you said to me
I'm hiding away from reality
Dening myself all the better parts
Then you slip back and say "Don't take it hard"
And then I find it hard to sleep at all
Wishing I could give someone else a call
Someone that's closer, closer, close to me
Forgetting someone might’ve come over me

Do you know the bar? The way to the bar?
But it's clear and bright now
From the statements to the lies
From the big black coffin
To the black under your eyes

But if life is complex
Why present a fake?
And when I close my eyes
I still see this face
Looking upon me
Still upon me
Still

No competition over ecstasy
Find ebb and tide when you're confronting me
I will admit all of my weaker parts
But I'll shut up if you don't want my point
My point of view to stand against your own
Perhaps you're better off on your own
But I don't need to be put down this way
I'm going down but you can stay


Do you know the bar?
The way to the bar?
And it's clear and bright now
From the statements to the lies
From the big black coffin
To the black under your eyes

But if life is complex
Why present a fake?
And when I close my eyes
I still see this face
Looking upon me
Still upon me
Still

And it's black because I know it'll never work for me

And it's black because I dont want us to be
Another opportunity
Wasted by by all of these
Loose-ends,
“they don’t know their own best” — friends
And “Let's pretends”…


submissions
Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven Lyrics 16 years ago
Well thought out - creative analysis

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Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven Lyrics 16 years ago
Ahh but so is LOTR, Tolkien deeply catholic, his good friend the Christian apologist C S Lewis

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Peter Gabriel – Washing Of The Water Lyrics 16 years ago
I sung it as a lullaby to all three of my kids, just slow the tempo a bit

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Peter Gabriel – Family Snapshot Lyrics 16 years ago
Actually George Wallace

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Peter Gabriel – In Your Eyes Lyrics 16 years ago
Not perfect love, Perfect Devotion. The singer has fallen hopelessly in love with the one he sings about.

Generally this crashes and burns, the one devoted to can't stand it, feels undeserving...

OR

They feel deserving, almost always proving their not.

BUT

I would like to think somewhere the perfect devotion met the deserving soul...

The Devotion was deserved, the Love returned in acceptance of the love.

I envy that love.

Beren and Luthien

Arwen and Aaragorn

Romeo and Juliet

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Peter Gabriel – In Your Eyes Lyrics 16 years ago
SO RIGHT!!! Probably American radio chopped these out...

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Peter Gabriel – In Your Eyes Lyrics 16 years ago
Nice...

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Peter Gabriel – Digging In The Dirt Lyrics 16 years ago
Nice Vice! I like it...

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Peter Gabriel – Come Talk To Me Lyrics 16 years ago
First Off, I love people who come to a site like this, find an artist they DON'T Like and then go to that part and say everyone who doesn't like such and such an artist is an idiot. The opinion of the parasite in the dog crap on my old sneakers is a thousand times more important than theirs.

This song is a fav of mine as just about all PG, but his daughter, I would be shocked... so much sexual imagery in the song, it sure seems like lovers...

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Peter Gabriel – Solsbury Hill Lyrics 16 years ago
I recently had a horrifying experience, a teenage child who attempted suicide. One of the most frustrating consequences that you might not think unless you go through it, is “Learning the ropes of the system” incompetent people, well intentioned people that overwhelmed, people who enjoy a little bit of power. You see I couldn’t “spring” my child from them for a week and the emotional ride was a roller coaster.
I had always pictured a boy in an orphanage finding that his Dad, long thought lost, had come back and was getting him out of the orphanage, now I thought of my child imprisoned, figuring out how you were “supposed” to act. Example: she exhibited crying behavior — Are you kidding me? What should you think being locked up with Lunatics?

Climbing up on Solsbury Hill
I could see the city light

Wind was blowing, time stood still
Eagle flew out of the night
(Cold January in a very urban area, my child waving from their window as we pulled away after visiting hours)

He was something to observe
Came in close I heard a voice

Standing stretching every nerve
I had to listen had no choice

I did not believe the information
Just had to trust imagination
My heart going boom-boom-boom
Son, he said, grab your things I've come to take you home
Eh, don't quit
(the conflicting information as to WHAT ARE YOUR RIGHTS?? The limbo of a teenager, and the downright mis- information and incompetence)

To keep in silence I resigned
My friends would think I was a nut
(Shut up, you don’t need to broadcast this incident, no you cannot Text!)

Turning water into wine
Open doors would soon be shut
(If you shout out to everyone what you have done, they will treat you differently, think before you BROADCAST)

So I went from day to day
Oh, my life was in a rut

(Stay cool stay cool fit in, fit in, Don’t go crazy having lost all your rights and freedom in one day with no due process, hang in there kid)

'Til I thought of what I'd say
Which connection I should cut
(Careful how you answer, some real assholes running this place)

I was feeling part of the scenery
I'd walk right out of the machinery
My heart going boom-boom-boom
Hey, he said, grab your things I've come to take you home
Eh, back home
(Fit in, don’t exhibit crying behavior)

When illusion spin her net
I'm never where I want to be
(They kept the carrot on the stick; maybe tomorrow you can get out maybe not)

And liberty, she'd pirhouette
When I think that I am free
(ha ha, not today!)

Watched by empty silhouettes
Who close their eyes but still can see
(kids so medicated, orderlies so dumb, they seemed inhuman)

No one taught them etiquette
I will show another me
(Fake it til you make it)

Today I don't need a replacement
I'll tell them what the smile on my face meant
My heart going boom-boom-boom
Hey, I said, you can keep my things They've come to take me home
(See you later A**holes!)

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Peter Gabriel – Solsbury Hill Lyrics 16 years ago
Interesting, but i think not... water into wine is too literal and he either did or believed he did 9depending on your point of view) I just don't think it would be so thinly veiled - Just an opinion...

submissions
Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven Lyrics 16 years ago
Oops sorry, no intro,

I believe Stairway to heaven is filled with Lord of the Rings references as are other Zepplin songs. I believe the song is, at its heart, the Choice of Arwen to give up her mortality for Aragorn. Accepting the Gift of men.

submissions
Led Zeppelin – Stairway to Heaven Lyrics 16 years ago
"Stairway To Heaven" in bold

There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold

{Arwen has pledged her the very nature of her existance to Aragorn. In binding herself to him she gives up the grace of the Eldar — staying within the Circles of Middle Earth when she dies or becomes weary of Middle Earth. However she accepts the “gift of men” (see “stairway to heaven” below)

Poem associated with Aragorn:

All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.

The poem appears twice in the The Lord of the Rings' first book, The Fellowship of the Ring. Firstly, it appears in chapter ten "Strider" in Gandalf's letter to the hobbits in Bree, before they know that Strider (Aragorn) is the subject of the verse. It is repeated by Bilbo at the Council of Elrond. He whispers to Frodo that he wrote it many years before, when Aragorn first revealed who he was)
===
And she's buying the stairway to heaven.

(Arwen}

(The Gift of Men in Middle-earth refers to a gift of Ilúvatar to his Younger Children, which remains a source of some confusion for Tolkien enthusiasts. The concept includes both mortality and free will. Below are two interpretations of the nature and extent of the Gift of Men as articulated by Tolkien.

The Gift of Men was an act of the supreme being Ilúvatar that set the race of Men apart from the Elves. While the race of Elves would know the most bliss and contentment and would conceive more beauty than any others of the Children of Ilúvatar, it was decreed by this gift that Men would be the prime instruments of Ilúvatar within Arda.

Ilúvatar willed that the spirits/hearts of Men are not content within Arda, and find no rest therein, and therefore seek beyond the world and its confines. They are not bound to the Circles of the World, as the Elves and all other creatures of Arda are bound to the Earth. The spirits of Men truly leave the physical world, and do not return. Thus their fates are completely sundered from that of the Elves, who do not die until the world dies, unless slain by violence or ill chance, or by wearying at the last of the passage of centuries [1]. But as the years grow long and Time wears, even the Valar will come to envy the gift of Ilúvatar to the race of Men, that of liberation from the physical world, and the inevitability of loss and sorrows that must come with this existence within Arda.

Moreover, it is also a consequence of this true spiritual freedom of not being bound to either the ordinance of Fate, or the confines of the World that the spirits of Men do not dwell long in Arda, and after what seems to be a very short time to the immortal Elves, men age, grow weary, and die.

However, a key aspect of this gift of living within Arda for a short time was a virtue instilled into the race of Men to be motivated to create destinies for themselves amidst the powers and chances of the world. Men were able to shape their lives beyond the Music of the Ainur, which rules the fates of all other things in Arda. Men may choose to live in tune with the themes of the Music that created Arda, or be indifferent to it, or live in defiance of it.}
===

When she gets there she knows, if the stores are all closed
With a word she can get what she came for.
Ooh, ooh, and she's buying the stairway to heaven.

There's a sign on the wall but she wants to be sure
'Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings.

{The “Gift” of men

As Aragorn lies on his deathbed, having chosen that it was his time to go; “ …and to me has been given not only a life span three times that of Men of Middle-Earth, but the grce to go at my will, and give back the gift. Now, therefore, I will sleep.

To which Arwen says

“For if indeed, it is as the Eldar say, the gift of the One to Men, it is bitter to receive.}
===

In a tree by the brook, there's a songbird who sings,

{Beren met Lúthien, the only daughter of King Thingol and Melian the Maia, who was dancing and singing by a brook. Luthien is the forebeare of all the Numenoreans as well as all of Elronds people}





Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiven.
Ooh, it makes me wonder,
Ooh, it makes me wonder.

{?}


There's a feeling I get when I look to the west,
And my spirit is crying for leaving.

(The west is where the undying lands are. Faramir looks to the West before eating, Saruman's Spirit looks to the West and is blown into nothingness:

To the dismay of those that stood by, about the body of Saruman a grey mist gathered, and rising slowly to a great height like smoke from a fire, as a pale shrouded figure it loomed over the Hill. For a moment it wavered, looking to the West; but out of the West came a cold wind, and it bent away, and with a sigh dissolved into nothing.}

In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke through the trees,
And the voices of those who stand looking.

{When Gandalf first meets Bilbo he is blowing smoke rings:

We first meet Bilbo, who is enjoying blowing small smoke rings, when he encounters Gandalf the wizard. The two converse and Gandalf, unbeknownst to Bilbo, marks his door with a sign that states he’s interested in a job as a burglar or “treasure seeker.”
Later, Bilbo learns Gandalf can blow magic smoke rings}

Ooh, it makes me wonder,
Ooh, it really makes me wonder.

And it's whispered that soon if we all call the tune
Then the piper will lead us to reason.
And a new day will dawn for those who stand long
And the forests will echo with laughter.

{Tom Bombadil is essentially a pied piper, he lives in the one forest and uses his music to defeat evil trees and Barrow wights:

An enigmatic individual who had a close kinship with nature. It is not known exactly who or what Tom Bombadil was. Some say he was a spirit of nature or an embodiment of Nature itself; others say he was a Maia or even a Vala. Tom himself said, "Don't you know my name yet? That's the only answer. Tell me, who are you, alone, yourself and nameless?" (FotR, 142) Goldberry called Tom "the Master of wood, water, and hill." (FotR, 135) J.R.R. Tolkien said Tom was intentionally an enigma. (Letters, #144) But whatever Tom's precise identity, he was clearly a unique presence in Middle-earth, and one over whom the Ring had no power.
Tom was an ancient being. He seems to have been in Middle-earth from the beginning.
"Eldest, that's what I am... Tom was here before the river and the trees; Tom remembers the first raindrop and the first acorn. He made paths before the Big People, and saw the little People arriving. He was here before the Kings and the graves and the Barrow-wights. When the Elves passed westward, Tom was here already, before the seas were bent. He knew the dark under the stars when it was fearless - before the Dark Lord came from Outside."
The Fellowship of the Ring: "In the House of Tom Bombadil," p. 142
In appearance, Tom was like a Man though somewhat shorter. He wore a blue coat and big yellow boots and a battered hat with a blue feather. He had a long brown beard, bright blue eyes, and a red face creased with laughter. Tom was a merry old fellow and he enjoyed laughing and singing. }

If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now,
It's just a spring clean for the May queen.

{Sam Gamgee is "trimming the virge" when he learns about the true nature of the ring"

When Gandalf came to Bag End in April of 3018, Sam was trimming the grass under the window (or so he claimed) and overheard the Wizard telling Frodo that Bilbo's magic ring was the One Ring lost by the Dark Lord Sauron long ago. Sam could not help but cry out in dismay when he learned that Frodo would have to leave the Shire. Gandalf discovered him and decreed that Sam should accompany Frodo when he went.}
====
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on.

{Bilbo Often speaks of the road, and there are three different versions of his song:
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say. }
===
And it makes me wonder.

Your head is humming and it won't go, in case you don't know,
The piper's calling you to join him,
Dear lady, can you hear the wind blow, and did you know
Your stairway lies on the whispering wind.

{Arwen doubts her choice?}




And as we wind on down the road
Our shadows taller than our soul.
There walks a lady we all know
Who shines white light and wants to show
How everything still turns to gold.

{Galadriel and the magic mirror?:

Galadriel, the Lady of the Golden Wood of Lothlorien, was the most powerful Elf in Middle-earth in the Third Age. She had been one of the leaders of the Noldor who left the Undying Lands in defiance of the Valar, and she was the last of them to remain in Middle-earth. Galadriel rejected the chance to take the One Ring and claim power for herself, and at last she was able to return into the West.}


And if you listen very hard
The tune will come to you at last.
When all are one and one is all
To be a rock and not to roll.

Arwen’s final, bitter realization
{Arwen and Aragorn lived happily together for 120 years. They had a son, Eldarion, as well as daughters. In the year 15 of the Fourth Age, the King and Queen travelled to the North-kingdom. Arwen bound the Elendilmir on Aragorn's brow when he assumed full kingship of Arnor. They dwelled for a time by Lake Evendim and they went to the Brandywine Bridge to meet with Sam Gamgee, Merry Brandybuck, and Pippin Took. Arwen made Sam's daughter Elanor her maid of honor.
Aragorn died in the year 120 of the Fourth Age. Arwen was deeply grieved and at last she understood the bitterness of mortality. Arwen said farewell to her children and went to Lothlorien where she died the next winter. Her grave was on Cerin Amroth where she and Aragorn had become betrothed.

And she's buying the stairway to heaven

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