| Billy Joel – You're My Home Lyrics | 12 years ago |
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Sometimes being in love is like that. You're near someone and at the strangest moments, you remember how attractive they are to you. Sometimes it's specific and typical visual/sensory appeal, but sometimes it's something else. It's the echo of all the time you've spent together. All the things you've found beneath their skin and behind their eyes. Sometimes all of that is wondering and astounding and glorious and lovely and sometimes, for some reason ... it's *hot.* Media has a tendency to cheapen sex, but we shouldn't forget that ... well for starters cheap sex for it's own sake is fine and healthy if everyone involved consents and goes into it fine and healthy and safe. But we also tend to forget that sex is part of many loving relationships in a way that isn't necessarily cheap but isn't necessarily all pretty and Hollywood clean either. |
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| Billy Joel – You're My Home Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Someone of his writing caliber wrote Captain Jack, Keeping the Faith and Only the Good Die Young, for starters ... so I'm not sure where you're going with that. Only bad writers talk about sex without waxing melodramatic or being sneaky about it? | |
| Billy Joel – You're My Home Lyrics | 12 years ago |
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I guess I don't really see why we should pull our heads out of "the gutter" in order to interpret the lyric. This is the fellow who wrote "Only the Good Die Young," and also "Captain Jack." He's comfortable mentioning sex directly sometimes and he's content to do so implicitly others. Both are fine, as far as I'm concerned. It could be referring to something like a futuristic building in which one experiences instantaneous delights via virtual reality technology be they sexual or gastric or what-have-you. It could also be referring to the line from Coleridge's Kublai Khan in which case it's the same thing, minus the technology and mostly sexual. Personally, I don't mind deviations from the archetype of "classy" romance in my love songs. It's based loosely off of late Romantic fads, which is rather funny both because that was a long time ago and because it would be silly to assume all the flowery language of Byron was never intended to conflate, by way of example, roses with vaginas. Other than that line, it's straight out of a cheesy but heart-felt John Denver song right down to the guitar riff and the vocal affectation (I would be surprised if this isn't an intentional reference because it's so uncannily like Denver's singing voice and musical style). Cheesy is nice sometimes, but I would be quite sad if people's main objection to this song is that it doesn't have *enough* cheesiness and Platonic tint. One of my favorite love songs is The Book of Love by the Magnetic Fields. It's playful, it's sardonic, and it's still beautiful in it's own way. It's not the best example because the only sexual reference is a bit sly, but it's a good song so I have no regrets. :P But if I wanted to list examples of pop and rock songs that talk about sex, even if I just narrowed it down to songs that are supposed to be interpreted as romantic ... I'd be here all week. And that's a good thing. Because most people who write love songs for other people aren't pining at balcony windows. Sex is part of it for a lot of singers in love, why not for our love songs? |
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| Fleet Foxes – Helplessness Blues Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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What struck me as I listened to it was that he felt like he was describing personal struggles, not political or ideological ones. Those certainly apply metaphorically and there are some really cool interpretations of the wording here. But after reading about some of the band's comments while working on the album and how the writer was struggling with his sound and his writing and at times wasn't sure what or how to write ... that sort of cemented it for me. I think this song is about finding a place in the world. The narrator (and my guess, also the artist) doesn't know what he wants to do. He has vague shapes and notions ... but he doesn't believe he's anything special or want to be anything special. He wants to be part of something big, a small piece of a great, good work. But he's not sure, and he feels lost. He's not sure who to listen to, the dreamers or the practical people and he's not even sure what either side's advice would mean were he to follow it. He wants it to be as simple as building that white picket fence and having his house and family somewhere quiet and pretty. But it isn't. So for now, he's lost but hopeful. |
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