| Tom Waits – Pay Me Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Can anyone shed some light on this song? One of my favorite on the new album. I feel like there must be a story behind it I am missing -- Disgraced actress turned prostitute leaves town? Are the gallows real or figurative? "The only way down from the gallows is to swing" -- What a line. Waits/Brennan in peak form. | |
| Tom Waits – Hoist That Rag Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I'm glad the more recent comments on this song recognize that it is a serious stretch to say the song is about American imperialism or the Iraq War. You can't just take the issue of the day, force it on an amazing song like this, and call it an interpretation. If you want to use the themes of the song and relate them to your opinion on current events, go right ahead. Just know your thoughts are not necessarily in the song or lyrics. They are your impressions taken away from the song. stogie wrote, "Great names for shady characters. Piggy Knowles = Karl Rove? It's a name that describes him well." If that is not a stretch, especially in light of tipkin's great information, I don't know what is. For those of you who think this song is "about" something so specific as Iraq, at least check out the names in the song next time. Also, let me fill you in on something: In the VAST majority of Waits' songs, he is either 1) deconstructing and putting his own spin on a classic song form (i.e. ballad, waltz, blues, barcarole, etc.), 2) playing a character, or 3) both (as in this song). There are some artists that you can pin down easily, but Waits is not one of them. If you've ever seen him interviewed, you know what I mean. It's ludicrous to say this song has anything to do with contemporary politics directly, but I could see it having an anti-war theme. The main problem I would have with an anti-war interpretation is that Waits is clearly playing an unnamed gangster/pirate/badass character in this song -- and he's reveling in it. He's enjoying it. Where is the implied criticism of this character's worldview? It's a bleak world, but I don't see any judgments made about it. If anything, I would say Waits' exploration of this gangster-thug's attitude admires his hard-bitten, cynical take on life while recognizing that it is not ideal. The world of "Hoist that Rag" is bleak, but it's a "damn good address for a rat." For this character, there is no other way. This one of the many examples of Waits' exploring the lives of fictional down-and-out and marginal characters and how they would see the world. Oh, yeah, and the songs really about Bush. What else could it be about? :) |
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