| Ben Howard – Oats in the Water Lyrics | 7 years ago |
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References to gold, coke and rust are used as analogies to love and loss. "Midas touch" also refers to love and loss as Midas was able to obtain what is dear (gold for Midas - love for him) at a dear cost (death for Midas - loss of his loved one for him) that wasn't initially obvious. Whereas Midas got all the gold he ever wanted but he died because he couldn't eat it -- This guy got all he wanted in love but when his loved one died he paid with heartbreak. "Rust" here refers to progression towards death -- the impermanence of our lives. Just as rust eats away at steal, so does time and illness eat away at the lives of our loved ones. I think when he says there's a joke in the way we rust, he's referring to bitter irony in loving others whose lives are inevitably transient. While it would typically be fool-hardy to invest so heavily in something that you know will slip away -- that is the nature of love. The references to different paths ("go your way" vs "I'll take the long way 'round') refers to the divergence of our human life with our loved one due to death. "Breath again" refers her beginning a new journey post-mortem. "Hold your gaze" refers to his wish for her having strength and resolve (to gaze forward resolutely) in that journey. "Long way 'round" and "own way down" refer to his own mortal path that will also ultimately lead ("down") to death. He has to carry on in his mortal life "As I should" even though he is suffers from his loss and feels cut off from what was had been so precious to him. References to loss and weather tearing down relate to his grief. Oats in the water represents the loss of promise/dreams that can no longer come to fruition. Now that she's gone, he's tormented by things left unsaid ("things you never asked"). |
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| Ben Howard – Oats in the Water Lyrics | 7 years ago |
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The song uses references to gold, coke and rust as analogies to love and loss. "Midas touch" refers to being able to turn things to gold - which in this case is an analogy to having what you hold most dear - for this guy is his loving relationship with a woman. Coke would taint gold-- here it means blight or loss of what is precious -- For him this is a reference to the loss of his loved one to death. "Joke in the way we rust" refers to the ironic correlation between the strength of love for someone with the inevitable devastation wrought by death. "Go your way" vs "long way round" refers to his thoughts on her post-death journey vs him continuing in this life without her. "Go your way" and "Breath again" both suggest his wishes for her spiritual journey after death. "Hold your gaze" seems to be something akin to wishing her to stay steady and strong in this journey. References to weather and oats in the water relate to his sense of devastation and loss. Now that she's gone there are things he wish they had talked about that he regrets not talking about ("things you never asked her, how they tear at you.." |
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| Band of Horses – The Funeral Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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what this song means to me: I know that I have so much to offer -- that the life inside of me is so full of hope and promise and beauty -- I means so much for me to understand me but when you look at me, you don't see me at all. You only see my weaknesses-- you see me as hardly golden -- but you don't really know me at all. You know me all wrong. I grieve to think that only in death will you finally understand me, but by then, it will be too late: my life and hopes and spirit will be dead like dead leaves blowing on the wind. Still, to be understood in death is better to be misunderstood in life. But every day, every occasion, I will wait for some brilliant moment when you will really be able to see my value and understand what I'm about. |
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