| Seals & Crofts – Summer Breeze Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Haha, you are funny, i'm sure that's exactly what it means. And JamzXIV, jasmine is super-easy to grow and smells just incredible. Wherever you are, get a jasmine plant and smell incredible fragrances every evening, every summer, forever, and think of this song when you do. | |
| Bob Dylan – License to Kill Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| I don't know that Dylan would have had this viewpoint, but to me, the woman is the sane one, the one left behind or victimized by this masculine rush to power, technological and military. She's the classic woman of modern liberal thought: she represents the earth, non-complicit in the destruction but awaiting salvation-- the waiter and watcher and wonderer. | |
| Eddie Vedder – Guaranteed Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| I don't know why people vote down an honest question. I agree with Lewikee, above, 3-1-08. | |
| Eddie Vedder – Guaranteed Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Very good points! I think he knew the possibilities when he went to face the truth of himself in the wilderness. Though i do believe that when the end came he was still a little surprised. As we all will be... much as we know it is coming, we'll still probably mainly be in a state of disbelief... What--Who, me?--Now? Already? Awwww! | |
| Eddie Vedder – Society Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| I think the character is debating with himself, trying to figure something out. He's asking, "If less is more, how you keeping score?" In this stanza he's "trying out" that materialistic/status argument... seeing if it holds water. As the questioner, that is. As if he's a skeptic asking himself (the escapee) how he can "keep score"--and seems to defeat himself in the argument. The fearful part of him telling the adventurous part, "You can't do it." But then he comes back to the main chorus, the main theme--we know his "higher self" (in my opinion) prevails! | |
| Eddie Vedder – Long Nights Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Incredibly powerful song. I cry when i hear it. Not sure if it would have such an impact if i hadn't seen "Into the Wild"--i saw the movie first, so the song will always have the association with Alexander Supertramp (but it might--Eddie's voice, the speed, the eerie chords...). | |
| Jethro Tull – We Used To Know Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| There's a very funny YouTube interview of Ian Anderson where he addresses the question of the Eagles ripping off this song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xny0Uj4--tk | |
| Jethro Tull – Velvet Green Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Uh... maybe it's him!! | |
| Jethro Tull – Look Into The Sun Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Yes, exquisitely lovely! | |
| Jethro Tull – Inside Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Always thought it said, "And inside hid you." Which could work. | |
| Jethro Tull – Inside Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| Your take is right on. I always loved Tull... saw them once in Portland, Maine, in the mid-'70s. This is one of my favorite songs, esp. as a woman hearing him say, "Can you cook, can you sew, well i don't want to know!" He's a real man! | |
| The Who – Behind Blue Eyes Lyrics | 12 years ago |
|
Yes, i thought of that too, about the blue eyes representing the white races. Why not go there for a moment... to where the song (like so many of its time) had radical political overtones. I'm surprised i haven't seen another comment like yours, though i haven't read them all... it's about white guilt! About the entire Western First World having acted in a conscience-free way, now being recognized as sociopathic, and defending ourselves as at least having worthy dreams. So the whole refrain of "No one knows what it's like to be the bad man, to be the sad man, behind blue eyes," means nobody knows of the misery of being in what looks like (from the outside, some Third World perspective) an enviable position--when in fact it's spiritually bankrupt. The bridge of "When my fist clenches crack it open" means stop the wars; it goes on to become a general plea for help in reforming (quit consuming sickening garbage such as all the media garbage--not to mention crappy food! --that we foist on the world) but still, finishes with the selfish "Help me" sentiment of giving us blankets and coats. As if we are the needy ones. But that's what sociopathy does--turns guilt into self-pity. Not saying i believe all this, just that it is a possible reading of the song, thanks to bobsmyuncle for the suggestion. |
|
| Pink Floyd – Another Brick in the Wall, Pt. 2 Lyrics | 12 years ago |
|
I haven't read through every one of the 200-plus comments here, but wondered if anyone had noticed the blatant anti-feminine tone of the song, but more, the movie "The Wall." It's been decades since i saw it, and all i can remember is my disappointment at how the women--teachers, mothers--were made to represent conformity, civilization, tyranny; while the poor little boys just want to play and be wild and crazy, these big mean mommies are trying to make them behave. Of course we all know growing up and living in society is a compromise, and different people are comfortable with different levels of freedom and of responsibility. You can look at having to adjust to rules of social living (don't steal; share your toys; clean up after yourself; don't hit others; be nice to the doggie; make yourself presentable; eat the nutritious stuff before the junk; don't play with your wee-wee in public; etc.) as oppressive to the spirit, but then again, you can see their value in keeping a civil and healthy society. Either way, it happens, whether a government, a mob (the tribe), the family, the church, is doing it: they raise us to behave a certain way, especially in public. To associate the objectionable aspects of being educated, civilized, etc., with the feminine principle is childish and misogynistic. Seriously--i love Pink Floyd's music, but i remember when i saw that movie, thinking, "What a bunch of knuckleheads--grow up and forgive your mummies for raising you. She didn't do so badly, now did she? Oh well nowadays they'll just give the kids some ADHD medication--the mommies, the daddies, and the doctors seem to agree. Now there's a real brick wall--creating little addicted consumers out of normal, energetic, cloistered children! I suppose there's a song about that, or there ought to be. But hopefully the "drug-them-down" force isn't characterized as a woman. |
|
| Townes Van Zandt – Rake Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| There's no real wedding, and he's not settling in to any kind of prison, marital or otherwise, in my mind. It's just a matter of the "chickens coming home to roost," the night binding to the day, the dark side catching up with him, perhaps in the form of a health catastrophe (he's about to die), or perhaps just having a mental breakdown of realizing how he's spent his life. I love this song! Nothing can match those lines, "Now the dark air is like fire on my skin, and even the moonlight is blinding," which i take to mean, now the dark air is like fire on his skin, etc. Just kidding, but really, it seems clear to me: he sees himself like the picture of Dorian Grey, rotten and poisonous, to the point where the touch of innocence or light will make him shrink or dissolve. He is too dark now even for this world. | |
| Townes Van Zandt – St. John The Gambler Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| Such a beautiful, sad song. One of the quintessential Townes ballads. I don't get the last line, though, and think maybe it's "To a funeral drone, a calico, 'neath a cross of twenty years." As in a droning dirge, the sound of mourning. And the calico part just means she is in her dress is below the cross. | |
| John Denver – Leaving On a Jet Plane Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| That's what i always heard. Makes sense. Of course there's a lot of personal drama and history, but basically war is tearing them apart. It's a 1960s peace song. | |
| Peter, Paul and Mary – Leaving on a Jet Plane (John Denver cover) Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| I always understood it to be an anti-war song. The man is leaving for Vietnam. That's why it was so popular as a peacenik folk song in the '60s. | |
| Neil Young – After the Gold Rush Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| What a beautiful song, and a good explanation of what seems obvious to me. | |
| Iron & Wine – Jezebel Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| But do the wolves eat her up in the anime story? | |
| Iron & Wine – Jezebel Lyrics | 13 years ago |
|
I think you're right; it's not a direct retelling of a Bible story, and we don't have to squirm around wondering if we should sympathize with the plight of a woman who ordered the gruesome murders of many (i'd better go check a Bible to refresh my memory of that plotline). The song uses the term from the old story to paint a bigger picture. Historically, the word "Jezebel" meant a loose woman; to the Puritanical WASP mind, that meant some foreign, exotic, lusty, threatening female who made men evil via her irresistible sexual power. This song reminds us that not only might she be a sort of sacrificial lamb for many others' sins, she is also a symbol of a figure to whom people were once united in devotion and service: the Goddess--the beautiful, magnetic, mysterious, life-giving and life-taking sacred feminine principle. That's why the song gives us goosebumps. |
|
| The Doors – When The Music's Over Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| The wrong song is up here. This is something called "When It's Over," by somebody other than The Doors. We're looking for "When the Music's Over" on this page! | |
| Smog – Rock Bottom Riser Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| All good points, but what else i love about these lyrics is that he's diving for a gold ring... a material thing, the symbol of worldly riches; but he rises to the glimmer of pieces of sun, shattered by the water, and raining down. Beauty, ephemeral and more real than any tangible gold. | |
| Smog – Running the Loping Lyrics | 14 years ago |
|
This is (one of) my favorite song(s) on this album. I take it as a reminder that the great things in life might be in your private life, with your lover (about every other day)... and never having to wonder "did that rapper rape her"... what great wordplay. Throw out the garbage! |
|
* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.