| Asian Kung-Fu Generation – Blue Train Lyrics | 4 years ago |
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"Blue Train" was a general name for the sleeper trains which used to connect much of Japan, much like in the West romanticized as an adventurous journey in the popular imagination. They lost popularity to faster, newer trains and aviation and were eventually forced into retirement. At the time of this song they were still going, but with a much reduced passenger count (I think averaging 30% of capacity) and most routes having already closed. Picture a senior class trip, or newlyweds on honeymoon, or a small town dreamer moving to the big city. Your travel time measured in days, not minutes or hours. There's time to chat, to play, to think, to live as the world around you constantly changes from the ordinary and familiar and you step out into a brand-new unknown. There's a significance to such a journey, a memory that will remain. And now the trains are infused with the grime of decades of use, worn down and fading into obsolescence. The public is muttering that it should just be done with already but they're still limping along, knowing that just beyond the horizon lurks a true, final "last stop." It's these kinds of themes that caused Fanclub to be regarded as unusually dark for Ajikan. |
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| Asian Kung-Fu Generation – Blue Train Lyrics | 4 years ago |
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EN: (the lyrics here are not written as in the original format but I will follow them anyhow) A "white" (pure) voice tearing through the dark, the words you spit out A heart which stabs my chest with icy thoughts The final stop for this endless "blue" (innocence) A "now" [reality] like waking from a dream <-this is 現在 "genzai" [actual state] but sang as "ima", now I just plugged up the wound but the feelings overflow You say things like "real," such easy things to say The final stop for we who have no dreams A "now" like waking from a dream Here, the sunset runs openly Like trundling over a warped rail How far?, you ask Until this all finally runs out in the end I want to go on, I want to go on Out there, so far away Got no reason, just anxious to keep going The sunset runs openly Like trundling over a warped rail Melancholy lurks in every day Until this all finally runs out in the end I want to live, I want to live |
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| The Mountain Goats – Pigs That Ran Straightaway into the Water, Triumph of Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| As the last song of an album centered around drug addiction, it's the inevitable final descent for a life that's been swirling around the toilet bowl for 12 songs. Some of his companions are still circling the drain, others are already gone; one way or the other, but here he is on the edge, about to be sucked through. A madcap swan song, with the protagonist still unable to believe or trust in salvation and optimistic that he will be saved from it. | |
| fun. – Some Nights Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| A "swan song" is a surprisingly ancient term meaning a final great work, somewhat similar to magnum opus. The term comes from old stories that a swan would sing a beautiful song just before death. There are a lot of ways to interpret this; that every song he hears sounds like his last, that things are downhill from here, or even that songs that should be beautiful (like a swan's appearance) are not (sound like an actual swan). There are a lot of ways you can look at it besides that as well. | |
| fun. – Some Nights Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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For myself, I feel like it's about how a person's opinions/ideals are conflicted and change daily. It's an anthem for the kids who grew up during the 2 wars and their internal conflict in a world tainted by the war on terrorism. A person who wants to have strong convictions but is still unsure of himself (wonder just who I am, what do I stand for?), dealing with ten years of the war going on in the background and now unsure of his patriotism now that he is at enlistment age (not wanting to be trapped in a deployment or dying for a cause he might not believe in). At the same time the lyrics go from shallow; anti-establishment stereotypes, "jack my style," sex, believing he has no friends, to stronger opinions, the way the war is background noise for non-military people, his conflict over sadness for his sister being used vs his amazement at the life created from it; in the end he realizes that his opinions are not him and are not wisdom; that even if he expresses them it doesn't mean other people will change. As someone in the army, the verse that seem to reflect the current war really express what it feels like. You tend to judge soldiers who haven't deployed harshly, especially if they've been in long enough that they should have at some point, even when they might not have had any control over it; but at the same time, there is a lot of feeling no one can understand what you're going through leading up to a deployment (especially if you're going back to the same country again) and a lot of emotional/mental damage that you might never recover from. It's hard to find a meaning in the deaths in these countries now, that your battle buddies died for something that had nothing to do with them. The "this is not for the folks at home" line twists the "fight them over there" catchphrase, saying that we're sending our children out of sight to face the horrors of war so we don't have to have any contact with it here in the states. |
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| The Mountain Goats – Thank You Mario but Our Princess Is in Another Castle Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| If you think about it from the point of view of Toad; you're a hostage in a bare room, surrounded and oppressed by terrible sights and sounds, left to bemusedly contemplate whether you will be saved or killed. Your captors wander in and out and you never know if this will be the end or not every time. Suddenly you are rescued and the claustrophobic sensation you felt would go on forever evaporates in an instant, and you find yourself joking, " ... but our princess is in another castle." | |
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