| Massive Attack – Group Four Lyrics | 9 years ago |
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A security guard wanders through corridors of his workplace, convinced that he's awake and alert, but flirting with the edges of sleep. He's learned to shut off his mind, to love this silence of thought. He's learned to embrace the feeling of power that comes from holding all the keys, from having the freedom to roam, something that for other people would be a transgression. He remembers a relationship, time wasted. Who could want the complexity of a modern relationship, with its questions and complications, when offered this sensuous imaginary alternative, daydreams and illusions of power? As he wanders, we see him slip further into a sleep-like trance, the thoughts he's convinced himself that he doesn't have voiced by the sensuous whispers of his anima, sensitive, intuitive, breathing life into his daydreams. As she takes over, he finds himself being opened up to the universe, the lure of sleep or of madness drawing him in. And still he awaits it, yearns for the time of the starry sky when he can find his release. |
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| Sufjan Stevens – Arnika Lyrics | 10 years ago |
| I hear such eerie echoes of Elliott Smith's "Little One" when I listen to this song. I can't shake it, and I'm unbelievably grateful that Djoharia follows this to help lift from the darkness. | |
| Sufjan Stevens – John My Beloved Lyrics | 10 years ago |
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Themes: the end of a relationship, digging up the past, the questioning of faith and roles The sense I get from this song is one of mourning over an inability to get over past relationship issues and move on with one's life. The author struggles with finding new ways to imagine how relationships can progress, so he imagines the progress of his relationship through a series of different roles. The author is the beloved apostle John and the partner is Jesus. Then he is the Daedelus to his partner's Icarus. Next, the author is Jesus and the partner is Judas. Then the author is Jesus and the partner is John, the roles that the author finally settles on. An interesting note about this song is the subtle but pervasive sense of the masculine in the partner. All the characters he compares his partner to are male. His tongue is on his partner's chest rather than breast. At the very least, his partner is someone with a rather masculine energy. On to the lyrics. "Are we to speak, first day of the week Stumbling words at the bar Beauty blue eyes, my order of fries Long island kindness and wine" The author meets the Other at a bar on a Monday. The most mundane of circumstances. One thing starts to lead to another (beauty, blue eyes, kindness, inebriation, lust). "Beloved of John, I get it all wrong I read you for some kind of poem Covered in lines, the fossils I find Have they no life of their own?" The author sees the possibility of a new relationship, and in his excitement he imagines this person to be Jesus (the beloved of John) and places them on a pedestal, ascribing poetic virtues to them. He compares this person to his past relationships, and finds that these past relationships cannot compare, they are old and uninspiring. He ignores the lessons that they have to offer (the lines). "So can we pretend sweetly Before the mystery ends? I am a man with a heart that offends With its lonely and greedy demands There’s only a shadow of me in a manner of speaking I'm dead." The author is in love with love, and he knows that this relationship will lead nowhere, but wants to enjoy it while he can. He knows that he is terribly demanding, but he wants so badly for the relationship (any relationship) to work that he practically wills it in to existence as a way of ignoring the overwhelming emptiness at his core. "Such a waste, your beautiful face Stumbling carpet arise Go follow your gem, your white feathered friend Icarus, point to the sun" The author wants their partner (Icarus now) to fly free, but knows the peril of doing so. Having fostered this love, though, he can't take it back; by pretending to be in love, he has molded his lover in a particular way. He has crafted their wings out of wax and set them on a trajectory. He knows it is doomed (such a waste), and also knows that what has been set in motion is now destined to come to pass (Icarus' fall). "If history speaks of two baby teeth I’m painting the hills blue and red They said beware, Lord hear my prayer I’ve wasted my throes on your head" This reference feels ancient, maybe Roman, especially when in the same breath as hills and just after Icarus. Blue and red could be a reference to melancholy and anger. Two baby teeth suggest teething problems, the early issues in a relationship. The hills (a reference to all things timeless) are the ones who are telling him to beware, that his effort in the relationship is a waste. "So can we be friends, sweetly Before the mystery ends? I love you more than the world can contain In its lonely and ramshackle head There’s only a shadow of me in a manner of speaking I'm dead." The mystery here is another reference to faith. More pointedly, to the mystery of love and the faith in it. The author really does love his partner, but knows the relationship is ending. He wants to end it amicably, but has no hope since the world (the whole of his existence) is lonely. "I’m holding my breath My tongue on your chest What can be said of my heart? If history speaks, the kiss on my cheek Where there remains but a mark." The author is afraid to speak this truth, that he knows that the relationship cannot survive based on this lie. He's engaged in lovemaking, but his heart is not in it. He thinks his lover will inevitably betray him, and holds his heart back out of fear. He casts himself in the role of Jesus, and his lover in the role of Judas. "Beloved my John, so I’ll carry on Counting my cards down to one And when I am dead, come visit my bed My fossil is bright in the sun" Here, we see another shift; having decided the relationship is over, the author can see his former partner in a more accurate light. He realizes that his partner has been John all along, worshiping and dutiful. Life has become tedious and depressing, and death something to be embraced. "And when I am dead, come visit my bed" implies a desire to still be in a relationship with the other person but only on the author's terms. "My fossil is bright in the sun" is an absolutely brilliant double-entendre. The author suggests he will still lust after the other even on his deathbed, but that a relationship cannot happen with him in his current state (he has to go through a literal or metaphorical death first). "So can we contend, peacefully Before my history ends? Jesus I need you, be near me, come shield me From fossils that fall on my head" The author wants resolution, and sees no hope in the future. He pleas to Jesus for absolution; he is haunted by guilt for not paying enough attention to the lessons offered by past relationships. "There’s only a shadow of me in a manner of speaking I'm dead" The ending note of the song. The relationship has gutted him. Even if he succeeds in learning from his mistakes and forgives himself, it hardly matters, since without the other person he doesn't even know who he is anymore. On the whole, there's a suicidal feel to this whole song, as if we're looking in on something horribly intimate; either a preemptively protective Dear John letter (subtly suggested by the song title, note that it's John my Beloved and not Beloved my John as per the lyrics) or a suicide note. It's a delicate bauble left in your hand that you don't dare drop, but don't know what to do with it either, so you just have to hold it until the moment has passed. |
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