sort form Submissions:
submissions
Billy Joel – Goodnight Saigon Lyrics 9 years ago
Such a sad song. Sad as an understatement, since I can not find a better word.

"And who was wrong
And who was right
It didn't matter
in the thick of the fight"

This is beautiful. Indeed, it did not matter. It only mattered after the war is won. The "winner" was right.

submissions
John Lennon – Working Class Hero Lyrics 9 years ago
@[Skerratt911:14300]
I couldn't have said it better than you did. Especially the last sentences about the folks on the hill (the clever bankers and politicians) are my favorite. You are right, if people choose to be like that, they have every right to. But we should not be taught (me as an young woman) that is the only way to live.
I think this song is really critical about being an working class hero. But.. I hear some pity and also compassion in John's voice. It's like he fully understands why some become a working class hero; all the pain, influences and pressure that makes it easier to go along with the crowd, like you said.

submissions
Leonard Cohen – The Guests Lyrics 9 years ago
I think this song is about a funeral. An emotional one.

"One by one, the guests arrive
The guests are coming through
The open-hearted many
The broken-hearted few"

In the beginning, when the "guests" arrive, most of them are open-hearted. In the end of the song, the lyric changes into "broken-hearted many". I think broken-hearted of all the pain during the funeral.

"And no one knows where the night is going
And no one knows why the wine is flowing
Oh, love I need you ... oh I need you now"
I need you to tell me what happens next (in the night) and why I'm (or we are) drinking wine.

"And those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep begin
And "welcome, welcome" cries a voice
Let all my guests come in"

I don't think the dancing is the kind of dancing you do at a party. More like slowly moving with the music, in silence and in pain. The voice is from the deceased, he asks the people who come for their last goodbye, to come in. They are his guests.

"And all go stumbling through that house
In lonely secrecy
Saying "do reveal yourself"
Or "why has thou forsaken me?"

The guests come in, slowly and awkward. Secretly, they hope that he will reveal himself. This could mean: rise up from death or an open coffin? Others are asking themselves why he has forsaken them.

"All at once the torches flare
The inner door flies open
One by one they enter there
In every style of passion"

Maybe this is about the cremation itself. The fire, the door where the coffin will go through. Every guest has its style of passion, its own reason for being there and its own way of sadness and grieving.

"And here they take their sweet repast
While house and grounds dissolve
And one by one the guests are cast beyond the garden wall"

Now, everyone is in the next room where they have coffee and a cake (sweet repast). This is while everything falls apart and fades away. There will be more broken-hearted than in the beginning. The casting of guests is a metaphore for condoleances, I think.

Those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep begin
Those who earnestly are lost
Are lost and lost again

There are people who still dance, people who cry and people who are lost. And these will not recover from their loss.

* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.