| Modest Mouse – Sugar Boats Lyrics | 8 years ago |
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I believe this song is about futility and general bleakness of life. "This rock of ours is just some big mistake, and we will never know..." means that the subject has looked for a big picture and found no real answers and doesn't expect to. "Sugar Boats" seems to refer to the pleasures that keep us going, but as we all know, sugar dissolves in water. "Sugar Boats" refers to how we chase the things that are great, but only for a bit. That may include drugs, as other commenters have said. The "veins" lyric may be a reference to this. The subject seems displeased about circumstances, but isn't motivated to make any real changes. The subject says "I've been meaning to dismiss you... as soon as you paint every last grain of sand; as soon as you paint every last star in the sky." This is a reference to one of God's promises to Abraham in the Old Testament (his descendants would number in vast, immeasurable quantities), but I believe the lyric boils down to the fact that the "dismissal" will never happen as both tasks would take an immeasurably long time. "Swatting at mosquitoes" and "Orbiting the sun" refer to futility and the face that man cannot change course in the grand scheme of things. If you're somewhere there are mosquitoes, swat all you like - more will come. They fly around you for blood despite the threat of death because it's what they do. Similarly, people fly around the Sun on "this rock of ours" chasing those things they're driven to. The following lyrics about the subject's heart are an example of how we can't control our heart's desires and it gets us going chasing things repeatedly. ("Here we go again!") The watch as a void that the subject looks into refers to wasting time and being aware of it, but doing it anyway. The lyrics: "I ain't getting on no fast plane Hell, I ain't getting on no stuffy train Sugar boats on the Atlantic are fine" mean that the subject realizes it's possible to try other things get somewhere, but chooses not to. He or she uses weak justifications to avoid boarding a train or plane to some new destination. The subject would rather board a "sugar boat" that will be a fun trip until it dissolves. |
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