| R.E.M. – Harborcoat Lyrics | 6 years ago |
|
"They crowded up to Lenin with their noses worn off" As soon as Lenin and the Bolsheviks appeared to show the peasants a supposed better way of life (likely through literally speaking into a crowd), they readily accepted it without any suspicion (noses worn off = can't "smell anything fishy") "A handshake is worthy if it's all that you've got" All the peasants have to give is their trust, symbolised by a handshake "Metal shivs on wood push through our back" Not only are the peasants' backs against the wall (no more freedom/can't escape persecution), they're being literally stabbed in the back "There's a splinter in your eye and it reads, "React" It's blindingly and painfully obvious to they peasants that they should react against the oppression and fight back, yet they didn't "They shifted the statues for harboring ghosts Reddened their necks, collared their clothes Then we danced the dance 'til the menace got out" These lines address the peasants' conformity. They hide their secrets (ghosts, which could also mean hidden anti-party views that are now "dead"), redden their necks to appear stupid and boorish and "dance the dance" by playing along with the Party's "game" until they become desensitized and mentally conditioned to accept their opression (the menace goes away) "She gathered the corners and called it her gown Please, find my harborcoat Can't go outside without it" "gathered the corners" could refer to this woman hiding under a bedsheet (linking back to the earlier mention of ghosts- perhaps she is an anti-party revolutionary in hiding?). The "harborcoat" is a worker's jacket that the secret revolutionaries need to blend in with society (along with "reddening their necks") |
|
* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.